Happily Ever Madder: Misadventures of a Mad Fat Girl (13 page)

23

S
aturday morning, I take Buster Loo for an extralong walk at Pelican Trails to make up for not walking him the day before. The weather is nice and warm, so after I get back home, I decide to spend a few hours at the beach.

I’m sitting on my beach towel, spraying myself down with sunscreen, when I notice I’m the only female in sight sporting the prototypical skirted swimsuit favored by chubby girls. I don’t know if some kind of sorority of skinny girls has invaded the area or if the gym was closed and all the hot-bodied ladies took to the beach, but there are tanned and toned bikini-clad chicks as far the eye can see in either direction.

I tell myself not to worry about it. I mean, I wasn’t worried about it last night when I scarfed down that bacon cheeseburger and tater tots smothered in chili and cheese, so there’s no sense in worrying about it now.

I call Tia to see what she’s doing, and she’s working, so I call Jalena. She tells me all about a new guy she went out with last night and I listen with great interest as she rambles on about him. She’s at the Tanger Outlets mall in Foley and apologizes for not inviting me to join her.

“I thought you would be hanging out with your man-honey today, and I didn’t want to impose,” she says.

“The man-honey has been working a lot lately,” I tell her.

She asks me if I’ve been to the outlet mall yet, and when I tell her that I haven’t, she gets excited and starts telling me all about the “big girl” shops they have there.

“You can actually find something to wear that doesn’t look like it was made for a circus clown,” she says with great enthusiasm. “And the best part is that you won’t have to rob a liquor store to buy an outfit!”

“What a novel concept,” I say wryly. “Cool clothes for fat girls at affordable prices. I’m tempted not to believe you.”

“Girl, I know, but I swear on my stack of low-fat cookbooks that I’m tellin’ you the truth,” Jalena says, laughing. “You’ve got to come shopping with me sometime.”

“I would love that,” I say, thinking again how great it is to have a fellow fatty for a friend.

We talk for a few more minutes; then I tell her to have a good day shopping and she tells me to have a good day at the beach. I push the button to end that call and then dial up Lilly Lane and talk to her for an hour.

She tells me there’s a rumor going around about two teachers at the middle school having an extramarital affair, so we gossip about that for a while. I tell her I wish I was there so we could do some undercover investigating, and she laughs and says she thought the same thing when she heard about it.

“You need to come home,” she says. “I know we were just down there a few weeks ago, but we didn’t have time to really visit.”

“I know,” I say. “I’m ready.”

She asks how things are going with the gallery, and I tell her I sold one painting to Kevin Jacobs, the guy I called her raving about the first day I was open for business. She has a good, hearty laugh about that. We talk about Chloe and the house she’s looking at, and how happy we are for her that she’s finally getting her life all ironed out. She asks about wedding plans and I tell her I’m working on it but a long way from having it done. We have another “wish you were here” conversation, and I hang up the phone feeling worse instead of better.

I look out at the ocean, ignoring all the swimsuit supermodels, and hope this homesick thing is just a phase. I tell myself again that it was not a mistake to move down here.

“So what if I’m a miserable failure and have sold only one painting in a month,” I say out loud because the sound of the waves drowns out everything. “I came down here and I tried. That’s more than most people get to do.”

I pack up and head home, wondering how in the world anyone could feel worse after a few hours on the beach. Before going up the steps to our neighborhood, I turn to look at the ocean, hoping it hasn’t stopped working its magic on my soul.

Saturday night, Mason comes home and I don’t know if it’s because we start drinking or because he’s gearing up for a big legal battle, but he takes it upon himself to share what seems like each and every individual detail about the lawsuit. I never thought I would have absolutely zero interest in listening to Mason McKenzie, but as it turns out, I was wrong. The more he talks, the more I drink, and I wish we could go back to when he didn’t want to talk about work.

I think for a second about giving him a thirty-minute lecture on the pros and cons of the eight main brushes I use for acrylic paint just to get him off the subject, but I don’t because that wouldn’t be fair to him. It’s not his fault I’m in a bad mood. It’s mine. So I sit patiently and listen, nodding and doing my best to feign interest.

He finally wraps up his lengthy discourse with, “I don’t know why I’m telling you all of this, because I know you have no idea what I’m talking about,” and that just rubs me the wrong way.

“Well, maybe if I was smart like Allison I could better understand your lofty and intellectual conversation,” I say, not even checking the sarcasm in my voice.

“What?” he says. “Why would you say something like that? That’s not what I meant at all.”

“I’m sorry,” I say, reminding myself again that he is not the bad guy here. “That was uncalled for.”

“Is there a problem?” he asks. “Something you want to talk about?”

“I’m just homesick,” I tell him. “And I’m disappointed because I didn’t sell a single painting this week and I really thought I would be doing a lot better at this point. Especially after so many people turned out for the opening.” I sigh and think maybe after that horrendous speech I gave, everyone collectively decided that I was a dipshit unworthy of their patronage no matter how good my artwork was. “I’m never going to make any money if things don’t pick up.” I think about what Sylvie Best said to me and wonder if they went ahead and sabotaged me just for the hell of it.

“Ace,” he says, coming to sit next to me on the love seat. “You have to give it time. Remember when I first opened the office down here? I had to work part-time at the Blue Oyster for almost a year to make ends meet.”

“I didn’t know that,” I tell him.

“Well, I didn’t tell many people, because I wanted everyone back home to think I was a hotshot lawyer making big bucks down in Pelican Cove. As a matter of fact, I think the only person I told was Ethan Allen.” He smiles at me. “But you don’t have to worry about that because you have me to take care of you. It doesn’t matter if you ever make a dime at that gallery; just go in there and do your thing and be happy.”

“I can’t be happy if I’m not making enough money to at least cover the damn utility bill,” I say. “I barely made enough at the auction to cover my set-up cost, and I’ve brought in a whopping one hundred dollars since. I can’t just be a bum.”

“You aren’t being a bum,” he says. “It’s a man’s job to take care of his wife.”

I look at him and say nothing because all I can think about is his mother, who, in my opinion, is a worthless, snobby bitch. She grew up rich and went off to Ole Miss, where she wasted no time finding and marrying Mason’s dad, who, to this very day, caters to her every need. Rachel McKenzie’s entire existence depends on the success and benevolence of her husband, and I cringe at the thought of being like her. I look at Mason and hope against hope that he doesn’t expect me to live off him like that for the rest of my life. Because I won’t do it.

He puts his arms around me and I put my head on his shoulder and Buster Loo barrels in from the sunroom, jumps into my lap, and then wedges his little chiweenie head in between ours.

“Look at us,” Mason says. “Family hug!”

Sunday my mood is somewhat better. Mason decides to rent a catamaran and we spend the day on the water and I forget all about my problems. We pick up dinner on the way home and get in bed just before eight o’clock, both of us exhausted from a full day of salt water and sun.

24

M
onday, Mason is gone before I get up, and I take Buster Loo out for a seaside stroll before getting ready and heading to work. Avery and I didn’t do any rearranging on Friday, and since it didn’t seem to make any difference anyway, I elect to leave everything where it is for now.

I go straight to my office, flip open my wedding notebook, and get to work. I look up the Web site for Beach House Bed and Breakfast and decide to drive out there this afternoon. I piddle around the rest of the morning, making to-do lists and such. I have a few customers but no buyers. Avery comes in at one and she’s all excited about something she wants to paint, so she runs straight upstairs and gets to work.

I go back to my desk and look at the online pictures of Beach House Bed and Breakfast again and get excited because it looks pretty fabulous.

When I leave the gallery at five o’clock, I call to see if Mason could possibly meet me over there, and I’m not surprised and only mildly disappointed when he tells me that he can’t. I call Tia and she doesn’t answer and I call Jalena and she’s working late, so I take off by myself. I really wish Lilly and Chloe could be here, because this is the kind of things a girl is supposed to do with her friends. I turn up the radio and try not to think about how lonely I am.

When I pull up in front of the Beach House Bed and Breakfast, I forget about all of that as I gaze in awe at the Greek Revival–style home surrounded by large oak trees filled with Spanish moss. Behind the house, I see the Gulf of Mexico.

“This is it,” I whisper to myself. “This is the place.”

As I follow the cobbled sidewalk leading to the guest entrance on the left side of the house, I imagine being here in my wedding gown. I glance around the edge of the house at the splendidly landscaped yard, beyond which I see waves lapping onto a narrow strip of snow-white sand. I think about how Lilly reacted the first time she saw Gloria Peacock’s estate.

“Oh, Lilly,” I whisper, knocking on the door, “it’s magical.”

I laugh at the memory and then realize that I miss her so bad I could cry. She should be here with me now. I shouldn’t be doing this alone. I get upset and think about running back to my car and going home, but I know I need to get this done, so I just stand there and tell myself that I can do this because I wear my Big Girl Panties every day.

After the passing of three eternities, I finally hear the click of the lock, and a very elegant-looking lady opens the door and frowns at me.

“Hello,” I say nervously. “I’m Ace Jones and I was wondering if I might have a look around.”

“Do you want to make a reservation?” she asks, without even a hint of a smile.

“I’d like to get married here,” I say and start to get a bad feeling about this.

“It’s five thousand dollars to rent the place for one event, and I require half of that up front to hold the date.” She looks down at my flip-flops. “Are you still interested?”

“Yes, ma’am,” I say, trying to be as polite as possible. “I am.”

She motions for me to come in, but it’s painfully obvious that she would prefer dealing with someone in pressed slacks and a silk blouse. In other words, someone dressed just like her. I tell myself not to let her attitude bother me, but it does.

She shows me around the house, including the honeymoon suite upstairs, which she pointedly explains is not included in the price she quoted earlier. She takes me down a secret set of stairs to the kitchen and then out the door, where even her snidest comments cannot detract from the beauty of the lavishly landscaped backyard.

She leads me back inside to her office, where she sits behind a desk that has no chairs on the opposite side. I ask her if the place is available for December 31, and she reluctantly admits that it is. I ask about the honeymoon suite and, after studying her date book for what seems like six hours, no doubt hoping against hope to find a reservation, she smirks and tells me it’s available as well.

I tell her I’ll take it and she looks about as excited as a woman who just realized that she unleashed a loaded fart in a white dress. After I hand her the check, drawn on Mason’s account, she eyeballs my wide-leg yoga pants and asks me what the dress code will be. I want to tell her that no one will be allowed on the premises unless they’re wearing cut-off jeans, mesh trucker hats, and rubber boots. But I don’t. Because I’m nice.

I politely inform her that I’ll get back with her on the details after I speak with my fiancé. Like she’s entitled to know, she asks who that might be. I want to say Larry the Cable Guy just to see her reaction, but I realize the reference would be lost on this snobby old coot, so I just tell her the truth.

“Oh,” she says, and I can tell I just moved up a few rungs on her ladder of judgment. “The real estate lawyer? Why, what a handsome and charming young man he is.” She pauses and looks at me, and I can read her expression like a book. “That’s who this is for? For you and him?” She doesn’t even try to hide the fact that she’s aghast. “You’re engaged to marry J. Mason McKenzie?”

“Yes, I am,” I say, and instead of jerking that check out of her hand and ripping it to pieces, I decide to leave it where it is and stand my ground. Mason’s money is good enough for her and I’m good enough to get married at her precious little bed-and-breakfast.

“Do tell him that Mrs. Adday sends her”—she looks me up and down—“I guess I should say, kindest regards.”

I decide to clear the air in the nicest way I can at this point.

“Why don’t you just say what’s on your mind?” I say casually, like we’re talking about the weather.

“Whatever do you mean, dear?” Mrs. Adday snaps.

“Say that you can’t believe he’s marrying a girl who wears yoga pants and flip-flops during daylight hours?” I say with all the pleasantness I can muster, which isn’t much. “Because it’s written all over your face.”

Mrs. Adday smiles as she says, “Why, no! I would never want J. Mason to think that! No! How dare you say such a thing?”

“You’ve made it fairly obvious since you opened the door that you’d rather I take my business elsewhere.”

“Absolutely not!” She starts fanning herself with the check. “Why, I never!”

“You never what? Never thought anybody would pick up on your not-so-subtle hints?” I look at her like one might look at a naughty child. “Or did you think no one would ever bring it to your attention that they noticed?”

Mrs. Adday puts the phony kindness on full blast and showers me with compliments and apologies, all of which make me want to vomit right in her face. She wraps up her monologue with what an idiot might think was a heartfelt, “Oh, Miss Jones, I think you will make a lovely bride.” She smiles and folds her hands in front of her, as if to pray, but she is
still
looking at me like I’m a maggot.

I pluck the check out of her hand and give her a good stare down. “I most certainly will be, but not here.”

“What?” she says, looking frazzled. “Give me back that check.”

“I don’t think so,” I say. I rip the check in two and turn to go.

“But I do think the world of J. Mason,” she says in a really pathetic voice as she follows me out of her office.

“His name is Mason,” I say flatly, just before walking out the door. “Jeez.”