Sister of the Bride (9 page)

“The box!” said Gramma, suddenly sitting up on the edge of her chair. “I completely forgot about the box. I got it out of the closet and put it out where I would be sure to remember it, and then I came away without it. I declare, my memory is getting worse every day.” She sank back, worried and disappointed.

“I brought it,” said efficient Aunt Josie. “It's out in the back of the car.”

“Run and get it,” ordered Gramma, for the moment forgetting that her daughter was a grown woman and not a child.

“What box?” asked Rosemary, when Aunt Josie had gone out to the car.

“You'll see,” said Gramma with a smile.

Barbara, who was sure she knew what was in the
box, glanced at her mother and saw that she looked tired and resigned.

In a moment Aunt Josie returned with a large suit box, which she laid on her mother's lap. The family waited while Gramma's gnarled and trembling fingers picked at the knots in the string. Finally she was able to lift the lid and lay it on the floor, and her old hands folded back the tissue paper, brittle with age, and revealed the folds of a wedding veil.

“Why, Gramma!” gasped Rosemary.

“Oh.” Barbara had never seen such lace. It was gossamer, scattered with flowers and bordered with the most delicate scallops. And she had pictured it looking something like an old lace curtain.

“I've saved it over fifty years….” Gramma fumbled for her handkerchief.

Barbara was beginning to see what her mother meant by a wedding's being an occasion for sentiment. Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue…. If Rosemary disapproved of sentiment, how would she react to this?

Gramma wiped the corner of her eye. One of her daughters had not married at all, the other had had a wartime wedding in an army camp, while
Gramma's veil had lain in its tissue paper for over half a century.

Barbara suddenly felt a little sad herself. Poor old Gramma with her memories. It was so sad to see her sitting there with her wedding veil on her lap, not knowing that modern, unsentimental Rosemary was going to disappoint her. Barbara glanced at her mother. The anxious crease between her brows showed the distress in her mind. She did not want to see her mother, who was almost eighty, disappointed, but neither did she want a wedding in keeping with the veil.

“Father gave me a beautiful wedding, even though I was marrying a poor boy,” said Gramma, as her shaky hands lifted the veil, creamy with age, from the box. “Of course that was before he lost his money on mining and streetcar stocks. I had six bridesmaids and two flower girls.” She unfolded the veil, let it fall to the floor, and sat looking at it, her face soft with memory.

I can't bear it, thought Barbara, unable to look at her sister. It was all so sad and sentimental. She blinked back her tears. Poor old Gramma.

She wanted to reassure her grandmother by saying, I'll wear it, Gramma. I'll wear it when my turn comes. As she watched her mother and Aunt Josie
help to spread the veil, her thoughts flew to Bill Cunningham, whom she had not had a chance to mention to Rosemary. If in a month or two they began to go steady and went steady for a year and then got engaged and were engaged for a year, by that time she would be as old as Rosemary was now…. Buster jumped down from her lap and stalked across the room to investigate this strange new thing.

“Barbara, put that cat out.” Mrs. MacLane spoke so crisply that the contrast between her words and the atmosphere of the room was a relief to Barbara, who willingly opened the door and shoved Buster out.

“It is real princess lace,” said Aunt Josie. “You just don't see lace like that anymore.”

Rosemary bent over to examine the veil, holding her hands, with her fingers spread, beneath it, so they appeared to be seen through a creamy mist.

Tell Gramma about the suit, Barbara mentally pleaded with her sister. Tell her and get it over. Don't let her get her hopes up.

“It's beautiful,” said Rosemary softly. “Just beautiful.” Rosemary smiled at her grandmother. “Thank you, Gramma. Thank you for saving it for me.”

Barbara, standing beside her sister, threw her arms around Rosemary and hugged her. She hugged her for her kindness to Gramma, she hugged her for being sentimental, she hugged her because she was so happy. No bride could wear a veil like Gramma's with a suit. And no bride in such a veil could walk down the aisle unattended.

Barbara and Bill were sitting on the front steps of the MacLane house with a plate of butterscotch refrigerator cookies between them. This time Barbara had hidden the cookie canister in her closet, so Gordy could not find it and eat up all the cookies before Bill brought her home from school on his Vespa. Barbara had been telling Bill about Rosemary and Greg and how they planned to continue school after they were married.

“Good cookies,” said Bill, reaching for another.

“Thank you,” answered Barbara. How nice he looked with his shirt open at the throat—tanned, healthy, confident.

“You're a good cook,” said Bill.

Barbara smiled modestly. The cookies had been bought already mixed and chilled at the supermarket. All she had to do was peel off the plastic wrapper, slice them, and bake them. She was taking chemistry, and there was, after all, a limit to the number of cookies she had time to bake, even for Bill Cunningham.

“I think you should kiss me,” said Bill suddenly.

With effort Barbara managed to hide her startled feelings. Was he joking? Or did Bill really want to kiss her? “What for?” Barbara appeared calm, a little detached, as if kissing Bill was an impersonal matter she could consider and either accept or reject on its merits. Actually she was thinking, Kiss Bill? Here? On the front steps in front of the whole neighborhood?

“It's our anniversary,” said Bill, as if he was reminding her.

“How stupid of me to have forgotten,” said Barbara, stalling for time to find out if Bill was only joking. “Which anniversary do you mean?”

“Don't tell me you have forgotten so soon.” Bill shook his head. “It was just two weeks ago today that the sound truck played our song.”

“Of course.
Chattanooga Choochoo,
” cried Barbara, flattered that he had remembered the
exact day. “Our second anniversary! How could I have forgotten?” She glanced hastily up and down the street, and when she saw no one, she closed her eyes, tilted back her head, and leaned across the cookie plate toward Bill. His lips barely brushed hers, and when she opened her eyes he was grinning at her. To her annoyance, she felt color rising to her cheeks. It was embarrassing to be betrayed by her blushes when she had meant to carry off the whole incident with careless gaiety. “Have another cookie,” she said with calculated nonchalance.

“Thanks, I believe I will.”

From inside the house came the sound of the television set, and Barbara wondered uneasily if Gordy had been looking out the front window a moment ago. Well, what if he had? It had been an innocent kiss, scarcely a kiss at all. Still, the knowledge that Gordy might have been watching took some of the pleasure out of the moment. For once she hoped he had been in the kitchen eating beans out of a tin can.

When Bill had eaten the last cookie and had ridden off down the hill on his motor scooter, Barbara took the mail out of the mailbox, noticed with interest that there was a letter on good-quality
paper for her mother from Greg's mother, and stepped into the living room. Gordy was not there. Only Buster sat in front of the television set, his crossed eyes staring fascinated at a cartoon program. “Gordy!” she called out. “Are you planning to watch this program?”

“No,” Gordy called back from his room. “I turned it on for Buster.”

Barbara snapped off the set, and Buster fixed her with his evil eyes. “Oh, you,” she said crossly. She held the envelope from Greg's mother up to the light, but she could not read a word. She tossed it onto a table beside an envelope covered with figures in her mother's writing, which she picked up and examined curiously. It was a rough list of wedding expenses. The total shocked Barbara. She had no idea a wedding cost
this
much. The wedding dress, flowers…all the items that had never occurred to her…the organist's fee, postage for wedding invitations. Beside the list of wedding expenses was another column of figures. Life insurance, car insurance, health insurance, car payments. The total of this column also shocked Barbara. No wonder her mother had hoped Gramma would forget about her wedding veil.

Gordy appeared in the door of his room, his gui
tar in hand. “What did you go and turn that TV off for?” he demanded.

“Wasting TV on a
cat
.” Barbara was scornful.

“Buster likes cartoons,” said Gordy. “Cats get bored the same as people.”

“Then he should be out catching mice or getting in cat fights or something,” said Barbara. “He should do cat things, not people things.”

Gordy struck a jangling chord on his guitar. “I saw you smooching out in front with the Cunning Ham.”

So Gordy had been watching. The thing to do was put him on the defensive as quickly as possible. “
Smooch.
What a quaint old-fashioned word,” she said, displaying an amusement that she did not feel.

“It was quaint old-fashioned smooching.” Gordy was not going to accept the defensive.

“Bill Cunningham and I were not smooching.” Barbara enunciated each syllable clearly and distinctly. “And why don't you mind your own business?”

“Ha,” said Gordy darkly. He disappeared into his room, where he began to sing, “Love, oh love, oh careless love.”

That Gordy. Of all the millions and billions of
thirteen-year-old boys in the world, why did she have to draw Gordy for a brother? And having drawn him, why did he have to be looking out the window at that particular instant? She wondered if he was going to tell her father and what she should say if he did. It would be difficult to explain that Bill's lips had barely brushed hers in what could scarcely be called a kiss. And if she tried to explain, her father was almost certain to say, “Define your terms. What is a kiss?” And then she would have to say, “When somebody touches somebody with his lips.” And he would say, “It sounds to me as if you were kissing Bill Cunningham out on the front steps.”

At this point the telephone rang, and Barbara went into the kitchen to answer it. Rosemary was calling. “Is Mother there?” She sounded as if she was in a hurry.

“Not yet,” said Barbara. “She should be here any minute.”

“Look,” said Rosemary hurriedly. “Tell Mother to call me the minute she comes in. I've got a lot to say, and it's too hard to collect enough change to make a long call from a pay phone.”

“What happened?” Barbara was all eagerness for
the latest development in Rosemary's life, and regretted that Rosemary never had enough change for a long telephone call.

“Greg's mother came over and took us to lunch.” Rosemary sounded breathless, as she always did when she telephoned from school.

“What did she say?” Barbara asked eagerly.

“She was terribly nice and was so happy we had decided to have a real wedding, and she was positively thrilled about Gramma's veil. She said I really should choose silver and china patterns, because so many of their friends who lived in the East would want to know, and they could hardly send handmade pottery. We'd much rather have checks, so we could buy books and records, but you can't tell people that, so maybe she's right.”

“Maybe,” agreed Barbara, worrying about her mother's list of expenses. “Does she still expect us to send out two hundred invitations?”

“No. She said she was writing Mother that she was revising her list and cutting it to the bone,” continued Rosemary. “And she said we really must start planning the wedding. She says a wedding must be organized, or everybody goes to pieces at the last minute and nobody enjoys it. So I think I'd
better talk to Mother about wedding plans. And she—oops! My time is up. Good-bye.” Rosemary hung up with a clatter.

“Good-bye,” said Barbara to the dead telephone. At least Rosemary had agreed that they should start planning. Now, after she and her mother had been trying to get her to settle down and plan the wedding ever since Rosemary had announced that she was going to get married in June. She glanced at the cookie canister that she had forgotten to hide again before she had taken the plate of cookies out to Bill. It was empty. Even Gordy could not have eaten that many cookies at once, so he must be stockpiling them in his room for the future. She was trying to decide whether she should accost Gordy and demand her cookies back or avoid a battle and bake another batch when her mother came through the back door with her usual armload of groceries.

“The pounds of food it takes to keep this family going!” Mrs. MacLane was glad to relieve her arms of the weight of the groceries.

“Mother, there's a letter for you from Greg's mother. Rosemary has had lunch with her, and now she says we have to start planning the wedding right away. She asked me to tell you to phone
her the instant you came in.” Barbara started to unpack one of the bags.

“Oh, she does, does she?” asked Mrs. MacLane dryly. “It's nice to know that her future mother-in-law has such an influence over her.”

Barbara went into the living room for Mrs. Aldredge's letter, which she handed her mother. Mrs. MacLane laid a box of macaroni on the counter, opened the letter, and read it while Barbara watched. When she had finished the letter, Mrs. MacLane glanced at the typewritten list of names and addresses that was enclosed. “Well…” was all she said.

“Well what?” asked Barbara.

“Well, at least she has cut her list in half. That's a help, but there are still our friends to invite, too.” Mrs. MacLane looked worried. “I talked to your Aunt Josie this morning, and she says that even if we get the wedding dress through her store, using her discount, a dress that will go with Gramma's veil would cost over a hundred dollars. And I suppose now we'll have to have a caterer…. I do want Rosemary to have a nice wedding, but I honestly don't see where that much money is coming from.”

“I'll put the groceries away,” offered Barbara.
“You phone Rosemary. I got the impression she was going to hover over the phone until you called, because she's in such a hurry to get on with the wedding plans.”

Mrs. MacLane took a pad of paper and a pencil from the drawer by the telephone before she put through the call to Rosemary. Barbara moved quietly about the kitchen, so she would not miss a word.

“Hello, Rosemary?…Yes. Yes, I received the letter and the list…. Yes, I know, dear. I know you have finals coming up, but if you stop to think, so does everyone in the family, and your father is responsible for the printing of the yearbook. You know what a chore that is at this time of year.” Mrs. MacLane doodled a wedding cake on the pad of paper while Rosemary talked. “Yes, dear, I realize you have to write a paper on Plato, but after all, it is your wedding, and you are the only one who can make some of these decisions.”

Decisions like who is to be the maid of honor, thought Barbara, carefully folding a paper bag that was the right size for carrying a lunch.

“All right,” said Mrs. MacLane. “You are going to wear Gramma's wedding veil. That much we have settled…. I know you'd rather wear a short dress,
dear, but you can't wear a short dress with a long veil. It wouldn't look right. Now how many attendants do you want?”

Barbara held her breath.

“Yes, dear. Barbara for your maid of honor.” Mrs. MacLane jotted a note on the pad of paper while Barbara felt lightheaded with relief. “And now who else?…Yes, Millie and Greg's sister, Anne. And what about your cousin Elinor? You know Uncle Charlie will be hurt if you don't include her.”

Even Barbara could hear Rosemary's wail over the telephone.

“Now, Rosemary,” said Mrs. MacLane, “I know she's only twelve, but she can be a junior bridesmaid.”

Oh dear, thought Barbara. Elinor was at the chunky stage, where she appeared to have no waistline. She was painfully self-conscious, and she giggled. Oh, how she giggled, especially when boys were mentioned. Barbara could picture her walking down the aisle, her lips compressed in an effort to hold back the giggles, her bouquet quivering. Barbara could understand Rosemary's wail of protest, so loud even she could hear it. A junior bridesmaid who went off into a gale of
uncontrollable giggles during the ceremony would certainly spoil the wedding. And then Barbara, avid reader of wedding news, had an inspiration. “Mother,” she whispered urgently.

“Just a minute, Rosemary.” Mrs. MacLane held the phone against her shoulder. “What is it, Barbara?”

“Elinor could circulate the guest book at the reception. Lots of wedding stories in the paper mention a girl who circulates the guest book. That would give her something to do.”

Mrs. MacLane relayed this suggestion to the bride, who thought this a perfect solution. Circulating the guest book would make Elinor feel part of the wedding party, and she would be less prone to giggles if she did not feel that everyone was looking at her.

“And what about the reception?” inquired Mrs. MacLane, now that cousin Elinor was disposed of.

The buzz of Rosemary's voice through the telephone receiver was rapid. Apparently she knew what she wanted in the way of a wedding reception. Barbara strained to catch even one word.

“I think that's a very wise decision,” said Mrs. MacLane. “Punch and cake at the church will be easy for everyone. And if the weather is pleasant,
as it probably will be, we can have it outdoors. The Sunday school room is a little dark, although I'm sure flowers would help it.”

There went a catered reception, thought Barbara, glad this strain on the family budget was eliminated. An outdoor reception in the garden of the church would be much prettier—flowers and pink punch and light dresses against a background of old redwood trees, the afternoon sun filtering through the branches, a bird singing—no, skip the bird. The picture was getting too sentimental.

“As near as I can make out,” said Mrs. MacLane, when her conversation was finished, “what Rosemary wants is a do-it-yourself wedding. She doesn't want a caterer or a florist to decorate the church. She wants us to gather flowers for the church ourselves, although just where we are to gather them she doesn't make clear. She says the things we do ourselves are the most beautiful. Except for the cake. It seems that all her life she has looked at wedding cakes in the window of Larson's Bakery and dreamed of seeing her own there someday.”