On the Rocks(68)

Before I was able to sample an appetizer, Katie grabbed me and forced me to follow her into the ladies’ room. “I can’t get this comb out of my hair, and I want to take my veil off for the reception. Can you pull it out for me?” she asked. She sat down on one of the overstuffed chairs and tilted her blond head back so that I could remove the comb that held her fingertip-length veil in place. For some reason she had styled her hair in one of those bad hairdos you expect to see in your parents’ prom pictures from the fifties. Dozens of bobby pins were entangled in her ornate hairstyle, blond curls piled en masse on top of her head.

I tossed my bouquet of pink (fruit-punch pink, not raspberry) peonies down on the chair next to her enormous bouquet of white something or other and placed my glass of champagne on the small table next to her chair. I began to delicately move her hair out of the way of the comb to try to figure out which pins were catching, but there was no way to tell. She had enough metal in her hair to prevent her from getting through security at Logan Airport, and trying to identify the pins that were causing the problem was an exercise in futility.

“Can’t we cut the veil off the comb from the bottom and just leave the comb in your hair? It’s pretty, I don’t think it will look funny, and then we don’t need to worry about ruining your . . .” I searched for the words for what to call this look she had so carefully orchestrated. “Bird’s nest” came to mind, but I didn’t think that was what a bride wanted to hear on her wedding day. “. . . Curls?” I tried. Much better.

I gazed at our reflections in the mirror, and her eyes looked like they were about to explode out their sockets. She gasped and wailed in horror, “Cut my veil? I’d think that was a joke if you didn’t have a history of ruining my wedding attire. I cannot believe you just said that.” Her shoulders hunched forward as if I had somehow managed to suck all of the bridal bliss out of her body by suggesting I ruin her veil. I yanked on the comb a little harder than I should have, and her face tensed in pain.

“Oww! Abby!” she squealed. Tears welled in her eyes, and she began fluttering her hands in front of her face while looking up at the ceiling lest her falling tears ruin her eye makeup. Okay, making the bride cry was probably something I should have tried to avoid. Now I felt bad. I hated when that happened.

“Katie, I’m sorry. Just sit still a minute! I’ll get the comb out without ruining the veil or your hair, I promise.”

“Forgive me if I don’t believe you,” she snorted.

“Do you want to argue with me, or do you want to get back to your cocktail hour?”

The mention of her party immediately cheered her up, and her eyes grew wide with excitement. “You’re right. Let’s just take care of this so we can get back out there. By the way, did you see the scallops? They looked really good. We have mini-grilled cheeses too.”

“You do?” I began to work diligently on the curls and the pins with renewed urgency. “Why didn’t you say that to begin with? I would have had this out already,” I laughed.

Katie reached back and put her hand on my wrist. I looked at our reflections again in the mirror. My sister in her Vera Wang gown and crystal-encrusted bridal panty, and me in my horrendous pink dress and cotton Fruit of the Looms. No matter how often I saw the two of us together, I still could not shake the thought that one of us must have been switched at birth. How two such totally different people could be born from the same woman was really mind-boggling. Then again, she looked like my mother, and if I wasn’t really my parents’ child, my mother would’ve returned me by now. So I guess we would have to chalk it up to a medical mystery and the wonders of the human genome.

“I’m sorry I snapped at you,” she said quietly. “I’m really glad that you’re my maid of honor. I wish you had decided to bring a guest. It would be more fun for you.”

“It’s fine,” I said reluctantly. “There isn’t really anyone I would have brought with me anyway.”

“Have you met anyone at the beach? What about that guy you’ve been hanging out with? You talk about him a lot. What’s his story anyway?”

I held pins in her hair with my right hand while gently pulling at the comb with my left. The sooner I freed this comb, the sooner I could revisit the bar. “Sort of,” I sighed. “There isn’t much to tell about Bobby. He’s a nice guy who likes to make fun of me. We’ve had some interesting moments so far this summer. We get on each other’s nerves more than anything.”

“You and Ben started off that way, remember? You used to say he drove you crazy and not in a good way.”

“Exactly. And look how that ended,” I sighed.

She picked up her bouquet and spun it in her hands, checking the blossoms to make sure they weren’t starting to wilt. “Well, I hope you’re starting to realize how crazy he made you. I mean, you attacked me in a bridal salon. It was like you were possessed. He’s turned you into a nut. You know that, right?”

“I do. That wasn’t one of my prouder moments,” I admitted.

“I blame him for most of it. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I blame you too. But mostly him. You weren’t acting like yourself. And the dress, I didn’t know, Abby. I swear I didn’t.”

“I know,” I said.

“I wouldn’t have bought it if I’d had any idea.”