A Little Hope(27)

She wasn’t programmed to lose her sister. Never. She could still easily see Lisa walking her to her kindergarten classroom—Lisa’s curls, her dark eyes and knowing smile, Lisa’s small plaid book bag she held like a briefcase. Her parents had adopted Lisa when they thought they couldn’t have children, and she was given everything in a way that didn’t spoil her but made her generous and confident. In a couple of years, her parents ended up being able to have Suzette, and then Carrie, and for a few years, the three girls slept in one room like The Brady Bunch kids.

At the bar that day so long ago, Suzette lit another cigarette, stronger than an unfiltered Camel. She cried because Finland could have changed her life, and she wouldn’t stay long enough to let it.

Now when the door opens with that subtle ding, Mrs. Crowley snaps the plastic guard of the register in place and runs the paper through it. “Hello there,” she says. Her curls are perfect. There are so many spools of thread behind her, and the radio quietly delivers a news segment from a BBC reporter. “Chilly one, isn’t it?” She glides over to the seamstress’s empty chair and takes a sweater off the back of it. “The air just stabs you when it hits, doesn’t it?”

Suzette nods. “I forgot to wear a coat.”

“You mustn’t… the bride can’t have a cold.” Mrs. Crowley laces her fingers together. “Ms. Tyler knows you have an appointment? Shall I ring her?”

“No, no. We talked yesterday. I think I’m a few minutes early.”

“You must be tickled that all this planning is coming to the end.” The woman adjusts her Christmas tree pin on her sweater. She wears a cream-colored satin blouse under the sweater, and pants that are so pressed they could hang without a hanger. “Want a candy cane?” She holds out a small ceramic gingerbread house with holes in the roof for miniature candy canes to sit in.

“Yes, please.”

“I love Christmas weddings… if Mother Nature cooperates for you.”

“Yes,” Suzette says. Did she eat today? She feels like she didn’t.

“My daughter, of course, was bound and determined to be married in July. I said, Mary Jane, you’re going to be hot the whole day. Your face will be shiny in pictures. You might not even want to take pictures outside.” She shakes her head and sighs. “And then she asked her friend’s toddler to be a flower girl… a two-year-old who wants her mommy, a sweltering day. Need I say more?” She looks up to the ceiling and smiles. “But it was lovely, all of that aside. A lush green golf course in the background.” Her smile comes and goes like lightning.

Suzette smiles. “I always wanted a Christmas wedding.”

“And your fiancé? Does he like a Christmas wedding, too?”

“Oh yes. Yes. He loved the idea.”

“Good.”

“Yeah.”

“I can’t imagine Ms. Tyler being late.” She looks at the seamstress’s empty work station. “I always tell her she has an atomic clock wired to her brain.”

“Traffic probably.”

“Probably.”

Suzette sees her dress hanging in its thick white bag on a rack by itself and she feels her shoulders sag. Her sister Lisa had just picked out her wedding dress before her diagnosis. She never even went for a fitting. When the boutique phoned one day inquiring about the dress, her mother told the man to keep the damn thing. Suzette coughs now. “Did your daughter—”

Mrs. Crowley looks from the parking lot back to Suzette. “Did she what, dear?”

“Feel weird?”

“Weird? About getting married, you mean?”

“I guess.”

“Oh. Well, maybe.” She pulls out her own candy cane and holds it as if she’s never tried one. She unwraps it carefully and tastes it for a second. “If she did, she didn’t tell me. But I did. If an old lady matters.” She chuckles. “Do you?”

“What? Feel weird? Um, a little. Well, not weird. I just feel, I just feel… vacant.” The word surprises her. It is perfectly chosen, and she just chose it. Yes, that is the feeling. Her cheeks burn. Why did she say anything? People always gossip, and no one needs to hear this. It’s Finland all over again. Oh, and with everything her poor parents have been through. “I kind of don’t want to put that dress on again.” When did this feeling start? She can’t say. She wants the wedding to be over, and she wants to never put on the dress.

“Maybe you’re just tired of the preparation.” Mrs. Crowley’s eyes dart back and forth between Suzette and the parking lot. Suzette looks. Not a car in the lot besides theirs. A moving van charges by on Route 23, and way down the street she can see the traffic light for Gatehill Mall, a cluster of cars with people going Christmas shopping. In the other direction is The Dock, the restaurant where Damon proposed. (Damon’s sweet face that night, so hopeful.) The sky outside is crisp blue with threads of clouds. “Maybe you want to just be married, without all the fuss?”

This brings Suzette a moment of quick relief. Is that it? “I don’t feel like I know. I know that Damon’s a terribly nice guy. I know he has a smile that makes babies smile back at him when we walk downtown. I know if we had kids, they would be loved and valued—by him, by me. I know it all seems to fit. That I could set up an office in our home. I know he will go with me to chop down the best Christmas tree every year, and I know he will pour me wine if I have a bad day, and we can sit on the porch and I can put my feet on his lap. I know all this. I know it can be great. But I don’t want to pull the trigger. That’s what I don’t want to do.”