Golden Girl(121)

“My beautiful girls,” Vivi says. She knows they’ll both protest if she gets overly “emo,” but how can she help herself? Her oldest child is getting married, her younger daughter is the maid of honor. Would someone please tell Vivi where the years went? It feels like she just brought Willa home from the hospital, just burst into tears because Lucinda said she “loathed” the name and JP had to explain that they (Vivi) had decided to name the baby after Willa Cather, the writer. (“First children are to be named after family,” Lucinda said. “Is Willa Cather family?”)

What about the eternity Vivi lived through when Willa was a toddler, going to the Children’s House half a day, and Carson was a baby? Then it felt like a second eternity when they were both small, Willa six and Carson three, and Leo entered the world. The girls started battling for Vivi’s remaining attention; there was name-calling and hair-pulling. Willa threw the remote control during an episode of Caillou and hit Carson above the eye (stitches). Carson bit Willa during bath time and broke the skin. (JP had joked about a rabies test and Vivi, delirious with lack of sleep, had laughed.)

Vivi raises her glass and the girls do as well. Through her tears, Vivi sees their three flutes come together; Shawn Mendes gives way to Lady Gaga. Vivi grants herself a moment of congratulations. She got her girls this far. Willa and Carson have always loved each other. And today, they like each other.

“To you, Willie,” Carson says.

Willa smiles. She looks as beautiful as Vivi has ever seen her—without her hair done, without makeup, without wearing the ivory silk dress that hangs on the back of Vivi’s closet door—because she is illuminated from within. Lit by love.



The florist has outdone herself with pink roses, pink lilies, and ivy. The bridesmaids are in blush, the groomsmen in navy blazers, Nantucket Reds, and matching blush bow ties. There’s a string quartet playing Pachelbel’s Canon in D. As mother of the bride, Vivi is the last person to be shown to her seat before the processional. She’s on the arm of Zach Bridgeman, with Dennis following a pace behind in his too-tight gray suit pants. Zach seats Vivi and Dennis in a pew with Amy, who was escorted down just before Tink Bonham. Amy pretends to be absorbed in the program.

When the bridesmaids come walking in, Vivi beams at the girls and winks at Carson, but she—and everyone else in the church—is waiting to see Willa.

Jeremiah Burke’s Trumpet Voluntary begins. Everyone stands and Vivi turns. Willa and JP appear in the entryway; there’s a collective intake of breath throughout the church.

Vivi quickly checks on Rip and sees his eyes shining with tears. He looks exactly as he should—as though there is no other woman in the world. There never has been, Vivi thinks with confidence. And never will be.



After the ceremony, Willa and Rip climb into a horse-drawn carriage that will take them to the Field and Oar Club. All the guests are walking over except for Lucinda and Penny Rosen, who are being driven by JP and Amy.

Dennis is busy chatting with Joe DeSantis, so Vivi links her arm through Savannah’s. She has strolled the streets of town thousands of times but today is the day of her daughter’s wedding, so it feels distinctive.

“So far, so good,” Savannah says. “Everyone’s being civil.” She means Amy. She means Dennis.

“Of course,” Vivi says. “We’re all adults.”

Vivi sounds a little more confident than she feels. The ceremony was the easy part; Vivi has reservations about the reception. She resents that JP insisted that Willa hold it at the Field and Oar, a club that didn’t readmit Vivi after the divorce. JP and Amy will seem like the hosts when, in fact, Vivi is the one footing the bill.

High road, she reminds herself. She prefers life on the high road! The Field and Oar throws a beautiful wedding. Vivi got married there herself.

The family and the wedding party take pictures on the lawn. Vivi is wearing a peach silk slip dress which is maybe a touch sexy for a fifty-year-old mother of the bride, but it’s nowhere near as attention-grabbing as what Amy has on. She’s in an amethyst column dress with a neckline that plunges nearly to the navel and shows an eye-popping amount of skin. Amy seems to regret her choice of dress; she tugs and adjusts, smiles awkwardly, then tugs and adjusts some more. Eventually, she disappears, and when she returns, the neckline has been clumsily secured with a safety pin.

Cocktails and hors d’oeuvres. Vivi takes mental snapshots: Savannah leaning forward as she slurps an oyster out of its shell so she doesn’t drip on her dress; Leo, Cruz, Marissa, and Jasmine posing for a picture while Peter Bridgeman lifts his mother’s sea breeze off a table and takes a surreptitious sip, Tink Bonham laughing with Gordy and Amelia Hastings and saying, “I bet Willa will be pregnant by the end of the month!”

Dinner. The prime rib and Duchess potatoes are served with three spears of white asparagus and caramelized brussels sprouts; the plate is garnished with nasturtium blossoms. Vivi nibbles on one; it’s peppery. This wedding has taken a year to plan and is costing…yeah, a lot. Vivi leaves the dinner table to visit with people and make a pit stop at the bar. They’re serving only wine with dinner, and Vivi wants tequila, specifically Casa Dragones. The club doesn’t carry it, so Vivi dropped off a bottle earlier that morning.

She has just received her glass when someone joins her at the bar: Zach Bridgeman.

“Maker’s Mark on the rocks, please,” he says to the bartender. To Vivi, he says, “First of all, gorgeous wedding. Thank you.”