Once and for All(69)

“It can be. But not like that.”

We both stood there a second, recalibrating. Then I felt Ambrose lean into my ear again. “You still haven’t answered his actual question, FYI.”

“Will you butt out?” I said to him through clenched teeth, adding a swat for good measure. This time, he backed away. A bit. With Ben watching, like we were both crazy. I took a breath, composing myself. “I’d love to do something once this is all over. If, you know, you’re still asking.”

He smiled. “I am. How about this week? A movie, dinner . . .”

“Great,” I said. “Just text me. Let me give you my number.”

As he pulled out his phone, opening up the contacts and handing it to me, I wondered why Ambrose was so interested in this, especially since he had his own perfect, awesome girl and, in his mind, our bet pretty much sealed up. I was going to ask him after I’d typed in my number and Ben walked away. By then, though, he was gone.




Two and a half hours later, I was busy untangling yet another tulle bow from a chair. It was ten thirty, long past the originally projected end of the Lin wedding, and we’d just seen the last of the guests out the doors to their cars. This was a full hour after the departure of the bride and groom, which, despite the happy cuddling I’d seen at the head table earlier, did not—as far as my system went, anyway—bode well for their union. While the guests threw birdseed and glitter (great for pictures, awful if you didn’t want it on you and your clothes for eternity), Elinor and her groom came out to the limo to make their grand exit. They smiled for the camera and their friends and family. But in the final view I had from my vantage point near the country club gates, she was tugging her bias-cut, fluted dress as if he’d sat on it, her face annoyed, while he sat back against the seat, rolling his eyes. For them, I wished for forgiveness.

Maybe, I realized, I believed in wishes after all. At least for other people. Thinking this, I glanced over at Ambrose, who was collecting the large flower arrangements from the tables and toting them to Mrs. Lin’s car. What she planned to do in her hotel room with twenty towering vases of lilies, roses, and greenery was anyone’s guess. She’d made it very clear, however, that she would be taking anything the family paid for with her when she (finally) (blessedly) left. For the time being, however, she was still walking around barking orders. Ambrose and I were the only ones left to hear them, however; my mom and William had taken their ritualistic toast and commentary elsewhere.

“And these programs,” I heard her saying now, grabbing up the stack I’d brought from the church after the ceremony and put on the cake table. “Are the serving pieces ours?”

“No, they belong to the caterer,” Ambrose told her from behind a wobbling iris.

“Oh.” Mrs. Lin glanced around. “Well, the cocktail napkins, then.”

She picked them up, then headed my way, toward the exit. I made a point of bending down deeply over the chair in front of me, as if untying the bow there was on the level of splitting an atom. Even so, she said, “I’ll want all this fabric from these bows, as well. Tulle isn’t cheap.”

“Will do,” Ambrose said cheerfully. I shot him a look, which he didn’t see, too busy trying to keep up with her as she marched across the grass. Not for the first time, I wondered how he managed always to be so good natured, especially when my own patience had long ago worn thin.

By eleven fifteen, all that was left were the tents, tables, and chairs, which the venue would deal with (although I did see Mrs. Lin, on one of her final passes, studying them as if considering whether they, too, would fit in her rental car). It wasn’t until she drove off, the sedan packed to the ceiling, that my mother and William reappeared. They were in a much better mood, red-cheeked and giggly. What Mrs. Lin gives, champagne takes away.

“Ding-dong, the witch is gone,” William said, as her taillights turned out of the gates. “That was one for the record books.”

“Mark my words,” my mother said, “I will not deal with that woman again. If she forgot something, one of you has to get it to her.”

“I doubt that’s going to happen,” Ambrose told her. “She took just about anything not nailed down.”

“But the question,” William said, pointing at him, “is did you take anything?”

My mom and I looked at each other, not understanding. Then Ambrose, smiling, reached into his pocket, pulling out a handful of tissues. “Yep.”

“Damn!” William cackled. “I owe you twenty bucks.”

“Am I drunk? I don’t think I’m drunk,” my mom said to me. “But I don’t understand.”

William was still tittering, pulling out his wallet, while Ambrose carefully folded the tissues. Then, suddenly, I got it. “You took those from her bosom?”

Hearing me say this, William busted out laughing again. My mom, trying to look stern, said, “Okay, despite her behavior, that is not appropriate.”

“Oh, I think it’s very appropriate,” William told her, handing over a twenty to Ambrose, who took it with a grin. “She basically had them there in full view, like a human tissue dispenser. Don’t tell me you weren’t tempted.”

“I was tempted to punch her in the face,” my mom said. “But I guess this is the next best thing.”