My Best Man by Andy Schell (unputdownable books .txt) 📗

Amity and I are in the large bathroom off our bedroom in my mother’s house. I’m sitting on the edge of the tub, watching her poo up for the last time as a single girl. My mother has had a bottle of champagne sent out to us, delivered by Marzetta, who politely but sadly hands it over, and Amity forgoes the glass provided to swill out of the bottle. She’s skipping a lot of the poo up steps. “How come you’re not curling your hair?” I ask.

Her hair is still pulled back in a ponytail; she’s lightly brushing mascara on her eyelashes. “I’m feeling kind of natural today, Bubba.”

“Should I take you to see a doctor?”

“Stop!” she scolds, picking up the bar of soap by the sink and throwing it at me.

I duck as the bullet flies past. “This is going to be really weird,”

I tell her, picking the soap up from the floor. I don’t say it negatively, just honestly. “Whoever thought we’d really get married? God, I wonder what we’ll be doing five years from now?”

She looks into the mirror, and instead of looking at herself, she looks at me.. as she did on the first day she brought me home.

“Don’t worry about it, darling’. Life never plays out the way you think it will, I guarantee you.”

“No shit. Whoever thought Jacqueline would turn out to be a shaman?”

“What’ st hat “In this case, it’ sa tall priestess who repeats herself while wisely sorting through all the muck.”

“Besides you, Harry, she’s my best friend.”

“You’re right.” If I weren’t afraid of hurting Amity’s feelings, I’d tell her how I proposed to Jackie that she take Amity’s place at the altar and how Jacqueline refused me on Amity’s behalf. “She’d never do anything to hurt you,” I tell Amity.

“I’d never do anything to hurt her either,” Amity responds.

I want to tell her, “But you did!” She doesn’t know I’ve been made aware of her tryst with Jackie’s former boyfriend Arthur. And this is the thing that bothers me most about marrying her. her ability to revise her history at will. At the same time, I realize I’m the yin to her yang, since I’m revising my future at will. I wonder if we’ll ever stop altering the past and the future and just let things be as they are.

“Do you think we’ll be happy?” I ask.

Now she looks at herself in the mirror and smiles. “We’ll be happy, Bubba,” she tells me with surety. “We’re going to cut the shit and get on with it.”

Amity and I are driving to the church in our new Mercedes. My mother had ordered a limousine for us, but Amity convinced her to cancel it. She’s insisted on traveling in full regalia in her new car. My mother and I practically had to sit on her huge dress to get the whole thing stuffed behind the steering wheel.

“You sure you don’t want me to drive?” I had asked.

“No way, Bubba!” she’d told me.

We have the windows rolled down, and the fall wind rushes through the car, blowing the lace ribbons in her hair. “Look at

us,” Amity squeals. “We’re straight out of Town and Country/ This would be the most killer ad for Mercedes!” She’s right. A brand-new gold sedan, the bride behind the wheel, the groom along for the ride. My mother and Donald are in front of us in their Cadillac, leading the way, and Jacqueline, after arriving at the house just an hour ago, is behind us in her rental car. a train of madness, with Jackie serving as the caboose. Tina Turner is singing on the radio, asking us “What’s Love Got to Do With It?” It’s a valid question. In the beginning, the answer would have been nothing. But now, love has everything to do with it, I can tell by Amity’s repose. She’s happy and at peace, rock-solid peace. But even in the cool breeze, I’m sweating. Amity looks over. “Harry, for heaven’s sake. Stop your worrying. It’s not like you’re going to the executioner. It’s just a bunch of fancy-ass people in expensive clothes, and some nice old guy, who probably hits the sauce a little too much and fondles the altar boys, standing there in a big ole white robe, and you and me. Believe me, darling’, this whole thing will be over sooner than you think.”

“Good,” I tell her, wiping my clammy palms on my tuxedo pants. “How are you staying so calm?” She glances over at me, takes my hand, and gives me a heartfelt smile. “Because this is the most wonderful day of my life. You’re doing something for me that no one else has ever done, Bubba. Ever. You’re loving me for who I am. No conditions. No rules. You’re putting my happiness before your own. And that’s the meaning of true love, Harry. I want you to know how much you’ve inspired me.”

“But, Amity,” I say, “that’s how your parents love you.” She glances at me briefly, then concentrates on the road. “I suppose,” she sighs. “And I love them too, but they just don’t get me. It was the wrong family, the wrong house for me. I couldn’t stand pork and milk. I hated riding that stinky old school bus for miles on dirt roads, just to get to Waco to go to school. My brother

and sister thrived in FFA, while I thrived on THE. It was the only way I could accept my boring life. But I always knew it wasn’t permanent. My cousin came to visit me when I was six, and she loved our farm, but I told her, “This dump is just a place to hang my hat until I can strike out on my own!” “

“Jesus, Amity, you said that when you were six?”

“I was an honest six. And I wanted more than a farm family in Waco could offer. I wanted a family with a good name.