A Bad Bride's Tale (22 page)

“What? What do
you
want, Mum?” It was always about what her mother wanted, wasn’t it? Or was that too harsh?

“Well . . .” Patti didn’t pick up on Stevie’s sardonic “you.” “Me, me and your father, we’re so . . . so different now. I want to explore, darling. India, Marrakesh, the Balkans . . . Myself! All those secret places. Is that really so dreadful? Chris wants to hide himself away in the Bodleian Library.” She looked down, the day’s remnants of turquoise shadow now just a wash of color on her crinkly eyelids. “Our stories are beginning to diverge.” Confiding in her daughter seemed to verify Patti’s feeling of estrangement, reinforce its credi- bility. “It’s a transitional time. I’m trying to be philosophical.”

Stevie rolled her eyes, wishing she’d never probed into her parents’ marriage. They had their own dynamic and their own dramas that had to play out. Nothing she said would make any difference—she should know that by now. They were not one of those couples who’d put their children at the center of their worlds. She would

always be slightly on the periphery. “But, Mum, you are quite ca- pable of dragging Dad to a souk. Drug or bribe him or some- thing.”

“I
could.
” Patti laughed. “But force him to be something else? No, no, that goes against everything I hold dear. You can’t force things . . .” Patti looked at her daughter, alarmed. “Oh, baby. You’re crying. Baby.” Patti engulfed her daughter in a hug. “Oh, darling. I’ve upset you, I’m sorry . . .”

Stevie took a guttural unladylike sniff of snot and tears, cross with herself for allowing things to get to her. She’d tried to hold it all in and failed. “I just hate the thought of it . . . childish, I know . . . you and Dad.” She looked up at her mother’s face, real- ized that it was more familiar than her own. “What hope for my marriage if you and Dad can’t make it?”

“Your marriage?”

“How can I believe mine will work if yours doesn’t?” “Faith, darling.” Patti looked sad. “Faith.”

“But . . . but . . .” Stevie sucked back her tears, tried to grapple hold of herself again. “It’s awful.”

“My marriage? Or your marriage?” Patti smiled. “Yours? Don’t be silly. It’s not had time to get awful. If you think it’s bad now! Goodness me, you’ve only been married a few weeks.”

“I know.” Stevie sat up, pulled hair out of her mouth, the irrita- tion she had felt toward her mother now replaced by an overwhelm- ing feeling of love and childlike neediness. “It’s ... it’s... Oh, God, I think there’s a chance I’ve made a mistake, a big mistake.” She extricated herself from her mother’s hug. “There, it’s out.”

“You’re probably just being overemotional after seeing Tommy.” Patti’s face seemed to fold in on itself, losing the bright-eyed en- thusiasm that so often got mistaken for youth.

Stevie wiped her face and took a deep breath. She felt a huge load lighter for her honesty. The panic subsided. “The honeymoon, it . . . Well, it wasn’t great, Mum.”

Patti smiled gently. “Oh, that’s a shame, a big shame, but
darling
. . . it can take a bit of adjustment. The romantic thing— all hearts and flowers—it’s a myth, cooked up by courtly male po- ets in the Middle Ages.”

“You always said you
know
when you know.”

“Yes, I did. I believed in love at first sight. But I
thought
I knew about me and your father, didn’t I? And now . . . well, now I sup- pose I don’t. And lots of my friends are in the same boat, or worse. Pam Hamilton’s Michael has become emotionally incontinent and agoraphobic since he retired. What life is that for her? Sue’s Jesse has had an affair with his secretary. I mean, the horrific cliché of it. Anyway, I’m digressing; what I mean to say is that maybe I was wrong. Maybe the human heart is more complicated than I gave it credit for.” She held Stevie’s hand and stroked it lightly. “And, let’s not forget, Stevie, I was twenty-one when I met your father. It was all quite different.”

“You were young and naive enough to believe in true love?” Patti smiled. “No, mostly relieved to leave my parents’ house,

relieved to be an adult, relieved to be having sex. You girls, well, you’ve had so much experience already. You’ve lived full, indepen- dent lives. And what with the divorce statistics, it must be harder to see any reason to get married at all. But you have to work at it. And it will be worth it. I
know
you, darling. You’re the loyal type. You need stability.”

“A fifties housewife trapped in a twenty-first-century thirtysome- thing body?”

“Not exactly.” Patti smiled and picked a strand of dark brown

hair from her daughter’s shoulder. “Jez is a good man. A little loud and insensitive at times, but colorful, which is good.” Patti lowered her voice for emphasis. “And, let’s not forget, you want a family.”

The euphoria of confession evaporated. Stevie hunched over and sighed. “There
is
that.”

“But, darling. Stevie, look at me . . .
look
at me.” Patti pressed her daughter’s hand into hers and searched her face quizzically. “That absolutely doesn’t mean you should do something that makes you unhappy. If you are unhappy, truly unhappy, you must tell me.”

“Am I telling you? I’m not sure.” It was impossible to tell where one feeling ended and the other began. She was a conflicted mess.

“Nothing that’s done can’t be undone. . . . Stevie? What’s the matter? You’ve gone white as a sheet. Are you okay?”

Stevie stood up quickly, hands over her mouth. “Oh, God, sorry . . . I think I’m going to be . . .”

stevie checked her e-mails
from her dad’s computer, keeping an eye on the time so she wouldn’t miss the next London- bound train. New work interest. Great. That would supplement her New York spending. Becca is having a party. Dom Roberts is getting married, save the date. Yes, he came to her wedding, she’d have to make the effort for his, even though it was in Edinburgh. And a flurry of e-mails from Lara: Lara’s date with the almost- famous illustrator she met at Bungalow 8; Lara’s escape from almost-famous and almost-mad illustrator via bathroom after one martini; Lara’s heroic lineup of three dates (“romantic multitask- ing”) in one night, none of whom were second-date-worthy, and one of whom told her he was grossed out by a previous date because

the woman ordered dessert; Lara missing British men’s way of do- ing things—getting her drunk and lunging at her—and wonder- ing when American women actually get to have sex; Lara’s forwarded e-invitation from a hot, divorced TV producer for a casual hook-up weekend at the Breakers in Palm Beach. What was this? Lara turning down swanky hotel in Palm Beach? Surely not. That didn’t sound like Lara. She read Lara’s final e-mail more carefully.

“Have decided Palm Beach is too far to go for shag with man with receding hairline, even if otherwise hot and stinking rich. Also, Stev, I find that my head is turning toward Sam, you’ll be pleased to know. Think you may be right—shit, aren’t you always right? About time I went for a decent guy. Crossing off days on BlackBerry until you arrive.

L”

Stevie swallowed and responded: “Great! Am SO pleased about Sam. To add to your social menagerie, have passed your number on to Katy Norris’s boyfriend, Seb. Hope you don’t mind. He’s a banker recently relocated to NY—wants to make new friends. He’s less annoying than Katy—not hard, I know—but don’t feel you have to hook up on my account. Just the messenger. And keep those legs crossed, girl. See u soon! S x”

“Steeeeeeeevie!”
Patti hollered up the stairs. “Chris? Have you seen our daughter?”

Then the sound of her mother’s feet on the stairs. The office door flew open. “Stevie,” she hissed, bright-eyed and animated. “Got it.”

“It? What’s it?”

“A test, darling. A pregnancy test.” Patti drew the box out of a paper bag. “You don’t mind, do you?”

“Mother!” Stevie put her head in her hands. “Yes, I
do
mind. I’m only a couple of days late. I’ve got some kind of weird bug.”

“Perhaps. But you say you were sick at the hospital, too.”

“Please don’t look at me like that, like you’re about to unwrap a Christmas present or something.”

“What’s the harm? I’m sure these tests can tell seconds after con- ception these days. Now, can you manage a pee?”

Outside the toilet, Patti hopped from one bare foot to another nervously like a father-to-be outside a maternity ward. She pushed the door slightly ajar. “All okay in there? Have you done it yet?”

“Yes, yes. Give me a second, for God’s sake, mother. I’m doing my trousers up.” Stevie opened the bathroom door, holding the white stick as far from her body as possible, as if this might some- how influence the outcome, her heart pounding. Yes, things had been tricky with Jez, but he’d had mitigating circumstances. A baby would be a new start, wouldn’t it? “I can’t believe you’re mak- ing me do this. There’s absolutely no way I’d start being sick so quickly.”

“I started throwing up a few days after bonking. Here, let
me
look at it.” Patti took the pregnancy test from her daughter and studied the two boxes. “One line . . .”

“What does that mean?”

Patti reread the instructions on the side of the box. “Oh.” Patti pointed the stick at her daughter. “No. How strange. This suggests . . .” She studied the instructions again. “You appear not to be pregnant.”

“I knew it,” said Stevie quietly.

Sensing her daughter’s deflation, Patti put an arm around Stevie and kissed her hair. “But it’s very early to test. It says here do an- other test in a week if your period still hasn’t come.” She put her hands on her hips. “You know my intuition is never wrong.”

“That’s a slight exaggeration.” Stevie stared at the white stick

again. “Anyhow, it’s probably just as well I’m not pregnant. All things considered.”

Patti looked upset. “Darling, if you were, it wouldn’t be a disas- ter. I think you’re just having early marriage wobbles. And I’m sure a baby would make Jez grow up a bit. It would be something . . .” “Bigger than ourselves that glued us together?” interjected

Stevie.

“Exactement.”

TWENTY-SEVEN
Æ

does love in your thirties mean wanting the same
things at the same time? Because without a consensus, love fal- tered. And at thirty-six, she was no longer interested in the jour- ney, she wanted the goddamn destination. Katy sighed, searched through her camera phone for pictures of Seb, in an attempt to feel closer now that he’d gone back to New York at the first available opportunity.
Ha.
There he was standing stiffly on a beach in Thai- land, wearing his navy Armani trunks, frowning, after an argument about who forgot the sunscreen. There he was again, caught just as he turned his back. And, there? Oh. Bless. That was Jez, a halo of strawberry-blond hair ablaze in the sun, smiling a little forlornly: Stevie had left the day before. Seb had gone diving, so she and Jez had gone for a long walk along a beach to cheer him up. He had discovered a cute little off-the-beaten-path reggae café, hidden in a delightful cove. And there they’d sunk too many Tiger beers and chatted and chatted on about everything, really. She’d been nervous at first. After the Jacuzzi incident, she’d feared that he’d crack jokes about it as Seb had, or, worse, avoid the subject altogether as if it

were something unspeakable. But instead he’d laughed and brushed the debacle off as “too much booze in the sun,” as if she’d done little more than dance on a table in high spirits. And because he saw it like this she did, too.

There was an easy simplicity to Jez: He didn’t overanalyze. She liked this. And she also liked his crackly cough of a laugh, his straightforward sense of humor, his loud maleness—the kind of loud maleness that took up its own space and made her feel com- paratively small and delicate and feminine. Because they were new friends—yes, they really had developed a genuine friendship in those few days after Stevie left, she thought—there was no history of disappointments, no agenda; just a delight in discovering com- mon ground and the joy of male company without the complica- tions of sex.

She remembered his last day in Thailand all too clearly. They’d sunbathed on the beach while Seb windsurfed. Between slurps of his melting pineapple ice cream, he told her about his wedding—a silly anecdote about his mother and a tepee and frozen peas, but an anecdote so sweet and familial that, to her horror, she’d burst into tears and, red-faced, tried to explain that she feared she’d never have a wedding anecdote, good or bad. And when she cried, snuf- fling her tears and snot onto the sleeve of her caftan, Jez hadn’t em- barrassed her. He’d just wrapped her in his arms and said it was okay. And in his arms, for a few magical seconds, she felt as if she were suspended in salty warm water, supported, cleansed, and weightless.

Katy checked her watch and sighed. There were so many things she should do this Saturday. And she’d done none of them. She’d only been in the office two days since getting back to London on Tuesday, as she’d taken the Friday off sick. She’d tried to cheer herself

up—filled her day with shopping, manic shopping in Selfridges: shoes, lingerie, a new dress, more treats, a facial, all the things that magazines advised as pick-me-ups. None of it had worked. This was why she was sitting on the limestone floor of her bath- room in her pajamas at noon, nursing her third glass of wine, salty black rivers of MAC mascara streaming down her face.

Damn it. What she’d give to be back on that warm Thai sand now. London had reinforced her unease and helplessness. She had never felt less in control of her life. She’d worked hard, so bloody hard throughout her twenties and thirties to get to a position, careerwise, where she was able to step back, have a family, settle down, and step off that treadmill. She’d never expected a man to “keep” her. And now that she could take her foot off the accelera- tor?
Rien!
She couldn’t make Seb propose.
Or
want babies. Or even want her. In fact, the more she strove toward her goal, the farther it slipped from her reach, as if the mere act of reaching out repelled it. Perching on the edge of her bath, Katy put down her phone and picked up a fertility home kit she’d bought from Boots, marveling how her life was beginning to be dictated to by these shrink-wrapped boxes of thirtysomething-friendly science, always packaged with a picture of a woman wearing a pink jersey holding the indicator stick, smiling dreamily—as opposed to peeping at the results through gaps in her crossed fingers. She read the instructions. She had to come off the pill first? That would go down well. She could see Seb’s face now. Then she thought a little more defiantly; Seb will just have to cope with it. He will have to use condoms.
She
wanted to know how long she had left, even if he didn’t. And this little box of tricks would do just that, by measuring something called FSH in her urine. Hope- fully it would just tell her that everything was working normally and