Can't Let You Go (29 page)

Charlie Benson’s.

I smiled at some old high school friends and fellow church members. Sam and Maxine occupied the tenth row, and when we passed, my grandma looked Charlie up and down then gave me a discreet thumbs-up. Finally, we reached the altar, and Charlie’s fingers slid over mine as he lifted my hand from his, and we took our places on opposite sides of the associate pastor. Joey and his brother hugged, bringing an unbidden smile to my lips.

The guitarist broke into the wedding march, and dresses swooshed as everyone stood to their feet for the bride.

Frances glided down the aisle, her father smiling, but losing his battle against tears.

I stole a glance at Joey, and my heart expanded in my chest.

His face said it all.

He loved her.

This man of few words loved her. Not a fawning, game-playing adoration that I’d witnessed in Ian, but an awe-struck, I’m-drunk-at-how-much-I-adore-you love. Joey’s expression held joy and rapture, like he was seeing her for the first time. The same expression he would wear sixty years from now.

“Wait.”

The room froze at that one word from the bride.

Oh, no.

Frances stood mid-aisle, her feet immobile, as if captured in cement. Her father spoke feverishly in her ear, but Frances just shook her head, her updo bobbing.

No.

Oh, no, no, no.

“I’m sorry,” she cried. “I. . .I don’t think I can do this.”

A collective gasp nearly lifted the rafters.

“Frances?” Joey took a step toward his bride.

“No, please.” She held up her hands to hold him off. “We rushed this. It’s not right.” And then the most horrid of horribles happened.

Because Frances Vega trained those dark brown eyes on her maid of honor.

“Joey and I have made a colossal mistake.” She picked up the hem of her dress, a woman ready to run. “And Katie was right all along.”

With that, Frances broke from her father’s arms and sprinted as hard has her heels would allow, right out of the sanctuary.

L
ike cinematic slow-motion,
two hundred heads swiveled toward me.

“What have you done?” Charlie’s words rang like buckshot in my ears.

“I . . . I . . .” The gears in my brain stuttered and stopped. “I don’t know. I can fix this. I’ll talk to her.”

“No—”

But it was too late. I took off down the aisle, only tripping once on the hem of my dress. Chatter swelled all around me. People pointed. Dirty looks were thrown. Frances’s grandma flipped me double birds.

But I kept running.

As did Joey. He was right at my heels, and I feared he’d tackle me to the ground on his way to his bride.

The blur that was my best friend ran into the room we’d been in earlier and slammed the door.

“Frances, let me in.” I pounded with the flat of my hand. “I mean it. I’ll break this door down.”

“You have the arms of a ten year old boy,” she called. “Go away!”

“Open this door, or I’m telling that whole congregation about the time you skinny-dipped at science camp!”

The door flew open and Frances jerked me inside.

She looked like a fury.

“You need to take some deep breaths.” I used the voice one employed to talk a jumper away from the ledge.

She tugged on the tight collar at her neck. “My gosh, I’m about to roast alive in this thing.” Like a hamster, she walked in fast circles, her heels grinding into the carpet. “I’m hot, I’m sweaty, and I need to get out of here.”

“You need to sit down.”

“I don’t want to sit.”

“You need to get back out there.”

“I don’t want to get back out there!”

“You need some hard liquor and street drugs.”

Frances stopped pacing.

And laughed.

My nerves had me giggling as well. “What in the world is going on?”

Frances sank into a Sunday school chair and let her head rest on the back, staring at the veined ceiling. “You were right. I don’t know him. And Joey doesn’t know me.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“I can’t even take my cat. I love Mango. We’ve been together through so much. My first heartbreak. His mange phase. And now I can’t even eat a bowl of cereal in front of my soon-to-be husband. You
know
how I love my Toastie Oaties.”

“I think you’re taking the
intolerant
part of lactose intolerant a little too far. I’m sure Joey won’t mind if you have some dairy.”

“But what kind of wife would I be if I ate that in front of him?”

“One who’s whole-grain satisfied?”

“I’m being serious. We can’t even afford to be on our own. I’m terrified I’m going to be working so much, I’ll flunk out of the PhD program.”

“You’ve never flunked anything in your life.” I grabbed a chair and pulled it right next to her. “And that’s what really scares you. You’ve done everything so perfectly. Aced every school subject, every college class, anything you’ve ever put your mind to. But this marriage business is unchartered territory.”

“It’s absolutely frightening. I haven’t slept in two weeks.”

We both startled as the door shook and fists pounded the door. “Frances! Frances!”

Her eyes widened. “It’s Joey. Don’t let him in here.”

“Frances!” he called.

“You’ve got to talk to him,” I said.

“You go talk to him.”

“Me?” I barely knew the guy.

“Yes. Go out there and tell him. . .tell him I just can’t marry him.”

“Frances, I don’t think—”

She shoved me with the force of a WWE wrestler. “Tell him!”

I made my way to the door, praying for God to send a holy rapture. I was never going to live this day down.

I eased outside and shut the door behind me. “Hi.” I swallowed and tried to think of profound things to say. “How are you?” Oh, geez. How was he? Joey looked like he’d just watched his life ripped away from him. His face was ashen, his eyes wide and rapidly blinking, as if hoping to see a new picture.

“I need to talk to her.” Sweat beaded at Joey’s temple. “I gotta get in there.”

“That’s not a good idea. She, um, she sent me out here to speak to you.”

“What did she say?”

Oh, boy. “She said that. . .” I wanted to tell him anything but this. “She said she couldn’t marry you.”

“Why?”

“Frances thinks maybe you guys haven’t had enough time to know one another.”

“So what?”

“Well . . . maybe if you had a little more time to date.”

“People get married quickly all the time. Her parents did and look how they turned out.”

“True. But Frances is worried you two have some obstacles that might be hard to face together. Like money. Responsibilities.”

“Katie, I love this woman so much.” His pain was sharp enough to pierce the both of us. “She’s my everything.”

My guilt was boundless. “I believe you, Joey.”

He fisted his hand and pounded on the door. “Please let me in so we can talk.”

Silence was his only response, but Joey wasn’t giving up.

“Frances, I know you think we don’t know each other well enough, but that’s not true. I know so much about you. I know that you’re the most beautiful person I’ve ever met. And you’re pretty on the outside, too. I know that you have a kindness that fills me up. You’re the girl who visits lonely people at the nursing home and picks up stray puppies on the side of the road. You’re the girl who never passes a street musician without dropping in change. You smile at the sun and find four-leaf clovers. And your laugh. My gosh, your laugh. When I hear that sound, I have to stop whatever I’m doing and just watch you.” Joey leaned his head against the door. “I know your heart, how strongly it beats for the people you love. How fiercely you care for your family and your friends.”

A scraping sound came from the other side, like Frances had dragged her chair closer.

Joey pressed his palms to the door, as if his hands could pass through the wood and reach her. “I know we’re gonna be broke. And I don’t have a handful of degrees like you. But I’m good with the cars, and I can pick up an extra job, work double shifts. We might not have cable TV and steak dinners for a while, but I promise you those years are coming. And I don’t care if I have to eat beans and rice, as long as you’re there with me. We might be poor in Massachusetts, but I’m a rich man as long as I’m with you.”

“Any luck?” Charlie asked, joining us in the hall.

I shook my head no.

“Be my wife,” Joey said. He had spoken more words in the past few minutes than I’d heard from him in the entire last month. “Be my wife, and I promise no matter what we lack in material things, I’ll make up for it in fun, in memorable days, in all the ways I’m going to love you. You know me, Frances. Don’t think you don’t. I’m the guy who would slay dragons for you. The one who will be your biggest cheerleader. The one who will always be true, who lives to hold your hand. I want to hold that hand forever.”

Joey’s volume dropped. He was now speaking to an audience of one. “I don’t know what’s ahead for us. I can’t promise you it’s going to be easy and we won’t have hard times. But I do promise to be faithful. To love you every day of my life. Let’s do this thing together, Frances. You and me. Let’s have an adventure and figure it out together. We’re all we need.”

I pulled a tissue from my strapless bra, a little trick Maxine taught me years ago. I dabbed my eyes then blew my nose.

A rustle came from the other side.

A sniff.

Then the door creaked open, and Frances took one step outside. “I love you, Joey.” Her face was splotchy, her nose Rudolph red. “I seriously love you.” She threw herself into his arms and kissed him like nobody was watching.

And only two hundred or so were.

Joey held her close, the color returning to his skin. “Will you marry me? I don’t care when or where. But just say you’ll be my wife.”

“Today.” Frances laughed, a soulful chuckle that indeed turned heads. “Let’s get married today.”

With her updo completely unraveled and her makeup in artful streaks down her cheeks, Frances walked down the aisle with her fiancé. They stood before the pastor, God, and those who loved them best, and exchanged vows. Promising to cherish each other in sickness and in health. For richer or poorer. With cats or butter and cream.

“I now pronounce you man and wife.” Pastor Higgins closed his Bible, and his sigh of relief could be heard two blocks over. “You may now kiss your bride.”

Family and friends jumped to their feet, cheering for the couple.

Joey tipped his wife over his arm and kissed her but good.

And I finally let out the breath I’d been holding.

Today love had won.

It beat out fear. And darkness. And doubt.

All because two people said yes.

T
he diner was
extra packed Monday morning. Locals wanted to get in for the blue plate special as many times as they could before Micky’s closed. Though there were more people stuffed inside, including a line that went out the door, the volume was subdued and eerily hushed. Folks carried on conversations in a tone usually reserved for funeral visitations.

In Between was sad. The melancholy ribboned through every city street, bounced off the rooftops, and was stirred into coffee cups with the sugar and cream. No matter what side a person had been on, it was a loss. There would be no more cinnamon rolls made by Loretta’s rough hands. No free coffee at the hardware store. No more haircuts whose prices varied by how much gossip you could bring to the chair.

Life moved on. It changed, it grew, it died, it threw out something new.

I realized I wasn’t good with change, and since coming to live with James and Millie, security had become an obsession. My idol. Somehow I would adapt to life without the Valiant. Life without Charlie.

Though maybe not today.

The object of my anger and years of affection now sat with his little sister in table number twelve. My section.

I snagged Kourtney as she walked by. “Hey, can you get that—”

“Consider it done.” Her tresses hung extra frizzy and limp today, as if in protest of her impending job loss. Kourtney adjusted the tray she carried. “Thanks for fighting for the diner.”