Conceived Without Sin (40 page)

"But I can't put my finger on it…" Sam trailed off.

He grabbed Buzz's shovel and began poking around in the hole.

"Then call off the wedding," Buzz
advised sagely.

"What?"

"You heard me." Buzz raised his eyebrows.

"I can't do that–"

"Because why?" Buzz asked.

"Because we're in love!" Sam said angrily, jamming the shovel in. The blade hit a thick root. "Got one!"

"You see. You just said it. You love her. I'm only kidding about calling off the wedding; I was testing you. You passed. Besides, I hear the band is rockin' and I want to go dancing
this weekend and drink free Pepsi.

"You love her. Marry her. Now relax. You're a nervous wreck, man. As your best man, I humbly advise you to take two aspirin, drink plenty of fluids, and call me in the morning. And give me a hand with this friggin' thing."

Sam threw the shovel down, picked up the ax, and hacked three times until he cut the root.

"Hey, Mister Green Thumb, you're gonna get blisters."

"Too late," Sam said, sucking a red blotch between his thumb and index finger. Buzz laughed.

"Okay. I'll play psychiatrist for you. Tell me, Sam, what exactly is giving you cold feet about Ellie? Does she have cold feet too?"

"Not that I can tell. She's as happy as a lark. It's me. Like I said, it's hard to put my finger on it. It's just something in the back of my mind, a nagging doubt. Something
she said the other night."

"My lips are sealed. You know, if you were a Catholic, you could be talking to a priest who has counseled fifty gazillion engaged couples."

"Buzz, let's not get into the Catholic thing right now."

"Touchy touchy," Buzz joked, trying to keep the conversation on an even keel.
Sam sure is wired today.

"So tell me what she said."

"She said she wasn't sure who she was. We
were alone together, having a nice conversation, and she kind of broke down. It's like I saw a side of her that I never saw before."

Sam paused. "She said she didn't know who she was."

"Who does?" Buzz asked slowly, purposefully.

"Don't get cute, Buzz," Sam said.

"I'm serious. Look, cut her some slack. I mean, who are you? Who am I? It's the big cosmic question.
Who are you?"

"I'm Sam Fisk," Sam
said without thinking.

"Are you sure that Ellie wasn't, you know, going through her, you know–"

"No, I don't think it was that."

Buzz leaned down and gave a tug on the bush. There was some give, finally. He put his work boot heel on the largest part of the stump, and pushed hard. The stump gave some more. "Almost there. A little more digging. You do it."

Sam picked up the spade and began digging
again. The sound of the chainsaw in the backyard came to a halt.

"I suppose Bill is done," Sam remarked, not looking up from his hole. "Boy, he's a bear for work. This is his third night in a row after work. Says his back is too sore to play pick-up, so he drives across town to haul dirt and cut down trees for me."

"He's quite a guy. I wonder why he never got married?" Buzz asked, looking up,
as if he could see the backyard through the walls of the house.

"Why don't you ask him, Dr. Buzz?" Sam said a bit testily. Sam's shadow was making it hard to see into the hole.

"Man, would you cut it out. I can't wait until you're married and the good-old, super-dull, stick-in-the-mud Sam Fisk returns."

Sam stopped digging. "Sorry, Buzz. I guess I've got a case of the nerves." He rubbed his forehead
with his forearm. "I've never gotten married before. I'm a wreck."

"Forget it. Take it out on me. I think I know what's bothering you about Ellie."

Sam didn't say anything. Buzz took his silence as a cue to continue. Sam resumed digging little clumps of dirt out of the hole.

"You see, when two people get together, they change each other. You and Ellie are changing each other. She's getting mixed
up with all these westsiders, too. She's been calling Donna every night since the Revco Ten Thousand. She's reevaluating herself. It's normal. This is Buzz Woodward, amateur psychologist speaking now. You see, you've been
idealizing
her because she's so beautiful and you're so fugly and you can't believe she loves you. A few warts show up, like Ellie's recent, run-of-the-mill, totally understandable,
garden-variety identity crisis, and you're flipping out."

"What does fugly mean?"

Buzz laughed. "You never heard of fugly? It's New Jersey slang for, uh, pretty darned ugly."

Sam frowned. "Those are some pretty fancy psychiatric terms you're using there, doc. Is this term fugly supposed to help or hinder my self-esteem?"

"The truth, as Freud said, is always good for one's self-esteem."

"No way
Freud said that!"

"Okay. I just made it up. Freud said Oedipus'll wreck ya, or something like that. The point is–your lack of good looks notwithstanding–the point is that Ellie is going to change on you. Just wait until she has a baby, man. It's part of the whole 'for better or for worse' thing. Hell, you might wake up one day and decide to become a Bible-thumping televangelist. Is she supposed
to dump you? People change. One day I was a fallen away Catholic, the next day I walk into a church, go to confession, and start reading Thomas Aquinas like I'm eating potato chips."

Sam thought about that. "I can see your point." He hesitated. "It's just that I've been having this horrible nightmare over and over again."

"You havin-zee nightmare?" Buzz twilled in his best terrible German accent.
"Und vil shu tell zee Doctor Buzz about deze horri-bell drrrreams?"

Sam ignored the accent.

"I dream that I'm on the wrong side of the court, sinking hook shots into a basket. You, or the Man, or Bill is always telling me not to shoot, but by the time I realize it, it's too late, the ball goes in, and I've lost the game. Donna or Ellie is in the dream, always, sitting on the bench. I've had it
four or five days in a row now. I wake up in a cold sweat. The images haunt me during the day. I can't concentrate at work."

Buzz rubbed his chin, then lit up another cigarette. Holding it between his teeth, he reached down to the stump again and gave it a huge heave.

"Rage! Rage, against the dying of the bush!" Buzz shouted theatrically.

The stump came out with a muted ripping sound, causing
Buzz to fall onto his bum.

Nonplussed, he took a drag on his cigarette. "Got the sucker!"

"Cool!" Sam rejoiced.

"I think I know how to interpret your dream, Sam."

Sam sat down on the grass next to Buzz. He had an irrational urge to ask to take a puff on Buzz's cigarette.

Nerves.

"Your dream means one thing," Buzz continued, "and one thing only." He paused, watching for Sam to be perfectly still.
Don't smile,
Buzz thought. "It means you're an extremely dysfunctional basketball player!"

Buzz fell back laughing with vim
and
vigor.

Sam punched him lightly in the ribs. Buzz laughed harder.

"Stop it!" Buzz yelled. "You're killing me! A
dysfunctional
basketball player–hah!"

"Very funny, Doctor Buzz," Sam said, finally allowing himself a laugh, but only a short one.

Buzz caught his breath, and
sat up, leaning back on one arm. "You know, Sam, Sirach says that any man who puts stock in dreams is a fool."

"Who or what is Sear Rack?" Sam asked.

"Sirach. Sirach was an Old Testament guy who was always giving out advice. You know the quote you read on the top of the Fact and Comment section in Forbes? You know, 'With all thy getting, get understanding?' That was old Doc Sirach. He's got a
lot of cool quotes. My favorite is, 'Let no woman have power over you, lest she trample on your pride.'"

"You're kidding, aren't you?" Sam asked, unsure.

"I kid thee not. Anyway, I wouldn't worry about your dreams. It's in the Bible."

"Didn't Joseph have a dream telling him to take Mary to Egypt?"

Buzz squinted at Sam. "You've been paying attention during the readings at Mass, haven't you?"

"No.
I just heard that somewhere. Well, does the Bible say to pay attention to dreams, or was Joseph not up on his Sirach?"

Buzz shrugged. "Ya got me. And I hate a Bible-thumper who doesn't even believe in the Bible. You would make a very annoying Protestant."

"Thank you," Sam said placidly. "Where are we going to put this stump?"

"Maybe we can leave it on the treelawn and some town guy will pick it
up. It's your town. You never know, in Shaker you might have to recycle the freakin' thing."

"You sure have a mouth on you," Sam pointed out.

"Sorry. There's another quote in Sirach that says to never start using foul language, because if you do, you'll never be able to stop. I started when I was a kid, and therefore, according to Doc Sirach, I'm a hopeless case. After all, it's in the Bible."

Sam chuckled. "If you're trying to make me laugh to help me with my nerves, well, it's working."

"Good, tell you what–"

"–Hey guys, can I borrow that ax?" Bill White called as he came around the side of the house.

"Sure Bill," Sam said. "What for?"

"I want to split the logs. Do you have a splitting wedge?"

"I don't even know what a splitting wedge is," Sam said. "I'm not much of a Harry Homemaker."

"You're gonna hurt your back, Bill. Why don't you call it a night?" Buzz suggested.

"Gee, Mom, thanks for your concern."

Sam laughed. "Buzz is right. Let's head for the adult beverages. Buzz has a special video for tonight."

"What is it?" Bill asked.

"An absolute classic," Buzz explained. "Charles Grodin in The Heartbreak Kid."

"Never heard of it," Sam said. "What's it about?"

"It's about a guy
who marries this girl and falls in love with a younger, beautiful woman on the honeymoon. It made Grodin a star. It's really weird, but funny."

"Hey, you just described yourself, Buzz!" Sam said.

"Thank you."

"Is that the kind of movie Sam should be watching two days before he gets married?" Bill asked seriously.

Sam and Buzz exchanged knowing looks.

"I think," Sam said with a smile and a nod,
"that it will probably be the perfect movie to watch. I need a good laugh."

After a quick meal of cold Dominos pizza leftover from the night before, they retired to the living room to watch the video.

The only furniture in the room was Sam's couch and the television stand. Neither Sam nor Ellie had moved in yet. There were no rugs on the hardwood floors.

As the plot became more absurd and more
hilarious, the laughter from the three men echoed throughout the house.

5

Donna, Ellie, and two of Ellie's classmates from Saint Marys spent that evening at Bucky's house. Sue McCormack, Ellie's roommate in college, was the maid of honor, while Jennifer Towey and Donna were bridesmaids. (Weeks earlier, Sam had asked Ellie to make Donna a bridesmaid so she could match up with Buzz during the wedding
after all the formalities were covered, and Ellie had reluctantly agreed. Ellie now wondered why she had been reluctant.)

They had gotten their hair done by a professional stylist Ellie had hired for the evening. A manicurist had also been hired.

Donna didn't dare ask what the cost of all the primping and fussing was going to be, and wondered if she was expected to chip in. She had already been
"forced" to spend one hundred and eighty-five dollars on the dress.

The hired help had departed.

Donna had barely uttered a word all night, intimidated by the "career talk" as she thought of it, between Ellie, Sue, and Jennifer. Sue was a lawyer, practicing in a huge firm in Chicago, and Jennifer was a financial something-or-other for General Motors in Pontiac, Michigan.

Sue and Jennifer had greeted
Donna politely but did not make a great effort to include her in the conversations.
Maybe that's their way of being nice.

She felt like a pet.

"Honey, we're going to do something about your make-up," Ellie said maternally, as they both admired Donna's new haircut at the vanity in Ellen's huge bedroom. Her room was bigger than all the bedrooms in the Beck's house combined.

Donna was both thrilled
and terrified by her haircut and style; she had trouble believing that she was looking at herself.

"My sister was going to help me with make-up for the wedding," Donna blurted.
Well, Cindy
will
help me if I ask her.

"We'll hear nothing of the sort," Ellie insisted. "We'll all help each other tonight; that way we can be certain our make-up doesn't clash with our dresses."

Sue and Jennifer nodded
as if Ellie had just said that the world is round and the grass is green. They were sitting on the bed, a mile away.

"Don't worry about them," Ellie leaned in close to Donna's ear so her two friends couldn't hear. "Sue is hopeless; she can't do make-up to save her life, but doesn't know it. I'm doing this for her. Just play along. Trust me, you'll look fab."

Donna could not be sure if Ellie was
telling a white lie or not. She wanted so much to believe Ellie, who had been treating her so–and Donna still hated the word–wonderfully since the Revco Ten Thousand tournament. She decided to believe her, because if it was a white lie, it was designed to make her feel good about the whole thing.

Sue and Jennifer were up first.

An hour and a half later, Ellie stood behind Donna, looking into the
mirror, and exclaimed with completely convincing candor: "Donna, we've brought out the real you! It's so exciting! Promise me, oh promise me you'll come over on Saturday and let me do it again, just like this, for the wedding! Oh Sue! Look at her!"

"You look fab!" Sue said in admiration. Jennifer nodded.

Donna blushed beneath her blush. She wasn't used to this girl-stuff. She held back tears.
If only they knew where I'll be in a few weeks!

"Sue, could you help Jen bring us the champagne from Bucky's bar in the den?"