Four Times Blessed (7 page)

             
“Yes.”

             
“Don’t you feel better?”

             
“Not really, to be perfectly honest.”

             
“Oh, don’t worry, sweetheart, you look beautiful. Right, Eleni?”

             
“Yup, she looks great,” says Eleni.

I scowl at her.

              “Now, Crusa, none of that. You just be your sweet, beautiful self, and this boy won’t be able to help but marry you.”

             
I grunt.

“Your mother always had excellent taste in men, you know.” It’s possible this does make me feel a little better. A little.

              “Yes, she certainly had an eye for the handsome ones,” my zizi keeps on teasing. She takes my hand and Eleni takes my other one, granting me a gorgeous smile. People say she takes after my mother more than either Camillo or I.

             
When we step out of the trees and I see the boat, the obviously not-ours one that’s wide and white and at an awkward angle to the dock as of yet, I feel nauseous.

It won’t let up, so I just keep trying to ignore it and smile. That’s my job. Not too difficult. Easy, really. I can so totally do this. Plus, I think I could make it to those bushes if I really felt something coming up.

              My zizi and Eleni have me by the elbows, but I think Camillo’s wandered off. He thinks he’s so independent now that he’s an apprentice, that boy.

Santa Lucia, the entire island is here. Not that I can focus enough to recognize anyone’s faces. It’s just the general crush of bodies that I’m basing that assessment on. I swear, I can’t even see what passes for the sand here on our beach. It’s not like the beaches they show you in the books. Which worries me. I wonder if those are what this Andrew guy was expecting, coming to an island and all. This one’s still nice, though.

Sure, you don’t want to walk on it without a good pair of shoes. Boots, even. But that would look ridiculous, so people don’t do that. But they do wear their shoes.

             
The little beach here, it’s made of little rocks, size, smoothness, bleaching, all trying to tell you their whole life stories all at once. Honestly, they’re worse than my Uncle Canterbury’s wife. Who came from a quaint western island. From a family of three. Dreamed of being a florist, but now can’t even think of being anything other than her husband’s cute little island’s best squash grower. It’s because they start as flowers, you see, that they respond to her fingers so lovingly.

The stones on our beach, they gather in folds, with underskirts of upturned shells. You want to wear your shoes to walk on those, too, on account of the more delicate parts will snap off the heavy twisted hearts and then both ends end up wanting to slice your foot open. And beaches are dirty so you could get infected real easy.

              Anywho, the shells clatter over themselves as you walk, and I like it. I’ll tell Andrew about it if he takes me for a walk here one day. I’ll tell him how it’s like the dances the little girls do in tons of jewelry and dresses all covered with tons of shells. The whole ones that we hunt out and save from being stepped on the day before a performance, and spend all night sewing on for them.

             
Sometimes, the shells, when they’re all laying out at low tide, they remind me of the thumbprints of a whole host of angels, or maybe ghosts. Dusted and swept up against God’s dustpan, and that’s why they’re in little lines like that. I probably won’t tell Andrew that.

We move through the crowd. People smile at me and pat me, and I duck my head and smile back.

Yes, I am very excited to meet Andrew. Thank you, it’s Eleni’s dress, she lent it to me for today. Hi, it was so sweet of you to come. The wedding will be this fall, once we both finish our certifications. Yes, Andrew went to a military academy, too. I know, isn’t that funny? He was in communication-broadcasting, so he was on the military campus. Yes, an officer. Not Long Island, Upstate. Yes, it would be difficult to have him working in the same lab as me, he he.

             
There’s more but it’s making me uncomfortable so I pretend to be cutely distracted by the huge boat that’s docking in front of us and leave them all to talk about me to each other.

             
I know I’m nervous because my jaw is clenched and even in the sundress I’m steaming. I keep having to remind myself that the ground is one way and the sky the other because they keep trying to switch places on me. Which is annoying.

             
We come to a halt on the main dock. My zizi is fidgety and keeps clearing her throat. Eleni sighs and lets go of my arm because we’re both starting to sweat where we’re touching.

             
The crew of this Andrew’s boat tosses ropes to some of my uncles and I start having heart palpitations. Christ, what a boat. I believe it should be called a yacht, if I remember my lessons correctly. It’s sleek and smooth, and huge.

             
I feel weird when I think it will be mine.

             
I feel the blood switching places in my body haphazardly, and forefathers, that’s panic. Shoot, shoot, shoot. I can’t stop it so I just hang on to my zizi tighter and she holds my arm tighter still.

             
An automated staircase unfolds and there are gasps and whispers from all around us. We all watch it form itself, step by step, so quiet.

             
Then a door slips open from somewhere above, and there are people at the railings. We see the tops of their heads and I hear the chatter swell. A man in a black suit and sunglasses comes down the stairs, followed by another man just like him. By the time they spill out the bottom, I can’t tell them apart anymore.

             
A blaring noise comes from the boat and I bite my tongue. What the hell was that? It has a pattern. Ah, music. I’m way too tense.

There is music playing from somewhere on the ship. Now people are really talking loud, getting to say things they couldn’t before because this noise covers it up, or maybe they’re just trying to be heard over it. Then another person stops at the top of the stairs. He looks about my age and has a light complexion.

This must be Andrew.

             
He comes down the stairs and he’s wearing a type of clothes I’ve never seen before except on models in the internet ads that always sneak through. 

             
He looks excited when he sees us all waiting. Well, I’ll be. Thank goodness. He’s human and responsive to the environment. After all this time doing nothing but hearing about him, I was worried I’d turned him imaginary.

I pull off my aunt and she slips her arms away and clasps her hands in front of her. I reach over to Eleni so she can hand me the bouquet of flowers. Then I freeze because my crazy mind wonders if this really is Andrew or am I about to offer myself in marriage to one of his deckhands.

I smile and tell myself to be serene and don’t fall.

It’s something I learned at the academy. Poise, they called it. Put signs up about it on the walls. Part of their holistic approach to education.

              The walk to this Andrew guy is longer than I thought, but when I finally get there it’s easy because all I have to do is the same thing my zizi’s had me practicing on every single person that’s walked into the meetinghouse all week.

             
“Andrew. Welcome to our island. I’m Crusa, and we’re so happy you’ve come.” I smile until my cheeks plump and I reach up to give him a quick kiss on one of his ruddy ones. I debate whether I should actually let my lips touch him. I figure I should. His skin is chilly, and I bet the yacht has AC.

             
“Thank you for having me,” he says. “You’re more lovely than I imagined, Crusa. Please let me give you a gift.”

Hm, the boy gets points for already remembering my name. And bringing me a present. He turns to one of his black-suited men and takes a small box from him. I don’t know if I’m supposed to take presents from him right now, and my eyes want to search out my aunt but I don’t want to turn away so I force my head to stay forward. Another academy skill.

              Andrew holds the box close to his stomach, and I take a few steps in to get a better look. He smiles down at me and I blush. It’s embarrassing, but honestly I’m just surprised I haven’t thrown up yet.

             
“Please accept this from me as a symbol of our attachment. Let it be the first gift of our life together.”

             
Um, ok. I think maybe he had a script, too. He looks like he’s nervous when I take the box, though, and it’s endearing. He’s suddenly much less scary.

“Thank you,” I say as warmly as I can. I have nowhere to put my flowers so I wedge them under my arm and open the box.

              Inside are three gold bracelets, clean and sleek as the boat, excuse me, yacht, behind the sentinel-still boy.

             
“They’re beautiful,” I say. They are.

             
He smiles a nice smile, takes them out, and slips them over my hand. I take his arm because I know what we have to do next, and, thankfully, he allows it.

             
It must take over an hour just to get through all those people and back up to the meetinghouse.

             
I thank Jesus Christ when we’re safely seated at the head of a long table. People bring us things to drink. Having Andrew so close makes me nervous and tingly, so the cold lemonade is a nice shock.

             
I’m sure it’s a lovely meal because my zizi can do nothing less, but I don’t know because I can’t eat it. Mostly because I can’t believe I’m going to marry the creature next to me.

             
“So, Crusa, I’ve read everything of yours that’s been published. I most recently read your paper on
P. c. crucifer
. Very interesting.”

             
Apparently he’s researched me.

             
“I found the remarks you made in your conclusion about your data being supportive of the claim that human-generated climate changes are influencing the evolution of species unnaturally very…interesting. Don’t you think that’s a bit of a leap? I expected more, as they say, scientific restraint from someone from Long Island,” he laughs. “But it’s your first paper as a lead investigator, right? Nobody can blame you. Everybody sounds a little naïve in their first one. Besides, how can the beautiful woman sitting beside me have ever entertained such a shocking opinion?”

Huh? and Um… are about the only things I can think. Luckily, my aunt senses my distress and responds for me.

              “That was more the opinion of our Crusa’s research instructors, wasn’t it dear?”

             
“Uh…”

             
“I heard they’re known for more…environmental perspectives out here, what with the oceanography and atmospheric facilities they put in. Best in the nation. But are you saying my fiancée had a little help with her paper?” Andrew leans towards me and smiles.

             
“I had some help, but I did write the part you’re referring to myself.” Unfortunately. My advisor adored it. The central grading service did not. “I honestly didn’t mean anything by it, though.”

             
“Of course you didn’t, dear,” says my zizi, as worried as I am that we’ve just lost my husband over a stupid peep frog. I see her mouthing a prayer when, in the next moment, Andrew pats my hand.

“It’s not your fault. You should have been given more oversight. Your instructors should’ve looked after you more closely and pointed it out so you could change it.” He gives me a soft look and then shares an amused one with my aunt.

              I don’t know whether I’m more regretful of my mistakes or offended that he’s pointed them out. Darn that
P. c. lucifer
. I mean
crucifer
.

             
My aunt asks Andrew about his senior thesis, and he goes off excitedly about mass communication something or other, gesturing so widely that I have to use all my willpower to not duck. To occupy my mind, I start making a list of the qualities I appreciate about him. Because I know the priest is going to ask me for them when he comes to marry us. Ummm…enthusiasm…passion…sharp mind…and…