One Good Friend Deserves Another (27 page)

Wendy looked anywhere but at her mother, unsure of how to respond.

“What I came here to tell you today was how truly, truly sorry I am about you and Parker. If you’re very sure this is the right thing for both of you…well, I’ll do my very best to do what a mother
should
do, what I’m very good at, and that is smooth troubled waters.”

Wendy bowed her head, strangely moved. She noticed her mother’s hands. Normally, her mother’s fingernails were finished with the subtle rosy hues of a French manicure, refreshed every Monday morning. Now, those white tips were ragged with chips, the cuticles bitten into little bloody strips.

And it came to her that while she was at the cabin, licking her wounds and seeking comfort among her friends, her mother had remained at the club, skipping all her appointments, facing the swarm of gossips with no information at all.

Wendy reached out and took her mother’s hand. Across her mother’s face passed a spastic little smile that threatened to quiver into a sob.

“Maybe, Mom,” Wendy murmured, “it’s time you started treating me less like a daughter and more like a friend.”

“Oh, Wendy.” Her mother laughed, a little laugh that was half relief and half despair. “How in God’s name am I ever going to do that, when I can so clearly see disaster coming?”

“Just hold your breath and cover your eyes.”  Wendy thought of the weekend she’d just spent with Dhara, Marta, and Kelly, thinking of what true friends do for one another.  “If it all goes badly, well…I could always use help picking up the pieces.”  

T
hey say there’s nothing like April in Paris, but Marta was convinced the City of Lights couldn’t hold a candle to September in New York City. This month was a crystal blue calm between the hordes of summer tourists and the crush of the Christmas season. To her, the air smelled of pencil shavings and the warm-linen perfume of new notebooks. Even if she had no other reason, the fine weather alone was a good excuse to take a Sunday stroll through Central Park.

She wandered into a maze of white tents that marked a craft fair. She paused at one pavilion to peruse a vendor’s collection of painted wooden bracelets. She breathed in the scent of fried dough and promised herself some for lunch. She bought a straw hat tied with a coral scarf that matched the sundress she was wearing. No reason to hurry. Scurrying to get things done was an old habit she was trying hard to change.

Two-thirds down the second row, she came upon Gabriel Teixeira’s booth. She slowed her approach, scanning the paintings hooked on the flaps. Yesterday, in the popcorn-scented shadows of a seedy Asbury Park bar, Wendy had finally cracked enough to give some details about the man and his work. Marta figured the three watered-down drinks had a lot to do with the loosening of Wendy’s tongue, but it didn’t hurt that the four of them had spent the day amid the rough-edged pleasures of the Jersey boardwalk. Riding a fifties-era wooden roller coaster seemed like a fitting way to blot out the fact that yesterday would have been Wendy’s wedding day.

Marta saw the man’s feet first. His black sneakers were hiked up on the table. He tilted back on a folding chair, his face buried in a tattered book. With a quiver of worry, Marta looked away. This man had torn apart an engagement and unhinged a steady woman. So she sent up a Hail Mary hoping he wasn’t an unkempt jerk of a hipster, a newer version of Wendy’s former weakness.

Hiding her face with the brim of her new hat, she wandered to a pile of large framed paintings leaning against the tent pole. She thumbed through them, becoming more convinced with every click of the frames that she’d found the right Gabriel. Each new canvas illuminated what Wendy had been trying so hard to describe: the fragility of everyday things, and the hopefulness of pure light.

Then she found it.

“Can I help you?”

Marta startled. She glanced up.
Up.
She found herself face-to-face with a dark-eyed, dark-haired hunk. Clean-shaven. His hair a crisp temptation for a woman’s fingers. His features, utterly arresting.

She considered a moment, searching his face for the unknowable. Character. Integrity. Kindness.

Physically, at least, she approved.

“Yes, actually, you can help me.” She tipped the frames against her legs to better reveal the painting that Wendy had so lovingly described. It was a collection of four bottles of different shapes and sizes, clustered together in the light pouring through an old window. “How much for this one?”

His expression shifted, lightning-quick, from polite curiosity to surprise. “That isn’t for sale.” He hefted the painting and then carried it around the table. “Apologies. That wasn’t supposed to be there.”

“Please don’t disappoint me.” She followed as he leaned the frame gingerly against the back tent post. “A friend of mine saw that painting about a month ago, and she can’t stop thinking about it. She wanted to buy it then, but the circumstances weren’t right.”

“I have others that are similar.” He walked to the other end of the tent and started flicking through a different set. “Let me show you—”

“Sorry. My friend fell in love with that one the moment she saw it. She has very particular taste.” Marta pulled off her sunglasses. “She works in the Haight-Livingston Museum.”

Marta was sure Dhara could name those long muscles in a man’s back, the strong swooping ones that go from the shoulder to the hollow of the lower spine. They flexed as Gabriel stilled.

“She’d probably kill me if she knew I was here today, spilling her story to a stranger. But I felt compelled.” She softened her voice, not for privacy’s sake, for around them buzzed skateboarders and strollers and weekend joggers, but because she sensed the tension emanating from Gabriel. “It’s a heartbreaking story. About the same time she fell in love with this painting, she broke an engagement. She has been in pieces since.”

He turned to her with eyes full of emotions she couldn’t begin to name. Except for pain. Yes, she recognized that kind of pain.

Marta’s heart did a little lurch.

Oh, Wendy. Now I see.

And she felt a certainty come over her, as if she had just seized the ball during a championship game and could envision the path through centers and forwards to the opposite end of the court. She hadn’t been sure how she’d handle this today, willing, for once in her life, not to make a set of bullet points to guide the conversation. All she knew was that once-bookish little Marta had shot up through the world like a rocket and—because of bad timing and single-minded stupidity—she’d lost one of the best guys the world had to offer.

She didn’t want that to happen to Wendy.

“It’s a strange thing,” she said. “With everything my friend has been going through, she can’t get this painting off her mind.”

Gabriel crossed his arms and swayed a little. “Better not buy it for her then. It’ll just remind her of bad times.”

“On the contrary. It’ll remind her that she made the right decision.”

Moods shifted across his face. He searched some horizon beyond her, some point much farther than the opposite booth. “You’re Marta, aren’t you?”

She flinched.

“I guessed right.”

“Honestly,” she sputtered, “I can neither confirm nor deny—”

“She used to talk about her friends. Kelly, the computer genius. And the doctor, Diana—”

“Dhara.”

“Yes, Dhara.” He changed focus, fixing on her. “Wasn’t hard to figure. The only one of you likely to risk getting into the middle of this was the high-powered Manhattan attorney.”

She dropped her gaze as she felt for the first time in a while an honest little thrill for being pinned as both a successful lawyer and a good friend. “You’re mistaken. This girl, Martha, whoever she is, should know better than to stick her nose into her best friend’s business.”

“Dangerous, that.”

“There may be an exception, though. Like, if she’s hoping to stop one painful decision from turning into two.”

He made a little grunt and tightened his grip on his arms. “Frankly, I’m not convinced selling this painting to you will do any good.”

He crouched down before the painting again. He rubbed his bare neck as his head sank between his shoulders. For a long time he just stared, as close to the painting as a man would come to the face of the woman he wanted very much to kiss.

Lucky, lucky Wendy.

“You know, you’re right.” She took a step away from the table into the bright September sunshine. “I’m not buying it today. It shouldn’t be me who gives her that painting.”

“She won’t take it from me.”

“Maybe not now.”

“I want her to have it.”

“Why don’t you hold it for her until she’s ready to see it again?”

He granted her his profile, tight and infinitely sad. “You really think that time will ever come?”

Marta slipped on her sunglasses, thinking about how long it took to heal a battered heart.

“Give it six months,” she murmured. “Yeah, six months ought to do it.”

These days, Marta’s heart felt like a helium balloon drifting loose in her chest. The experience of Dhara’s wedding ceremony swelled it to an exquisite fullness.

Desh had arrived midday amid a raucous entourage of family and friends. He greeted Dhara’s mother at the entrance to the hall where she blessed him by marking his forehead in red. (Vermillion and turmeric powder, Kelly whispered later, as they stood on the bridal side of the wedding canopy watching the achingly gorgeous couple circle the sacred fires.) Dhara’s father welcomed Desh at the wedding canopy, offering presents before escorting his daughter down the aisle. At the end of the Vedic rituals, the grandparents—stooped and smiling—shuffled down the flower-strewn aisle so the bride and the bridegroom could touch their feet in reverence.

And now, the ceremony over, the photos taken, and the whole reception waiting in the hall for the married couple to make their official appearance, Marta stood by a tall terrace window blinking into the sunlight. She gripped the folds of her organza sari, determined not to use the fabric to dab at the tears that kept threatening the kohl around her eyes.

A tissue appeared in the blurry range of her vision. Marta grasped it and then glanced beyond to Kelly’s teasing wink.

“You wouldn’t know that I’ve been to dozens of weddings.” Marta patted under her eyes. “I mean, I had like eighteen bridesmaid’s dresses. I gave them all to a niece last year.”

“There’s nothing like a Hindu wedding.” Kelly’s jewel-blue sari set off her piled red hair to striking effect. “And this one, particularly so.”

Marta nodded her agreement. This three-day series of ceremonies and parties, the chanting of the Sanskrit, and the whole ritual joining of the families had revealed to her so much that she had never understood. Dhara and Cole’s long, cautious courtship suddenly made sense. Dhara’s battle with Cole’s addiction seemed, in Marta’s estimation, one step closer to heroism. Marta wasn’t about to set her own aunt Fidelia on a hunt for an appropriate bridegroom, but right now, crumpling her soggy tissue, she was filled with new appreciation for Dhara’s leap of faith.

“Desh really is a hottie, isn’t he?” Marta flicked open the latch of her clutch and shoved the soggy tissue within. “In a scholarly, owlish sort of way.”

“He adores her.”

“He’s star-struck. She looks like a goddess.”

“I think that’s the point. Oh God, I want a wedding just like this.”

“Here’s your chance.” Marta caught sight of a young man by a small café table glancing their way. “Ravi is eyeballing you for about the fifteenth time today.”

Kelly scanned the room until she caught Ravi’s eye. She sent him an awkward little wave. “He doesn’t recognize me. I keep looking at my reflection and not recognizing myself.”

“Don’t be silly. He remembers you from the engagement party.”

“He is sort of cute, isn’t he?”

“Yes, he is. Now stop grinning and turn around,
chica.
Give the guy a chance to chase.”

“I don’t know.” Kelly moved to the opposite side of the window, leaning against the frame, so Ravi could see only her back. “Ravi might be a complication right now.”

“What, three guys chasing you is too much for Kelly Palazzo to handle?”

“What’s this about Kelly and three guys?” Wendy joined them. She looked as fragile as a harem slave, the kohl she must have freshened in the ladies’ room making her brown eyes look enormous. “Don’t disappoint me, Kell. I have my heart set on you and Trey.”

“Up in the air.” Kelly furrowed her brow. “Possible but unlikely.”

“My money’s on Lee Zhao.” Marta jerked her chin in Ravi’s direction. “But I wouldn’t mind another Hindu wedding.”

As Wendy riffled through her purse for what Marta suspected was a cigarette, Marta exchanged a glance with Kelly. Dhara had specifically tasked Marta and Kelly to watch over Wendy during the three days of ceremonies. A wedding so close after the date of Wendy’s own broken plans couldn’t help but bring up difficult emotions. Now Marta searched her heart-weary friend’s fine features for some subtle sign of distress.

“Please, you two.” Wendy rolled her eyes as she pulled out a pack of mints. “Practice a little subtlety, huh?”

“We’re just worried about you.”

“Did you see Dhara? Did you see how she was beaming? You think I would have been beaming at my own wedding?” She ripped open the end of the roll and offered them a mint. “No way. I’d have been vomiting in the planters.”

“Just checking,
chica.
”

“This is the way a wedding should be. Every day, I’m more sure of that.”

A noise at the other end of the hall caught their attention. The doors swung open to reveal Desh and Dhara, striding in to cheers and congratulations. They’d changed clothes from their gilded reds, and now both Dhara’s gloriously beaded sari and Desh’s long tunic were a pure white. The couple was soon lost in a crowd of well-wishers.