The Sweetest Gift (The Gift) (18 page)

“This is the first time I ever got divorced before I got
married,” he said with a brief laugh. “I just hope that the children aren’t
going to be confused.”

“They’ll probably be fine in time,” Justin said, glad
that he didn’t have to be the one to break the news to Tucker about his
engagement to Maggie.

A couple hours later, Maggie descended the stairs to
find Tucker playing his guitar in the living room. Justin had taken the
children for a walk.

“How are you doing, Maggie? Are you o.k.?”

“Yes,” she said in a voice so low that he could barely
hear her.

“This is going to work out for the best, you’ll see. We
can still be best friends and music partners. I hope you’ll continue to make
records and tour with me.”

“Sure Tucker,” Maggie said listlessly.

“Maggie, I have something that I bought for you when I
thought we were going to get married. I’d like to give it to you now as a
symbol of my friendship and respect for you.”

Tucker went over to his guitar case and pulled out a
smaller case which was behind it. He handed it to Maggie.

“Open it, sweetheart.”

She opened the latches on the battered old case and
looked inside. Her hands started to tremble. She pulled the mandolin out of the
case and looked inside it through the f-hole.

“Oh my god, Tucker. This is a Lloyd Loar mandolin. I
can’t possibly accept this.”

“No, Maggie, you have to take it. You deserve this
mandolin and I want you to continue to be my partner. You’re very special to
me.”

Tears started falling from Maggie’s eyes again,
splashing on the surface of the mandolin like rain drops. She reached down with
her hand to brush them off. Just then, Justin and the children walked in the front
door of the house and came into the living room.

“What’s going on, Mama?” Belle asked.

Tucker looked at Justin and then he looked at the
children.

“Your mother is going to marry your Uncle Justin,” he
said.

“Oh yeah, we know,” said Belle and then the children all
ran upstairs to play in their rooms.

“Well, they seem to be taking that well,” Tucker said.

Justin looked at the mandolin that Maggie was holding.

“What’s this, Maggie?” he asked.

“Tucker just gave me a Lloyd Loar mandolin,” she said
and burst into tears again.

“Wow,” was all Justin could say.

.

Chapter 22

Later that afternoon, Justin moved their
suitcases over to the guest house in spite of Tucker’s protestations. Maggie
didn’t feel comfortable staying in the main house with Tucker since they
weren’t engaged any longer. Justin was more than happy to share the smaller
house with Maggie and the kids. He felt somewhat uncomfortable around Tucker
too since he felt that on some level that he had lured Maggie away from him.

That evening, they all joined Tucker over at his house
for dinner. Tucker had recently hired a new cook and she made a delicious
dinner for everyone. Maggie noticed that the dinner was more nutritious than
the food Tucker normally ate. Afterwards, they sat in the living room with some
tea, and Maggie asked him what was going on. Tucker looked slightly embarrassed
for a moment.

“My doctor had a talk with me while you were out in California. He told me that it was time to change my lifestyle. Cut back on the drinking,
the red meat, the fat. Lose some weight, get more exercise.”

‘Well, all of those suggestions sound like good ideas,
Tucker,” agreed Maggie.

“He also isn’t sure that I should continue touring right
now. I was hoping to talk to you about this, Maggie.”

“Oh, so what do you want to do about the world tour?”

“The doctor thinks I should postpone it for a while
until I get my blood pressure and cholesterol under control. Then maybe when
I’m in a little better shape, we could make some plans to tour in Europe and Japan.”

“Is there anything else going on Tucker, that you
haven’t told me about?”

“No, the doctor’s just playing it safe.”

Maggie looked at Justin and he could see that she was
alarmed. Maggie had been worried about Tucker’s health ever since he had a
heart attack at the Grammy awards. He had stopped doing the drugs that had
precipitated the heart attack, but she had noticed that he often seemed tired.
Tucker had spent most of his life living on the edge and she had the feeling
that it was starting to catch up with him.

“We could always work on another album, Maggie.”

She smiled at him and took his hand.

“I’d like that. Maybe we can come back when the kids are
on vacation or you could always come stay with us.”

“I’m sure we can work something out,” Tucker said.

Maggie noticed that her children were signaling her from
the front hall.

“I hope you’ll excuse me Tucker, but it looks like the
kids want me to go back with them to the guest house so they can get ready for
bed.”

Tucker stood up and walked over to Maggie and kissed her
on the cheek.

“Stay a couple minutes, Justin,” Tucker said. “I need to
talk to you about something.”

Maggie and the children left the house and walked down
the driveway to the guest house.

“What do you want to talk about, Tucker?” Justin asked.

“I want you and Maggie to know that you’re always
welcome here. In fact, after Maggie and I were engaged, I changed my will so
that she would be the main beneficiary of my estate. I’ve already settled a lot
of money on my daughter Clara and she’s not interested in leaving Australia to move to the United States. I want Maggie to inherit the property here in Nashville, and the rights to my music.”

“Are you sure you don’t want to change your will now
that you aren’t engaged any longer,” Justin suggested.

“No, I don’t think so. Maggie and her kids have always
been like a family to me. You too, Justin. I haven’t forgotten the way you took
care of me after I had the heart attack at the Grammy awards. I want you and
Maggie to consider this your home in Nashville, and after I pass, it actually
will be your home. Maggie is always going to need a home base here in Nashville, this is the center for her kind of music.”

“Tucker, this is incredibly generous.”

“Don’t say anything about this to Maggie, please. I
don’t want to make her nervous. I’m fine and hopefully I will stay that way for
a long time. I just want Maggie and you and the kids to know that you always
have a home here.”

Justin patted Tucker on his back.

“It means a lot to us,” he said choking up for a moment.

The next afternoon, everyone decided to go for a walk
down to the stables to feed the horses. The children ran up ahead to the barn,
leaving behind Maggie, Justin and Tucker.

“So do you have any wedding plans, you two?” Tucker
asked.

“Not really, we haven’t had much time to think about
it,” Maggie said.

“Well, you know that I was pretty excited about putting
on a big wedding, Maggie. I was wondering if you and Justin would consider
having your wedding here. It would mean a great deal to me.”

“Oh Tucker, that’s incredibly sweet,” she said and
kissed him on the cheek.

“You have a lot of friends in Nashville and we could
invite your family from Boston and all your friends from Louisiana. Justin
could invite his parents and his friends from California. I’d like to host a
big celebration of your marriage, give the children something to remember for
the rest of their lives.”

“I don’t know, what do you think Justin?”

Justin looked at Maggie and Tucker and smiled. “I think
it’s a great idea.”

“O.k., I don’t want to interfere too much, so I’ll leave
all the wedding plans to you. If you need help with anything, just let me know.
I was never able to host a wedding for my daughter Clara, so I would enjoy
having the opportunity to do that for you,” Tucker said smiling at Maggie.

“Thanks Tucker,” Justin said.

“Ah no problem, it’s going to be a lot of
fun.”

Over the next few days,
Maggie, Justin and Tucker started making plans for the wedding. Maggie and
Justin didn’t want to wait too long, so they picked Columbus Day weekend for
the date. Tucker invited a well-known wedding planner to come by to meet with
them to go over the details of the reception. They decided to set up a
flowering arbor in the garden for the ceremony, and tents around the lawn for
the wedding meal. They settled on a preliminary menu of southern barbeque
combined with some Cajun dishes like okra gumbo with jambalaya to celebrate
Justin’s heritage. The caterer suggested a Bananas Foster station and New Orleans bread pudding with bourbon raisin sauce for dessert.

Then Maggie, Justin and Tucker
started working on the guest list. Maggie thought they should limit it to 500,
Tucker thought he would have trouble keeping the guest list under 800. Finally
Justin had to take him aside and remind him that Maggie wasn’t fond of being
the center of attention at large events. He told Tucker that if they didn’t
keep the size of the reception down, then Maggie probably wouldn’t show up.
Justin remembered Maggie’s first wedding which barely had 100 guests, and how
nervous she had been walking down the aisle.

Next, Maggie asked Tucker if
he would take her to a bridal shop in Nashville so she could look at wedding
dresses. Maggie was somewhat superstitious, so she asked Justin to remain
behind with the children since she didn’t want him to see her in her dress
before the wedding. Tucker had called ahead to warn the bridal shop owner that
they were coming, and she had reserved two hours of her time to meet with them
and show Maggie dresses. When they walked in the front door of her shop, the
owner appeared to be flustered for a moment. For anyone in Nashville, it was a
little like getting a visit from royalty, in this case the King and Queen of
Country Music.

“Mr. Travis and Miss Williams,
so nice to meet you,” she said and almost curtseyed. “So are you the happy
couple?”

“Well, we might be happy and a
couple, but we’re not the ones getting married,” Tucker said. “Miss Williams is
marrying her long-time bass player, Justin Boudreau.”

“She’s going to make a
beautiful bride. I think that we might have some dresses that she will like.”

Maggie was starting to feel a
little left out of the conversation, so she decided that it was time to take
control of the proceedings. She walked over to a rack of dresses in the middle
of the room and started describing what she was looking for.

“This is going to be my second
marriage, so I don’t want white. I’d like something simple, nothing too over
the top.”

“What, no rhinestones?” Tucker
said and laughed.

Maggie smiled and pulled out a
dress that had caught her eye.

“No, something like this.”

“Excellent choice, Miss
Williams. The dresses on that rack are from Vera Wang. I think we have a couple
dresses that you might like.”

The owner took out some
dresses and hung them up so Maggie could get a full view of them.

“They’re all pretty, but I
especially like this dress. I like the way the fabric on the skirt folds to
almost look like a cascade of flowers.”

“As you can see, that is a
strapless sweetheart A-line gown. The drop waist bodice is asymmetrically draped
and the full chrysanthemum skirt is made of organza.”

“It’s so beautiful,” Maggie
murmured.

“I like it too,” Tucker said
decisively. “Why don’t you try it on, Maggie?”

“O.k.”

Maggie went into the dressing
room with the owner and changed into the wedding gown. A few minutes later, she
emerged to show the dress to Tucker who was sitting down in a chair.

“Maggie, I’ve never seen you
look so beautiful,” Tucker said. He sighed for moment. “Maybe I shouldn’t have
encouraged you to marry Justin.”

“No, you were right. Our
utmost consideration should be providing a family for Jake.”

The shop owner discretely went
into a back room and returned with a selection of veils.

“Would you like to see how a
veil would look with this dress?”

“I’m not sure that I would feel
comfortable wearing a veil. They seem so….” Maggie searched for the word for a
moment. “Virginal.”

Tucker laughed softly, and
smiled at Maggie.

Maggie laughed too.

“It’s going to be hard to pull
off virginal when I have three kids. In fact, I’m not even sure I should go for
the white dress.”

“Well, it’s not exactly white,
Maggie, it’s kind of off-white. And perhaps it’s symbolic of the purity of your
love, if not your body.” Tucker smirked for a moment.

“Oh Tucker,” Maggie laughed.

“You could always go for
something in red,” Tucker continued to tease Maggie.

He finally ended up eliciting
a laugh from even the shop owner.

“Many of our older brides wear
white,” she said, “it’s traditional.”

“Then maybe you should take it
Maggie, it’s certainly beautiful on you.”

“O.k., I don’t think I’m going
to find a dress that I like more than this one.”

Maggie quietly asked the shop
owner the price of the dress and was a little shocked by her answer. The owner
went to the back of the store to give Maggie and Tucker some privacy.

“Tucker, this dress costs as
much as my new Weaver mandolin,” Maggie whispered.

Tucker laughed.