From the Hat Down, page 38
“Give me your phone,” Sean said softly, eyes still wide.
Obediently, Meg pulled it out of her back pocket and handed it over. Sean dialed a number and waited. “Hi, honey,” she said. “It’s not Meg. But she has to tell you something anyway. I’m putting her on.” Sean handed the phone to her.
“Hi, Ted. It’s Meg.”
“What’s up?” He sounded concerned.
“I asked Gina to marry me and she said yes.”
Pause. “Are you serious? Oh, my God! Meg, that’s awesome! When? Where? Details!”
Meg laughed. “We haven’t quite gotten that far but Gina said she wants to have a ceremony at the DR. You guys are invited.” She stood and started pacing.
“Well duh,” Sean practically yelled as Ted started laughing in Meg’s ear.
“Hell, yeah!” Ted whooped. “Congratulations! Are you doing formal invites?”
Meg ran a hand through her hair. “Gina’s mom is all about that but I think Gina can rein her in. I don’t know. I just asked on Friday—well, technically it was Saturday and we spent all day Saturday telling people. I called my dad and he talked to Gina’s mom and it’s been insane. I’m a total basket case.”
“It couldn’t happen to better people. I’m so glad for you. I’m gonna hang up with you because I know Sean wants to throw a fit about it. Keep us posted. Bye!”
“Bye.” Meg hung up and stared at Sean. “Seriously. I’m totally beyond help. I’m not sure I can find my way home. I’m surprised I found my way here.”
Sean got up out of her chair and threw herself into Meg’s arms. “I am so proud of you,” she said. “And I’m getting all choked up.” She pulled away and wiped her eyes. “Fuck. I want to know exactly how it happened. Can you stick around?”
Meg grinned. “Sure. Technically, I have tomorrow off, so. . .”
“Oh, my God. Slumber party. You are so staying here tonight and we’re having a pre-bachelor party.” Sean stood regarding her. “Meg, I am so happy for you right now I feel like I could—I don’t know. Burst. Cry. Jump up and down. Fuck!” She hugged Meg again. “Oh, my God.” She wiped her eyes again. “Who else have you told?”
“Just family. I’ll be announcing to my other friends as I wrap my brain around it all. I’m still kind of floating.”
“So for real. How do you feel?”
“Like it was the right thing to do. Everything just fell into place.”
Sean gave her another hug. “Oh, my God. I cannot even—I am so excited. Let’s get a bucket of fried chicken and a bunch of ice cream and celebrate.”
Meg laughed. “I’m so glad you’re looking out for my health with those dietary choices.”
“Fuck it. This is momentous. This is the most amazing news ever. Now come on. Fried chicken. And more beer while we’re at it. Let me get my shoes on.” She turned suddenly. “And I want to talk to Gina.”
“What for?”
“To congratulate her. Duh! And besides, she’s going to be my sister-in-law of sorts.” She left and Meg stared after her, then pumped her fist in the air.
“Yes!” she said.
Meg finished her part of the paper, saved it, and emailed it to Sean. She checked her watch. Nearly nine her time. She and Gina generally talked around ten her time, though lately, they’d been talking quite a bit. Meg grinned. And it was never enough, as far as she was concerned. It had been nearly two weeks since the Fourth. She’d go back for another visit in a week. Not only to see Gina, but to sit down with her and Marcella to discuss the commitment ceremony and other things, like when Gina could move to Laramie.
Gina’s decision.
No hesitation.
She’d come to Laramie.
Meg leaned back, staring at the ceiling. So what if it wasn’t an actual marriage? It felt like one. It’d be great for their union to be legal, for them to get recognition under the law. But somehow, doing it in spite of that sat right with her. Gina had already suggested getting legally hitched in Canada, though it wouldn’t transfer to the U.S. Or Massachusetts or Iowa or the other two states that allowed marriage. It wouldn’t transfer to Wyoming, but hopefully some day soon that would change. Meg was already trying to figure out when a good time for a marriage in a state that allowed it might be. Who knew she’d be such a big ol’ marriage softie? She glanced over at Moonshine, who was dozing on his blanket near the door.
She pushed away from her desk to get him up and take him outside when her home phone rang. She checked the caller ID and groaned aloud. Irene. She ran through her options as the phone rang a second time. Let the answering machine pick it up? Answer and say she’s busy? Answer and hang up really quickly? Ignore it and pretend she never got the message? It rang a third time. Meg reached over and answered, deciding to take a gut shot. She hadn’t spoken to Irene in a while, and her dad would hear about it and gently remind her to call her mom.
“Hi, Mom. What’s up?” Her response must have caught Irene off-guard, because only silence greeted her.
“Meg?”
“Uh, yeah. What’s going on? Kind of late for you, isn’t it?” Nearly eleven for Irene, and she generally never called past eight Mountain Time.
“Maybe a little.” And then she launched into her usual spiel and how she’s been doing this, that, and the other and Ed’s doing such-and-such and why doesn’t she hear more from Meg, breathy sigh.
“Sounds like you’re busy. That’s good.” Meg remained casual, waiting for her mother to get to the point because calling at this hour meant she had one.
“Well, I. . .ran into Phil the other day and I found out that he’s actually moving to Colorado. And he mentioned that, well, that he and his fiancée were planning a visit to the ranch.”
“Yeah, he told me he wanted to bring Alicia up.”
“I didn’t realize he was engaged,” Irene said, a hint of indignation but maybe a little bit of contriteness, too.
“Well, Phil and I had a nice talk when he was here in May, and I knew he was.” Meg kept her tone level, wondering what Irene was up to.
“Ed says Phil’s father isn’t pleased about it.”
Meg could visualize her, drumming her perfectly manicured fingernails on whatever perfectly polished furniture was within reach. “Phil figured he wouldn’t be.”
“Ed says Wayne—that’s Phil’s father—got so angry when Phil finally told him that he threw him out of the house. Then Wayne drank himself into the next day and told Ed he was cutting Phil out of the will.” Irene’s tone was hushed, as if she was trying to pass a secret in a library.
“That’s pretty harsh,” Meg said. “And actually, Mom, it’s none of my business. If I want to know what happened, I’ll ask Phil. But you’re telling me this why?”
“Well,” she said in her normal voice, forgetting, perhaps, about the overdone Kentucky drawl, “after Phil said he wanted to take his fiancée—”
“She has a name. It’s Alicia.”
“Fine,” she snapped. “As I was saying, after Phil said he wanted to take her to the ranch, I went online, thinking I could pass along some open days for him—”
“I think Phil’s perfectly capable of calling Dad or emailing him about that. Or checking the DR’s event schedule online by himself.”
“Do you mind?” Irene responded, irritated. “May I continue?”
Meg waited.
“I saw something there that made me a little upset,” Irene said.
Meg sat up straighter. “Which was?” Her mom probably snooped all the time on the DR’s site. She was just using Phil as an excuse.
Irene was quiet for a very long time but Meg heard her breathing.
“I thought about calling your father,” Irene finally said, “and demanding that he take this—this bit of news off the website, but realized that it’s his site and I don’t really have the right to do that. So I decided to approach you about it.”
News? Meg went cold. Oh, shit. The commitment ceremony. She hesitated, trying to choose her words carefully before she spoke, trying not to just hang up. “Are you referring to my upcoming commitment ceremony?”
“How could you do this to me?” Irene said, hurt and disgust in her tone. “How could you broadcast your unnatural lifestyle to the public like that?”
There it was. Out there for all to see, and though Meg knew Irene harbored thoughts like that, hearing them hurt. Cut deep. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, hurt and anger jockeying for expression. “I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that.” She took another deep breath. “And it has nothing to do with you. It does, however, have everything to do with me and Gina.”
“It’s an embarrassment,” Irene practically wailed. “What will my friends think? My relatives? I haven’t even told Ed about it.” She drew her breath in sharply and Meg held the phone and stared at it as if she didn’t know what it was before she put it back to her ear.
“They can think whatever the hell they want. And if they’re going to judge you based on something you’re not even doing, then they’re not really your friends, are they?”
“How dare you? How dare you say that? You know nothing about me.” Her tone was clipped and bitter.
Anger wrapped around Meg’s esophagus like barbed wire. “And why is that, Mom? You just told me how unnatural I am. I think that pretty much says how you feel about me and my relationship with Gina. So how the hell would I be able to get past that to find out who you are?”
“I knew I shouldn’t have let you stay with your father.” Irene’s voice inched up a register. “No girl should be raised by a man alone. You wouldn’t have turned out like this.”
Meg clenched her teeth. She would not allow Irene to see how pissed she was. “Stop it. Go after me all you want. But you will not insult Dad. He did the best he could and he raised a damn fine daughter without your help. Your issue is with me. Keep it there.”
“If you had just come with me—”
“I’d still be gay.”
“I don’t need to hear this,” Irene said.
“Of course you don’t. And you’ve never expressed much interest in me anyway. But I’ve put up with your unending assaults on my dignity with your asinine homophobia and your ridiculous attempts to set me up with every man you see. And tonight, I had to endure you telling me how unnatural I am. I’m over it.”
“Don’t you talk to me like that.” Irene’s tone could have sliced meat.
“Then don’t talk to me like I’m something distasteful. And don’t pretend that I’m something I’m not. One, I’m not straight. Two, I asked Gina to marry me. She’s the person I will be sharing my life with.”
Silence. Meg imagined Irene as a deer in headlights.
“That’s—” Irene started but Meg interrupted, wanting to control the conversation and, by extension, her own anger. Her words came in a rush, like a dam breaking.
“Yeah, I know,” Meg said. “People like me don’t have that right. We’re evil and bad and not good enough for that. That’s bullshit, and I don’t care what you think. I don’t care what all your friends say about people who aren’t like them. I asked Gina to marry me and she said yes and it was the most amazing moment of my life. And it won’t be legal in most places in this country and we still won’t have the same rights you do, but we’re having a ceremony anyway because there are lots of people in our lives who care about us and want us to be happy, including Dad and Gina’s family. They want to participate in a ceremony, even though legally it means nothing, thanks largely to ignorance like yours.”
“You can’t talk to me—”
“And don’t pull your born-again crap on me. Jesus didn’t discriminate. He didn’t tell anyone that they couldn’t sit with him or talk to him because they were black or gay or lepers.” Meg stood and paced. The angrier she got, the steadier her voice sounded and she was glad for it.
“You’ve got a lot of nerve talking about Jesus,” Irene said in an icy tone Meg had never heard her use.
“No, you’ve got a lot of nerve running around disrespecting people in Jesus’s name.”
“You—”
“Wait.” Meg said it in such a way that it silenced Irene. “You need to hear this. I know you know Alicia’s black. Phil told me about Wayne. He told me what was at stake in his relationship. He told me what he risked losing because he loves Alicia. And he didn’t think twice about it. He’s giving up a hell of a lot to be with her but he’s doing it because he knows that he needs to live his life for himself and because he knows he loves her. Jesus talked a lot about love and forgiveness. He talked a lot about loving your neighbor as yourself. Phil’s dad is probably in the process of disowning him right now. Writing him out of the will because his son fell in love with someone he doesn’t approve of. Is that something Jesus encouraged people to do? Disown their family members for loving?”
“That’s different,” she said, anger in her own voice. “Completely different.”
“How? It’s racist. How is that different than homophobia? Both take things away from people. Both denigrate people. Both hurt. Phil and I have a lot in common. We both get shit for loving people others don’t approve of.”
“Don’t you talk like that to me,” Irene’s voice shook but whether from anger or something else Meg couldn’t tell.
A strange numbness coursed through Meg’s blood and she suddenly felt incredibly sad. “Whatever, Mom. Pull your head out of your ass and look around. There are a lot of people out there who don’t conform to your norms or your expectations. And just because they don’t doesn’t make them bad or evil or wrong. It just makes them different. As long as nobody’s getting hurt, why the hell do you care what people do?”
“I don’t have to listen to this,” she threatened. “Your offensive language and your unnatural views.”
“No, you don’t. So hang up.” Meg waited but Irene stayed on the line because Meg heard her breathing. She forged on. “Go ahead and believe what you want—believe what all your friends say about gay people. Because all that shit is wrong. I know for a fact. Because I am gay. And I’m not sick or unnatural or deviant. And none of my gay friends are like that. And I have lots of straight friends who know what you believe is wrong, too. And they’re going to come to my commitment ceremony and they’re going to celebrate the day and be really happy for me and Gina even though we can’t get married yet.”
“Well, I hope you’re happy with those people,” Irene almost spat. “Because you’re probably all going to hell.”
“I’m extremely happy. I used to wish you could be one of those people. I stopped a while back because it was clear I was not what you wanted. But no matter how hard you try to block it out, the fact is, I’m your daughter. I’m the one who lived.”
“How dare you bring that up? You don’t know anything about what I went through!”
She softened her tone. “You’re right. I don’t know. I’m sure it was horrible. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone. But you’ve got one who made it, and I’m right here. I graduated at the top of my class for both my bachelor’s and my DVM. I work hard. I take care of other people’s animals—their livelihood, out here. I help Dad every chance I get. I mentor students. I write research papers to advance knowledge in my field. And I met an amazing woman who loves all of that about me, who loves me for who I am. I’m more than your narrow views. And I wish you’d get past that.”
Irene started to cry. “How could you do this to me?” She said over and over. “Why can’t you be normal?”
Meg’s chest constricted. “I am normal. There are all kinds of normal and I’m in there.”
“Why?” Irene said with a little groan. “Why must you continue down this path? I just want you to be safe.”
The years of disappointment and tension Meg harbored toward Irene and toward their problematic relationship crawled up her throat. “I’m sorry I’m not who you wanted as a daughter. That’s not my fault. But maybe if you’d give yourself the chance to find out who I am, you’d be okay with me. I wish you would. Dad’s told me a lot about you and I think I’d actually like you as a person. But it’s not going to happen because you can’t get past your own biases. I am who I am. And I’m healthy and happy. If that’s not good enough for you, that’s too bad. Good luck, Mom. I hope you get out of life what you want.”
And Meg quietly hung up, shaking, feeling a numbness that left her cold, but also a deep relief that left her lighter. She went out back, needing to feel the Wyoming night and the distant comfort of a billion stars. She inhaled deeply, allowing the dark to calm her, and watched the sky for a while until she heard her cell phone ringing from the kitchen table. Gina’s ring. Meg smiled and went inside.
“Hey,” she answered.
“Hiya, Cowgirl. Have I told you lately how much I love you?”
Meg closed her eyes, still smiling. “I believe you did this morning. But say it again because I will never get tired of hearing it.”
“I love you more than Nonna’s marinara.”
“Holy shit.” Meg laughed. “Now that’s love.”
“Yep. So how are you?”
“Missing you. Loving you. Completely amazed, still, that you said yes.” Meg stood in the doorway, watching the sky again.
“I wanted to. I so wanted you to ask me to come to Wyoming,” Gina said, a smile in her voice. “I didn’t want to push you, though. I told you I’d wait, however long it took. And I meant that.”
“Good thing I realized the error of my ways.” Meg leaned against the doorjamb. “And asked before you turned a hundred.”
Gina laughed. “Well, that might have put a little damper on our honeymoon. I’d need extra coffee, maybe, to get going.”
A shooting star tracked across the sky, splitting the dark momentarily, like a flare. Meg sent it on its way with a little message of hope. “I think you’d get going just fine, Ms. Morelli. Past experience with you demonstrates that quite well.” She smiled at the heat building at her core. “So tell me about your day, future wife of mine. Spare me no detail. Even the boring ones.”
