Here Comes the Bride, page 23
After the skits, it became obvious that there was a big theme running through the whole Engagement Encounter Weekend—discussing issues and concerns before marriage. She’d heard Ava say it a million times. “Now is the time to come to your partner with any concerns.”
The only concern she could think of was Janet. Was Janet going to drop in with expensive gifts forever? The weekend didn’t really seem centered around addressing issues with ex-girlfriends. The concerns that Ava mentioned involved how they would discipline the kids, manage their finances, and practice their faith.
Ava would ask a question such as, “Have you discussed how you will discipline your children?” Then each couple would break up for a short time. One person would go back to a dorm room, and the other person would stay in the activity room, so they could write down their answers without being influenced by the other party. After ten minutes, they would meet up again to discuss their answers with their partners.
Cate and Ethan had already discussed a lot of the issues that Ava brought up. They both wanted two, maybe three children. They’d created a budget when they’d moved in together, and both had agreed to avoid using credit cards. Oscar had provided more than enough opportunities to discuss discipline.
It was interesting to see how many couples hadn’t discussed stuff. It was hard not to overhear some of the conversations in the room. Dawson and Summer hadn’t even discussed how many kids they wanted, and it came as a huge surprise to Angie that Matthew didn’t even want kids. For the first time, she actually thought the weekend might be beneficial. A lot of people needed the opportunity to discuss their future.
“Remember,” Ava said over the buzz of voices. “There are no right or wrong answers here. Every answer is okay. It’s just important that you discuss these things before saying your vows.” She’d said it twenty-five times.
After hours of the same drill, Ava announced that they were going to play a game. One would’ve thought the dim lighting would’ve deterred the woman. They all stood around while she and Stu unrolled a giant tarp. It was covered with large rows of squares made from masking tape. “Okay,” she said clapping her hands. “This is my favorite game. Now I want each couple to stand on a square in the first row. Okay, everyone take their places.” Cate and Ethan took a square next to Dawson and Summer. “Now, I’m going to ask questions, and then for everyone who answers yes, you can move forward a square. Those of you who answer no stay behind.” She read the questions from a pad of paper. “Do you have a monthly or weekly budget plan?”
Along with two other couples, Cate and Ethan took a step forward. Summer and Dawson, Angie and Matthew, and even the nice couple they’d shared breakfast with all stayed behind.
“Remember, it’s okay to say no,” Ava said. “The important thing is that you discuss it. Okay, next question. Do you have plans for who will handle each household chore?”
Cate and Ethan joined two other couples in moving forward. Since Ethan was a much better cook, he’d prepare most meals, and Cate would do the dishes. He had trash duty and mowing the lawn, and she had vacuuming, laundry, and dusting.
Several questions later they were tied with three other couples. She looked over her shoulder and noticed Summer and Dawson still hovering around the first row, and Matthew and Angie were barely noticeable in the dark. They were still on square one.
“All right, next question. Have you discussed how you will handle family holidays?” It was the only question Cate and Ethan really hadn’t discussed. It was something she really didn’t want to think about. The thought of not having her parents around on Christmas or Thanksgiving made her heart break a little bit. Worse, the thought of sharing Yorkshire pudding and turkey with Denise every year for the rest of her life made her heart ache even more. They stayed behind.
“Have you discussed—”
“No we haven’t!” A frustrated voice echoed from the back of the room.
Ava looked startled, and everyone spun around to see who’d interrupted.
Matthew wiped sweat from his brow with the back of his hand. “We haven’t discussed anything!”
“Matthew,” Angie whispered as she touched his arm. “Calm down. It’s okay.”
“No. I can’t calm down! I can’t calm down because I suddenly realized we haven’t discussed anything. And I mean anything. There’s a lot you don’t know about me, Angie. I . . . I . . . I finally realized—I’m gay!”
Dawson took a few steps away from him. The only sound in the room was the the rain hitting the rooftop outside.
“I thought so,” Stu said quietly.
“Well, that’s okay,” Ava said. “There are no right or wrong answers here. It’s okay to answer this way. As long as you discuss it before—”
He began to laugh, joyously. “Oh that felt so wonderful! I’ve finally said it! I’m gay! I’m gay! I’m gay! I’m gay!” He was practically dancing. Angie looked as if she’d just had a bucket of ice water thrown over her head.
“Angie, I love you.” He grabbed her shoulders. “And I always will, but I can’t do this! I can’t. Oh what a release! I’ve finally said it!”
Angie pushed his arms off her shoulders. “And you’re telling me now? In front of twenty-five Catholics? I can’t believe you! How could you do this to me?” She pounded his arm with her fists. “You fucking bastard!”
He took her arm and pulled her from the room without saying good-bye.
“That is the perfect example of why you should discuss things—”
“Before you get married,” the entire room said in unison.
“That’s right!” Ava said.
Needless to say, the game was not the same afterward. Everyone was still reeling with the excitement and shock of watching Matthew come out of the closet. Cate was willing to bet none of her girlfriends had witnessed anything like this at their Pre-Cana weekend. They didn’t see Angie and Matthew again, and Cate could only imagine what poor Angie must be feeling. It was hard to believe that she didn’t have a clue that her fiancé was homosexual. It was horrible, but the whole scene had kind of added a spark to the day, and the game wasn’t as boring after that.
They ate dinner with several other couples while Stu played “One Bread, One Body” on his guitar. The topic of conversation at every table was Matthew and Angie, and most people wondered how she could’ve been so clueless.
Ethan leaned over and whispered in her ear, “When you’re finished eating, say you have to go to the bathroom and meet me at my car.”
“What?” she whispered back. “We can’t leave.”
“We’re not going to. I just want some fresh air and some time away for a little while.”
“All right. Sounds like a plan.”
They ate iceberg lettuce with thick ranch dressing and sandwiches with white bread and slices of orange American cheese. As soon as she was finished eating she felt Ethan’s elbow in her ribs. “You go first,” he whispered.
She slipped away to “the bathroom” and right before entering, she made a sharp left and headed for the door. She felt mischievous as she slipped out the front door of the convent.
Rain poured over the parking lot, and she ran to Ethan’s car. It was very poor planning on their part. He should’ve given her his keys. She pulled her sweater off and held it over her head while she waited. Luckily it was only a couple seconds before she heard the sound of his alarm deactivating. A couple seconds later they were sitting in the car with wet heads.
“I just had to get out of there,” he said.
“I know what you mean.”
“I just couldn’t take the darkness and the dank odor any longer. I thought we could just use a little escape, sitting in the car listening to music.” It sounded like the best thing she’d heard in ages. He popped in the latest Coldplay CD, and they held hands over the center console. According to the schedule they wouldn’t start their next activity for twenty minutes. They had twenty minutes of freedom. They left the car windows cracked just so they could breathe in fresh air.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m sorry I dragged you into this.”
He shrugged. “It’s no big deal. Really. I mean, don’t get me wrong. I could think of about eighty million other things I’d rather be doing, but I knew it was going to be like this. It’ll be over soon enough.”
She squeezed his hand.
“If Stu has copies of his CD for sale I think I’m going to buy one,” he said.
She laughed. “Maybe he can play at our wedding.” She told him the story about how she’d mistaken the words to “Oh Lamb of God” as “Oh Canada” for most of her childhood. Listening to his laughter put her in a much better mood.
“I wonder how poor Angie is doing,” she said.
“No kidding. But it’s better that she found out now.”
“I know. This weekend is really good for some people.”
Twenty minutes went by quickly, and before they knew it, they had to go back. Before leaving, they kissed over the center console.
“Next break. Meet me back out here,” he said.
“Will do.”
Before bedtime, they managed to sneak off to his car again. This time, they actually became more brazen and drove to a McDonald’s around the corner where they ordered soft-serves. It was dark so they figured it was safe to walk back to the building together. The air smelled crisp and clean from the rain. As they held hands, she was sort of glad they’d attended the retreat. It had been sort of fun sneaking around, and after Matthew and Angie, she realized how lucky they were to have each other.
• 28 •
A New Leader
The lights came on in the middle of the night. Summer moaned and covered her head with a pillow, so Cate got up and turned off their light switch. She slept horribly after that. Just as she’d drifted into a dream, a knock sounded on the door. “Time to get up, ladies and gents!” The voice was male and sounded Irish. She wondered what had happened to Ava.
After a hot shower and a blow-dry, her bangs were back to normal. She headed downstairs and expected to find Ava waiting by the cafeteria entrance with her hideous apron, but neither Ava nor Stu were around. In their place was a tall, white-haired priest with a ruddy complexion and a million broken blood vessels on his nose.
“Good morning to ya,” he said to Cate. “We’re goin’ to have Mass this mornin’, so please go into the activity room.”
“Where are Ava and Stu?” Her curiosity was overwhelming.
“One of them got the food poisoning last night, and they won’t be coming back.”
“Really?” Her prayers had been answered. “They’re not coming back?”
“I’m afraid not.”
It was all she could do to keep herself from shouting yes! at the top of her lungs.
Mass went by quickly. The priest introduced himself as Father Flannagan. “Everyone just mostly calls me Father Nick though,” he said. “I bet you never imagined you’d get marriage advice from a priest. I know it seems strange, but in many ways my relationship with God is like a marriage. I usually come to give Mass and answer questions, but since your leaders got sick, it looks like we’ll do an activity. Then I’ll let you guys go home a little early.”
She loved Father Nick, and judging by the blissful expressions of all her classmates she sensed that they did too. He was friendly and cheerful and normal, unlike the two phenoms who’d previously been in charge.
“So I’d like to start off the mornin’ with . . .” He reached for the hat, and she felt her palms grow sweaty when she remembered Ethan’s question. “... the questions you guys asked yesterday. Don’t worry. It’s completely anonymous.”
He pulled a tight, hard, square of paper from the hat. It had been folded a million times. It took him several minutes just to unravel it. He slid a pair of reading glasses over the tip of his nose. “Ah huh. Ah yes.” A spark of wisdom flashed across his eyes. “Now I know many of you might face this sometime in your marriage. The question is, ‘My fiancé wants to borrow money from his parents, but I don’t want to. I feel that it might put a strain on our relationship with them.”
He placed the paper on a chair next to him before addressing the group. “I always tell everyone who comes to me before marriage to avoid borrowing money from family members at all costs. As you go into marriage together you become your own family, and if you still rely on your parents for anything, it might create a certain amount of pressure or expectations that could make for very uncomfortable situations.” He said a lot of the same things Al had said when they’d discussed her mother.
Father Nick went through several questions, and Cate was impressed with some of the things that people had come up with. There were questions about interfaith marriages and dividing family holidays.
He was about halfway through when he unfolded a slip of paper and an obvious frown fell over his face. She knew which one it was and tried to avoid eye contact with Ethan, or anyone for that matter. He looked at the group sternly. “Now, let us talk for a minute about domestic violence.” Everyone eyed each other suspiciously, wondering who had asked a question that had caused this jolly old man’s face to turn to stone. “Domestic violence is never okay. In any situation.”
They spent an hour on the topic, and she couldn’t help but notice that throughout the lecture the priest didn’t look at them as she’d expected him to. For some reason she’d expected him to just know it was Ethan. However, he kept looking at Dawson, and the light bruise above his eye. She felt terrible.
They spent the rest of the morning going over the questions. When he was finished he told them that Ava had left a description of the last activity for the weekend. Each couple was supposed to split up again. This time they had to write a letter to their significant other. A letter that said what they loved most about them, and what they were most proud of—all the things they looked forward to in the future.
She could’ve sworn she heard all the men in room groan. She headed back to her room with Summer and began her letter.
It was nice to be able to tell Ethan how much she loved him. It wasn’t every day that people told one another how much they appreciated each other, or all the special things about them. She told him that he was her best friend, and that every time she thought about him she smiled.
When she was finished writing her letter she folded it up and caught a glimpse of Summer working on hers. She’d drawn hearts and smiley faces all around the borders. They went back downstairs, and Cate couldn’t wait to see what Ethan had written to her. She sort of wished she could read it in private, and not in a room filled with twenty other people.
They sat in fold-out chairs across from one another. He smiled at her when he gave her the letter.
Dear Cate,
I have to admit, at first I hated coming to the Pre-Cana weekend. But I decided to be a good sport and go along with it because I love you and this is what you want. However, when we started whispering and sneaking out to my car and laughing at the situation, it took me back to when we were kids. And I remembered falling in love with you for the first time. I really remembered what that felt like. I’ve loved you for as long as I can remember, and it’s only growing stronger. It’s not just because of your truly kind heart or all the good times we’ve experienced. Everyone has a special person in their life who makes all their problems disappear. To me that person is you. The sound of your voice, or the way you laugh can always remind me that everything is going to be all right. I’ve really enjoyed this weekend, and I’m looking forward to a lifetime of love and happiness with my best friend. I love you.
Ethan
“I love you too,” she said as she folded up his letter.
She felt a tear run down her cheek. This is why she wished she were in the privacy of her own home. She didn’t want to be a blubbering fool in front of a bunch of strangers.
She didn’t feel like much of a fool, and quickly quit crying when she noticed Dawson balwing like a baby. “I love you so much, baby.”
Summer cradled his head on her boobs as he cried.
“You’re the best piece of ass I’ve ever met,” he sobbed.
The weekend had seemed to be worthwhile for everyone.
• 29 •
Let GO Already
Halloween was always her favorite day of school. All the children came dressed in costume. They had a big parade at school, and each grade level got to participate. She loved watching all the kids in their costumes. A lot of parents came to help, and several mothers set up a party for her class afterward.
Cate and several of the other teachers at school had decided to dress up together as beauty pageant contestants. One of the fifth grade teachers, Mr. Petrowski, dressed as the MC for the pageant. Cate dug up one of her old bridesmaid dresses from her closet, a lavender one she’d worn in Cousin Val’s wedding, and made a sash that read “Miss Escondido” using a glitter pen. She bought a crown and put her hair in a French twist the day of school. Simone had found an old prom dress at a thrift store and wore a “Miss Pacific Beach” sash across her chest. Mr. Petrowski wore a cheesy toupee and rouge on his cheeks, and carried a fake microphone around with him all day.
Her students were by far the cutest things she’d seen in a long time. George came dressed in solid green. His entire face, including his lips, were covered in green face paint and he wore a gigantic green afro on his head. Cate didn’t want to ask him what he was for fear of hurting his feelings. She was relieved when little Priscilla Rowlands asked. She was dressed as a black cat. “What are you?” she asked.
“I’m a piece of broccoli.”
“What a creative costume,” Cate said.
His chubby hands clutched a fancy gold bag of truffles. She thought it was an odd contribution to the party. It wasn’t mandatory that the kids bring something. She wondered if his mom had felt pressured to provide something at the last minute and had sent him to school with a re-gift they’d had lying around their house. “What do you have there?” she asked.
