Page 47 of Best Woman
“I’dneed at least nine,” I shoot back.
“Please, everyone, it’s my wedding day. Can we not?” Aiden says.
“You’re the boss,” Derek says.
“Butonlytoday,” I say, searching through my bag—HannahG, American Music Awards, last year—for the concealer Mom purchased the other day. “Tomorrow you are back to being mine to torment.”
“Did you guys know that Julia once shot a staple gun at me?” Aiden asks the group. “I was seven.”
“Shut up,” I fire back. “You were nine. You’re lucky this is a little too yellow for me. You need to wear more sunscreen.”
“Fuck off, I wear SPF fifty! I’ve just been playing a lot more golf than usual,” Aiden says, leaning back in his chair with hiseyes closed like a model being prepped for fashion week. “I got a hole-in-one today!”
“Your life is my hell.” I start dabbing a light layer of makeup under his eyes.
“I moved the ball while he wasn’t looking,” Ben whispers into my ear as he leans against the table next to us. “I’m dying to sit down but I don’t want to crease,” he says at normal volume, shifting uncomfortably in his dress shoes. It’s nice to know that his level of perfection isn’t easy for him to maintain.
I roll my eyes. “OK, diva.”
“You look amazing,” he says, bumping my hip with his. “Sure you don’t want to take the guys up on that offer to clear the room?”
“Not really,” I say, tapping the concealer under Aiden’s eyes. “But maybe before the reception?”
“Ugh,” Aiden says below us.
Eventually the testosterone starts to become overwhelming, so I escape for a moment of quiet out the side doors of the temple building, where a large courtyard connects the synagogue with the four-story building where I attended Hebrew school until I was fifteen. The courtyard is empty and blissfully quiet, so I walk in a slow circle around the mosaic laid into the ground depicting colorful scenes from the Torah: Moses posed in front of the Red Sea, waves parted to allow the Jews passage.
Passover has always been my favorite Jewish holiday. Hanukkah is lame primarily because it isn’t Christmas, Purim is overwhelming. Sukkot is nice enough, but Passover is so rich with ritual, tradition, and food. There is something about sitting around and telling a story, acting out its dramas in the same way they’d been acted out for generations, dipping the parsley in thesalt water, hiding and hunting for the afikomen. I always feel connected to something bigger than myself, sitting around that table with the people I love, people who are as familiar to me as the traditions we share.
That’s what today is about. As nerve-racking as this week has been, with emotional land mines at every turn, it isn’t about me. It’s about celebrating life and love and history and the future. I don’t believe in a lot of it, can’t ever see myself doing it, but I understand why Aiden wants to, and I’m happy that he’s getting what he wants. I can do that for him today, and let everything else wait until tomorrow.
I rejoin Aiden and the groomsmen just in time for Aiden and Rachel’s first look and an ensuing photo session. We pack into a small but well-appointed room so the happy couple can sign the ketubah. It’s packed and noisy in the antechamber. I feel sticky under my dress and we haven’t even gotten to theceremony. The bra my mom forced on me is uncomfortable, the underwire digging into my chest, although I have to admit it’s doing wonders for my boobs.
Rachel looks gorgeous in a silky, lacy gown I would never have expected she’d wear. It’s very vintage and glamorous and sexy while still being modest and traditional. I’d always thought she was pretty, but now I see what Aiden sees. She is gorgeous and glowing, and she smiles every time she looks at my brother. Today is the happiest day of her life, and that’s all I want it to be for her.
Before I know it, we’re back in the groom’s quarters, and I can hear the sanctuary filling up through the thin walls. The groomsmen are passing a bottle around, one I wave off as Derekoffers me a swig. I cross to where Aiden stands checking himself in the mirror.
“Don’t name your kids something embarrassing,” I say. “And don’t get a minivan. Go on lots of vacations but only tointerestingplaces, like Copenhagen or Tokyo or Mexico City. Do not wearJust MarriedT-shirts at Disney.” His eyes meet mine in the mirror. “Don’t lie. Don’t cheat. Don’t vacation exclusively on cruises. Don’t go to bed angry. Don’t be one of those married couples who only hang out with other married people.” I draw closer behind him, fixing and fiddling with the back of his hair. “Tell her how you feel, even if it scares you. Tell her you love her all the time. Mean it.”
“I will,” he says. “But we already have the T-shirts.”
Somehow, I’d forgottenthat Kim and I would be walking down the aisle together.
She meets my eyes warmly, devastatingly beautiful in her burnt sienna slip dress, with her braids pouring down the open back, skin shimmering in the synagogue’s warm lights and rich tones. I think about how she’d felt over me, under me, inside me yesterday, how close we’d been. We wait as the couples make their way, one by one, toward the chuppah. When we are the last pair left, she holds out her arm so I can take it and leads me down the aisle. It’s exactly as I’d imagined: two beautiful women in gorgeous gowns surrounded by a crowd of family and friends. This is the image I want my family to have of me. To replace the little boy and awkward teenager of their memories and leave me forever as this: a woman, thebestwoman.
I’ve won. So why doesn’t victory feel like I thought it would?
Because with every step toward the bimah, I alternate between memories of last night in Kim’s bed and everything I lether assume all those weeks ago. The righteous anger she’s deployed on my behalf toward Aiden and my mother, the judgment she’s made of my entire family. Victory feels hollow when I’ve lied for it, when I hadn’t really needed it to begin with. In every way that matters I have the life I want. It isn’t always easy and has in fact often sucked, but I had saidThis is what I want my life to be,and I had made it happen through sheer force of will. And everyone in this room had said, for the most part, “Cool. Got it. You do you, babe.” Why wasn’t that enough?
Kim squeezes my arm as we part, and in that moment I resolve to tell her everything tonight, after the wedding. I can’t sleep with her again without her knowing the truth, and if I’m able to really explain things to her, maybe she’ll understand and I can salvage this thing between us that already feels like something I can’t live without. I just have to get through the ceremony and the reception, make sure my brother has the best night of his life, and then we’ll see.
Aiden enters with my mother and father on either side of him, and I feel a massive tidal wave of love for all three of them. It is messy and intense but undeniable. My parents are beaming with pride for their son, and a smile breaks my face open. I laugh, just a little. My little brother is getting married.
Rachel makes her entrance, luminous and lovely, and Aiden has the nerve to cry a single, manly tear. I resist the urge to make a barfing noise. He is sowhipped.
Their vows are handwritten and elaborate. Rachel, who has grown up with boats, talks about Aiden being her captain, which seems a bit misogynistic, and her North Star, which is sweet.
“You will always be the Han to my Leia,” she says. Next to me, Ben groans.
