The Rest Will Come Page 3

  “Okay, where is the guy you’re sleeping with after my wedding?”

  “His job is to ensure I have plenty of alcohol to keep me well lubricated the whole reception and then to well lubricate me after the party.” Ronnie laughed plumes of smoke.

  “Very classy, Ronnie. Because you finding alcohol on your own has ever been a problem?”

  “Ha! God no. But it is so much easier to have a minion to do it for me. He should have at least one purpose besides sex.”

  “How gracious of you.”

  “I’m a cunt. You know this.”

  “Ronnie! My mother is right outside.”

  “Yeah and she knows this too.”

  “I love you anyway.”

  “You’d better. I’m wearing this hideous dress for you!”

  “That dress is absolutely not hideous! It’s tasteful, and you’ll be able to wear it again.”

  “Yeah. Right.”

  Ronnie sneered, again without her eyes. Emma told herself again that it had to be jealousy. More importantly, it did not matter. This day was about her and Justin. Even if Ronnie got sloppy drunk, even if she had some sort of dramatic meltdown, that would be her “date’s” problem. Tonight, it would be only Emma and Justin, starting the life she always wanted.

  Emma’s father held a white umbrella over them as they walked down the soggy aisle. Her heels sank into the wet ground, plunging into the fabric laid down as a path in the grass. It took the exertion of every one of her leg muscles to steady each step and make her parade look graceful. All eyes were on her, as she wanted, as she had been dreaming about since her dress fitting. She would not wobble and fall at her own wedding. She clung to her father’s forearm and listened to the splat of the droplets on the umbrella above drowning out the Wedding March.

  Justin stood at the summit of the aisle under his own umbrella beside Emma’s army of bridesmaids. Ronnie was making a concerted effort not to look irritated and bored. When she and Emma made eye contact, Ronnie put on her biggest alcohol-fueled grin for her. Ronnie loathed weddings, which made her participation all the more meaningful.

  When Emma looked back at Justin, her heart swelled, and that life completing excitement flared again. She clutched her hand tighter around her father’s arm. He responded by folding his fingers over her hand as he did when she was a child and too scared to walk into a new classroom, back when she lived with him and he was still there for every first day.

  Justin looked over at his best man, Tom, and they bantered in some nonverbal joke. Dimples pierced Justin’s cheeks as he chuckled at his buddy. Then he outstretched his fist to bump knuckles with Tom. By the time Emma was halfway up the aisle, slow, soggy, and unstable, Justin’s eyes finally met hers. He smiled for her, but his dimples did not dig in as deeply as they did at Tom’s joke.

  She told herself his eyes lit up for her, that he was reflecting her devotion and excitement. This day was the beginning of all he would want for himself because he was getting her.

  The reception was a blur. Emma had invited everyone she had ever known. She wanted the grand wedding she had fantasized about while she sat alone at lunch between her classes after her mother had abruptly moved them to Denver. She wanted a full support system to launch them into their new life; she wanted to see all the relationships they had built around them. And she wanted her wedding to be seen.

  From the hallway, she could hear the music bumping and conversation humming on the other side of the door. She wound her fingers tightly into Justin’s and pulled him close. He smiled at her with his recklessly dangerous smirk and kissed her like he meant it, hand at the base of her head, eyes closed. She grinned back against his lips when the DJ announced them.

  “Please help me welcome Mr. and Mrs. Justin Atwater!”

  The voice boomed, and the doors swung open to the sea of faces and flashing lights. Emma put on her widest grin and allowed Justin to lead her across the floor. The crowd was a tapestry of upturned lips and clapping hands. The music and the cheers engulfed them.

  Justin led Emma onto the dance floor and expertly twirled her around, allowing her wedding dress to balloon around her waist. As the song ascended over the crowd, he wound her up in his arms, and they began to dance. She followed his steps around the floor, pressing her face against the warmth of his skin and deeply inhaling his copious application of cologne.

  Bliss. This was her bliss.

  The music faded around them, and the clapping swelled to replace it. A ripple of clinking glassware rose from the crowd, and Emma pressed her lips into Justin’s on command. Beaming widely and deliberately, they made their way to the bridal party table.

  As they walked, Emma caught sight of Ronnie taking shots with her date at the bar. Even from a distance, Emma took note that Ronnie’s companion was not the wide-shouldered, buzzed-headed, tattoo-clad stereotype she had come to expect. Ronnie’s date looked somewhat normal, unimposing, a shorter man with dark and uninked skin. When Ronnie looked up, Emma jerked her head to signal Ronnie to follow them. She was pretty sure Ronnie rolled her eyes, but she took her companion’s hand and did as requested.

  When the two couples converged behind the beautiful table settings Emma had painstakingly selected, Ronnie and Justin did not even bother to look at each other. Each expertly pretended the other did not exist with the fluency of years of practice.

  “Hi, I’m Emma,” Emma said, leaning in and outstretching her hand to Ronnie’s date.

  Ronnie sat back and allowed Emma to introduce herself.

  “Terrence.” He shook her hand genuinely, maintaining gentle eye contact. “It’s very nice to meet you, and congratulations.”

  Emma was temporarily stunned by Terrence’s simple sincerity. Of the numerous deplorable men she had met on Ronnie’s arm, Terrence did not belong.

  “Why thank you, Terrence,” she replied, giving Ronnie the wide-eyed I-really-like-this-guy look.

  Ronnie rolled her eyes and took another deep drink of her cocktail.

  “Justin, this is Terrence,” Emma said, tapping Justin on the shoulder.

  “Hey, what’s up, man?”

  Justin offered his hand without bothering to grant Terrence any true engagement. He was too busy staring off onto the gyrating dance floor at an awkward mix of Emma’s busty high school cousins and relatives too drunk or too old to hold a rhythm. She could not necessarily blame him for brushing Terrence off. Aside from his distaste for Ronnie, the men she dated never lasted more than an appearance or two maximum. What was the point of meeting them?

  Emma secretly tucked a genuine hope for Terrence down inside her chest.

  With a plate of lean, dry chicken and some soggy vegetables mingling with the wine in her stomach, Emma made the rounds with Justin as his wife.

  By the time she reached Ronnie, Ronnie had crossed that very crucial line into drunk. Emma always knew by her eyes. Ronnie could drink with the best—or worst—of them and had cultivated an impressive tolerance over her alcoholic years, but her tell was always in the coverage of her eyelids. At that certain intoxication level where she tipped over into excess, her eyelids drooped to halfway shade her eyeball. The opening of her eyes would then steadily decrease until she would close them and be passed out for the foreseeable future.

  Ronnie’s eyes peeked up at Emma in the dim swirling light of the reception with half of the pupil showing. She was no doubt on her way out. Terrence was not beside her, so Emma assumed he was minioning her another drink or puking after trying to keep up with her.

  Ronnie smiled, a pure drunken look that captured her face and dragged it down off her skull, and lifted her limp arms to Emma. Emma shook her head and let Ronnie wrap her up in a paralytic hug.

  “I love you so mush,” Ronnie slurred into her ear.

  “I love you too.” Emma laughed and patted Ronnie’s head as she would her toddler cousins.

  “Good wedding?”

  “Good wedding.”

  Ronnie smirked again for a moment, then somethi
ng else crept across her features. Her lips twitched and moved toward words multiple times, leaving them unspoken. She would not be able to help it; eventually, she would let whatever questionable thought was batting around her inebriated brain fall out on the floor in front of them.

  “Emma, I have to ask you something.”

  Emma braced. If Ronnie ever hesitated to say something, especially annihilated as she was now, it was never anything good.

  “Sure,” Emma replied reluctantly.

  “Why Justin?”

  “Oh come on, Ronnie, not this again. Not at my wedding.”

  “No, no, listen. You married down to my level. Like, what are you doing? A fucking tatted up bartender with a criminal record? Shit, he belongs in my bed more than he belongs in yours.”

  Emma face froze, and she shot Ronnie a steely look.

  “I don’t want him in my bed. Jesus. You know I don’t want him in my bed. You know what I’m saying.”

  “I love him. Isn’t that enough?”

  “If that’s enough for you, then yes. I just had to ask.”

  “You don’t have to like him.”

  “Oh, I don’t. But what I think of him doesn’t matter. He’s your husband now.”

  “Yes, he is.”

  Emma tried to fight the icy feeling creeping through her veins. Ronnie was always so venomous when she was drunk, always pushing to get a toehold inside someone’s head. She made sober Ronnie look like the portrait of self-control.

  “I’m going to go find Justin,” Emma said.

  “Look, I’m sorry, Emma. You know I didn’t mean anything by it. I am happy for you.”

  Sure she was. Emma once again told herself it was Ronnie’s immature jealousy and focused on what she had, what she had cemented tonight. She pitied Ronnie for planning to bed and discard what seemed like a decent guy like Terrence. She could insult Justin all she wanted if it made her feel better about her life.

  Ronnie’s eyelids had drooped even lower when Emma turned to walk away. She shook the conversation from her brain and plunged back into the party that was all about her. She chatted with the remaining guests, circling the room in search of Justin. She spotted him in the corner with Tom and his groomsmen again, fist bumping away. The scantily clad groomsmen’s dates stood looking bored in their dresses more appropriate for the club than a wedding.

  “Hey! There’s my beautiful wife.” Justin raised his arms and snaked one around Emma’s shoulders, drawing her in. “Hello, beautiful wife.”

  “Hello, husband. Where have you been?”

  “I’ve just been here, you know, with the bros. Are you about ready to wrap this thing up so we can get headed to our honeymoon?”

  Justin kissed her to punctuate the word honeymoon, and she smiled, forgetting her flush of anger at Ronnie’s questions and Justin’s typical vanishing act.

  “Yes, I am. We just have to toss the bouquet and garter, and we are off!”

  “You think anyone is sober enough to catch those?”

  “Not at all. We should have done it right after the cake, but it’s tradition.”

  “Well then let’s go throw some stuff!”

  ***

  On the plane to Hawaii, Justin laced his fingers into Emma’s, allowing his palm to trace the lines on hers. She cuddled into his arm and pressed her head into his shoulder. He kissed her hair and breathed against her scalp.

  Emma felt a deep, unadulterated happiness, thinking how perfectly life had lined up for her, now for them.

  Chapter 3

  There was a wet bikini on the floorboard of Justin’s car. It was not Emma’s bikini. It was some other woman’s used, soggy bikini. Right there out in the open. For anyone, for her, to see.

  Emma stood in her driveway under the blazing Colorado sun with the car door open. Her hand still gripped the top of the doorframe. Her eyes went wide and immobile, her head cocked awkwardly to the side, and the soft breeze swirled through her hanging lips.

  She did not know what to do. She did not know how to think.

  There was another woman’s wet bikini crumpled up on the floor of her husband’s car.

  Without thinking, Emma took the cell phone from her pocket and dialed the number automatically.

  “Ronnie. Get over here now…No. Now.”

  She hung up and stood petrified and unmoving until Ronnie walked up beside her and craned her neck to peer into the car at what had Emma so captivated.

  “What is that?” Ronnie asked, squinting from behind her sunglasses. “Is that a swimsuit?”

  “Yep,” Emma answered robotically.

  “I’m guessing that is not your swimsuit.”

  “Nope.”

  “There is another bitch’s bikini in Justin’s car?”

  “Yep.”

  “Well whose fucking bikini is it?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “Just some bitch.”

  “Just some bitch.”

  “Where is that rat bastard?”

  “Work. He took my car today. He was getting the oil changed on his way in. I came out here to grab some sunglasses to walk down to the store.”

  “And some bitch’s bikini is on the floor.”

  “Yep.”

  “What the fuck!”

  “Exactly.”

  “I’m going to murder him.”

  For once, Emma and Ronnie were on the same page about Justin.

  Emma hesitated in her shock until Ronnie peeled her hand from the car door and pushed it shut. She allowed Ronnie to take her shoulders and lead her back into the house and out of the sun. Ronnie maneuvered her to the couch and sat her down, blank and near catatonic.

  She kept seeing the tiny, crumpled pile of patterned material. Tiny red cherries on black fabric. A heap of red strings tangled everywhere. She kept imagining the woman who filled out that bikini, who peeled off that wet, clingy bikini in her husband’s car. Which one of the cocktail waitresses or shot girls from his work was it? Which desperate regular or college-aged groupie was it? Was she hotter than her? Did she have bigger tits? Did she let him have sex with her right there on the passenger seat, the passenger seat Emma rode in when Justin held her hand on the shift stick?

  Emma’s mind was whirling behind her vacant, immobile eyes.

  “Emma. Emma!” Ronnie called her back. “What are you going to do?”

  “I-I don’t know. I’ve never been cheated on before. What am I supposed to do?”

  “Um, you have to date them to be cheated on. How would I know?”

  “You never suspected Terrence.”

  “Hey, Terrence and I are most certainly not dating, so there can be no cheating. What he does on his own time is his business, so long as he doesn’t infect me with it.”

  “What should I do? Do I confront him about it? Do I pretend I never saw it? There could be plenty of explanations.”

  “Explanations for some soggy bitch’s bikini stripped off in his car?”

  “He’s cheating on me. The bastard is cheating on me.” Emma flew to her feet and started pacing frantically in front of the couch, picking at her fingertips. “First he suddenly doesn’t want kids anymore, and now he’s sleeping with some girl in a bikini in his car!”

  “Wait, what? Emma, he doesn’t want kids?”

  Emma stopped, frozen in the shock of her accidental confession. She had not wanted to reveal it. Saying it made it real, cemented it into the world and made it something she had to deal with. A choice she had to make. She did not want to prove Ronnie right about him so few years into their marriage.

  Emma’s eyes quivered when she stopped wringing her hands and looked up at Ronnie. “He told me a couple of months ago. He doesn’t want kids anymore. He said he doesn’t want to change his lifestyle. He doesn’t want to be all tied down like our friends who have kids. He doesn’t want to change.”

  “A couple of months ago? Emma! Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I don’t know.” Emma dropped back onto the couch cushion, tea
rs spilling down her cheeks in waves. “I really didn’t want it to be true. We were talking about going to counseling, and I thought maybe we could work it all out without having to tell anyone.”

  “Oh, Emma. All you’ve ever wanted is babies.”

  “I know,” Emma squeaked, succumbing to her sobs.

  Ronnie wrapped her arms around Emma’s shuddering back and rested her chin on her shoulder. She let Emma cry as she held her calmly.

  “Emma,” Ronnie said when Emma’s tears had subsided a little. “Do you even want to be with him?”

  The question launched a new wave of sobs. “I don’t know. I hadn’t decided. I do love him. I was trying to figure out if I loved him enough to stay without kids. If he’s cheating on me, maybe he doesn’t even want to be with me.”

  “What are you going to do? Are you going to confront him?”

  “I don’t know. Is a bikini even enough evidence?”

  “Does it need to be? When does he get home?”

  “I won’t see him until tomorrow. He won’t get home from the bar tonight until after 4 am.”

  “If he’s even at the bar.”

  “Ronnie…”

  “I’m sorry, Emma, but come on.”

  “I have to know. I have to know if it’s just a bikini or if it’s a bikini because he’s cheating on me.”

  “Fair. So you confront him.”

  “I confront him.”

  They let the words die between them, both retreating into the quiet that followed. Emma tried to force the image of Justin crawling on top of some bar trash in the car out of her mind, but it played over and over relentlessly, more graphic with each rotation. She tried not to hear his voice in her head telling her he did not want to have children. Ever. She tried not to feel her heart fracture with each echo and hallucination.

  Ronnie kept her company in her misery and her internal madness until Emma could not endure it any longer and retired to her bed. She was surprised how easily sleep found her in her turmoil, how it cradled her and swept her away under a heavy blanket. It felt right to give up, to flee, to hide. It would be better if she could disappear in her bed and no one found out what happened.