As I looked around the ceremony in the brief moments before the traditional music silenced everyone in attendance like the most skilled elementary school teacher in existence, I realized that I recognized approximately three people, two of whom were Noah and his father, my brother. He had asked me to sit in the front row of the chairs with him, but I had respectfully refused. I loved Noah and had spent more years of his life with him than his mother had, but the reality was I was not his mother. I didn’t want to pretend to be, even if it was only the seat that was chosen for me that made it look as though I was trying to take on that role. No, if there was anything that my privileged upbringing had given me, beyond the memory of my own wedding that was attended primarily by people I didn’t know, it was a sense of propriety and etiquette. I might have spent my childhood barefoot eating hotdogs I roasted myself on sticks that I had plucked right off the ground, but that didn’t change that I knew exactly what material and color my shoes should be for any given outfit and occasion, and which fork I should use no matter what obscure course I was eating.
It was that etiquette that ensured I never flaunted my wealth except for my clothing and the occasional piece of jewelry I wore if I was feeling particularly fancy, and that kept me sitting in the third row at the wedding, wanting to be close enough to the ceremony that I could see every tear and hear every word, but not wanting to take a position that I didn’t belong in.
Sitting in that third row meant that I was intermingling with the non-family guests, and that, for the first time in my life, gave me anonymity. I looked around me and realized that no one seemed to know who I was. They didn’t recognize me. Not as Noah’s aunt. Not as my father’s daughter. Not as my brother’s sister. Not as Virgil’s ex-wife, and that was the big one. It was something that I never really had the opportunity to experience. I was accustomed to being one of those women who acquires a different middle name depending on the circumstances. I might have been born Eleanor Elizabeth, but I became Eleanor Oh-You’re-Josiah’s-Sister, or Eleanor This-Is-Stefan’s-Youngest-Daughter, as if I wasn’t the only one, or Eleanor Our-Gracious-Hostess, or the occasional, painful Eleanor Benjamin’s-Sister-I’m-So-Sorry. Or the one that I dreaded the most: Eleanor Virgil’s-Wife-You-Know-Yeah-That-Virgil.
That all fell away as I sat there amongst the pastel-and-jewel-toned revelers. Suddenly I was just another of them, another person come to wish the couple good luck and congratulate them on taking the ultimate of terrifying, yet potentially exquisite, adventures of their lives together. That’s when I knew that I didn’t want it any other way. I didn’t want anyone there to know who I was. Not Auntie. Not wealthy. Not anything. Just Eleanor. For once, I was going to experience what it was like to not have expectations hanging over me, or to see that look in the eyes of a person who I was meeting. That look that said their perception of me changed completely the instant that they knew about my family’s money. There were a few different variations of that look. They could either look at me with the disgust that seemed inbred in people, making them automatically assume that I was arrogant, entitled, out of touch, or any other of an assortment of less than flattering adjectives that meant I was somehow less of a human being than they were because I was born into a wealthy family. Or they might get a little glint in their eye that told me that they were no longer seeing my face, but one of those giant money symbols that popped up in Scrooge McDuck’s eyes when he looked at his vault.
When I looked back on it, that was the look that I saw in Virgil’s eyes when we first met. In my youthful starry-eyed stupidity, I thought that I was seeing love at first sight. Instead, what I was really experiencing was greed at first what-did-you-say-your-name-was-again. Not that Virgil was completely destitute. If he was, we wouldn’t have met at the oppressively boring party held by a particularly vacuous daughter of one of my father’s clients. I later found out that he wasn’t there as an invited guest, but by that time, I was already in too deep.
I didn’t want to make that mistake again. I didn’t want to see either one of those looks. I had sunk away into normalcy when I was at the ceremony, and I wanted to keep that rolling. I tried to adjust the shawl again so that I looked a touch less matronly, but gave up when I saw the stream of guests starting around the corner.
“Why?” I asked, turning toward Noah.
“Because you’re my Auntie and I wanted to introduce you to everyone.”
He had the same slightly pouty look that he always got when he was a little boy and I had to withhold a laugh. He was a grown man on his wedding day and I had to remember that. Fishing a butterscotch out of my pocket and hiding in his fort with him until he was over whatever was bothering him wasn’t going to work this time.
“You can still introduce me to whoever you want to, Honey. You just don’t have to tell them who I am.”
“But…”
“You better hurry if you are going to get those pictures before your big introduction,” I said, cutting off his next statement. “I’m going to head on in and browse around a little. Something smells delicious in there and I want to get my hands on it before the other guests.”
I gave him a wink and shuffled off toward the entrance to the reception. A warm, sugary smell was wafting through the air toward me, making my stomach rumble. I realized that I hadn’t eaten anything since breakfast, determined that I was going to fit into the sheath, but the combination of control top pantyhose and sitting through the ceremony had created enough wiggle room in the dress that I knew I was going to be able to sneak in a few of the treats that Noah had told me he created for the wedding as a surprise for his beloved bride. I was one of the few people who knew of his passion for baking and had supported him in it since he was young. In fact, I was proud to say that I had taught him the hummingbird cake recipe that had become his Thanksgiving tradition. My brother wasn’t as thrilled about his only son’s ambitions and had always hoped that he would just put it behind him and go into one of the several industries through which our family had built its wealth and power. Noah had done both, letting his father funnel him into the Royal and Company Advertising Agency while still fostering his love of baking on the side. It was that love that had brought him to Snow, though the agency would have as well.
I sighed as I stepped into the beautifully decorated reception and looked around for a moment. I wished that I had even a hint of what the two of them felt that day. Even in the days when I was swept away by Virgil, the days when I really thought that we were in love and that we were going to have a wonderful life ahead of us, we never looked at each other the way that Snow and Noah did. There was something there, something so powerful and pure it went beyond anything that I had ever experienced. It was easy to feel as though you were in love with a person when you only ever knew their surface or when the love that you gave them was only a show for others who might be looking in. The way that they looked at each other was different. It was as though they were looking into each other, not past the faults and issues that they knew were there, but at them. They stared right into the darkest parts of each other, pulled close to the mistakes and problems of each other’s pasts, and told those parts, without hesitation, without fear, “I love you”.
I continued to pity myself and lament the years that I had spent with Virgil as I made my way around the room, eating whatever I could get my fingers on, as Snow and Noah made their grand entrance and he swept her onto the dancefloor, and even as we dispersed to our tables to sip coffee and wine and eat even more desserts. I had avoided sitting down since my seat was at Noah’s family table and was hovering close enough to the bar that I could confidently say that my decorum and etiquette were at serious risk, when thoughts of fairy tale romance left, quickly to be replaced by something much more fiery – and much more fun to contemplate.