“Actually, I have another one here,” she said, pulling an envelope from one of the mysterious compartments of her dress. “You wouldn’t bring it over to him, would you?”
“No,” I said, quicker than I had intended. There was no chance that I was going anywhere near her brother. “Actually, I was just going out for some air.”
“Are you all right? You look a little red in the face.”
“It’s just too stuffy in here, that’s all. I’ll be back.”
I tried to leave but she put a hand out to stop me. “Wait,” she said. “I need to talk to you.”
“I’ll be back in a few minutes. Promise.”
“No, I need to talk to you now.”
“Why?” I asked, surprised by the urgency in her tone. “Is something wrong? What’s he said to you?”
“What’s who said to me?”
“No one.”
“What’s no one said to me? What are you talking about, Cyril?”
I glanced across the room at Julian, who was watching us now while wearing a furious expression, and I started to feel annoyed by his attitude. If you didn’t want me to marry her, I thought, then you could have stopped me. But now that I’ve gone through with it, don’t fucking look at me like that.
She opened her mouth to speak but, before she could reply, her mother Elizabeth appeared arm in arm with a boyfriend young enough to be her grandson and I saw my chance to escape.
“Don’t leave,” Elizabeth purred, taking my hand and holding on to it. “You haven’t met Ryan yet.”
“I haven’t,” I agreed, reaching out and shaking the boy’s hand. He was young, certainly, but if I had to be honest I didn’t think he was all that special. He looked a bit like Mickey Rooney in the Andy Hardy films. Only not quite as tall. Halfway across the room I could see Charles watching the pair of them, perhaps recalling his and Elizabeth’s infamous trysts of 1952 that had led to such trouble.
“Marriage is such an outdated institution, don’t you think?” said Ryan, looking at me and Alice as if he had just been confronted by a pair of turds in human form.
“That’s an odd thing to say,” said Alice. “To a bride on her wedding day, I mean.”
“Ryan is just joking,” said Elizabeth, bursting out laughing. She’d clearly won the award for First Drunk At The Wedding. “He’s from Vermont,” she added, as if this explained everything.
“I was in Vermont once,” said Charles, slipping in between the two of them and using his elbows to separate them. “I spent a few weeks in Newport. On business,” he added, dramatically.
“Newport is in Rhode Island,” said Ryan. “Different state.”
“I’m aware of that,” said Charles, humbled. “I was making a non sequitur. I was in Vermont once. And, in other news, I was in Newport, Rhode Island. On a different occasion.”
“This is Charles Avery,” said Elizabeth, thrilled beyond belief to have the chance to show off her little treasure. “And this is Ryan Wilson.”
“Hey,” said Ryan.
“Good afternoon,” said Charles.
“Charles is Cyril’s father,” said Elizabeth.
“Adoptive father,” said Charles and I in unison.
“He’s not a real Avery,” added Charles after a short pause. “Anyway, what brings you here, young man? Are you engaged in some sort of student exchange?”
“No, I’m Elizabeth’s lover,” he replied without missing a beat and, to give him credit, even Charles was impressed by such un-Irish frankness.
“Fair enough,” he said, for once looking a little deflated. I wasn’t sure why he was bothering, to be honest. It wasn’t as if he had any interest in re-igniting things with Elizabeth. He’d told me once, after all, that he thought it was a mistake for any man to marry a woman old enough to be his wife.
“I’ll be right back,” I whispered to Alice.
“Wait,” she said, turning and gripping my arm. “I need to talk to you.”
“When I’m back!”
“It’s really important. Just give me—”
“Jesus Christ, Alice,” I said irritably, shaking her off, the first time I had ever raised my voice to her.
“Woah, buddy!” said Ryan, and I shot him a contemptuous glance.
“Five minutes,” I said to Alice. “Call of nature.”
As I left the room, I found my head turning, as if independent of my will, toward Julian again but he had his back to me now and was leaning over the bar with his head in his hands. There was something about the way his shoulders were shuddering that made me think he was crying but I dismissed this as an impossibility. I had never seen Julian weep in his entire life, not even when he returned home from the loving embrace of his IRA kidnappers, short a thumb, a toe and an ear.
Once in the lobby I felt able to breathe again but when I saw Dana making her way toward me, arms outstretched for a hug and some form of unspeakable musical congratulation emerging from her ruby lips, I turned on my heels and ran toward the staircase, taking them two at a time and breaking into a run as I ascended to the fifth floor penthouses where the bridal suite held pride of place at the center of the corridor. I fumbled around for my key, then quickly closed the door behind me as I ripped off my tie, making my way to the bedroom, where a cool breeze was blowing through an open window, inhaling and exhaling deeply until I began to feel my heart rate return to normal. I sat down on the corner of the bed but it had been covered with such a delicate throw and handfuls of rose petals that it only served to deepen my despair and so I stood up almost immediately, moving over to the sofa.