A Wedding in December

by Anita Shreve

  "We're doing some subcontracting for a company in Boston to provide facial recognition software for places like Logan."

  "Hope the ACLU doesn't stop you in your tracks," Harrison said.

  "I think the climate has changed. How's your business?"

  "Not great. Someone said — I forget who — that it was as if God or Alan Greenspan had pushed the pause button."

  "What happens in New York affects what happens in Toronto."

  "Absolutely," Harrison said. He had a question for Bill but wasn't sure it should be asked. "You and Jerry Leyden must have stayed friends," he said tentatively. "I was a little surprised to see him here."

  "He gives a lot of money to a charity I head up in Boston,"

  Bill said.

  At the beach house, Harrison suddenly remembered, Jerry had offered to spring for pizzas for everyone. "What's with you two, anyway?" Bill asked. "Not sure," Harrison said. "Nothing, really." Bill stood. "Going to get some more strawberries." Harrison watched Bill walk to the buffet. He thought about the notion of nonstories. What if he hadn't signed up for eighteenth-century French poetry and hadn't arrived late to class that morning in October and hadn't sat in the last chair in the last row next to a pretty blonde in a white turtleneck? He would not have met Eve­lyn. Might he, the next night, or a week later, have met someone else? And what would that person have looked like? Might Harri­son have daughters now instead of sons? Or would he, in a kind of wild enterprise, have gone looking for Nora, despite the fact that she was already married? Harrison was still in college when he heard that she and Carl Laski were together. He remembered his tremendous surprise and then his sharp dismay. It was as though a moat had suddenly been built around Nora. One didn't compete with the likes of Carl Laski. Though Harrison had not spoken to Nora since that night at the beach house, she was always there, in his thoughts, and he sometimes imagined himself getting in his car and driving to New York to see her. In the early years, after Harri­son had heard that Nora had married Laski, he'd wondered what Nora's life was like. The associated glamour. The cachet of being married to someone famous. Then Harrison found himself in the publishing business and heard the gossip: Laski's misanthropic exile, the stories about the drinking. It seemed to him that Nora had entered a foreign country to which Harrison did not have a passport, that she spoke a foreign language.

  Bill returned to the table without the strawberries. "Changed my mind," he said. "Think I better go see how Bridget's doing. Order her room service. Pamper the bride-to-be."

  "That's your job," Harrison said.

  Harrison, paper tucked under his arm, found the library empty, the espresso machine ready to go. He pressed what he thought was the right button and received a half cup of espresso, the operation im­mensely satisfying. He settled himself on the sofa on which he'd sat yesterday when he'd had coffee with Nora. When he looked up through the bank of windows, he saw that the snow had almost stopped. A weak sun glowed through a layer of nearly translucent cloud.

  For a moment, coffee cup in hand, Harrison merely sat, not will­ing yet to open the newspaper. He watched the light come up slowly through the thinning cloud, causing the snow-laden bushes and trees to begin to sparkle. In less time than it took to finish his coffee, the view was almost too bright to look at. Harrison briefly closed his eyes.

  Like a dark silhouette against a bright background — photo­graphic negatives — Harrison saw Nora as she'd been that spring at Kidd, and, after the summer, during their senior year: a girl in slim jeans and dangling earrings at the sidelines of a game; a young woman with her hair spread all along her back as she hunched over a book in the library, unaware that Harrison was standing behind her; Stephen's girlfriend, lolling on Stephen's bed in the dorm while the three of them — Harrison, Nora, and Stephen — listened to Lynyrd Skynyrd and Eddie Kendricks. After Harrison's realization that Nora and Stephen were a couple, Nora seemed to be every­where Stephen was, and as a result, the three of them had become a kind of item. Stephen seemed not to mind Harrison's presence. In fact, his roommate appeared to encourage it. Harrison was an audi­ence, and Stephen, Harrison knew, loved an audience.

  By senior year, Stephen had become an icon on campus, albeit a partly tongue-in-cheek one. At the games, an impromptu cheering section would coalesce, yelling, Steev-en! Steev-en! each time the shortstop came up to the plate. The cheering was an end unto it­self, as were many of the student endeavors that year, Harrison re­membered, entirely ironic, a kind of double irony having the effect of actually celebrating Kidd's golden boy. From Harrison's position at second base, he had an opportunity to cast quick glances in Nora's direction whenever the pitcher was warming up. She didn't usually join in the cheering, but sometimes Harrison caught a glimpse of her funny half smile. Once, when Harrison turned a double play, the crowd cheered Harrison! Harrison!—a triple irony if ever there was one.

  Occasionally, when Stephen was at class, or, more likely, sleep­ing, Harrison found himself alone with Nora. Harrison remem­bered a day in early May when the two of them came across each other on a footpath.

  "Oh, hi," Harrison said. "You off to practice?"

  It was a warm day. Nora had on shorts and a T-shirt in anticipa­tion of tennis practice. Harrison was wearing long pants and a long-sleeved shirt as required by Coach D. They would be practic­ing sliding that day.

  "I am," Nora said. "But. Um . . ." She looked out to sea.

  "But what?" Harrison asked.

  "Can . . . can I talk to you about something?"

  Harrison didn't have to be asked twice. "Of course," he said.

  Nora dropped her backpack and sports bag to the ground. Har­rison did the same. He followed her to a large flat rock that over­looked a cove. They sat.

  "Um. Stephen's drinking," Nora said at once.

  "I know," Harrison answered, though he was surprised by the abruptness of Nora's pronouncement.

  "A lot."

  "Yeah, I guess it's pretty bad," Harrison said, having seen what he thought was the absolute worst of it a few nights before: Stephen hugging the toilet bowl. His roommate had wanted an audience for that, too, but Harrison, after one glance, had drawn the line.

  "Where does he get it?" Nora asked.

  "The booze? Frankie Forbes," Harrison said, referring to a local guy in his early twenties who worked construction in the area. Forbes bought the booze and sold it Thursday afternoons off the back of his truck to students. Cash only. No IDs required.

  "You drink," Nora said. "I drink once in a while. It's not the same."

  "No."

  "Why? Why is that?" Nora hugged her knees. Her legs, from her shorts to her tennis socks, were bare. Harrison remembered his de­sire to run his hand along her calf.

  "I don't know," Harrison said. "Stephen's engine runs at a differ­ent speed than mine." Harrison, who was mildly obsessed with the notion of buying a '69 Camaro he'd seen advertised in the local paper, was thinking in automotive metaphors that spring. If he could get his mother to send him the money that his plane ticket home would have cost, and he added that to the cash he'd saved working Sundays at the supermarket in town, he could almost swing the deal and drive home to Illinois for the summer.

  Nora swept her hair off her neck and tied it in a knot at the back of her head. "I ... I don't know, Harrison. Do you think we should get him some help?"

  "We all need help," Harrison said.

  "I'm serious. I'm worried about him. Last night. Last night, he was so drunk I honestly don't think he even knew I was there."

  "Where were you?"

  "On the beach."

  Harrison didn't want to think about Stephen and Nora on the beach. He forced himself not to glance at the inside of Nora's thigh, perfectly visible to him. "I don't know," Harrison said. "I don't think he'd listen. I'm just amazed he hasn't gotten caught more often than he has. Truthfully, I can't believe he's still in school."

  "He's doing better with his grades."

  "You're helping him with t
hat."

  "Yes."

  "Well, I guess it's good you're doing that, because otherwise he's going to blow his scholarship to Stanford," Harrison said. Stephen, whose grades were only average, had been recruited by the school's baseball coach. No one else at Kidd had gotten into Stanford. Har­rison would go to Northeastern, Nora to New York University.

  "He'll drown at Stanford," Harrison said.

  (Harrison, with a heart-stopping pause in the library, checked himself. Had he really used the word "drown"?)

  Nora rolled her neck in a lazy, sensuous way.

  "Hey, listen," Harrison said, putting his hand on Nora's shoul­der, fulfilling a months long ache simply to touch her. "If you want to help Stephen, I'm with you."

  Nora shrieked, and Harrison let go of her shoulder as if his fin­gers had been singed. Nora grabbed the sides of her waist where Stephen had goosed her. It had not been a gentle goosing. The pokes, Harrison thought, had been more like jabs. Stephen lifted Nora to her feet and wrapped his arms around her. He kissed Nora on her neck, a long and demonstrably possessive kiss, something Stephen seldom did in front of Harrison. Harrison had, in fact, ap­preciated the couples previous restraint in his presence. Their threesome would have been impossible without it.

  "So, Branch, what are you going to help Nora out with?" Stephen asked.

  Nora pulled slightly away from Stephen.

  "We'll be late for practice," Harrison said, checking his watch. He saw Stephen's sports bag twenty feet behind the rock on which Harrison and Nora had been sitting. Had Stephen intended to sneak up on them?

  "So, hey," Stephen said with a winning smile that revealed per­fectly white teeth, "party Friday!" He smacked his fist into the palm of his other hand. "Binder's beach house."

  "Stephen," Nora said quietly.

  "We have a game early Saturday," Harrison pointed out.

  "Actually," Nora said to Stephen, "if you want to know the ttuth." She paused. "We were talking about your drinking."

  "What?"

  Stephen put his hands in the pockets of his pants and stood im­mobile for a long moment.

  "My drinking?" he asked finally. "Really? What about it?"

  "We're worried about you," Nora said.

  Stephen nodded, as if slowly taking in the new information. "You and Harrison are worried about me." Harrison watched as Stephen's bewilderment turned to something harder. "Well, nice to know my friends are looking out for me," he said. "Um, Harrison? Did you mention to Nora that you were plastered Saturday night?"

  "That's different, Stephen," Nora said.

  "Oh, really? Cause Harrison couldn't find the toilet and took a piss against Hodgkins, which, as all present know, is the freshman girls' dorm."

  This was a fact, one Harrison had hoped to forget.

  "Maybe the both of you," Nora said. "Maybe both of you should get some help."

  "It's not like we're doing drugs," Stephen said, and Harrison heard, for the first time since Stephen had snuck up on them, a thickness in Stephen's voice. Had he been drinking already?

  Harrison walked to the place where he'd dropped his backpack and sports bag and hoisted them over his shoulder.

  "So, Harrison, you in for Friday?" Stephen called after him. "Forbes needs five bucks from each of us by Thursday."

  And Harrison had felt then an inexplicable kind of helplessness, a desire not to be left out of a party at which Stephen and Nora would be present.

  "Sure," Harrison had said, starting off in the direction of the baseball diamond. "Count me in."

  "I hear one can get a wicked cup of coffee in here," Rob said from the doorway of the library.

  Harrison, startled from his reverie, glanced up. "The best," he said.

  "You were a hundred miles away," Rob said.

  "Four hundred. You have breakfast?"

  "Don't do breakfast. Never did."

  "That's how you stay so trim," Harrison said, admiring the long line of Rob's cashmere sweater and jeans.

  "Nerves," Rob said, walking further into the room. He appeared fresh from the shower, his hair still wet.

  "You get nervous before a concert?" Harrison asked.

  "Every time." Rob paused in front of the espresso machine and studied it. "How do you work this thing?"

  "It's incredibly difficult," Harrison said, standing. "I'll have to do it for you."

  Harrison pressed a button and shrugged. Rob smiled. "Don't know if I can master that," he said.

  "Give it a few days."

  Rob took a seat across from Harrison and glanced around the room. "Beautiful, isn't it?"

  "Very."

  "I didn't know Nora had it in her."

  "I think we're all learning a great deal about one another this weekend," Harrison offered.

  Rob nodded. "You, for example. I didn't know until two weeks ago that you were in publishing."

  Should Harrison reply with a comment about his not knowing that Rob was gay? Did Rob want that conversation? Harrison couldn't tell. "I like your friend Josh," Harrison said instead.

  "He' s practicing."

  "He brought his cello with him?"

  "Virtual practicing. He sits in a chair and closes his eyes and puts his fingers on imaginary strings and visualizes the playing."

  "Really," Harrison said. He thought of Beethoven composing symphonies he couldn't hear.

  Rob crossed his legs, and Harrison noted the long trouser socks, the custom-made shoes. That Rob had understated elegance was a given. What interested Harrison was that Rob seemed a man per­fectly of his era. The snowy white shirt under the V-neck sweater. The Movado watch. The trim cut of the hair, not drawing atten­tion to itself, yet somehow suggesting with a few spikes in the front an edgier look than most. Harrison made a mental note to catch a concert if Rob should come to Toronto.

  "I admire both of you," Harrison said. "I've never had an ear for music."

  "I remember that about you."

  Harrison laughed.

  "Stephen could sing, though," Rob said. "Remember the night he got up and did that Neil Young thing?"

  "Wow, I haven't thought about that in years," Harrison said.

  "Actually I was jealous of you," Rob said. "I had a wicked crush on Stephen."

  Harrison checked his surprise. "Didn't everyone?" he asked casually.

  "One day, I saw him running along the beach," Rob said. "I was standing on the cliff near Rowan House, and I could see Stephen approaching from a distance. He had a beautiful stride, stepping in and out of the water with such ease. I always thought of him as a superbly aligned animal. Like a cheetah, maybe. He seemed oblivi­ous to everything but the moment. I envied that."

  Harrison said nothing.

  "I'm sorry," Rob said. "This must be hard for you. Being here with all of us must constantly remind you of him."

  "A little."

  "If we'd only known then what we know now," Rob said. "That he was the one guy among us who should never have taken a drink. He used to say that one beer was too many, but twelve wasn't enough."

  "Did he?" Harrison asked. "He once told me that having one beer and quitting made him feel lousy."

  "You can't outrun that fate."

  "No, I guess not."

  "But, my God, he was the funniest guy. Remember the time Mitchell got called out of class, and Stephen — I swear he didn't miss a beat — stood up front and pretended to be Mitchell and finished the class? He nailed the guy, just nailed him. That little hitch in Mitchell's walk? The Boston accent? He even did his laugh. It was brilliant."

  "I'd forgotten that," Harrison said, smiling at the memory.

  "He was something," Rob said.

  "He was something," Harrison said.

  There was a long silence in the room.

  "This is none of my business," Harrison said, "but did you know at Kidd?"

  "That I was gay?

  Harrison nodded and hoped he hadn't overstepped his bounds. Did every gay man anticipate and loathe this question?

/>   "Of course," Rob answered.

  "You dated ..."

  "Amy Shulkind. Only because Bridget set us up. She was always doing that. Matchmaking." Rob took a sip of coffee. "In the begin­ning you hope it isn't so," he added. "I don't know anyone who's glad of it as a boy." He set his cup on the coffee table and glanced at a copy of The New Yorker. "So what about you, Branch? When did it all happen for you?"

  "Sorry?"

  "Find yourself. When did you know who you were?" Rob opened the magazine, looked at a cartoon.

  "That's a tough one," Harrison said. "Not sure I'm there yet."

  "Still an existentialist at heart?" Rob asked, looking up. "That's the one good thing about being gay. It tends to clarify everything in a hurry. Well, not the only good thing."

  "Hope not," Harrison said.

  "You've got a family," Rob said, closing the magazine.

  "I do. And I suppose it's not really fair of me to pretend I don't know where I'm at. I have tremendous clarity about my boys."

  "The one bad thing about being gay," Rob said, leaning back and crossing his arms over his chest.

  "Not the only bad thing," Harrison echoed lightly.

  "No."

  "I imagine it's the music that defines you now," Harrison added, wishing very much that he had listened to one of Rob's CDs before coming here.

  "That . . . and Josh . . . and, I don't know . . ." He smiled. "The Red Sox."

  "You always were a masochistic son of a bitch."

  "You wait."

  "Wait what? Another seventy, eighty years?"

  "The Cubs aren't exactly red-hot."

  "They ran out of gas," Harrison said. "Sammy's monster year and Leiber's gutsy performance just weren't enough."

  "Hey," a voice called from the doorway. Bill stood in a bright blue parka and hiking boots.

  "Billy," Rob said. "What's up?"

  "We're on for a game after all."

  Rob glanced out the window. "In this?"

  "Snow-ball," Bill said, holding up a Wiffle ball and yellow plas­tic bat. "Jerry's idea. He said he once played snow-golf in Aspen, took him forty-five minutes to finish the first hole."

  "Aspen," Harrison said.

  "Look," Bill pleaded, "if I have to sit around all day waiting for this wedding, I'll go nuts."