“Maybe.”
I hadn’t even decided what dress to wear for my mom’s beachside ceremony, let alone thought about my hair. All I knew was I wouldn’t be in the seafoam green strapless silk chiffon Danica and the other bridesmaids were wearing. My mother made no bones about letting everyone know my best friend would look better in the hue than her flesh and blood and only child. Whatever. Apparently, my primary function for the big day was getting her dress from point A to point B, and then the pressure was off.
Not that I think she had planned on giving me such an important role in the first place. But a delay with alterations at the dress shop, along with a last-minute opportunity to combine a business trip with a prehoneymoon in Paris, had created a first-world problem for her. And the only viable solution had been to ask the problem child: me.
“Laney can’t be counted on,” I had overheard her telling someone on the phone at work. “I just don’t know . . .” Oh, well. Desperate times called for desperate measures, apparently.
Not that I ever had a hope of measuring up in her eyes.
First class was, for lack of a better word, classy. I marveled at the size of the seats and my personal in-flight entertainment setup. Too bad I had a layover in Chicago; it would have been nice to jet all the way from New York to Hawaii in such luxury.
That grande latte had worked its way down to my bladder. “Is it okay to use the bathroom now?” I asked the attendant, who was bringing an elderly lady her first gin and tonic of the day.
“Honey!” She laughed. “Other than lounging in the cockpit, feel free to move about the cabin.”
I scooted toward the nose of the plane, bypassing the next group of passengers boarding, and into the first-class lavatory, which was identical to those in the back, except for the fancy lotion. Well, that answered one of those burning life questions. Rich people had to pee in Lilliputian-sized lavs just like the cattle in coach class.
The plane was rapidly filling. By the time I made it back to my cushy seat, it was covered with ruffled Wall Street Journal pages, headphones, and a banana.
“Um, excuse me? That’s my seat.”
“But that . . . that’s impossible,” Tech-Boy stuttered. God, he was even better looking in close quarters. His tie was now gone. “My phone app said this seat was empty five minutes ago; that’s why I switched to this row.” He held up his smartphone.
“Well, clearly,” I said, cocking the banana at him, “your app doesn’t know its ass from its elbow.” It was kind of a stupid thing to say, since a piece of software had neither an ass nor an elbow. But I think he got my point.
Grumbling, he snatched his precious paper up before my bottom landed on it, then popped up from his own spot like a jack-in-the-box. Scanning the cabin for another place to sit, no doubt. Too bad his app couldn’t tell him the airline had given me the last available first-class seat.
I rolled my eyes as his finger jabbed at the attendant button. “Jack and Coke, please. Double Jack.”
“That’ll go good with your banana,” I muttered. Which was worse, the fact that he couldn’t stand to sit next to me or that he was going to need large quantities of alcohol to get through the trauma? WWDD? I thought. Dani would probably have the guy curled around her little finger by now, with his phone number in her back pocket to prove it.
“Anything for you?” The flight attendant touched my shoulder like a best girlfriend would.
“Just an orange juice, please.” Resisting the urge to add, What normal people drink at nine thirty in the morning. I pulled the black and navy blue Windwest Airways sleep mask over my eyes and tried to ignore my seatmate as he powered down every gizmo he had brought on board.
Relaxation.
Starts.
Now.
“Can I have my fruit back?”
I slid the sleep mask up and stared him down. “I don’t know. Can you?” It was unnecessary, but I couldn’t resist. Yes, even comic book artists can be members of the grammar police force. Top of my class at School of Visual Arts.
“Just hand over the banana and no one gets hurt,” he said in his best tough-guy voice. I reluctantly surrendered a smile and he resumed custody of his fruit.
How many hours till Chicago?
• • •
“Seat backs and tray tables in their locked, upright position, please.” Our flight attendant, Anita, was preparing the aircraft for departure. She was also looking to dish and gab. “So where’s the wedding?”
“Hawaii. Waipouli Beach.”
“Oh, gorgeous!” she gasped, before reverting back to work mode. “Everything with an on/off switch needs to be powered down, sir.”
This guy was like the Energizer Bunny, still going and going and going with that phone. I heard him mutter something about IPOs as Anita moved on.
“Are you going to go through withdrawal if that thing is off for two hours?” I asked him.
“Work to live, live to work. The market just opened.”
There was a growing roar from the jet engines as they began to spool up for takeoff. He gripped the oversized armrests, just like in my cartoon version of him in my sketchpad. But no evil supervillain grin, just a grim set of his lips. His stubble gave him a rough-and-tumble, “I just woke up and rolled over here” look, but the rest of his demeanor screamed uptight and anxious.
“What do you do?” Yes, the oldest prompt in the book. But it seemed to distract him momentarily.
“Software design,” he replied, jutting his chin. “Apps, specifically.” I thought of my “don’t know ass from elbow” comment and gave a weak grin and guilty snort. “And what, are you curing cancer?” he finished defensively.
Oh, he did not just say that.
The cabin lights dimmed, and the plane began to tear down the runway.
“Graphic artist,” I managed through gritted teeth. It sounded better than out-of-work comic illustrator. Maybe someday I would cure the world with laughter. Or at least invent some sort of kryptonite to render pompous guys powerless and unable to say stupid, hurtful things.
Give him a break, Laney Jane. He can’t read your mind.
I went for my overhead light just as he moved to punch his, our fingers grazing and almost tangling as the eight-hundred-thousand-pound silver tube suddenly became weightless, lifting us into the air.
“I’m Noah,” he said quietly. “And I really hate flying.”
“Laney. Think they’ll serve us good snacks on this bird?”
Noah
BEHIND THE EIGHT BALL
I know it’s statistically safer to fly than drive. My chances of dying on this flight are something like one in fourteen million. Still, statistics say the first three minutes and the last eight minutes in flight are the most likely times when things could go wrong. And I’m stuck next to another victim of the bridal apocalypse. Great. What are the chances of that? She took up half the first-class cargo space with her dress, and she’s got the stewardesses fussing over her every move. Where’s my drink? They’re supposed to be flight attendants, not bridal attendants.
Amber, Brittany, Camille, Darinda, Emma, Fawn, and Gabi. I wondered how they would react were Sloane to tell them they weren’t going to be her bridesmaids after all. Haley, Iris, and Jessie would probably be cool with it. I’m pretty sure Sloane only chose them because they fit the dresses and the alphabetical order.
There was a time when I thought we were in love and able to shut out the rest of the world. When and why did she have to open the floodgates? Ten bridesmaids! Two girls for every guy was picture perfect in Sloane’s mind. I’m pretty sure she has everyone accounted for on that damn checklist of hers . . . except for me.
Wheels going up. Damn, they sound like they are falling off. What percentage of accidents are due to landing gear failure? Jeez, Noah, think of some happier statistics. Like how many freakin’ lily of the
valley stems your insane fiancée plans on importing from Holland to total $3,150. Nine into three thousand, carry the . . .
God, the girl in 3B smells really good. Like, warm sugar cookie good. Way better than lily of the valley ever could. I got a whiff when she pushed by me in the waiting lounge and almost took me out with her humongous bridal bag. They should charge her an extra seat for that thing . . .
Oh, great. She’s reaching into her carry-on. How much do you want to bet she’s going to pull out the most recent wedding porn from the newsstand? The Knot, Brides, Martha Stewart Weddings . . . I had a forest’s worth cluttering my coffee table at home, property of Sloane. Fuel for the wedding juggernaut.
The shared armrest between us vibrated against my elbow. Was she having a seizure? I flicked a glance over. No bridal magazines to be seen; instead, she had something clasped between her hands and she was shaking, turning, and cursing it in rapid succession.
She caught me looking. “What? You’ve never seen a Magic 8 Ball?”
“I’ve never seen anyone violate one like that.”
She blew a dismissive pfft from her bottom lip, which ruffled her choppy bangs and gave me a good look at her wide, green eyes. She rolled them in response to my comment and offered up the fortune-telling toy. “You try.”
“No, thanks.”
“Come on. Not one shake? You know you want to,” she taunted.
What were we in, second grade? I refused to bow to her bullying tactics, turning my gaze to the window instead. I wished I could see the wing of the plane from first class. Seeing the wing always made me feel a little better about—
What the hell?
She had literally reached over, unlocked my tray table to horizontal position, and set the Magic 8 Ball in front of me. “You look like you could use a good shake,” she added.
What I could really use is another double Jack and Coke. “All right, all right,” I muttered, giving it a halfhearted tumble.
Will this plane land safely? I silently queried, then flipped it and watched the die inside slowly float to the top. Without a doubt, hovered in the display. Well, that was a good sign. I gave it another shake, thinking about my morning meeting and Bidwell’s threat. Not that I would trust a ten-dollar toy to decide my fate, but . . . Will I “get it out of my system” in Vegas?
Get rid of my cold feet?
Get on with things?
Go with the flow?
Give in?
“The pyramid’s stuck.” She was leaning over my shoulder, snooping on my fortune.
“It’s not a pyramid,” I informed her. “It’s an icosahedron. It has twenty sides.”
“Well, shit.” Her tone was mockingly amazed, laced with scorn. “You’d think it would give me at least one answer I want, then.”
“Well,” I mused, giving it another slow shake, “if you understand probability theory, you’d have to turn it about seventy times on average to see all its answers at least once.” Great, Noah. Way to put an idea in her head. She’ll be shaking that thing all the way to Chicago.
“Did you just calculate that in your head?” She sounded both impressed and slightly creeped out.
I ignored her, looking down at the ball. The raised letters displaced the liquid to show Reply hazy, try again, in the window. I shook it again. Cannot predict now, it insisted. Of course you can’t predict, I told it. You’re a cheap, plastic plaything. I’d be crazy to trust you as an oracle of prediction on the matter of my pending marital status.
Maybe I had asked it too many questions at once.
To marry or not to marry: that question had grown larger and more open-ended than just a simple “yes” or “no” answer could satisfy.
I wordlessly handed back the toy to my seatmate, allowing my own mind to spin over that.
In Flight
“It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s . . . Laney Jane!”
“Allen Burnside, you give that back!”
It was hard to think of Allen and not picture him at eighteen, the lanky skater kid with the swoop of blond hair. The class clown who loved to talk with a cigarette dangling out of his mouth, squinting like a grunge version of James Dean. Who wrote poetry and played drums and totally won my heart in seventh grade when he lost the election for class president. “That’s the way the cookie bounces,” he’d said. “Wanna go get high after school?”
Was Allen my soul mate?
Might as well ask the Magic 8 Ball.
I squeezed my eyes shut and waited a beat to peek at the answer. You may rely on it.
Thanks. But really, can I?
We may have been voted Cutest Class Couple, but Allen and I hadn’t exactly had the most reliable track record, especially after that fateful day on the beach. Over the next decade, we had taken our own sweet time, and turns, hurting each other.
Not that I was keeping track or anything.
I absently rubbed the 8 Ball like it was a genie’s lamp and tried to conjure up that early spring day, verbatim, from our senior year.
“Give it, give it!” I’d hopped up from my blanket on the sand and given chase, practically climbing Allen’s six-foot-one frame like a ladder to get back the letter he had swiped. He held it infuriatingly an inch from his face and out of my reach, studying it.
“Laney, this is an acceptance letter to Otis!”
“I know, butthead. It came today.” I gestured toward my blanket. After pulling several fat white envelopes from the mailbox, I’d walked down to the beach to open them in solitude. The last thing I’d wanted was my mother hovering and commenting.
“That’s perfect!” he crowed, pulling me into one of his signature Allen Burnside bear hugs, over the shoulders and stranglehold tight. Somewhere downwind, a radio was blasting Blink-182’s “Dammit,” its poppy riff ebbing and flowing out of earshot above the dull roar of the waves. “Laney and Allen, taking on L.A.! It’s like they named the city after us.” He rocked us until our feet faced the ocean. “Pretty soon we’ll be standing, just like this, in front of the warm, blue Pacific . . . instead of the dirty, gray Atlantic. I am so proud of you, girl.”
I gently butted my head against his sternum. “Thanks.” The wind had picked up. He pulled the hood of my zippered hoodie up over my breeze-tangled hair and we raced back to secure the blanket, and my other letters, from blowing down Quogue Village Beach.
I remembered how we collapsed to the sand, kissing like teens are wont to kiss: with a deliberate passion, with a luxury of all the time in the world. In junior high school we had kissed for practice; by sixteen we had learned how to deliciously build up each other’s libidos and how to set them free.
Looking back, I realized I was kissing him out of consolation that day. We were on the cusp of graduation, and he was heading to California with his band come fall. I had been accepted to L.A.’s Otis College of Art and Design. But my number one choice—well, my mother’s—had always been the School of Visual Arts right in Manhattan, and they wanted me, too.
“I want you so bad, Laney Jane.”
I remembered the conflicted feeling as I twisted his ring off my finger, Blink-182 in the background, insisting that this was growing up. I could still hear my voice, barely a whisper above the chilly ocean breeze but loud enough for it to sink in. And there was no taking it back.
“Allen, we need to talk . . .”
• • •
Will this trip be a grand adventure or would I have been better off staying home?
Better not tell you now, bubbled to the Magic 8 Ball’s surface.
Why the hell not? Stupid 8 Ball. I guess it was kind of a loaded question anyway. I tucked the toy, and my thought, away for the time being.
“Ladies and gentlemen, we’ve reached our cruising altitude, and the captain has just informed us that it is safe to use approved portable electronics at this time . . .”
Great. Tech-Boy went to work peeling his laptop out of its case, practically knocking his Jack into my juice. I pulled a vintage issue of the Hernandez brothers’ Love and Rockets from the side pocket of my bag and leaned on the armrest closest to the aisle, and as far away as I could get from his cologne—and his insane typing. He reminded me of one of those dipping drinking birds made of glass. His index finger would slowly come down and hover on a key before popping back, then dipping down quick and pecking out multiple characters across the lighted keyboard. Then back up and slow, like the bird with the liquid in its butt bulb. There was no rhyme or reason to his assault on the keys, no steady rhythm.
After dating a drummer for so long, I craved rhythm.
“Frittata with ham, sir.” Anita reached past me to place a tray in front of my seatmate. He barely glanced at the food, which was served on ceramic rather than plastic. The egg smelled heavenly, and the sides of asparagus and fruit were plump and bright, like close-up photos from a foodie magazine.
“Hold on, hon. I’ve got nothing listed for you.” She frowned. “Let me go check on that.”
She sashayed up the aisle.
“Hmm, my app might not know an ass from an elbow, but it knows how to keep my stomach from rumbling,” Noah said, tucking into his frittata. “Ordered ahead,” he added, mouth full of egg. “On my app.”
Anita was back. “I’m so sorry, we don’t have any additional hot breakfasts, but I can give you yogurt with granola and fruit.”
“Not a problem. I love fruit and granola. And yogurt! It doesn’t make your pee smell funny, like asparagus does.”
Noah pushed his spring veggies off to the side of his plate and continued index-fingering his way through the alphabet on his oh-so-important document. I smiled, dipped my spoon into my parfait, and went back to my Love and Rockets storyline. It was one with Maggie and Hopey, who were just about my favorite characters from any graphic novel ever.
Dictatorship of the Dress (9780698168305) Page 3
