I feel guilty just reading that stuff, so I do a quick sign of the cross and add the word “Catholic” to my search. I find a question-and-answer site with a priest. A man asks what’s supposed to happen if a parishioner drops the wafer on the floor. The priest says he should scoop it up as fast as possible and pop it in his mouth, because Communion isn’t symbolic. It’s sacred.
None of this helps. It’s time to call Mom and get her to fix it. The latest report is my parents found a house to rent, and Mom has job interviews lined up. She’s not working double shifts at the gas station and missing Dad. The dark circles under her eyes are probably gone. She can handle it.
Before I find my phone, Eden bursts into the room, flops on the bed, and puts the pillow over her face.
“What’s wrong?”
The pillow swallows her mumbling, so I pull it away from her and sit on the bed. “Eden?”
“Our family is crazy. Not good crazy, either. Bad crazy.” She sits up. “There’s a dress war.”
“But we have dresses.”
“Not us. Them. Grandma says she and Mom and Aunt Bernie have to wear pink because you’re wearing pink. Mom and Aunt Bernie say pink isn’t good for older people, plus your mom already bought a blue dress. Grandma’s mad because your mom didn’t consult with anyone on the dress, and now she’s ruining the wedding pictures. Your mom cut the tags off the dress, and the store won’t take it back, and your dad doesn’t want her to spend money on a different dress. Grandma’s mad at both your parents. My mom is completely stressed out. She’s not sure if she should wear pink and match Grandma, or blue and match your mom, and basically none of them are speaking.”
Another family conflict and another money problem. I picture the dark circles returning to Mom’s eyes. I say a quick prayer. Dear Holy Blessed Imelda, I’m back.
Eden bolts out of bed and pulls the table with the puzzle between our beds. “We have to finish this before the wedding. It’s important.”
“It took thousands of years to make the Grand Canyon. We need more than one summer to finish.”
“We need to. We have to.” Eden sounds frantic.
“I don’t get it.”
“All I know is when I’m doing this puzzle, I’m not thinking about anything else.”
She’s deep in concentration within minutes. I want to ask her about blond Jesus and blond Mary, but she seems to be relaxing. Plus, I know Nick is right. Unless Jesus and Mary walked from Sweden to Jerusalem, their skin is darker. I think it’s a marketing thing. People want Jesus to look like them or, I guess, they want to look like Jesus. For hundreds of years, Popes gave Caucasian Catholics a Caucasian Jesus. If I went to a Catholic Church in Africa, I probably wouldn’t find pictures of Caucasian Jesus and Mary. Obviously the Pope thought, Hey, if we want to grow the membership in Africa, we need to make an African Jesus and Mary.
I’m tired of thinking about all of it—church pictures, the Communion wafer, sin, and prayer. Mostly I’m tired of sending out prayers to the Patron Saints and getting silence in return. Blessed Imelda has not solved my wafer problem. Don’t even get me started on Saint Sebastian and hardware stores.
Finally Eden looks up. “I do have good news. The first is a surprise, and I have to tell someone or I’ll explode.” I’ve never seen Eden look so excited.
“Okay.”
She leans forward. “Justin and I agreed we can’t afford a honeymoon, but I’ve been secretly looking for the cheapest possible trip, and I found this incredible deal to go to Las Vegas. We’re not the kind of people who go to Las Vegas, but I found a package with a beautiful hotel, and it includes two shows and a trip to Hoover Dam. So I booked it and paid for it, and Justin doesn’t know. So don’t breathe a word, okay?”
“Very cool. My lips are sealed,” I say. “What’s the other news item?”
“Your parents want you and me to make a road trip to your house. We’re supposed to make sure the house is in good shape and bring back your dad’s suit for the wedding.”
“That’s awesome!” I think about all the stuff we could do in Holmestrand: see Jessica, eat at Dave’s Diner, drive by the lake.
From downstairs comes Grandma’s hurry-up-and-I-mean-it voice. “Girls!”
I groan. “Now what?”
Eden hunches over the puzzle. “She bought small cakes from the bakery for us to sample so we can pick a flavor for the wedding.”
“I thought we were having cupcakes.”
“She found a bakery that will make a wedding cake with a fountain in the middle, and that seems spectacular to her.” Her voice is flat. “All we have to do is pick a flavor.”
“A fountain? You’re kidding.”
“I’m not known for being a kidder.”
Grandma yells again. I get as far as the bathroom when I notice Eden isn’t with me. I pop my head back into her room. “Aren’t you coming?”
“Please tell her my stomach hurts. Besides, I won’t be eating cake at the wedding.”
“What do you mean?”
“Please, Mary. Just go downstairs before she goes crazy. You can decide. I don’t care.”
Downstairs Nick is sitting at the table next to Luke and Uncle Will. I quickly smooth my hair and straighten my shirt. “I invited our neighbor to the tasting.” Grandma winks, and I want to disappear—or make Grandma disappear—but Nick doesn’t notice. He’s smelling the cake Luke has perched under his nose.
“Lemon?” Luke asks.
“I definitely smell lemon.”
Luke makes a face. “I don’t like fruit or vegetables in my cake.”
“If lemons were important, they’d grow them in Ireland,” Uncle Will says.
Grandma slaps the table. “Please! I need all of you to have an open mind. There are five samples. We have white cake with raspberry filling, lemon cake, carrot cake, red velvet cake, and plain white cake. Drink milk in between bites so you’re getting an honest and true taste.” She looks at me. “Where’s Eden?”
“She says her stomach hurts, and we should pick.” Here I am truth-stretching to Grandma, just like Mom.
“I suppose her anxiety is kicking in.” Grandma sighs. “Why don’t you and Nick take your samples to the porch and eat out there? I have a feeling we’ll be battling over the lemon and raspberries and carrots in here. I don’t want you and Nick influenced by these two.” She points at Luke and Uncle Will.
My mood instantly improves. I get to hang out with Nick and escape Grandma and Uncle Will’s bickering. Nick and I take our plates to the porch and sit on the wicker bench. I can hear Uncle Will complaining about the carrot cake through the door. Nick stabs his fork in the cake and eats.
“Your uncle is so wrong. This carrot cake is epic.” He licks a dab of frosting off his thumb. “I’d mow the lawn for free all summer for one piece of this cake.” He takes a bite of the lemon cake, and closes his eyes. “Oh my God. I just changed my mind. Why isn’t all cake made with lemon? There should be a law. How come you’re not eating? This is amazing.”
“I’m with Luke on this one. Cake shouldn’t be contaminated with vegetables or fruit.”
“You have to try it. We’re under orders. Don’t dilly dally.”
I laugh and take a bite of the lemon cake. “Yuck. It reminds me of furniture polish.”
“I’ll take the rest of it.”
While he eats his cake samples and mine, too, I start talking about the wedding story, and once I start, it all comes tumbling out. I tell him about shopping for the dresses, Eden’s shower, and the dinner with Justin’s parents. “This cake we’re sampling? Grandma is ordering it with a fountain in the middle. Eden doesn’t want that. And I should be able to stand up and say no, and I try, but it’s not working.”
“It’s her wedding. It’s not your job.”
“Eden has a real condition, so it actually is my job. A bridesmaid is supposed to help deal with the stress and conflict involved in a wedding. And it’s not easy. My family is making me crazy. I’d like to … I
don’t know…”
Nick raises his eyebrows. “Punch someone?”
It takes me a few seconds to remember our conversation at the beach. Talking about it seemed like a good idea while we were sitting in the sun, but now I’m not sure. “It’s not that interesting.”
“Come on. Fair is fair.”
“First I should tell you that I won a state award for being this great church youth group member,” I say. “That’s important because you’ll either like the irony, or you’ll cut me some slack.”
He sets down the plate. If anyone will understand, it’s a shoplifting, skateboarding basketball player who thinks Caucasian Jesus is a joke. I take a breath. I’m ready.
* * *
I almost didn’t go to Ryan Dorman’s Halloween party because he’d invited the whole class. That meant Brent Helzinski would be there, and he’d been tormenting me for weeks. I kicked a ball, and it smashed his face, and he was out to get me. But I figured he’d behave himself at a party.
The party was in Ryan’s basement, and it was perfect—dark, creepy, damp. Fake tarantulas and bats dangled from the ceiling, and his mom made mummies and ghosts and propped them by a big table with candy, chips, cheese, crackers, and a cake decorated like a cemetery. There were games, too. Pin the wart on the witch, a zombie dance-off, speed-mummy-wrapping, and bobbing for apples.
I was dressed as Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz, a costume recycled from last year because Mom didn’t want to spend money on something new. Jessica was dressed as Hermione from Harry Potter. We were by the apple-bobbing station talking to Ryan and Josh Bloomquist. Nobody was bobbing for apples because they didn’t want to mess up their costumes. It looked like fun, though.
Brent waddled over. “Hey Little Bo Peep, you afraid to get wet?”
He was dressed as a motorcycle guy with tight pants—all his pants were tight—and a leather vest. He had a mullet wig and a fake tattoo of a snake slithering up his arm. Ryan and Josh were both dressed as Superman but neither said a word to Brent. So much for superheroes. But I kind of understood. I’d seen Brent pick on lots of people, and I’d done the same thing as Ryan and Josh—suddenly act distracted or like I couldn’t hear or see what was happening.
Brent pulled on my pigtail and laughed. Only an idiot can’t tell the difference between Dorothy and Little Bo Peep. But I ignored him. That’s what you’re supposed to do with bullies. Ignore them. Then he pulled my hair again.
I was so irritated. I said, “Knock it off!”
“Let’s bob for apples,” he said. “If you get more than me, I won’t pull your hair for the rest of the night.”
“I’m not having a contest with you.”
He got closer—too close. I could smell the nacho cheese chips on his breath. He’d been calling me Scary Mary and saying mean things since the ball I kicked nearly broke his nose. Early in the week he pretended to trip in the hallway, which made him “accidentally” push me. Now he was ruining the party. I waited for Josh or Ryan or Jessica to say something. They shifted on their feet and suddenly seemed fascinated by their cups of punch.
“Don’t be such a baby,” he said, tugging my hair again. His two buddies, Eric Jablonski and Jude Sorenson, were leaning against the wall, laughing. Ryan and Josh wandered away, two cowards in Superman costumes.
Finally Jessica stepped in. “Just take him on, Mary. I don’t think Brent can win at anything.” She turned to Brent and said, “When she wins, go back to your corner.”
“Fine,” he said. “I will. The contest will be how many you can get in one minute.”
I faced the bin of water. The apples were small, so they looked easy to bite. I leaned over the bin, took a breath, and put my face in the water. It was super cold, but I got an apple immediately.
Suddenly my arms were pulled behind my back and a hand shoved my head to the bottom of the bin. Then someone—Brent, obviously—held my arms and kept my head under water. I tried kicking backward, but mostly I was just thrashing around. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t yell.
Later Jessica told me it was only a few seconds, but in those seconds I thought so many random things. I thought, Am I drowning? My parents will be sad. Will Brent go to Hell? What if there’s no Heaven?
And then I was standing up, blinking water, coughing through the apple, which was attached to my teeth. The first thing I heard was Brent laughing and then Jessica yelling, “You’re a complete and total pig!” She put her arm around me. Brent went back to his buddies against the wall. Their laughter seemed louder than the music.
Jessica whispered to me. “I’m going to tell Ryan’s parents what Brent did.”
I shook my head and pulled the apple out of my mouth. My face was wet, so they probably couldn’t tell I was crying. Please, please, stop crying, I told myself. The last thing I wanted was Brent seeing me cry.
The tears stopped. Suddenly I felt tall. I felt strong. I was going to get even. It wasn’t right to let the bullies run the world. Jesus wants us to turn the other cheek, but even He didn’t do it all the time. He got mad—furious, even—at people who did the wrong thing. He stood up to them, and that’s what I was going to do. I was going to stand up to Brent.
My little bite made the small apple even smaller, but it was firm enough and big enough to make my point. I wound my arm back and threw the apple as hard as I could. Brent tried to shift, but he was so slow, he took the apple in the nose. Blood gushed down his face.
I didn’t feel bad. Not for a second. I would’ve thrown another one except Ryan’s parents showed up. Someone had run upstairs to tell them Brent was trying to drown the girl from The Wizard of Oz.
* * *
Nick doesn’t take a second to think about it. “That guy is a soul-sucking creep. He deserved it. I don’t care what the Bible says; I believe in karma. What goes around comes around.”
“There’s more,” I say.
“Right. You said you punched him before spring break. This was a Halloween party. So this thing with King Creep went on all year?”
“Basically. It scared me at first, but I always felt better after I lashed out at Brent. Does that make sense?”
The door opens, and it’s Luke. “Grandma says to tell you Nick’s mom called and she said he was only supposed to be here thirty minutes and now he’s late.”
Nick scrapes the last thin line of frosting from his plate with his fork. “I’m going to my dad’s for a week. Tell me the rest when I get back, okay?”
“Okay.”
Luke pokes Nick’s shoulder. “Grandma wants to know what cake you picked.”
“Carrot. The lemon is a close second.” Nick gives a quick wave as he leaves. “See you later.”
The sun is slipping behind the oak trees across the street. I lean back and close my eyes and focus on the birds’ song so I don’t have to think about Brent and how the story really ended.
“How about you Mary?” Luke asks. “What’s your vote?”
“You tell me, buddy. What do you want my vote to be?”
“Plain white cake.”
“Then that’s my vote.”
He runs into the house cheering, “Plain white cake! Plain white cake! Plain white cake!”
Chapter Nineteen
There’s going to be a wedding in 15 days
The doorbell rings early the next morning. It’s Nick, standing with his arms behind his back and a grin on his face. “I have something I need to give you.”
“Um … do you want to come in?” It seems like a grown-up thing to ask. Eden hasn’t left for work yet, so I’m not violating the rule about being unsupervised.
“I can’t. My dad’s here, so I only have a minute. Last night I was thinking about your big wedding job. I went to the Catholic Church website to find forms to nominate you as Patron Saint for Junior Bridesmaids.”
At first I think he’s joking. Nick from the intellectual church, Nick who called Mary “Jesus’s baby mama.” But his face is serious.
“I don’t get
it,” I say.
“I figured there has to be a sainthood process. That guy didn’t randomly become the Patron Saint of carnival workers, right?”
“Right.”
“Turns out the process is pretty complicated. You have to go through a Bishop, and the Bishop has to gather evidence, and I guess someone has to prove you made a miracle happen, maybe even two miracles.”
“You’re such a geek.” I’m laughing.
“Obviously,” he says.
“You realize I’m the least qualified person in the world, right?” I say it like I’m joking, but it’s the truth. Punching boys. Hiding the Body of Christ. Keeping Mom’s secret. Nobody’s ever going to call me the Blessed Mary Margaret Miller.
“You might be the first kid in a wedding to actually take it seriously. You care. You really want to help Eden. I think you’re the real deal.”
My face feels warm, so I have to look away.
“Anyway, there was no time for the formal nomination. This is the best I could do.” He hands me a button that’s a little bigger than a silver dollar. He’s covered it with a piece of paper printed with tiny words.
I squeeze it. I want to hold it against my heart, but I’ll do that later, when he’s not watching. “This is the greatest button ever made.”
“Obviously.”
“I mean it. This is the greatest thing ever.”
He’s quiet, and I’m quiet, and suddenly it’s very, very quiet. No cars, no television—just air and happiness.
I can’t stop myself. I hug him.
His back stiffens a bit, and he sort of pats my shoulders. I hear Eden thumping down the stairs, so I push him back harder than I mean to.
“Have fun,” he says, backing away.
“I’ll try.”
The door shuts just as Eden comes downstairs wearing her hospital uniform.
“That was Nick. He wanted to tell me he’s going to his dad’s for a week.”
A Patron Saint for Junior Bridesmaids Page 10
