Wrong Dress, Right Guy

by Shirley Hailstock

  Mac headed for Cinnamon. She stood several feet from him talking to a group of his friends. He liked it that she seemed to fit in to the scene, that she felt comfortable taking care of herself while he performed his groomsman duties. She was totally unlike Jerrilyn, who had to be attached to him from the moment they arrived until they left. He excused himself to pass a couple en route and found Jerrilyn stepping into his path.

  “How about a dance?” Jerrilyn asked.

  Cinnamon chose that moment to look for Mac. Their eyes met and he saw the smile on her face freeze as Jerrilyn put her arms around his neck. Cinnamon gave him an I understand smile and went back to her conversation.

  Mac pulled Jerrilyn’s arms from his neck. The fact that several people’s eyes were on them wasn’t lost on him. Taking her hand, he danced with her.

  “Is this another game, Jerrilyn?”

  “Why, Mac, you can’t still be angry.” Pushing herself back, she stared up at him. “It’s been two years.”

  “Why, Jerrilyn?” Mac asked the question he’d been waiting two years to have answered. “Why did you wait until everyone was at the church? If you didn’t want to marry me, you had ample opportunity to call it off.”

  “I had every intention of coming. I had the dress on. My hair was done. My father was there. Everyone was ready. But I just couldn’t. I wasn’t sure. Don’t you understand, Mac? I had to be sure.”

  “Jerrilyn, no one is ever sure. Not truly.”

  “I am now.”

  Light dawned in Mac’s brain. His feet stopped moving. Jerrilyn stopped, too. They stared at each other.

  “Mac, isn’t it obvious I’m still in love with you? What I did two years ago was a mistake. I’ve wanted to tell you that, but I never had the courage until now.”

  “I’m engaged,” Mac said, finding his voice and falling back on the lie he’d told earlier. And one he had not cleared with Cinnamon.

  “But you’re not married.”

  Jerrilyn’s arms started moving over his shoulders and around his neck. She pressed her body into his. Mac remembered her clinging to him, the way she would wrap herself around him and he thought the world would never be the same.

  “What about Perry?” He paused as her arms began a familiar journey. “Doesn’t this look a little awkward?”

  “Perry and I are past tense. We’re only here because we’re between relationships.”

  “Frankly, I’m surprised you found someone to replace me,” Jerrilyn said.

  “Cinnamon isn’t replacing you.” Mac glanced across the room at where Cinnamon stood. She was talking to Mr. and Mrs. Tate, but her eyes took in the two of them. “You no longer have a place that needs replacing, Jerrilyn.” With that Mac kissed her on the cheek and walked toward Cinnamon.

  “Mac, we need to talk,” Cinnamon said the moment they got in the car.

  “I apologize,” Mac told her. “It got out of hand. I never expected Jerrilyn to rush off and tell anyone.”

  Mac pulled the car into weekend traffic. It was heavy in the District as always. This was the in-between hour. That’s what Samara called it. That time period between afternoon events ending and evening programs beginning. People heading for dinner before attending one of the District theaters, or going farther into Virginia or Maryland for one of the theaters there, were pouring onto the roads. Rock Creek Park had an amphitheater where summer concerts took place and there was always something going on to draw tourists onto the many spokes of the giant District wheel.

  “What did you expect her to do?” Cinnamon asked. “Be upset? Crawl into a hole because her former fiancé has moved on?”

  “I expected her to say hello, tell me she was sorry and go on her merry way.”

  “I can’t believe you,” she said. “Men are such brainless creatures.”

  “That’s not true.”

  “If it isn’t, then why am I here? If you wanted her back, you’d have come alone. And you wouldn’t have waited two years to see her again.”

  “I don’t want her back. She offered.”

  “She did?” Cinnamon was clearly surprised. “She made a play for you? After you introduced me as your fiancée?”

  He nodded.

  “I’m wearing a ring the size of the Grand Canyon and still she wants you back?” Cinnamon glanced at him. “What did you tell her?”

  Holding her breath, she waited for him to answer.

  “I told her she’d been replaced.”

  Cinnamon was stunned into silence. She knew Mac had asked her to come to this wedding because Jerrilyn would be here. Naively, Cinnamon thought it was so he appeared to be involved or becoming involved with someone. She was his protection. He was using her as a buffer between himself and Jerrilyn McGowan.

  “Mac, are you still in love with her?”

  Mac stopped the car at a traffic light. He turned in his seat and looked at Cinnamon. Darkness was falling. She could see the shadows crossing his face.

  “To tell you the truth, Cinnamon, I’m not sure.” He raised his hand from the steering wheel and flailed it in the air. “I know it’s been two years, but seeing her again today brought back a lot of memories.”

  That wasn’t the answer Cinnamon was looking for.

  “Allison says she’s wrong for me. She’s right. I know that, but it doesn’t change how I feel.” He paused. “There is one thing I know.”

  Cinnamon waited for him to continue.

  “She’s part of the past. I’m not going back there.”

  A car horn sounded behind them. Mac grabbed the steering wheel and started the car moving again. For a long while he drove in silence. Cinnamon wondered what he was thinking. Was he still in love with Jerrilyn and fighting it? She looked at her hand. The huge diamond stared at her.

  Mac reached over and covered her hand with his. It was warm and reassuring.

  “Did you get anything to eat?” Mac suddenly asked.

  “Not after the announcement.”

  “Announcement? What announcement?”

  She raised her hand. “Our engagement.” Cinnamon smiled. “How quickly you forget.” She hoped to lighten the mood. “It seemed I danced and talked to everyone, but had no chance to eat.”

  “Wanna get something?”

  “Is there a quiet place where we can talk?”

  “Not here,” he said.

  Cinnamon had forgotten. Mac was a public figure in this town. Any restaurant they went to was bound to have people who knew him or people who recognized him. They could go to Samara’s, but Cinnamon didn’t like to drop in on her sister unannounced. It was unlikely that Samara would have a man there, but there was always the chance.

  “Do you mind Chinese take-out?”

  “It sounds wonderful.”

  “Then I know a place.”

  Half an hour later they were getting out of the car in front of a house in Georgetown. Cinnamon held the heavy brown bag away from her dress, as grease was inching up the side. Inside Mac turned on the lights and pointed her toward the kitchen.

  “This is lovely,” she told him, coming back into the living room. “How can you say you only work here? This house has so much character.” She looked at the crown molding, the ageless architectural details that defined the space. And the furnishings were comfortable and inviting. Two sofas faced each other in front of a fireplace. Cinnamon took a seat on one of them.

  Mac pulled his jacket and tie off and dropped them over a chair. On the mantelpiece was a large photo of Allison.

  “I’ll get the food,” Mac said. “Want something to cover your dress?”

  “Have you got a shirt or something I could put over it?”

  “I’ll see what I can find.”

  He brought her a T-shirt. Cinnamon took it and went in the bathroom. She removed her dress and pulled the t-shirt over her head. It came to her knees. Finger combing her hair, she left the dress hanging over the shower rod and went back to eat.

  Mac didn’t say anything when she came back. He
was spooning food onto two plates, but she heard the gasp that came from him as he stopped, the spoon in midair.

  “I wasn’t expecting that,” he said.

  She sat down and pulled a plate close to her. “Maybe we should talk about this other unexpected turn of events.” Cinnamon sat and put a forkful of food in her mouth. She’d never learned to use chopsticks and apparently neither had Mac for they both had forks.

  “What are we going to do about this pretend engagement? It’ll be all over your office before the night is over.”

  “I’ll endure it,” he said.

  Cinnamon stopped eating and stared at him. “Endure it?”

  “I mean the comments that people make. In a couple of weeks, I’ll tell them we called it off.”

  “You know what they’ll think when that happens. That you’re a two-time loser. That you can’t hold on to a fiancée. That women desert you.”

  “It doesn’t matter,” he said.

  “Doesn’t it? You were so uptight about people knowing you’d been jilted. What do you think this will do for your reputation in this town? Your show is Keeping it Honest. How honest have you been?”

  Again he appeared to weigh her words. “Well, we can’t stay engaged,” he said. “And getting married would take it way over the top.”

  “Yes,” she agreed. “We said we’d attend Richard and Sandra’s wedding. That we would just be friends until it was over, that there would be no strings. I don’t think this is a string, Mac,” Cinnamon said. “This is a whole ball of yarn.”

  “We also said we didn’t even like each other. That’s not true anymore, either.” Mac eyes were tender when Cinnamon looked at him. Her throat closed off. She couldn’t eat another mouthful. “You like me now?”

  He stared at her for a long moment. “Why don’t we stay here tonight. I’ll take you home in the morning.”

  Chapter 10

  Whoever thought a day didn’t change much had never lived in Indian Falls. Mac found a newspaper on the front step and picked it up as they were going into the house. Opening it, he saw the headline and nearly stumbled across the threshold.

  Mystery Man Soon To Be Revealed. Below it was a sketch of a man. Mac wanted to crush the paper. He and Cinnamon had spent a wonderful night together. In fact, since he’d met her all his days had been different, instilled with a kind of magic that had him wanting to see her every day, wanting to be with her all the time.

  After eating, they’d gone to the living room and left the lights off. They’d talked. Mac had talked to her like he’d never talked to another woman. After a while she’d asked him a critical question.

  “Mac, are you still in love with her?”

  Mac didn’t answer for a moment. He wanted to weigh his body’s reaction—if that rush of emotion he had for Jerrilyn in the past was still there. It wasn’t. She’d told him that missing their wedding was a mistake, that she was sure now that she loved him.

  But for Mac nothing happened. Slowly he swung his head from side to side. “No,” he said, aloud. “I’m not in love with her.”

  “Are you sure?” Cinnamon asked.

  “Very sure,” he said. “I’m not sure now that I ever was truly in love with her. I know that our marriage would have failed in the long run. And my feelings for her are not those of a man in love.”

  Cinnamon had said nothing after he’s spoken. The two of them had watched the play of light on the windows from the trees outside and the occasional car that drove down the quiet street. Eventually, she’d fallen asleep in his arms. And he’d carried her to bed.

  In the morning she’d awakened beside him. Discovering her next to him had broken a barrier. He seemed to come alive with her. They’d made love. More than that, he thought. They had discovered a new kind of lovemaking, one that changed his perception of what two people could be to each other.

  And now, seeing the newspaper, he discovers that there is someone else. She hadn’t mentioned anyone. Yesterday, when they were at his town-house, it had been perfect, yet she said nothing. Only that they couldn’t get married. Was this the reason? Was there another man?

  Cinnamon had gone upstairs to change into her own clothes. She came down the stairs wearing khaki pants and a hot pink shirt.

  “Who is this?” he asked, thrusting the paper at her.

  Cinnamon swallowed hard. “Maybe we’d better talk,” she said.

  “You’re damn right we’d better talk.” Mac considered their time together idyllic. He didn’t spend time like this with women. At work, he was all business. With other women it was sexual. They went out, made plans to attend things, met for lunch or dinner and had sex. Never had anyone just sat and talked to him, listened to his plans for the future, his goals, dreams and asked him questions about his family because she was interested in him and not interviewing him for a magazine story.

  That’s the night he’d spent with Cinnamon. They’d fallen asleep in each other’s arms and woke up to make love. Or create a new universe, Mac was unsure which one. With her it was different. She completed him.

  And now there was a sketch of a man on the front page of The Weekly—her fiancé.

  He followed her into the dining room, a place filled with the debris of this joke. She sat in front of a laptop computer and opened it up. Her e-mail program came on.

  “I didn’t tell you because you don’t approve of this method. Lately, people have been sending me e-mail proposals. Some of them come with photos. I think someone may have sent a few to the newspaper.”

  She opened a few messages and showed him the photos popping up.

  “Umm, yummy,” she said over one of them.

  Mac snapped, “Yummy! That’s how you describe a man?”

  “Well, look at him.” She turned the screen toward him. The full color photo filled the screen. The man had long black hair that was layered and gave his face a softened look, high cheekbones, and dimples. “Look at those dimples. They’re irresistible. He’s yummy. What word would you use?”

  “Gay.”

  Cinnamon laughed. Mac scowled. “He’s no more gay than you are.”

  “How can you tell?”

  “I’ll show you.” Cinnamon reached for the computer mouse. On the graphic image she removed the layer containing hair. The black shoulder-length wavy mass was replaced by a close-cut neat arrangement.

  “What are you doing?” Mac asked.

  “Just watch.”

  Layer by layer she removed features from the photo; the high cheekbones became less defined and a wide smile replaced the more serene look. The dimples remained. Hazel-colored eyes converted to chocolate-brown, and the thin mustache morphed into a clean-shaven face. Removing the last layer, added back the lines of character to a face that had seen a few of the world’s crises.

  Mac’s mouth dropped open as the photograph revealed the true man behind the mask—himself.

  “Where did you get that picture?”

  Cinnamon smiled teasingly. “I have my sources.”

  “My sister,” he answered his own question. “I never sent this letter.”

  “Of course, you didn’t,” she said. “It’s a joke, Mac. You find something wrong with every man who’s sent a letter. I wondered if you were looking for a Mac clone.”

  “You think I want to marry you?”

  She looked at the photo and then at him. “Not exactly,” she said. “I think you want to find someone who’s just like you. And since that’s an impossibility…”

  “You couldn’t be further from the truth,” he said after a stunned moment. “I’m never going to get married.”

  “Well, who asked you?”

  She got up and went to the door. Turning back she looked at him. “Mac, this arrangement is not working. I’m sorry you don’t want to stay at your sister’s, but I think it would be better if you left. Today.”

  Mac didn’t see her go up the stairs, but he knew that’s where she’d gone. He felt like a heel, like he needed to kick himself. But h
e’d said nothing wrong. He wasn’t getting married.

  Ever.

  But women wanted to be married. Cinnamon wanted to marry. She’d told him as much when they first met. But he didn’t. He’d had his turn at the altar. It was someone else’s turn. His friends were making the journey and so far none of them had had the same experience he had. He never wanted to go through that again. And he never would. No matter how much he—

  He stopped. What was he thinking? What was his mind going to tell him. He wasn’t in love with Cinnamon. Was that the word he was going to use? No matter how much in love with her he was?

  This was a fine mess, he thought.

  Cinnamon heard Mac’s car door slam shut. The engine roared to life and he reversed down the driveway. He was gone. Going to the window, she looked out. His taillights glowed red as he stopped at the corner and then turned toward the highway. He was going back to Washington, to his house in Georgetown.

  She was alone.

  She hadn’t known how to respond when he’d seen the photo of himself staring from the computer screen. She’d meant it as a joke, thinking Mac would laugh at seeing himself uncovered, layer by layer. She didn’t know how the conversation got out of hand. When Mac asked her if she wanted to marry him, she should have shrugged it off, thought of something clever to say, but nothing had come. Unfortunately, she’d told him the truth.

  But she hadn’t given the enhanced photo to the newspapers. She could probably thank Allison for that. Allison had done all the masking of the photo and showed Cinnamon how to remove the layers. She was playing Cupid for her brother, and their little joke had backfired.

  Big time.

  Leaving her room, she walked toward the stairs, but only paused at them before continuing to the last room on the hall.

  Mac’s room.

  She opened the door. Everything was gone. The bed was made, the spread so precisely smooth it looked as if no one had ever slept there, no one had made love there. His computer was gone. The papers that had been spread out on the desk had been removed. The surface was polished and shiny.

  The room was empty of everything physical, but Mac was still there. His presence lurked in every corner of the place. She looked over the room, hearing echoes, snatches of conversations they’d had while they pillow-talked after the best sex she’d ever had.