Wedding Bell Blues

by Julia Watts

  Ben started the car. “So ... ready to go meet the in-laws?”

  “Why not? Might as well make this day as surrealistic as possible.” Today had been like a dream for Lily, though not in the sense that bubbly straight girls might say their wedding day was like a dream.

  Just like in her dreams, today Lily had been performing one bizarre action after another, and as in the dream world, no matter how bizarre her actions were, she had no choice but to perform them.

  Ben drove them into the rolling hill country outside of Versailles, where the only businesses were the beautiful working farms and the ugly corrugated aluminum buildings that housed textile companies.

  Ben slowed down when they passed one of these buildings. “Well,” he said, “there’s the source of the fortune you just married into.”

  The slate-blue aluminum building hardly looked like the source of a family fortune. On the building’s side was a block-lettered sign reading THE CONFEDERATE SOCK MILL. Next to the lettering was a line drawing of a cartoon Confederate soldier, who resembled a Civil War-era Beetle Bailey, leaning against a cannon, asleep in his sock feet. “Well...” Lily searched desperately for something to say.

  “I know it doesn’t look like much,” Ben said. “But we do an incredible international business. You see, back when he was playing sports in high school, Daddy got frustrated because he couldn’t find any socks that didn’t start sagging after several washings. So after he graduated from technical school, he developed a special kind of elastic and patented it. Confederate Socks never lose their elasticity, and we’ve made millions off ’em. Daddy always gives free socks to the Faulkner County High football and basketball teams, since that was where his idea began.”

  “It’s quite an American success story,” Lily said. “Growing up with a self-made man like that for a dad, no wonder you vote Republican.”

  “Hey, it’s in my best interest to make sure business is protected.”

  “Well, it may be in your best interest financially, but I still think that gay Republicans are like gazelles who try to make friends with lions.” She and Ben had had this argument umpty-dozen times.

  “But I guess there’s no need for us to argue politics on our wedding day, is there, honey?”

  “I guess not... pumpkin.”

  Lily laughed. “So, how are your parents gonna take this— you showing up with new wife and baby in tow?”

  “Oh, they’ll be thrilled, once they get over the initial shock. I mean, you’re certainly not who they would’ve picked out for me if they had had the choice, but as far as their gay-boy son goes, any woman is better than no woman.”

  Lily looked up from gnawing her nails. “You sure know how to flatter a girl.”

  Right past a run-down store advertising live bait and sandwiches, Ben pulled into a long driveway.

  The driveway ended at a huge monstrosity of a house — a red brick mansion with antebellum columns and a cupola on the roof. “When Daddy had this house built, Mom couldn’t decide if she wanted Tara or Monticello,” Ben said, “so they kinda built both.”

  Lily wondered what she would do if she had the money to build a house like this. The only thing she knew for sure was that if she did, she definitely would not use the money to build a house like this.

  “So,” Ben said, “you ready to meet the folks?”

  “Sure thing, Benny Jack.”

  “Never call me that. Half the reason I moved away from this damn place was so nobody would call me that.”

  Lily, with Mimi in her arms, followed Ben up the front porch steps. Ben opened the front door and hollered, “Mom!” There was no answer, so they went inside.

  The living room was decorated in slate blue and mauve, with lots of geese, sheep, and other ersatz

  “country” doodads. A TV with a theater-sized screen dominated the room. “Mom!” Ben yelled again, then said, “She must be out back.”

  Lily followed Ben through the enormous kitchen, through the formal dining room with the fully stocked china cabinet and floral centerpiece on the table, through the sunroom with its white wicker furniture. They went out the back door and down a stone path that led to a high wooden fence. Ben opened the gate.

  Mrs. McGilly was lying on a floating air mattress in the Olympic-size swimming pool, reading a glossy-covered romance novel and eating grapes. She was an attractive woman, with curly light brown hair that was highlighted with the occasional streak of silver. For the mother of three grown children, her body was positively streamlined in her purple swimsuit.

  Ben stood silently, waiting for her to notice him. Finally, she looked up and exclaimed, “Benny Jack! You ’bout scared me to death. You didn’t tell me you was coming!”

  “I wanted it to be a surprise.”

  Mrs. McGilly pulled down her sunglasses and regarded Lily and Mimi. “Well, hon, ain’t you gonna introduce me?”

  “Uh...sure, Mom. This is Lily, my wife, and Mimi, my daughter.”

  Mrs. McGilly sat bolt upright, upsetting the air mattress, and fell into the pool with a splash—sunglasses, grapes, romance novel, and all.

  CHAPTER 5

  “I didn’t mean to act so shocked,” Mrs. McGilly said, as they sipped lemonade in the living room.

  “It’s just that from the time he was a little boy, we never thought Benny Jack was the marrying kind.”

  “Well, I guess he just had to meet the right woman.” Trying to act extra-wifely, Lily reached for her husband’s clammy hand. She could tell that Ben was offended by his mother’s insinuation about his proclivities. Despite Ben’s rather obsessive penchant for color coordination, he liked to think he could pass for a hetero he-man.

  “And I just can’t believe this precious little doll here is my grandbaby!” Mrs. McGilly bounced the giggling Mimi on her knee. “Mamaw just can’t wait to take her little granddaughter shopping, no, she can’t.” She looked up at Ben and Lily. “Of course, I’m absolutely scandalized that y’all got married at the City Drug. Why, we coulda had the biggest wedding Faulkner County’s ever seen.”

  “You know I hate stuff like that,” Ben said. “Besides, we thought a discreet marriage would be more appropriate — what with Mimi and all.”

  “Now, Benny Jack, you know good and well nobody in this town woulda said a thing about it if you’d had a big church wedding. You’re a McGilly!” She smiled at Lily. “And now, so are you. We’re glad to have ya, hon.”

  “Thank you, Mrs. McGilly.”

  “Now you’re gonna have to drop that formal stuff. You’re family now. The least you can do is call me Jeanie.”

  “Okay, Jeanie.” Lily was finding it impossible not to like Jeanie McGilly. Despite the wealth that the obscene diamonds on her fingers attested to, she was completely devoid of pretension. Her attitude said: My husband and I worked damn hard for all this money, and by god, we’re gonna enjoy it.

  “You know what we oughta do tonight?” Jeanie said. “We oughta have a big barbecue to announce your marriage. Y’all are gonna be in town for a while, right?”

  “Actually,” Ben said, “we were talking about getting a place here.”

  Jeanie clapped her hands with little-girl delight. “Oh, nothing would make me happier than having all my boys right here in Versailles, all my grandbabies here where I can spoil ’em rotten!” She ran a French-manicured finger under her eyes. “Lord, I’m fixing to cry”

  Lily was beginning to wonder how a person as open and natural as Jeanie could have produced a son as stuffy and uptight as Ben. “Well,” said Lily, “I guess we should see about finding a motel —”

  “Motel!” Jeanie yelped, as if the word were blasphemy. “No family of mine ever stays at a motel when they can stay with me.” She leaned over conspiratorially. “Besides, hon, the only motel in Versailles is that run-down motor court on the old road, and they just rent rooms by the hour. Why don’t y’all get your things, and I’ll get you settled in the guest room? I would put you in Ben’s old room, but I don’t guess a
new wife wants to spend the night in a room where she’s looking at her husband’s old math team trophies.”

  Lily had brought minimal luggage: a small suitcase stuffed with clean underwear, a couple of pairs of jeans, a few T-shirts, and two respectable dresses and a dressy pair of shoes for the inevitable court appearances. A single diaper bag filled with clothes and a few books and toys took care of Mimi’s needs.

  Ben, by contrast, had brought two enormous suitcases that had to be pulled on wheels and one garment bag. They were certainly doing their job to defeat gender stereotypes.

  “This is the grandkids’ room,” Jeanie said, showing them a bedroom crowded with two sets of bunk beds, a crib, and a playpen. “You know, I was just thinking this morning that I should get rid of that crib and playpen ’cause the boys is all getting so big.” She tickled Mimi’s chin. “I didn’t know this mornin’ that I was fixing to have me a baby granddaughter.” She set Mimi down in the playpen, which was filled with colorful blocks and beads. “Why don’t you play in here while I show Mommy and Daddy their room?”

  Mommy and Daddy, Lily thought. Naturally, Jeanie thinks I’m Mimi’s biological mother. She knew this was a notion they’d have to straighten out, but now didn’t seem like the time.

  “Oh, Lily, I wanna show you somethin’.” Jeanie escorted her into a bathroom that was quite possibly the most sensual room Lily had ever seen. A deep marble tub, which was big enough to comfortably hold at least two people, was sunken into the floor. The tub was surrounded by candles, and a crystal bowl of many-colored bath oil beads sparkled like jewels in the light that shone through the window.

  “What a beautiful bathroom,” Lily said.

  “You can use it any time you want to,” Jeanie replied. “It’s my special place, I guess. I’ve been with Benny Jack’s daddy thirty-four years, and I’ve raised up three boys in this house. Sometimes I just need a place where I can get away from the men, you know what I mean?”

  “I know exactly what you mean.” Lily bit her lip as Ben erupted in a fake coughing fit.

  “Well, this can be y’all’s room.” Jeanie led them into a room with a king-size canopy bed.

  Paintings of outdoor scenes hung on the cream and hunter-green striped walls, and a stuffed wild turkey stood guard in the corner, looking as if he might say, “Nevermore.”

  “Benny Jack’s daddy bagged him a coupla years back,” Jeanie said, when she caught Lily staring at the dead bird. “All the McGilly boys love to hunt, ’cept for Benny Jack here.”

  “Well, I wouldn’t want him to hunt anyway,” Lily said. “I’m an animal lover.”

  “And this way you won’t be a widow during hunting season.” Jeanie smiled. “Well, I’ll let y’all get settled in. I’d better be heading to the store if we’re gonna have a barbecue tonight.”

  Lily had already popped open a Bud tallboy before she realized that only the men were drinking beer. The women at the poolside barbecue appeared to be sticking to diet soft drinks. Ben’s brothers, Johnny and Wayne, were knocking back beers and laughing, threatening to push one another into the pool. Lily couldn’t help but observe how muscular both of Ben’s bathing-suited brothers were. With their bulging biceps and V-shaped torsos, they would have been the gods of the gay scene if they had shared their brother’s sexual orientation.

  Ben stood with his buff brothers, looking unamused at their high jinks. He was the only male at the party drinking Diet Coke instead of beer.

  Johnny and Wayne had five kids between them —scrawny, unruly boys between the ages of four and ten. Mimi sat on a beach towel, playing with her nesting cups and occasionally looking up at her new cousins’ antics with the critical gaze of an anthropologist.

  “You come on over here, Lily,” Sheila, Wayne’s wife, said. “Me and Tracee wanna give you a crash course on how to handle a McGilly man.”

  Lily managed a smile, knocked back some beer, and sat down at the redwood picnic table across from the other McGilly wives. Lily could tell she was going to have a hard time telling Sheila and Tracee apart. They both had dark tanning-bed tans and peroxided blond hair. Their aerobicized bodies didn’t pooch or dimple in their bathing suits, and diamond rings and pendants glittered against their brown skin.

  They were the kind of girls who had made Lily’s life hell in high school.

  “So...” Sheila purred, “how did you meet Ben?”

  “Through a mutual friend.” It was true. Dez had been dating Ben at the time he and Charlotte started collaborating on papers. To celebrate the publication of Dez and Charlotte’s first paper, the four of them had met for dinner at an Indian restaurant one night. Lily could have gone into detail about her and Ben’s first meeting, but she figured the best policy here was not to lie unless it was absolutely necessary and to never give any more information than the bare minimum. “We were friends for a long time before we got…involved.”

  “Is that a fact?” Tracee laughed. “I had Johnny engaged to me before he knew what hit him. And of course, we had John Junior seven months after the wedding, so I don’t guess I can say much about your little un over there being born outta wedlock. Me and Johnny just got in under the wire ourselves.”

  Lily smiled politely and took a big swig of beer.

  “So, Lily, let’s see your ring,” Sheila said.

  Lily looked down at her hands — so different from Sheila’s and Tracee’s well-manicured, gold-encrusted ones. Lily had artist’s hands — long, callused fingers with nubby nails and ink stains that never quite washed away. “My ring?”

  “You know,” Sheila enunciated as though she were talking to a particularly slow-witted child,

  “your diamond. That Ben bought you.”

  “Oh,” Lily said, “we haven’t bought a ring yet.”

  “But, Lil-eeee!” Sheila whined. “You absolutely have to make him buy you a ring. That’s one of the fun parts of being married. And let me tell you, you better enjoy the fun stuff while you can, because most of the time, being married’ll just make you wanna tear your hair out!” Despite Sheila’s words of doom, a smile was plastered across her face as she studied the enormous diamond that winked like a third eye on her hand.

  “Well, I guess I’m just not that interested in material things,” Lily said.

  Sheila and Tracee wouldn’t have looked at Lily with more shock if she had just confessed to being a serial killer.

  Jeanie and an old woman Lily assumed was Ben’s grandmother were arranging a buffet on a folding table. “Wayne!” Jeanie hollered. “I reckon you’ll have to put the ribs on the grill. There’s no telling when your daddy’ll get home.”

  The old woman stuck a serving spoon in a bowl of potato salad and then made her way to the table where the McGilly wives were seated. “Oh, lord,” Tracee muttered, “here she comes.”

  “Honey,” the old woman said to Lily, “I just wanted to welcome you to the family. I’m Benny Jack’s Granny McGilly.”

  “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mrs. McGil —”

  “Now, there ain’t no sense in you calling me Mrs. McGilly when your name’s Mrs. McGilly, too.” She grinned, revealing a mouthful of sparkling dentures. “Lily McGilly — that’s a real humdinger of a name, ain’t it? You must love my grandson something fierce to let yourself get saddled with a name like that!”

  Lily laughed. “Well, that was the first thing I thought of when he proposed — if I could actually stand to go through life as Lily McGilly.”

  The old woman smiled back at her. “Well, Lily McGilly, you just call me Granny, you hear?”

  “I will. Thank you.” Granny McGilly was a stout old woman with soft white hair cut close to her head. She wore a plain blue T-shirt, sweatpants, and a pair of expensive white running shoes. Far from being a prissy old lady, she had an easy, comfortable manner about her that was almost butch. Lily liked her immediately.

  “Well,” Granny said, glancing over at the food table, “Wayne’s got the meat on the grill and everything else is ready. I re
ckon I could sit a spell.” She sat down at the table next to Lily and across from Sheila and Tracee.

  Sheila and Tracee exchanged glances, and Sheila said, “Excuse us. I think we’re going for a swim.”

  When Sheila and Tracee got up, Granny said, “Lord, Sheila, that bathing suit you got on’s crawling right up the crack of your hind end!”

  “Everybody’s wearing suits like this, this season,” Sheila said defensively. She turned to go to the pool, revealing most of her tanned, taut butt.

  “She’s just showing off,” Granny whispered to Lily. “She had that thing done where they take a vacuum cleaner and suck all the fat outta your butt — what’s that called?”

  “Liposuction?”

  “Yeah, that’s it.” Granny grinned. “Of course, she didn’t have that much fat in her butt in the first place. If she’d had the fat sucked outta her head, that doctor woulda had a real job to do.”