“Is that Anna’s old wedding dress?” I joked.
“No, Aidan chose it.” Lucy looked puzzled. “Why?”
I realized that she was far beyond where she had been twenty years before. So were we all. I smiled. “No reason.”
“Suck your cheeks in,” Sammie commanded. I did and she applied blush.
“Who’s the minister?” I asked in between pummelings.
“It’s Evan.” Elizabeth motioned for me to step into the dress. “He got ordained just for this wedding. He found an ad in the back of Rolling Stone. He and Aidan have been getting along like a house on fire, by the way.”
“Speaking of which”—Sammie dusted me with powder—“is Jack Williams still mad at them for shooting bottle rockets and setting his boathouse on fire?”
“What?!” I turned to Sammie.
“Eh, Jack had insurance. Evan and Aidan paid the deductible.”
Elizabeth had a stopwatch going. “We have three minutes to get down to the lawn.” With one minute left, we all stopped and stared into the mirror. I was beautiful. The silk dress had tiny spaghetti straps and was devoid of any frills. It was snug to the waist and then fell open to a beautiful wide skirt. A simple headpiece held a short veil that accented the French twist. My wide blue eyes stared back at me and I realized that for the first time in a very long time they looked happy.
“Twenty seconds, and ten, nine, eight . . .” Elizabeth counted down to “on air.” I stood on the back porch facing Bear Lake. Magically, a white carpet of rose petals had appeared. They led all the way down the lawn to the open tent. Mom was now in a pink mother-of-the-bride dress and Dad was in his tux. I could see Aidan and Evan standing at the end of the rose-petal carpet. Dad stayed with me while the rest of my family trooped down to join them and Aidan’s family. The music from The Michigan Bass and Buck Show started up and I whispered to Dad, “Is this my wedding march music?”
“Don’t be silly. That wouldn’t be appropriate.” He gave me a wry smile. We turned our attention to Evan.
“Welcome back to The Michigan Bass and Buck Show,” Evan said. “For the first time in history, we are hosting a wedding. This is the groom, Aidan.” The camera zoomed in on Aidan who smiled and waved. “And that’s the bride, Jeannie.” Joe, the cameraman, turned around to do a slow zoom in on me. “Now that we’re all introduced, let’s begin this solemn ceremony.”
Evan nodded to Joy, who hit PLAY on a boom box. As I listened to the opening strains, I burst out laughing. It was abBA’s “Take a Chance on Me.” They sang, “Honey, I’m still free, take a chance on me . . .”
Dad squeezed my hand. “Now that’s appropriate.” I practically danced down the “aisle.” Evan performed the ceremony and ended with, “By the powers vested in me by Rolling Stone and The Michigan Bass and Buck Show, I now pronounce you husband and wife.”
Aidan picked me up off my feet and swung me around while we kissed. Everyone clapped, and I saw Marv wipe a tear from his cheek. But when our families stopped cheering we heard cheers and hollers echoing from across the lake and across the town.
As people began trooping in for an impromptu reception, we learned that the Bear Lake Tavern breakfast crowd had been held in rapt attention by my near arrest and through the entire wedding. Tommy even popped open champagne for his customers. June at the June Wedding had watched the wedding ceremony while three brides-to-be clutched each other and cried at how perfect it was. Alan down at Alan’s Beauty Shoppe had brought all business to a halt so everyone could watch. He took time out from the show only once, when he realized he was over-perming someone and had nearly burned off her hair.
Soon, it seemed like the entire town was descending on Evan’s backyard. People danced and laughed and ate the fried perch sandwiches that Tommy Noyce brought from the Blit. Tom the handyman showed up with a keg of Stroh’s beer. Evan dragged his stereo speakers out on the porch and Mom and Dad danced to “String of Pearls,” then “Chattanooga Choo-Choo.” Charlotte and Sam danced next to them, while Jim and Janet held hands and beamed at the whole scene. Aidan’s half-brother and -sister and my various nieces and nephews chased each other across the lawn, and my brother, sisters, sister-in-law, brothers-in-law, and husband were companionably laughing and talking together. I watched them from where I leaned against the massive willow tree my sisters and I had planted twenty years earlier. We had all been together during the easy times and the not-so-easy times, and it was comforting to know that now, with Aidan at my side, it would all go on nonstop forever.
Chapter Forty-one
Aidan and I honeymooned in North Muskegon. We stayed at my brother’s house because my parents’ house was filled to capacity with Aidan’s assortment of parents, half-siblings, and some of my older nieces and nephews.
My sisters, their husbands, and more kids all crammed into the rooms left at Evan and Anna’s. I felt kind of sorry that my youngest nephew had to sleep on the floor in the living room, until he told me he preferred it. He said he could actually be alone for a minute or two there. Aidan and I did, in honor of our nuptials, get the one room with its own bathroom. Every day the huge gang of us piled into cars and hit the beach at Lake Michigan or went blueberry picking on Mrs. Blaine’s farm or took the little Butterfly sailboat for a spin on Bear Lake.
The car radio let me know that TechnoCat opened at the box office with not-so-stellar numbers and in second place to Station Break over the Fourth of July weekend. But neither Aidan nor I checked a text message, voice mail, or email. Electronic devices were firmly off-limits, we had decided. We were sitting at the kitchen table eating ice cream one evening when my parents’ phone rang. It was Rachael, who had finally managed to track me down. It didn’t sound like she was pleased that my six-year-old niece had answered the phone.
“Where are you?” she demanded once I wrestled the phone away from Joy and sat back at the table.
I licked my spoon before replying, “In Michigan.”
“When are you coming back?”
With a glance at Aidan I replied, “I’m not sure if I am coming back.” Her tone changed so fast I wondered if a different person had gotten on the line. She began pleading with me.
“You have to come back. Katsu is a disaster. He alienated Fiona Underwood and she took her next project to Paramount. Vincent can’t stand him and rejects anything that he presents. Jeannie, we need you. What can we do to get you back here?” Rachael cried. I was so taken aback I forgot to be pleased that she was begging.
“I . . . can I call you back, Rachael?”
“You’ll think about it?”
“Yes, I’ll think about it.” Carefully I put the phone back on the cradle. I filled Aidan in on the call and we decided it might work with some conditions attached. Then I called Rachael back. A week later Aidan and I headed back to Los Angeles. I would be returning to work at Oxford Pictures. During my conversation with Rachael I put in boundaries for the first time. I asked that my workload be reduced to just eight movies a year. We decided that Caitlin was more than ready to move up and handle a couple of movies on her own. We also agreed that there would be no phone calls after 7 p.m. or on weekends unless it was really, truly an emergency. I didn’t ask about Katsu. But his office was cleared out when I got back. He had been moved over to a different division of Oxford.
I sold my house and moved into Aidan’s house and we went on much as we had before. Except now we could spend evenings and weekends mostly uninterrupted. We still cooked and gardened but now we were working together on an exciting new project—one that was due in about nine months.
Acknowledgments
With love for
Ralph Precious, Randy Precious, Kristina Martinez-Precious, Lisa Precious,
Lori Precious, and Julie Precious
In appreciation of
Carrie Feron, my amazing editor at William Morrow,
Nancy Yost, my literary agent at Nancy Yost Literary Agency, who believed in me,
and Jane Cavolina, who help
ed to show me the way
Many thanks and deep appreciation to the people who advised or helped me in getting to the next step, in the many steps, leading to this novel:
Betsy Amster, Esther Aronson, Rich Barber, Tom Biggs, Todd Brock, Dick Buckley, Shannon Buckley-Newell, Julie Curtis, Steve Erickson, Jill Green, Dani Kollin, Cheryl Lodinger, Jessica Rich, Jeffrey Stewart, Steve Stone, and Anna Termine
About the Author
DANA PRECIOUS grew up in North Muskegon, Michigan, and lives in Los Angeles with her husband and son.
Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins author.
Copyright
BORN UNDER A LUCKY MOON. Copyright © 2011 by Dana Precious. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
FIRST EDITION
Designed by Diahann Sturge
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
ISBN 978-0-06-187687-5
EPub Edition © 2011 ISBN: 9780062042309
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