Murder on the Bride’s Side

sorry to hear about your father’s passing. How is your mother doing?”

“She’s fine, thanks. She’s actually dating someone now,” I said.

“Really?” Julia said. Julia worked as a family therapist. Something in my voice must have aroused her professional instinct. With a slight tilt of her head, she asked, “How do you feel about that?”

My mother is an English professor with a passion for Victorian literature. Her boyfriend, George, is a man heavy on the brawn and light on the brains, who labors under the illusion that George Eliot was really a man. He’s a nice enough guy, but as Dorothy Parker once said about someone, “His ignorance was an Empire State Building of ignorance. You had to admire it for its size.”

I waved my hands, at a loss for words. “Whatever makes her happy, I guess,” I said finally.

“Loss is hard. It’s a good sign that she’s moving on,” Julia replied.

There was a hint of sadness in Julia’s voice as she said this, and I was sharply reminded that Julia had had her own share of loss. Her daughter, Becky, had died tragically some years back.

Becky was Julia’s only child. As kids, Harry, Bridget, and I played with her, although she and Harry were the closest. Becky’s father, Tom, was an alcoholic who took his anger at his own failings out on his wife and child. I’m not sure when Becky started using drugs and alcohol to numb the demons that plagued her, but by her eighteenth birthday, she had a serious problem. After being told that she was a worthless waste of space almost daily by her father, it was hard for Becky not to believe that on some level it was true. Julia did everything she could to help her daughter, but nothing worked. After attending a party one night, Becky showed up at Harry’s bedroom window, high and drunk. Harry wanted to take her home, but she begged Harry to let her sleep in his room, saying that if her parents saw her in her current condition, her father would kill her. Harry relented and snuck her into his room. But Becky was drunker than Harry realized, and sometime during the night, she slipped into a coma. She never came out of it and died two days later. Julia was devastated.

Julia’s eyes now slid to Peter, and I quickly introduced them. From there we all fell into easy conversation. Harry was regaling Julia with exaggerated stories of his past exploits when raised voices to our left caught our attention. Not ten feet from us stood Roni and Megan. Megan’s back was to us; Roni’s was not. Her artfully made- up face contorted in anger, she leaned in close to Megan, her face mere centimeters away, and gripped Megan’s arm with such force that her nails made angry red marks. Roni’s next words floated clearly to our ears. “I’m not going to tell you again,” she hissed. “You’re making a fool of yourself out there. Stop gawking at the boys in the band. They are not interested in you, nor are they likely to ever be. Men are not interested in obvious girls. Especially obvious overweight girls.”

Megan yanked her arm free of her mother’s grip. “I hate you!” she spat out before whirling around and pushing blindly past us.

Roni took a half step in Megan’s direction, then seemed to rethink the move. Instead, she pulled out a cigarette, lit it, and walked off in the opposite direction.

Julia’s hand flew to her mouth. “Oh, my God,” she whispered. “She’s just—”

“A real bitch,” finished Harry succinctly. Julia raised confused eyes to his but said no more. “I’ll go after her,” Harry said.

“No,” I said suddenly. “Let me go. She’ll be even more embarrassed talking to you about it.”

“Are you sure?” Harry asked.

“Yes. Peter, I’ll be back in a little bit.”

“Okay,” he said. “I’ll wait for you here.”

The band launched into the first few chords of “I Could Write a Book.” As I turned back to wave good-bye to Peter, I saw Harry offer his arm to Julia. “How about a dance, Julia?”

Taking his arm, she walked silently away with him. When they were well out of earshot, they turned toward each other and began to talk, earnestly and passionately.

It didn’t take me long to find Megan. She was in the summerhouse, the little cottagelike structure that sat on the edge of Elsie’s property. Marianne Dashwood would have found it sadly defective. The building was regular, the window shutters were not painted green, nor were the walls covered with honeysuckles. It was used mainly to store boating supplies, but there were a few chairs and a cot, as well. Bridget and I had used it as a place to sneak cigarettes when we were younger.

Megan was sitting with her back to me, her shoulders hunched. On the floor next to her, I saw a beer bottle. I considered saying something about it but dismissed the idea. When I was seventeen, I’d snuck a few beers myself now and again. Megan’s rebellious behavior was the least of her worries. “Megan?” I said softly. “Are you okay?”

She nodded her head but didn’t turn around. “I’ll be fine,” she answered in a choked voice.

I pulled up one of the folding chairs and sat down next to her. She kept her head averted.

“Megan, I don’t want to sound like a cliché, but, trust me, it does get better.”

“The only way it will get better will be if she drops dead,” she said bitterly.

“I know how you feel. I really do. Being a teenager is hard enough, and when you don’t look like a Barbie doll, it’s all the worse. When I was your age, I had to wear these horribly thick glasses, I had a retainer, and looked like I was in training to become a sumo wrestler.”

She looked at me, her eyes red and puffy. “You’re just saying that. I can’t believe you were ever fat.”

“My nickname was Cocoa Puff because I ate that stupid cereal day and night.”

“Really? You’re not kidding?”

“Nope.”

She looked down again. “Well, that may be so, but I bet you didn’t have a mom who made you feel worthless. You should have heard her tonight. She actually compared me to that stick woman, Chloe, saying that’s the kind of figure I have to have if I ever want a boyfriend. She wouldn’t shut up about her. I bet your mom never did anything like that to you.”

My dislike of Chloe only increased at the news that Roni liked her. Viewed in a certain light, however, they did seem a perfect match. Unbidden, Austen’s words came to mind, “There was a kind of coldhearted selfishness on both sides, which mutually attracted them; and they sympathized with each other in an insipid propriety of demeanor, and a general want of understanding.” Maybe I had been immersing myself in Sense and Sensibility a tad too much lately. “No, you’re right,” I admitted, after a moment. “My mom never made me feel worthless.” I gave a little laugh. “The creeps I dated in high school did that.”

Megan sighed. “She won’t even let me date, so I wouldn’t know about that.” Shaking her head, she continued. “You know, if it weren’t for Harry, I don’t know what I’d do. He’s been so nice to me. Did you know he takes me out almost every weekend?” she asked me with a small smile. “We go to the movies or to lunch—basically any place that’s out of the house. I mean, Avery is great, too, and it really meant a lot to me when he officially adopted me last year, but he’s so infatuated with her that he can’t see what she’s really like.”

“I’m sorry, Megan. I won’t pretend that this isn’t hellish for you right now. All I’m trying to say is that there is life after your teen years. And there will be life after your mother. You’re a smart, nice girl. You’ll go off to college next year and start a new life and you’ll see. It gets better.”

She sighed and stared at her lap. “I guess it has to, right? But still, there are times when I really wish she would just disappear.”

“I know.” I put my arms around her and hugged her. From what I could see, Megan wasn’t the only one who held that sentiment.

I left Megan shortly after. She wanted to stay at the summerhouse a while longer. It was hard to see Megan so miserable. I just hoped that she’d heard me when I said that it gets better. But when you’re a teenager, it’s hard to see beyond next week.

As I walked back, I saw Elsie standing at one of the tables. With a furtive glance around, she pulled something small out of the pocket of her peacock blue silk gown. Looking around one last time, she reached down and opened a bright pink clutch purse on the table and dropped whatever it was she was holding inside. Closing the purse again, she turned my way. When she saw me, surprise registered on her face, and she made her way over.