A Wedding in December_ A Novel - Anita Shreve [26]
“Should we stop for coffee?” Bridget asked, lowering her foot from the dashboard.
“These guys must be starving.”
“They’re always starving,” Bridget said, staring at Bill. She hadn’t had a husband for almost a decade. Bill, she had discovered, was that rare man who had an extraordinary gift for bringing out the best in people. In herself. In Matt. And doubtless in the two hundred or so employees he had under him in his software business.
“What?” Bill asked, a smile beginning.
“Nothing,” she said.
“What?” he repeated.
“I can’t believe we’re doing this,” she said.
With his free arm, he pulled her toward him. She leaned briefly into Bill despite the awkward maneuver over the console. He kissed her quickly, taking his eyes off the road.
“You’ll kill us,” she said.
Bill pulled into the parking lot of a rest area, and the boys roused themselves. Dressed nearly identically in North Face fleeces and Abercrombie & Fitch jeans, they stepped out of the van and stretched. Each had grown half an inch while sleeping.
“Where are we?” Matt asked.
“I thought we’d get some lunch,” Bill said.
Waking from hibernation, the boys walked across the parking lot and into the fast-food complex. Bill put his arm around Bridget. “You’re sure you’re okay?” he asked.
“Coffee,” she said, trying to keep pace with his stride.
“Matt wanted to rent a tux.”
“He did?” Bridget asked, surprised that her son thought the occasion merited the formal wear.
“So we did,” Bill said.
“You and Matt are wearing tuxes?”
“And Brian, too.”
“To a wedding with twelve guests?”
Bill grinned.
“You guys,” Bridget said. “How did you pull this off? When did you get them?”
“That night Matt asked me to take him to get basketball sneakers? The tuxes were his idea, and he wants it to be a surprise. But I’m telling you now. Just in case you hate the idea, you’ll have time to get used to it. Because, baby, we are wearing those tuxes.”
“But I love the idea,” Bridget said.
They found the boys in line for Burger King, and Bill joined them. Bridget, who had never been able to stomach fast food, even before she’d gotten sick, gravitated to the frozen yogurt stand. She asked for a medium-size cup of vanilla with nuts on it (no wonder the twelve pounds, she thought). She turned with her cup and saw Bill waving her over to a table where the boys were already deeply into their Double Whoppers with extra cheese. The fat! Not to worry, she thought. The combustion engines inside Matt and Brian would burn off all the calories before they’d even reached the Berkshires. As Bridget walked to their table, she pictured Nora’s place, remembering the trip she and Bill had made two months ago both to visit their old friend and to see her new creation. In late October, when Bill and Bridget had decided to get married, Bill had thought of the inn and had written to Nora. There was romance in the idea of inviting old friends only, those who had known Bill and Bridget years ago when they’d been high school sweethearts. Bridget had told her friends from home that the wedding would be just family, a small white lie that bothered her only a little.
“Coffee,” Bill announced as Bridget sat down, the boys reining in the clutter of waxed papers and plastic cups, packets of ketchup and straw wrappers. Bill slid the overlarge cup toward her, and, instinctively, she drew her head away. The smell of the coffee was offensive. Slowly, so that Bill wouldn’t notice, she pushed the coffee to one side and dug into the yogurt with her plastic spoon. The