Come to the Edge_ A Memoir - Christina Haag [59]
The policeman’s gruff demeanor dropped at once. “Mr. Kennedy, I had no idea. Our orders were to—”
“No harm done,” John said, exchanging enough small talk to put the man at ease.
He took a bag in each hand, and I carried the dress, safe in its plastic sheath, and the wide-brimmed black hat I planned to wear the next day. “Nice,” he said. “Going down the Nile, are we?” Then he led me past the small crowd at Scudder and Irving, through a high hedge, and down the walkway to the back door of his father’s house.
Before we went in, he pulled me from the porch light and held me tight. “Where’ve you been? I missed you.” He smelled of sun and Eau Sauvage.
I expected everyone to be asleep, but they were all gathered around the kitchen table, laughing. In keeping with tradition, Ed was about to leave to spend the night at a house nearby. Maurice was staying elsewhere, too. Caroline smiled. She was tanned and relaxed, more serene than I could ever imagine being. She greeted me warmly, and his mother turned and rose from the table.
“We’re so glad you’re here! You poor thing, you’ve come so far.”
“It’s been an adventure.”
“Well, you’re here now. Are you hungry? Marta, Efigenio, heat up some of those lovely leftovers from the rehearsal dinner.”
I sat down at the table, and as Marta fussed over a plate, John began teasing his sister—one last grand ribbing before she was a married lady. He kept trying to get a rise, but each time she bested him. Even he couldn’t faze her.
His mother always seemed beguilingly girlish to me, and that night even more so. She spoke excitedly of preparations, of how well the rehearsal had gone, how delightful the dinner had been, and who would be in what car on the way to Our Lady of Victory Church in Centerville the next morning. Then her face brightened.
“Oh, John,” she said, as if it were Christmas morning, “show Christina the tent!”
And so, close to midnight, we made our way through dark hedges and down the dip in the hill by the main house—John’s grandmother’s house—which stood watch over Nantucket Sound. As if she couldn’t help herself, she followed us through the wet grass to the lawn, where a huge white tent stood billowing. It was lit up and filled with people. And when we reached the entrance, she walked in ahead.
There were actually two tents, she explained, one for cocktails and the receiving line, and a bigger one for dancing and the seated dinner. In the main tent, waiters from Glorious Food moved by us with the swift grace of dancers as they set up the large round tables and the white wooden folding chairs. Florists from New York were hanging lanterns and filling buckets and grapevine baskets with the simple summer flowers she loved.
She introduced us to the man in charge and lavished compliments on the staff. John hung back, wandering at the edges; he’d seen it earlier. She stood at the center of the tent under the highest peak, a bower of blossoms suspended above her, and surveyed the world of her making. She stretched out her arms. “Isn’t it wonderful?” she said, her face glowing.
And it was, to see the magic before the magic, the event before the event. I watched her then and thought, This is a woman who does not take life for granted. This is a woman who knows her luck and lives it, who grasps that beauty is transformative and transient. Even in a wedding tent.
The next day, there was football in the morning and a laughing bride. Tears at the church and cheering from the crowd. There were champagne toasts and dancing. After the receiving line and before the dinner, the wedding party gathered near the dunes in the russet afternoon light, and pictures were taken: the bridesmaids in easy elegance, their hair wreathed and their silk dresses fluttering; the groomsmen with blue bachelor’s buttons in the lapels of their periwinkle jackets. All wore breezy smiles. And when a wind came off the water, Caroline’s veil got tangled behind her.
The guests stood on the lawn and watched from a distance, the women holding on to their hats and smiling. The clink of