Something Borrowed - Emily Giffin [71]
"I want to fly back when she's born!" Darcy says. "I better not be on my honeymoon!"
Whether she does it on purpose or it is simply the way she is wired, something she can't help, Darcy inserts herself into every moment. Usually I don't mind, but after spending ages finding the perfect gift for my second-oldest friend, I wish she would pipe down and stop overshadowing Annalise and me for a nanosecond.
Always the diplomat, Annalise smiles quickly at Darcy before returning her focus to me and the blanket. She passes it around as everyone agrees that it is the ideal receiving blanket, so adorable, so soft. That's what they're saying, anyway. But something tells me that they are all thinking, Not a bad choice from a litigator with questionable maternal instincts.
* * *
When I return home from the shower, my mother follows me into the family room and bombards me with questions. I give her the highlights, but she is insatiable. She wants to know every detail about every guest, gift, conversation. I have a flashback to high school, when I'd come home, exhausted from a day of academic and social pressure, and she would inquire about Ethan's debate-team performance or Darcy's cheerleading tryout or what we talked about in English class. If I wasn't forthcoming enough, she would fill in the gaps, rambling about her part-time job at the orthodontist's office or what rude thing Bryant Gumble said on the Today show or how she ran into my third-grade teacher in the grocery store. My mother is an open-book chatterbox and she expects everyone to be just like her, particularly her only child.
She finishes her inquisition on the shower and moves on to—what else?—the wedding.
"So has Darcy decided on a veil?" She straightens a pile of Newsweeks on our coffee table, waiting for an in-depth answer.
"Yes."
She moves closer on our couch. "Long?"
"Fingertip."
She claps excitedly. "Oh. That will be beautiful on her."
My mother is, and has always been, a big Darcy fan. It didn't make sense back in high school given the fact that Darcy never put a premium on studying and promoted a certain unwholesome boy craziness. Yet my mother just plain old loved Darcy, perhaps because Darcy supplied her with the details of our life that she so craved. Even past the perfunctory parental pleasantries, Darcy would talk to my mother as a peer. She would come over to my house after school, lean against our kitchen counter, eating the Oreos my mother had set out for us while she talked and talked. Darcy would tell my mom about the boys she liked and the pros and cons of each. She'd say things like, "His lips are too thin; I bet he can't kiss," and my mom would become delighted and elicit more, and Darcy would give it, and I would end up leaving the room to start my geometry homework. Now what's wrong with that picture?
I remember once in the seventh grade, I refused to participate in the annual talent show, though Darcy incessantly heckled me to be one of her two backup dancers in her outlandish rendition of "Material Girl." Despite her own shyness, Annalise folded quickly, but I refused to succumb, didn't care that Darcy's choreography called for a three-girl act, didn't care that she said I was ruining her chances of a blue ribbon. Often I would let Darcy talk me into things, but not that one. I told her not to waste her breath, I had no intention of ever setting foot on a stage. After Darcy finally gave up and invited Brit to take my place, my mother lectured me on becoming more involved in fun activities. "Aren't straight As enough for you?" I asked her. "I just want you to have fun, honey," she said. I lashed out, saying, "You just want me to be her!"
She told me not to be ridiculous, but part of me believed it. I feel the same way now. "Mom, no offense to you or the second daughter you never had, but—"
"Oh, don't start with that nonsense!" She pats her ash-blond hair which she has been coloring with the same Clairol hue for the past twenty