Mixed Blessings (3 page)

"Are you kidding? Excuse me, but do you recall when all four of you did the boogaloo with my mother?"

"I don't remember that." He was all innocence, and they were both laughing.

"You're drunk."

"I must be." He turned around and grabbed her then, and held her close as he kissed her. It was a long time before he came up for air, and when he did, they were both breathless.

"God . . . I've been dying to do that all day. I can't wait to get to the hotel and tear your clothes off."

"My new suit?" She looked horrified, and he grinned in anticipation.

"And the new hat that goes with it. I must say, they're very nice though."

"Thank you." They held hands and chatted in the backseat, feeling new in their love again. In a funny way, it was almost like starting at the beginning, except that they were old friends, and everything they did was comfortable and blessed by the love they had for each other.

When they arrived at the hotel, a desk clerk walked them down the path into the main building, and they smiled at each other as they walked past a discreet sign pointing the way to the Mason-Winwood wedding.

"Must be a big day," Andy whispered to her, and she smiled.

They glanced at the gardens and the swans, and they were thrilled when they saw their room. It was on the second floor, and it had a huge living room, a small kitchenette, and a fabulous bedroom all done in a delicate French flower print and pink satin. It looked like the perfect place for their wedding night, the living room had a fireplace, and Andy was hoping it would be cool enough that night to light it.

"It's beautiful," she said, as the bellman left, and the door closed behind him.

"So are you. He gently took off her hat and swooped it through the air onto a table. And then he carefully undid her hair and ran his fingers through it, as it fell to her shoulders.

"You're the most beautiful woman I've ever seen . . . and you're mine

. . . forever and ever and ever . . ." He sounded like a child, telling a fairy tale, but that was what they had promised. And the bride and groom lived happily ever after. .

"And you're mine too," she reminded him, but he didn't need reminding, and he had no objection. The elegant new Chanel suit was quickly unbuttoned as they kissed, and the jacket fell to the floor as he lay her on the couch, and a moment later his own clothes were beside it.

Their clothes lay tangled on the floor while their bodies lay long and lean and taut as they discovered each other for the first time as man and wife.

All their passion, all their promises, seemed to come together in a single moment of abandon, and Diana lay clinging to him as though she would never let him go, not for a moment or a lifetime. Their ecstasy rose, and they shuddered with pleasure, and then lay peacefully in each other's arms long after it was over. It was sunset by then, and long pink and orange fingers of light streaked into the room, as they lay together, thinking of the life they would always share now.

"I've never been so happy in my life," he said softly.

"I hope you always will be," she whispered. "I hope I always make you happy."

"I hope we make each other happy," he added, and then unwound his long limbs from hers and stood up, smiling down at her, and he walked slowly to the window. The black and white swans were gliding smoothly on the pond, and the lawns looked perfectly tended. Young people in brightly colored cocktail dresses were hurrying to an area just beyond their view, as strains of show tunes wafted through the evening air toward them.

"That must be the Mason-Winwood wedding." Diana smiled at him, still lying on the couch, and suddenly hoped that they had just made a baby.

They had used no precautions at all this time, they had no reason to anymore. They had agreed not to, and see what happened, as soon as they were married. Both of her sisters had gotten pregnant on their honeymoons, and she suspected that the same might happen to them, which genuinely pleased her.

She stood up after a few minutes and came to stand with him, and just as she did, she saw a young woman in a short white wedding dress run down the path, holding onto a short white veil and a small bouquet, and with her was a girl in a red dress, probably her maid of honor. The bride looked about Diana's age, or thereabouts, an "assisted blonde,"

attractive enough, in a sensuous way, and the dress had looked elaborate, but not expensive. But something about the way she looked and the nervous way she ran touched their hearts as they watched her.

The feelings were all too familiar to them, and they wished her well as she ran to her wedding. .

"Barbie, come on!" Judi, the girl in the red dress, urged, as Barbara stumbled and almost fell in the white satin high heels she had bought at Payless only that morning. "Here . . . take it easy, kid Judi extended a hand to steady her, and Barbara stopped to take a deep breath, and stand hidden from the guests, as Judi waved to the best man, mouthing, "Is it time?" He shook his head and held up five fingers, as the maid of honor nodded her understanding. The two women were friends, although they hadn't known each other for all that long a time. Both were actresses who had come to L.A. from Las Vegas the year before, where they had been dancers. To save the meager sums they made, the two girls decided to become roommates.

Judi had had two bit parts since she arrived in L.A some modeling jobs, and almost got a walk-on in a commercial.

Barbie got a part in the chorus of a revival of Oklahoma! when it came through town, had tried out for every daytime soap, unsuccessfully, and like Judi, had spent the rest of her time waiting on tables. She got a great job at the Hard Rock Cafe when she first came to town, and gotJudi a job there too. And it was at the Hard Rock that they had both met Charlie.

Judi went out with him first, but they hated each other and had nothing to say, and it was Barbie he kept coming back to talk to. For a while, he ate lunch there almost every day, and then finally he got up the courage to ask her out. It had been easier asking Judi, the first time around-she was so much more casual, so much more matter-of-fact-but he thought Barbie was really special.

He and Barbie dated a few times after that, and by the fourth date, Charlie was head over heels in love with her, and too scared to say it.

He even stopped seeing Barbie for a while, but he couldn't stay away.

He called Judi and asked her to meet him. He wanted her advice, and he wanted Judi to tell him what Barbie thought of him.

"She's crazy about you, you jerk." It amazed her how any man twenty-nine years old could be so naive about women.

She had never known anyone like him, and neither had Barbie. He wasn't really handsome, but he was "cute," in a boyish way, and so innocent and decent.

"What makes you think she likes me? Did she say anything?" he asked Judi suspiciously, but she laughed again.

"Because I know her better than you do." Judi knew that Barbie liked his sweetness, his generosity, and she thought he had taken her to some pretty nice places. He made a good living as a rep for a major textile company, he did pretty well on commissions, he liked taking girls to nice restaurants, and he lived pretty well for a single guy. The nicer things in life were important to him. He had grown up dirt poor in New Jersey, and it meant a lot to him to have a good life now. He worked hard for it, and he earned it. "She thinks you're a great guy," Judi added, wondering if she should have made more effort with him herself, but he just wasn't her type. She liked excitement, and Charlie was too wholesome. He was a nice guy, but she liked her men racier. She was looking for the big time, and he bored her. Barbara was a different story though.

Judi knew she had grown up in a small town, won "Miss Everything in Town" by the time she finished high school, and then had some kind of blowout with her folks and ran away to Las Vegas. She'd been thinking of going to New York for a long time, but it was just too far from Salt Lake, and Vegas had been closer. But in spite of the men she'd met there, and the hard times, there was still something decent and unspoiled about Barbie, which made Charlie love her. She liked Charlie too. He reminded her of some of the boys back home, and she found his naivete refreshing. He was a nice change from the men she'd met in Vegas and L.A who seemed to expect everything in the world from a girl, from money to sex, and then some.

Charlie didn't want anything from her, except to be with her and spoil her, and it was hard not to like that. And he wasn't a bad-looking guy, even if he wasn't exciting. He had red hair and blue eyes, and every inch of him was covered with freckles. He had a boy-next-door quality about him that a lot of women found both endearing and attractive, and it touched Barbie too. Sometimes she thought he might be the solution to a lot of problems.

"Why don't you tell her what you think of her?" Judi encouraged him, and then suddenly three weeks after they started going out, they were engaged. And six months after that, Barbara was standing behind a hedge at the Bel Air Hotel waiting for the signal that would start her wedding.

"You okay?" Judi scrutinized her, as Barbie stood nervously, hopping from one foot to the other, like a frightened racehorse.

"I think I'm going to throw up."

"Don't you dare! It took me two hours to do your hair under that veil

. . . I'll kill you!"

"Okay, okay . . . Christ, Judi, I'm too old for this." She was thirty years old, only one year older than Charlie, but sometimes she felt a thousand years older. But when she wore less makeup, and just pulled her hair back in a braid, she looked younger than he did. But she had seen a lot more of life, and she was a lot more jaded. Only Charlie saw the sweetness and purity beneath her flash. Only he was able to reach a part of her she had been sure was gone forever. He invited her to his apartment for his home-cooked meals, they went for long walks, and he talked about wanting to meet her family, but she only shook her head at that, and she never answered his questions. She didn't like talking about them, and she said she was never going back to Salt Lake City to see them, but she never explained it. She had been furious one day when two Mormon missionaries had shown up at the apartment she shared with Judi, trying to get her to come back to the Church and move back to Salt Lake City. She had slammed the door on them, and shouted at them never to come back again. She didn't want any reminders of the life she had left behind in Salt Lake City. All Charlie knew was that she had eight brothers and sisters and about twenty nephews and nieces, but it was obvious to him that something had happened to her there, other than boredom. But she absolutely refused to discuss it.

He was far more open about his own past. He had been abandoned at birth in a train station, his records said, and had grown up in a series of state orphanages in New Jersey. He had been in several foster homes, and twice was considered for adoption, but he was a nervous child, given to allergies and skin problems, and by the time he was five, he had severe asthma. He outgrew most of it eventually, and the asthma had been in control for years, but by the time it was, he was too old for anyone to adopt him. He left the state home at eighteen, took a bus to L.A and had been there for eleven years. He had put himself through college at night, and his dream now was to go to business school, which would allow him to get a better job and support the family he longed for. For him, finding Barbie was like a dream come true. All he wanted now was to marry her, give her a good home, and fill it with children who looked just like her. He had said that to her once, and she had laughed at him.

"We'd be a lot better off if they looked like you!" She was a pretty girl, with an amazing figure, but she had never thought much of her looks, or herself, until she met Charlie. He was so kind to her, so protective, so unlike the men she had known, and yet sometimes she still wished he were a little bit more exciting. She had wanted to go out with an actor when she came to L.A maybe even someone famous.

And she had fallen for Charlie instead. And there were still times when she wondered if she should wait for her dream prince, or at least a famous actor. She had taken Charlie shopping to buy new clothes, and tried to introduce him to the latest styles to jazz him up a little bit, but in the end, she had had to agree with him, that on him they just looked silly. He was just a plainclothes kind of guy. His hair stuck up when he left it too long, so he had to cut it short, and he never got a suntan, he just fried, and after that he blistered.

"I'm not a glamorous type, you understand," he had explained to her seriously one night, over a dinner he had cooked for her. It was his specialty, cannelloni and 0550 buco and a big tossed green salad. He had actually learned to make it in one of his foster homes, he explained to her, and her heart went out to him when he said it. There were times when she really loved him, and other times when she wasn't quite as sure, and she wondered. Was he right for her? Really, really right? Or was he just generous and nice and convenient? She knew that no harm would come to her with him. But neither would any glamour or excitement.

Nothing was ever clear-cut in her life, the choices were always so damn difficult; the prices to be paid so high, the risks so great . . .

except with Charlie. He was offering her everything, everything she had thought she wanted years before or should now. Security, a nice place to live, a nice guy to take care of her, no worries, no headaches, no terror that she couldn't pay the rent this month, no fear that things would go from bad to worse again and she'd have to get another job as a showgirl. What she really wanted was an acting career, and the agents who'd talked to her said she had talent. All she needed now was a break. And she wasn't sure if Charlie would get in the way of that. If she married him, could she still work? Would he object to her career? He said he wouldn't, but he also talked about kids all the time, and that wasn't in the cards for her, not for now, not with him, not yet, and maybe even never. She didn't say that to him, of course, but what if her big break came? What if she got a regular part on a weekly show, or even a big part in an important movie? Then where would she be with her little life? But if the big break didn't come . . . at least she wouldn't be waiting on tables, And maybe it was the wrong way to look at things. She felt guilty about it sometimes, but she had to think about herself. She had learned that lesson a long time ago, right in the bosom of her own family. She had learned a lot of lessons from them, lessons she didn't care to learn again, or even remember.