Trying the Knot (46 page)

He remembered Carey Derry’s advice to lay low
or leave town for a while, and he asked “Where to?”

“A cousin of mine lives in Brooklyn,”
Tristana said offhandedly. “She and I have a lot in common.”

“Like what?”

“Well, we’re both survivors,” Tristana said
bemused. “Let’s go visit her, or do you have anything keeping you
here?”

“No, I’m game. No reason to stick around
here.”

Tristana nodded in agreement and turned the
key in the ignition. “Then let’s go take a bite outta the Big
Apple.”

“Should we wait for Alexa?”

“Nah, I’ll send her a plane ticket once we
get there,” Tristana said, and she tossed her clove cigarette out
the car window.

“Should we at least stay for the
ceremony?”

“I don’t think we’ll be missed,” Tristana
said as she pulled away from the church and cranked up the
radio.

Chelsea watched them drive off in the
direction of the horizon. It was one of those overcast days where
the hazy shade of dawn lingers until at last succumbing to an
equally morose dusk. Chelsea reached out to Ben with a hand in need
of a comforting squeeze. She longed for a gale force wind to
extinguish the sweaty tension festering between them.

With the shrug of his slumped shoulder, she
found herself backing away from him. Surrounded by empty stillness,
she said his name, but any attempt to make a connection was futile.
He was lost and searching inside of himself for a time past when he
did not seem so completely alone. It did not matter that she was
standing next to him. It appeared Ben would remain forever lost, a
piece of him had broken away and become unmoored, altogether
irretrievable.

“So, this is how it goes?” Chelsea asked.
Consummate longing saturated her entire being. She was unable to
fathom that each and every last one of them intended to grieve in
his or her own personal, isolated hell. “Is this how it is?”

“Don’t you have somewhere to be? A wedding to
stand up in?” Ben asked as if he was nowhere at all.

“Oh, as a matter of fact yes, I do,” Chelsea
said, eyeing her Chevy Malibu. She was packed and more than ready
to hit the road.

Ben had not intended it to sound so callous,
but he did not have the energy to explain. He had merely wondered
aloud if the wedding had started. Looking downwards, he was unable
to remain focused on anything but the cracked cement between his
shoes. He wiped his nose and bring himself to look up from the
blurred pavement.

“She-she was too great for this,” Chelsea
stuttered. “She deserves more. She deserved better than you, better
than any of us.”

Chelsea ran away from him as fast as her
fuchsia confines would allow, and when she discovered Nick waiting
in the back of the church, she suddenly felt a pang of sympathy for
him for the first time she could remember. With as much calm as she
could muster, she informed everything was all set, and she gave him
a spontaneous hug, which he returned appreciatively. It was time to
begin the long awaited connubial proceedings.

Nick assumed responsibility for corralling
his groomsmen, and he took charge in his easy personable fashion.
The bridesmaids lined up and were paired off with their respective
partners. It was all they could do to suppress their natural state
of obnoxiousness, but Nick’s mere presence commanded it. Rather
than issue orders, he climbed the balcony steps to summon Alexa who
was pounding out what had to be her eighteenth rendition of Joyful,
Joyful We Adore Thee.

Alexa followed Nick, who made his way to the
front of the church once she assumed Evangelica’s position in the
bridal procession. Joining the others, Alexa picked up the
atmosphere of suppressed mourning. For the first time that day, her
mind was preoccupied with something other than the kiss she had
shared with Tristana last night and her encounter with Nick. Now
Alexa could only think about her missing mentor. She shut her eyes,
and a subconscious dam blocked out any other thoughts whatsoever.
She bit her lower lip, and the stagnant heat caused tiny beads of
perspiration to run down her scrunched forehead. Sniffling, she
clenched onto her bouquet of day lilies and pink roses, which
trembled slightly.

Standing beside her pint-sized partner,
Chelsea placed her hand on Alexa’s shoulder and massaged gently.
Chelsea breathed the stuffy air that filled the oppressive church,
and she longed to be outdoors even though there was not a trace of
the slightest breeze blowing anywhere. Again her attention trailed
out the church to Ben, who sat alone and lost at the end of the
sidewalk.

Chelsea struggled to keep her feet planted
alongside her wedding party groomsman. All she really wanted was to
flee the scene and whisk Ben away in order to liberate him from his
sorrow. She wanted to feel herself pressed against him on the shore
of a distant beach. She watched as he lay back against the pavement
and he seemed to drift away. She wished it were possible to reel
him in from his sea grief.

With two cameras now hanging from his neck,
Thad whizzed past Chelsea and the bridal party as made his way to
the bride and her father. Ominously veiled, Kate clutched tightly
to her bouquet. Buried under teeming antique white, she let Ray
Hesse wrap his arm proudly around her for the sake of Thad’s
camera. Father and daughter waited in silence behind the wedding
attendants, and then Thad retreated to the balcony. With all eyes
focused on Nick and the priest at the front of the church, Kate
stepped away from her father and awaited her cue to march
forward.

After an eternity of silence, the wedding
Mass began. Evangelica’s pre-recorded vocals flooded each crevice
of the mammoth cathedral with her song, and the overly ornate,
resplendent church came alive. Finally, the attendants made their
way in pairs toward the altar, and their steps coincided with the
subdued vital beat of Vange’s vocals.

The sweet breaths of her exhilarating song
breathed its life force into everyone present. Each perfect note
was reassurance that life was more than a chaotic series of sounds
and visuals; it was a running subtext, and there was no choice
except grapple with the hope of making sense of it all. The
unfaltering waves of her vibrant voice lifted them out from under
the depths of time, and her heavenly music elevated them to a place
where the perfect eulogy was a song.

Evangelica’s presence permeated the church
and nudged them along with a subtle impact, not unlike a gentle
breeze sweeping the smothering humidity aside. Her very essence
rippled infinitely and indefinitely, suggesting her absence was a
momentary pause, a skipped beat which insinuated there was no such
thing as good-byes. She was part of them, and yet apart from
them.

Kate robotically fell into synchronized
unison with others, and she came alive only at the sound of the
haunting voice, which prodded her forward. In the distance, the
continuous distraction of cameras flashing prevented her from
losing herself in the moment.

When it came time for Nick and Kate to issue
their vows, Nick lifted the veil above her head, and the bride’s
attention focused on the crucifix hanging above, anything but her
groom’s eyes. She studied his cufflinks along with the floral
arrangements on the altar. The sensation of her own shifting aching
feet seemed more relevant than his immediate attention. Nick was
taken aback by the stoic expression on her face, and he looked with
resignation at his own hands.

As Nick glanced back at the front entrance,
Kate abruptly divorced herself of any emotional investment in the
wedding ceremony. Her body became rigid as her thoughts abandoned
the scene unfolding before them. Kindly Father Tim perceptively
realized there was something seriously wrong, and he softly
repeated Kate’s name to no avail. So, he turned to Nick for
assistance, but his gaze was fixated on the matte gold crucifix. A
Lake Huron-sized sea of indifference had accumulated between the
bride and groom.

Not quite sure what was expected of him, Nick
studied Kate searching for an answer or sign. When Kate finally
turned to face him she was devoid of emotion, and it appeared a
porcelain figurine had replaced the woman he knew and loved. Nick
repeated her name to no avail. By now it had become apparent to
everyone something was catastrophically awry at the altar, and the
ceremony sputtered to a standstill. As the crowd struggled to make
sense of the situation unfolding before them, the priest continued
to feign normalcy as he waxed prophetic about ties that bind.

Nick placed his hand on Kate’s elbow, and he
repeated her name, “Kate – Katie – Kate.”

Without warning, she burst louder than
intended, “What? What do you want from me?”

“Kate,” he whispered, mining the exact words
to express his remorse.

“What?” Kate demanded, clutching her bouquet.
She asked softly, “What do you want from me? What? What is it?”

“Not like this, Kate,” he said gently,
looking into her bloodshot eyes.

She remained unmoving and expressionless.

“This isn’t how it’s supposed to be,” he
said.

The confused priest looked back and forth at
the questioning groom and the stalwart bride. The silence echoing
between them was earsplitting. The situation was beyond Father
Tim’s control, and he waited patiently for the bride and groom to
resolve whatever it was that acted as a barrier separating them
from a lifetime of matrimonial bliss.

Nick asked, “Where’s the love, Kate?”

Kate hung back, silent for a long moment
until she managed, “She took it with her. It died with her.”

“You can’t mean that.”

Kate said solemnly, “When she left, she took
everything.”

She stared emptily and was transfixed
emotionlessly on the altar. Her eyes had become unforgiving as
glass, and no matter how deep Nick peered into the recesses of her
being, nothingness reflected back at him. His mind raced with
thoughts of how to make things right, but the more he thought the
less anything mattered. There was nothing he could do now, except
perhaps unshackle them both from a future plagued with guilt and
regret.

Nick realized now why she had met him here at
the altar, and it was not for the obvious reason to become man and
wife. Rather than to embark on the customary new beginning, she had
come to settle the score once and for all. He could not bear to
look at her any longer, and he turned away to escape her locked,
stony expression. Consciously, he deliberately turned away from his
bride. He would fall on the proverbial sword and provide the
ultimate sacrifice. As he forged his way casually down the center
aisle, he made his way past the shocked gasps and mortified
expressions of the bewildered crowd. Their flustered intakes of
breath and judgmental eyes followed him as he kept walking,
confident and surefooted.

“Bastard,” Chelsea cursed under her breath,
and she rushed to the side of the dry-eyed, stranded woman in
white. Chelsea wrapped her arm around her shoulder, but the
unresponsive bride failed to acknowledge any display of condolence.
Kate remained expressionlessly transfixed on Nick’s backside as he
made his way down the long barren aisle out of her life.

Camera flashes reflected in Kate’s serene
eyes, and each glowing burst was like a heavenly good-bye, fleeting
and indefinite. High above in the balcony, Thad watched as a
determinedly calm Nick grew larger in the window frame of his
camera, and he could not help but feel a hundred dollars
richer.

the end

About the
Author

Todd Erickson is a school librarian living in
the Detroit suburb of Ferndale with his partner. He was born in
Rogers City, Michigan near Lake Huron. He grew up on a steady diet
of gardening, ice cream and Knots Landing – all of which he still
enjoys to this day in some form or other.

Thank you for reading. If you have made it
this far, congratulations, but you might be wondering what is up
with the book cover as it’s not exactly representative of any
situation from the book. I conceived the image as an epilogue. I
have my suspicions of what it represents, but feel free to email me
your thoughts at:
[email protected]

This story is dedicated to the memories of my
Grandmother Barbara Jean Shea Smith, and also to my father Michael
John Erickson. Each died of familial ALS. It’s also dedicated to my
family, along with every family living with the reality of this
disease.

A lot of friends encouraged me in the initial
stages of this story, which incidentally began 20 years ago. Some
read all of it, or pieces of it, and encouraged me, and some
listened patiently to ideas that were a work in progress. To them,
I say thank you from the bottom of my heart.