Chapter 97
“Glad you could make it,” she said. She held her clamshell phone in her hands and talked into it. “Yes, he’s here. Okay? You got everything you need? Call you if you need anything else, okay? I’ll tell him.”
“Who was that?”
“RJ.”
“Was he checking up on me?”
“No.” She paused as if she wanted to hold something back but couldn’t. “Well, yes. He wanted to make sure you got here okay. But, he also had a question. He says to tell you he loves you.”
Pad blushed. “I just spoke to him on the phone minutes before I got to Tampa.” Hearing his aunt say RJ loved him made it sound so different, so innocent. He scanned the assortment of wigs. “What question did he have?”
“He wants you to find out on your wedding day. Not now.”
“Is he enlisting you to plan our honeymoon? Can you give me hints where we’re going?”
“What? You still don’t know where you’re going?”
“Nope. He’s been secretive about two things, the music selection at the reception and where we are going for the honeymoon. He’s got our passports so I’m guessing we’re headed to Canada or Mexico.”
“Why those two places?”
“That’s where our airlines fly. We don’t fly anywhere else outside the continental US.” Pad pointed to the line of wigs. “Now how did you pick one?”
Maddy picked up a bust with a wig and showed it to Pad. “We can just look and try some out. I thought you were bringing Jen?”
“One of the twins has a bad stomach flu so she couldn’t come.”
Maddy picked a dark brown, shoulder-length wig. She brushed back her thin slivery grey to place the wig on her head. Pad noticed that she lost more hair since the last time he saw her. She complained that the hair loss was due to new chemo drugs she was on. This time around, her hair seemed to grow back slower. When Maddy centered the wig, Pad stood behind her to make sure it was on correctly.
“Not you,” added Pad.
“I agree.” She turned her head left and right, changing profiles to make sure and then took off the wig slowly from the scalp line. She grabbed a blonde wig that had a pageboy cut. “What do you think?”
“Uh uh,” said Pad.
“What did you say?”
“I don’t think it looks good on you.”
“Did you pick out the flowers for the wedding?”
“What do you think about gardenias?” asked Pad.
Maddy stopped and smiled. “Aww! Your mother’s favorite!. She loved to cut them and bring them in the old apartment we shared all the time. I think that’s a great idea. So many things you can do with gardenias!”
“Will you help with the floral arrangement?”
“Sure.” She nodded. “You mind me asking if everything is okay between you and RJ?”
“Yeah. Everything’s fine. Why?”
“Nothing. Just last time we got to the point of you sending out invitations and the wedding got cancelled. Your guests are probably thinking the same thing this time around.”
“Everything’s good. I hope you can tell. RJ is more involved than before, relatively speaking anyway. We’ve worked out our issues the last couple of years, most of them anyway. We talk more now. Considering that we’re talking about RJ. He doesn’t really like to talk about how he feels. At least not right away. He likes to bottle it up inside until it blows up.”
“I’m glad everything is good, then. You know I used to wonder that the only reason you were with RJ was for other reasons.”
“Like what, Aunt Maddy?”
“That he was slightly older. More secure financially. I worried that you would get hurt.” As she perused the other wigs, she turned to Pad. “So what’s the final count to wedding?”
“It’s forty.”
“How many did you invite?”
“We invited seventy. But a few couldn’t come because of work. Ann won’t be there. She finally got a green light for surgery and it happens to be two days before wedding.”
“You told me that she wasn’t sure but now she is?”
“Yes. She’s flying back home to Bangkok today. She’s decided to get bottom surgery after all. There’s a doctor there that has performed lots of vaginoplasties and she got cleared to do it.”
“I’m glad. Ann is a great girl. I know emotionally and psychologically she’s been working towards this for some time.”
Pad lifted up another wig and inspected it then placed it back down. “I’m very happy for Ann. And Chaz.”
“Is Chaz still going to be the best man?”
“He’s flying out right after the wedding. He’ll be there when Ann is recuperating. But Ann’s family will be with her in the pre-op counseling and surgery. We told Chaz that he should go be with her and he was going to go, but Ann said not to since it was a last minute opening for the surgery.”
“Anybody else I know that’s not attending?”
“Well, you don’t know her but RJ’s mom is skipping the wedding.”
“Why?”
Pad shrugged. “She says religious reasons.”
Maddy looked up at the mirror and spoke to Pad as she did so. “Are you kidding? I thought she was okay with RJ being gay.”
“I guess being gay and being married and gay are two different things.”
“How’s RJ taking it?”
“He hasn’t really talked about it. But he’s upset. I think in his mind he knew some of his cousins weren’t going to come. He didn’t expect his new step-siblings or half-siblings would come either since they’re not that close but he expected his mom to attend. He didn’t even tell me until about her until two weeks ago. I know he’s tried to talk to her.”
“Poor guy. That breaks my heart. I’ve gotten to like him a lot more. He seems to really love you. I see how he looks at you. And you, him. That’s how Dave and I look at each other.” She stood, put her hands on the counter, and walked a little using the counters for support. “Hey, Pad, can you get my walker over there in the corner?”
Pad looked behind him and saw his aunt’s walker. He grabbed it and wheeled it close to her
“I don’t want to use this walker at your wedding. How would it look as I’m walking down the aisle with you with a walker?”
“I’d rather you have it then fall or something.”
“And then, what about the reception?” She sighed. “I want to be able to dance without this thing. I wish I had scheduled the hip surgery months ago.”
“I thought your doctor wanted you to take it easy and wait until you had more strength.”
“I know. I just didn’t want this.” She tapped the walker as she spoke and rolled her eyes.