Plum Lovin'

13

"This is a surprise," my mother said when Diesel and Bob and I walked through the door. "Are you staying for dinner?" Her eyes got wide. "What's that on your forehead?"

"It's a hive, and we just came to visit."

"You don't get hives," my mother said. "I've never known you to get hives."

Grandma bustled in from the kitchen. "Look at this, it's the big guy! Isn't this a treat."

"Thanks," Diesel said.

I gave him an elbow. "She's talking about Bob."

A car door slammed behind us, and Mary Alice galloped into the house. She was followed by Angie and Albert and Valerie with the baby. They were all dressed up.

"Goodness," my mother said. "What's going on?"

"Did you tell her?" Valerie asked.

"No. I just got here."

"Well, tell her!" Valerie said. "This is so exciting!"

The doorbell rang. It was Annie and the justice of the peace.

"Oh dear," Annie said when she saw my forehead.

Annie was hives from head to toe, but they were fading, and she was uniformly covered in white salve and makeup.

My father was in the living room, watching television. He turned the sound up and hunkered down in his chair.

I looked at Diesel. He was rocked back on his heels, smiling. "Go ahead, honey," he said to me. "Tell them the happy news."

"I'm getting to it," I said.

"What?" Grandma wanted to know. "What?"

"Diesel and I have decided to get married… today."

My mother went white and made the sign of the cross. "Holy Mary, mother of God…"

"What about Joseph?" Grandma asked.

I could feel panic rising in my throat. I looked to Diesel for help.

"He's out of town," Diesel said.

I inadvertently made a sort of strangling sound. "Ulk."

"It was all I could think of," Diesel whispered. "I'm not good at this crap."

My mother sucked in some air. "You're pregnant," she said.

"No!"

"Isn't this fab?" Valerie gurgled. "Two new babies!"

Now my father was on his feet. "Babies? Who's having babies?"

"Stephanie," Valerie said. "She's going to have a baby, and she's getting married."

My father was confused. He looked around the room. No Joe. No Ranger. His eyes locked on Diesel. "Not the psycho," he said.

Diesel blew out a sigh.

My father turned to my mother. "Get me the carving knife. Make sure its sharp."

The doorbell rang again, and Lula and Connie rushed in with the cake. It was a huge wedding cake. Three tiers with a bride and groom on top.

"We got it," Lula said. "Mary Beth Krienski got cold feet and called off her wedding over the weekend, and we got this kick-ass bargain cake. Tasty Pastry was getting ready to heave it into the Dumpster. We got there just in time."

"It's yellow cake with lemon between the layers," Connie said.

"Put the cake on the dining room table," Grandma said. "Do I look okay for the pictures? Is my hair okay?"

Pictures! Val would want wedding pictures. "I didn't think to bring a camera," I said.

"That's okay," Valerie said. "I brought my camera."

"Yeah, and Connie and me stopped at the store and got one of them happy-snappy things," Lula said.

"You gotta have pictures of the bride," Grandma said.

All eyes turned to me. I'd gotten rushed out of the house this morning. I was still wearing the clothes I grabbed off the floor, and I had a ball cap on my head. And two big red hives on my face.

"That's okay, pumpkin," Diesel said to me. "I think you look… cute."

I introduced Annie and the justice of the peace, and Albert Kloughn broke out in a sweat.

"I thought I recognized you," he said to Annie. "We met just once, and it was a while ago."

Annie smiled at him. "It's so nice to see you again, Albert."

Albert was wearing a suit and tie, and he tugged at his shirt collar. "Can't breathe," he said.

"I'm in a hurry to get married," I yelled.

"We need to get some papers signed," Annie said. "Albert, you sign here as a witness. And Valerie. And here for Stephanie."

I watched Diesel sign. "Just Diesel?" I said to him. "No last name?"

"That's all I've got," Diesel said. "My name's Diesel."

"I need a bathroom," Albert said.

"No!" I told him. "You're gonna have to hold it. Everyone get in their places. Valerie, you stand next to me. And Albert, you stand next to Diesel."

The justice of the peace jumped into action and whipped out his little book with the ceremony in it.

Lula snapped a picture and my mother started crying.

Albert stood rooted to the spot, his face white but his cheeks stained red. Diesel grabbed Albert by the back of his suit jacket and dragged him to his side, so we were all four in a row.

"Are we ready to begin?" the justice asked.

"Yes," I said, "but we need to change places. This is actually going to be Valerie's and Albert's wedding."

Albert went down to his knees, and Diesel yanked him up to his feet, still holding tight to Albert's jacket.

The justice started reading from his script. "Dearly beloved-"

"Skip ahead to the I do part," I said to the justice.

The justice thumbed over a couple pages in his book.

"I'm going to be sick," Albert said.

"Dude," Diesel said. "Suck it up."

Albert went down to his knees again. "I got this thing about weddings."

"You were okay when you thought it was mine," Diesel said. "Just pretend it's mine."

"I can't pretend," Albert said. "I'm no good at pretending."

"We could have a double wedding," Valerie said. "Simultaneous. Then Albert could concentrate on being the best man."

I felt another hive break out on my chin. "I need my salve," I said. "Somebody get me some salve."

"It's not a bad idea," Annie said. "The universe would rest easier if Diesel was married."

"I'm not marrying Diesel!" I told Annie.

"Hey" Diesel said, "a lot of women would give anything to snag me."

"I'm not a lot of women."

"No shit," Diesel said. He shifted Albert from one hand to the other. "Can we get on with it? This guys getting heavy."

"Would you really marry me?" I asked Diesel.

"Not forever, but a night might be fun."

Good grief.

"I'm confused," my father said. "Who's getting married?"

"Albert and Valerie are getting married," I said. I turned to Albert. "Here's the choice. You can go through this with your eyes open, or I can go get my stun gun, and you can get married with your eyes closed and your body twitching on the floor. My sister is pregnant again, and I'm going to make sure she's married."

Albert's mouth was open and his eyes were glazed.

"I'm going to take this as a choice to keep eyes open," I said to the justice of the peace. "Start reading. And hurry up."

"Do you-" the justice said to Albert.

"He does," we all said in unison.

"Me, too," Valerie said.

And Valerie and Albert were married.

"Let's cut the cake," Lula said.

My grandmother trotted in with a cake knife, and we clustered around the cake. It was a great cake, except Bob had eaten all the icing off one side.

"It's better this way," Grandma said. "You got a choice like white meat or dark meat, only this time it's icing or no icing."

I ran upstairs to the bathroom to look for more salve.

Diesel came up a minute later with a piece of cake for me. "That was a nice thing you did for your sister," Diesel said.

"How's Albert?"

"Deliriously happy."

"I think they've found true love."

Diesel nodded and fed me a piece of cake. "I have to go. I'm being reassigned."

"So soon?"

"Yeah, but I'll be back. You owe me a night."

"I do not owe you a night."

"I was willing to go the distance," Diesel said. "That has to be worth something."

"How about beer and pizza?"

"It's a start," Diesel said. "And don't worry about Del-vina. I changed him into a toad."

The doorbell rang, and I heard Grandma hustle to get the door.

"Stephanie," she yelled up the stairs. "There's a flower delivery guy here, and he's got a bunch of flowers for you. The flower guy said two of these were supposed to go to your apartment, but I said you'd take them all here."

I went downstairs with Diesel following, and I took three boxes from Grandma.

The first box held a single perfect long-stemmed red rose. No card.

The second box held a dozen yellow roses. The message on the card was… love, joe.

The third box held a bouquet of daisies. The hand-scrawled note said… valentine's day sucks, usually.

Valentine's Day didn't suck this year, I thought.

I felt someone brush a kiss across the nape of my neck, and I turned to Diesel, but the only thing behind me was the cake plate sitting on the bottom step.