Tapestry of Fortunes A Novel - By Elizabeth Berg Page 0,12

know, I’m sure, that she wanted so much for you to be with someone.”

“I know.”

“I do, too, sweetheart. I’ve learned it’s not so good to be alone. I don’t know how you’ve done it all these years.”

I did it day by day, I want to tell him. Month by month. And then year by year. I decided in high school that I wasn’t going to get married too soon. I’d forgotten that you can also wait too long, and then the only candies left in the box are the squished ones, rejected for their questionable insides. And if I am honest, I’d have to count myself among those with questionable insides. As Penny was fond of reminding me, I’ve never been able to make that particular leap of faith, to find within myself the kind of trust that exchanging vows requires. Though I did have a friend whose fiancé insisted that the old vows be used, and when the minister asked if she promised to “honor and obey,” she burst out laughing.

It’s a cliché based on enough truth to have made it a cliché: the wistful bridesmaids, straining to catch the flung bouquet. But I was always the bridesmaid who stood at the back with my arms crossed, a little insulted that I had to even pretend I wanted it. I watched many happy couples drive away, vastly relieved that I was free and not the one stepping into that decorated vehicle.

“You know, marriage is what you and your husband make of it,” Penny once told me. “You don’t have to cleave to anyone else’s paradigm.”

“I know that,” I said.

And she said, “I’m not sure you do.”

Now I tell Brice, “I’m thinking about moving somewhere else, maybe in with other people.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, maybe. I’m trying to stay open to a lot of possibilities, including not knowing yet what all those possibilities might be.”

“You’re not going to give me one of your lectures now, are you? You’re not going to ask me to take out a piece of paper and write down the first word that occurs to me and drop it in the basket, are you?” This was a technique I used sometimes in workshops.

“Not unless you pay me.”

He laughs. “I miss you, Cece.”

“You, too.”

“Keep in touch. Drop me an email now and then.”

“I will.”

But I don’t think we’ll email anymore. He’s moved on in a way I can’t, yet. It occurs to me that I should have asked about his new wife. I wish she could know one thing about Penny. When it became absolutely clear that she was not going to experience the miracle cure we all prayed for, Penny embarked on a daunting task: she wiped out and lined every drawer and cupboard in her house with beautiful paper. When I asked why she was using up so much of the limited energy she had on this, she said, “I want it to be nice for Brice’s next wife.”

I go into the coffee shop and order a coffee and a mini-cupcake. I find a table and drink my coffee and watch the people in the shop. I smell the beans being ground, listen to snippets of conversation and bursts of laughter. But on the inside, I tell Penny that Brice is getting married.

I know.

I bite into my cupcake and tell Penny that I know she wanted Brice to remarry, but now that he’s really doing it, doesn’t it hurt her feelings?

No. It’s bigger, here.

I check my watch, refill my coffee cup, sit back down at the table, and while I pretend to read a newspaper someone has left behind, I tell Penny about the letters Dennis Halsinger used to send me. At first they were written on napkins, the envelopes made out of magazine pages and sealed with masking tape, and I relished the quirky artistry of that, even copied it for a while. Then, as he began to make some money, the letters came on tissue-thin pages with rambling, poetic passages about what he was seeing and feeling: the incredible natural beauty of Tahiti, the politics of the place; the way he evolved in his views of what love and life were meant to be. I remember lying on my bed and reading his response to one of my letters where I despaired of ever finding true and lasting love. He said love only made sense in the context of it being in your own mind first, then given to others; that trying to force it never