The Rom-Commers(94)

Maybe this wasn’t polite, but I really wanted to understand him. “But don’t you miss Mom?”

My dad gave me a sad smile. “I do. Of course. And would I give up all this personal growth to see her again for even an hour and just clamp her into my arms? In a second. But that’s not a choice. All we have is what we have.”

“I miss her, too,” I whispered.

My dad squeezed my hand. “It’s okay,” he said then. “Here’s another thing I accidentally figured out: happiness is always better with a little bit of sadness.”



* * *



BY THE TIME my dad was in a pretty stable place with his postsurgical health, Sylvie and Salvador decided to make an announcement: they were getting married.

A surprise express elopement. In twenty-four hours. In Dad’s hospital room.

“We’re eloping,” Salvador explained.

“But we’re just doing it here,” Sylvie added.

“We don’t want to wait,” Salvador said.

“We just want to start our lives together,” Sylvie said.

“Sooner—not later.”

Of course they did.

“Works for me,” my dad said.

I wasn’t sure if it worked for me. And I was just wondering if there were a way for me to call in sick to this particular family event … when Sylvie asked me to be her maid of honor.

“What?” I said, as she dragged me out of the room to the hallway.

“You have to let me apologize to you,” Sylvie said then.

“You’ve already apologized like ten times.”

“But you never accept it!”

She wasn’t wrong.

That’s when Sylvie burst into tears. “I don’t know what else to do,” she said now, her face getting blotchy and her voice starting to rasp. “I didn’t mean to say it. I was just—I don’t know—scared and exhausted and trying to defend myself. I don’t think that. Nobody thinks that. It just popped into my head and I said it—more because it was mean than because it was true.”

“Does that make it better?” I asked.

“I regretted the words even as I was saying them. There’s no excuse. I don’t know how to make it right. But I’m begging you to forgive me. Please, please! You’re my favorite person. You’re my hero! Please tell me that I didn’t ruin our relationship forever in one stupid moment.”

I mean, I had figured I’d have to forgive her at some point. I just thought I’d give myself a few years.

But now she was suddenly getting married. Tomorrow. And if I didn’t let this all go, we’d spend the rest of our lives knowing that I was mad at her at her wedding.

What choice did I have, really?

“Fine,” I said. “I forgive you.” And as soon as I said the words, I felt them.

Sylvie threw her arms around me.

“But if you ever say anything like that to me again, I’m moving to Alaska. And I’m taking Dad.”

It was that easy.

Because she was the only baby sister I had.

Anyway, we had a sudden surprise wedding to plan.

It gave us a project, honestly. Twenty-four hours to hang some twinkle lights and fluff some tissue-paper roses. Mrs. Otsuka offered to make Sylvie’s bouquet with zinnias from the community garden, and Sylvie cried and hugged her.

We got grocery-store cupcakes and sparkling cider and asked my dad to play “Here Comes the Bride” on his harmonica.

Sylvie wore the dress our mother had worn at our parents’ wedding—not a wedding gown per se, but a simple white dress she’d loved—along with her favorite cowgirl boots. Salvador wore a ruby-red tux they’d found while thrifting. We got Dad a little tweed driving cap to cover his surgical dressing, and he put a gray jacket over his hospital gown and tied a silk scarf like an ascot. Kenji arrived in a little suit and clip-on tie with an origami flower pinned to his lapel for a boutonniere, and Mrs. Otsuka wore a salmon-colored pantsuit that was the exact color of love. And I let Sylvie put me in a chiffon bridesmaid’s dress with bell sleeves she’d found for three dollars at the Salvation Army.

The hospital chaplain performed the ceremony—which was mercifully short and very sweet—and we lit a candle beside a photo of our mom on the hospital tray table. Our dad “walked” Sylvie down the aisle by joining the couple’s two hands together. Sylvie and Salvador wrote their own vows, and read them aloud … and I didn’t even judge them.

I just took the high road right past all those mixed metaphors and clichés.

Love is love, after all.

Even for nonwriters.

And as those two kids kissed each other and pledged an astonishing, gorgeous, hope-filled promise to take care of each other for the rest of their lives … even though I never cried at weddings, I wept like a deluge. I wept because it was all too much—but in the best way. I wept with gratitude and grief and joy all at once—and because my mom would have done the same, if only she could’ve been here. I wept because my sister had found a genuinely good-hearted man, and because Mrs. Otsuka sensed halfway through that my dad was thirsty and slipped over to bring him some water. I wept because there was nothing cuter than my dad in his jaunty little cap—smiling through his bruises like a man who’d never seen a day of sorrow. I wept because halfway through the vows, Kenji slid his hand into mine in that sweet, unselfconscious way that little boys do. I wept because the nurses were all weeping, and because it was such a miracle to have something to celebrate, and because we were at a wedding right now instead of a funeral. I wept for luck and for beauty and for kindness—and for the magic of being alive.