“Oh, Daddy, please don’t worry. Ted is a good person. He does love me. And I admire him so much. Don’t you think I’ve become more confident since I’ve been with him?” Why this aspect sprang up in her mind as a reason to marry wasn’t clear. There were so many other things she liked about Ted, loved about him, but mainly, Ella looked up to him as someone who’d overcome difficulties. She wanted to be like that, too. “He’s made me more bold. Don’t you think?” she asked, her eyes crinkling in the corners—the way they did when she wasn’t sure of herself.
Douglas nodded, wanting to give her this quality that she had wanted so much. Courage. Even as a girl, Ella had wanted courage, and he had told her as often as possible that she was brave and good. Ted had merely taught her to speak up. That was only one kind of bravery. From Ted, she’d learned to verbalize more and to not put herself down so much. She’d even learned how to ask for Casey’s friendship. But couldn’t those things have just come with time? Douglas wondered. Couldn’t she have learned those things without Ted? Why did Ella credit him with so much of what she had done?
Ella reached for his hand, and Douglas took hold of it.
“Oh-kay. Oh-kay. Daddy is so sad that he’s losing you. You are my angel, Ella. You are my angel.”
“Oh, Daddy, I’m not going anywhere. I’m just getting married. Really, Daddy. Nothing will change. I’ll always love you best,” she said. “Just don’t tell Ted, okay?” She laughed, wiping her cheek with her free hand.
Douglas opened his arms wide to embrace his daughter. He felt like a selfish old man.
From her seat, Casey took another sip of her seltzer. A water bead of condensation from her glass splashed onto the open magazine. She heard the electric organ playing. There was a knock—it was time. She got up to tell the makeup lady, who was still in the bathroom. Douglas let go of his daughter and went to the door.
The ceremony itself was brief enough, with only two sacred readings and one Shakespeare sonnet. After the photographer snapped the last group shot, the wedding party progressed to the banquet room. The cocktail hour had ended, but many of the guests remained camped near the raw bar, tucking away what seemed like a limitless supply of jumbo shrimp. It took some effort on the part of the wedding hall manager to corral the guests to their seats. When everyone finally sat down, the manager signaled the deejay. An artificial drumroll played from a noise sound track. The deejay shouted into the microphone as if they were at a Knicks game, “And I give you Mr. and Mrs. Ted Kim!”
The manager nudged Ella and Ted into the hall. There were four hundred guests seated in round tables of ten, eating their first course of lobster tempura. Someone tapped his champagne flute with a spoon, and others followed along. Ted kissed Ella on the mouth, and she reddened immediately. The guests whooped in delight. Glasses clinked all around them. Ted kissed Ella until her neck was scarlet.
By this time, Casey was sitting with Jay at a table near the dance floor. Their table was made up mostly of Ted’s friends from Harvard Business School. The HBS men were attractive alpha types and their dates well-turned-out wives or prize girlfriends. She didn’t know if any of the women had gone to HBS. From knowing what Ted thought of girls who achieved “too much,” she didn’t expect much female business school representation at the wedding. She knew many of the older Koreans in the room—those she’d grown up with from church—but there were surprisingly few in number from their Sunday school days. Walter Chin, another HBS grad, the one who’d helped her get the job, was seated at the other HBS table. Casey and Walter had talked during the cocktail hour, but Walter was occupied, utterly smitten by his gorgeous date—a petite Greek lawyer from Philadelphia. Penny was divorced, was older than Walter by at least ten years, and had full custody of two teenage daughters—her gleaned bio had surprised Jay and impressed Casey. At their table, Jay tried talking to the men, but the HBS guys were older and not interested in chatting with some scrub analyst a couple of years out of college. As usual, Jay was also sleep-deprived, and he wanted the wedding to be over. The women were talking to one another about their kids and schools. Nothing could be more boring to Jay.
Across the parquet dance floor, Leah and Joseph were seated at Dr. Shim’s table, where everyone was an elder or a deaconess. Joseph didn’t know why he was seated at such a table of honor: The only explanation he could foresee was that his daughter was the bridesmaid. A few tables over, Casey was seated next to a tall white boy whose arm was draped over her chair. Joseph looked away. Though he liked his own table, it made him feel poor. The other elders were boojahs. To his right sat Elder Koh, who owned a ten-thousand-square-foot deli behind Penn Station, employing eighty-five people to keep it going. To his left sat Elder Kong, who owned seven commercial buildings in the Bronx and a shopping mall, as well as a multilevel parking lot in Brooklyn. It was Elder Kong who’d told Joseph to buy the three-story brick commercial building in Edgewater, New Jersey. On his advice, Joseph had used every cent of his retirement savings to buy that building, which had a pizza parlor on the first floor, a dentist’s office and accountant’s office on the other two floors. The rent just covered the vast mortgage, but Elder Kong had assured Joseph that when he retired in five or ten years, the asset would’ve appreciated and hopefully the rental income could supplement his Social Security checks. Elder Kong, called Midas, was a thoughtful counselor to his friends. He believed that all Koreans should be more successful in this strange country and contribute to its growth. The empty chair at the table belonged to Dr. Shim, who hadn’t sat down because he was busy greeting the wedding guests.