What are you doing New Year’s Eve? Part 1

About two weeks into December, Kevin said to me, “Oh, by the way, Roger is getting married on New Year’s Eve.”

“I’ll go,” I said, knowing this was code for I hope you didn’t have plans. “Where is it?”

“In a church,” he pouted, holding out his hands. “Look, my palms are sweating already.”

“Don’t worry, it’ll be laid back. Roger is a Buddhist.”¹

“Yes, but his fiance’s family are Mormon.” He paused. “Oh, and I have to go in uniform.”

“Why?”

“Because Roger is wearing his.”

The matching outfits revelation was a little odd, but so is Roger. It would be like him to ask his Air Force buddies to wear their dress blues to his wedding so that his lack of tuxedo would seem patriotic instead of frugal.

The day before the wedding, Kevin mentioned that we needed to get to the church half an hour early because Roger had said he “might need help with some stuff.”

Now I was beginning to get suspicious. What kind of “stuff” could a mere wedding guest help the groom with? I mused. Saying his prayers? Finishing off the bottle of Jack? CPR? But I lost interest in the mystery after a few minutes because I was on vacation and had serious loafing to attend to.

The next day we headed out twenty minutes before we were supposed to be at the church. Neither of us had ever been to there, but we had plenty of time to find it according to our handy Google map.  About forty-five minutes later, we concluded that Dumbledore had made the church unplottable.

Meanwhile, all that driving around was giving me time to ponder the dress blues again. “If you were in the wedding party,” I pondered, “Roger would have told you by now, right?”

Kevin shrugged. “There’s that 7-11 again. We’re circling.”

“And there would have been the rehearsal, the rehearsal dinner…” I paused as a terrible thought crossed my mind. “You’re not…the best man, are you?”

“If we don’t find this God-damned church in ten more minutes, I’m skipping this whole thing.”

Nine minutes and fifty seconds later we drove into the church parking lot. “Ah-ha!” I said, snapping my fingers in triumph. “You couldn’t possibly be the best man because you would have the rings!”  My sympathetic anxiety quelled by my unassailable logic, I got out of the car, took Kevin’s arm, and went confidently into the church…

…where Kevin was immediately set upon by a young woman who stuck a boutonniere in his lapel. Then he disappeared into the men’s room which was doing double duty as the waiting area for the groom and his wedding party, which consisted of his very tardy best man and a five-year-old ring-bearer named Cosmo — who, when he grows up, wants to be a soldier and the tooth fairy.

I still had hope (it ain’t just a river in Africa, folks) that the flower thing was a case of mistaken identity and Kevin would get to be with me during the ceremony, and I didn’t want to sit down and try to him a spot beside me like a brat in a movie theater. So I was hovering awkwardly in the hall outside the bathroom when an elderly Chinese gentleman marched up to me.

“WHERE’S PRU!” he yelled.

“Who’s Pru?” I whispered, terrified. He glared at me and wandered away.

Eventually the music began and I had to go sit down. It turns out that Mormon divorcees who marry Buddhists aren’t allowed to get married in the church proper; they have to seal their love in the adjacent theater-slash-gymnasium.  As I sat primly in my metal folding chair, having my feet stepped on by bored, hyperactive Chinese children, I wondered if some of the “stuff” Kevin was supposed to help with might have included a quick game of hoops had we’d gotten there on time.

After the pianist had played her rendition of every romantic ballad of the 70’s and 80’s known to man, the games began. Kevin preceded the groom to the front looking dashing as ever, though I noticed he kept his palms discreetly hidden from view. Two extremely young, extremely confused little girls stood at the back of the room until Daddy finally walked them up the aisle, stopping once or twice to let them dump white flower petals out of their baskets. Cosmo jumped onto the stage and stuck his fingers in his ears, which is how he remained throughout the ceremony. The two teenage bridesmaids were cute in their black t-shirts under their spaghetti-strapped, black and white satin dresses. And the bride, of course, was radiant.

The ceremony itself was short and sweet. It would have been even shorter if the bride hadn’t reminded the minister after the vows had already been said that they had rings.

“Honored guests,” said the minister after the do-over, “may I present to you Roger and Pru Hodges!”

So that’s Pru, I thought.

The newlyweds sauntered happily down the aisle, and the bridesmaids ran after them like gazelles, lest anyone think for a split second they should be escorted by Kevin.

Tune in again soon for What are you doing New  Year’s Eve, Part Deux!

1. Actually, recently Roger camped out on his porch with a gun and waited for his neighbor’s chicken-eating dog to come around, so I guess that makes him a fair-weather Buddhist. [↩]