Kim Gruenenfelder - Wedding Fever

He playfully touches my nose and jokes, “Trying to give me ideas.”

God, I am so sick of this. I push his hand away from me. “I wasn’t doing anything except telling you how happy they looked.”

“Okay, I’m sorry. Now you’re mad.”

“I’m not mad. I’m tired,” I say. “It’s been six years. A girl gets tired after six years.”

Fred gets a pained expression on his face. “Mel, I’m just not there yet.”

“Six years,” I repeat, my voice rising. “When are you going to be there? Seven? Eight? Twenty? Just give me a number, so I know what my options are.”

Fred looks around the restaurant self-consciously, then leans in toward me and lowers his voice. “Honey, please don’t do this.”

I make a conscious effort to keep my voice low, but can still hear myself getting angrier. “Seriously, what is it going to take? What event has to happen that you suddenly realize that you love me, and that you want to spend the rest of your life with me?”

Fred looks down at the tablecloth, and away from me. “I don’t know,” he says sadly. “But can’t we just have a nice evening? Do we have to have this fight again tonight?”

I sigh, too. I hate not getting through to him. He either doesn’t know how important this is to me, or doesn’t care.

And I know exactly what’s going to happen tonight. First, I will have a fleeting thought in my head of how I will live without him. About how I’ll go home, right after dinner, pack my bags, move out of his house, and move back in with Seema. I’ll think about how I will finally have the courage to get on with my life. I’ll daydream that I’ll find a new guy who can make a commitment. Who loves me enough to make a commitment. I’ll imagine what it’ll be like and wonder whether or not I am strong enough to do this— to be by myself after six years. And by the time dessert comes, in my head we’ll be broken up. It will just be a matter of saying it aloud.

And then, over dinner Fred will become the sweetest, most attentive boyfriend ever. He’ll tell me how much he loves me, hug me, passionately kiss me, give me the best sex of my life, and then fall asleep, with me fitting perfectly in his arms.

The next morning he’ll do something incredibly romantic: breakfast in bed, complete with champagne. Or an impromptu trip to Santa Barbara for the day. And I’ll be happy again (for the most part) and feel loved and trea sured (mostly). And I won’t bring up marriage again.

Until the next event happens that breaks my heart.

Fred gently takes my hand. “I have an early birthday present for you,” he says.

Yes—I am an idiot. As he fishes in his pocket, I feel a rushing surge of hope that he will pull out a square-shaped, velvet box.

Instead, he pulls out a travel magazine. “Here. Go to the page with the Post-it on it.”

I flip through to page ninety-seven, where I see a yellow Post-it over an article about Bora Bora, and a picture of overwater bungalows looking out over a large mountain. “It’s beautiful,” I say, confused.

“We’re going,” Fred says, flashing me a wide grin. “For ten days. Tahiti, then Bora Bora. Starting the day after Nic’s wedding. Check out the next page— it shows what our room looks like.”

I go to the next page to see the inside of a bungalow built right over the turquoise-blue water. It is stunning: there’s a high ceiling with a thatched roof, teakwood furnishings, a king-size bed with a fluffy white comforter, and plenty of cushy pillows everywhere. In the step-down living room part of the suite is a glass coffee table that you can flip open to feed the tropical fish swimming beneath.

“You got off work?” I ask him incredulously. Fred works all the time. We haven’t had a vacation together in two years, and even then it was a four-day weekend to see his family in New York.

“I thought I needed to take some time for us to just be alone together and reconnect,” Fred tells me. “As much as I love you, it seems like we’ve been drifting apart lately.”

I smile as I read about ladders that take you from your room right into the warm turquoise waters of the Pacific. “You can swim with dolphins at this hotel?” I ask, happily surprised. I look up from the magazine. “I’ve always wanted to swim with dolphins.”

Fred is clearly excited to elaborate about his surprise. “I’ve signed us up for that. And we’re going to do this picnic on a private island that’s only accessible by boat. Plus there’s snorkeling and water sports. And this amazing gourmet restaurant . . .”

I smile, stand up, and give Fred a big hug. “I love it. Thank you.”

Fred hugs me back. “I love you so much,” he says softly, then kisses me.

I give him another kiss, then sit back down.

Life is pretty good. I look at the pictures dreamily again and sigh. “I’ll bet they have a spa there. Maybe the two of us could get a couple’s . . .”

And then the strangest thing happens. Fred looks over my shoulder, and all of the color drains from his face.

I turn around to see a strikingly beautiful woman staring at him from the maître d’s podium. She is stunning. Looks like Bar Refeali’s way cuter sister.

I turn back to Fred. “What?”

“Uh . . . nothing,” he barely manages to squeak out. “Just a client. I did her divorce a few months ago. I’ll be right back.”

Fred throws down his napkin and quickly rushes up to the woman. She looks beyond thrilled to run into him, quickly giving him a tight hug and moving in for a kiss. I watch Fred pull away from her uncomfortably. He then kisses the woman’s cheek demurely. She looks a little thrown by his reaction— not angry, just puzzled.

Then she sees me. And she’s pissed. Fred gently takes her hand, and the two of them talk. Eventually, Bar looks at me inquisitively, kisses Fred good-bye on the cheek, then leaves the restaurant.

Once she is out of my sight, Fred walks back up to our table, and takes his seat. “I’m sorry I didn’t get a chance to introduce you. She was just leaving. Where were we?”

I stare at him. “You’re fucking her, aren’t you?”

Honestly, I don’t know why I said that. The words came tumbling out of my mouth before I could think about them.

But suddenly I can’t breathe. It’s as though my entire body instinctively knows what’s happening, and my brain is struggling to catch up.

“What?” Fred says, unconsciously looking around the room for a moment. “Why would you say that?”

I take a deep breath, throw down my cloth napkin, and look him dead in the eye. “Fred, do you want to get married or not?”

“Wow,” Fred says, clearly stunned by my outburst. “Because I’m not ready to get married, somehow I’m now cheating on you?”

I’m about to answer him with, “Yes. Why else would a man wait six years, unless it’s to sample what else is out there?”

But before I can say anything, from the corner of my eye I watch a tidal wave of red wine fly past me and hit Fred dead in the face.

I turn to see Bar, the beautiful blonde, with an empty glass in her hand. “Knulla dig! Farväll lögnare!” she spits out angrily at Fred, then turns on her heel and marches away.

I’m stunned. My jaw drops. I want to get up from the table, but my legs are frozen.

Fred begins calmly wiping his face clean. “I guess she didn’t like the settlement I got for her.”

Chapter Five

Seema

“So you’re saying this means I’m about to find my true love?” Scott asks me as he plays with his new charm and smiles so wide that I can’t tell if he’s fucking with me or genuinely thrilled to hear such news.

“I’m saying Nicole thinks it does,” I clarify. “I know it’s completely bogus, but you should have seen how she flipped out when—”