Anne Tyler - Breathing Lessons

He stopped and looked at her. He wore a dark, ill-fitting suit and a stiff white shirt, with a navy tie dangling unknotted from his collar.

"We'll be late for the wedding," she told him.

He shot back a cuff and checked his watch.

"Come on!" she said. It wasn't only the wedding she was thinking of. She felt there was something dangerous about staying around Ira's father.

And sure enough, Sam said, "Me and your little friend here was just discussing you going into the army."

"Army?"

"Ira couldn't join the army, I told her. He's got us."

Ira said, "Well, anyhow, Pop, I ought to be back from this thing in a couple of hours."

"You really have to take that long? That's most of the morning!" Sam turned to Maggie and said, "Saturday's our busiest day at work."

Maggie wondered why, in that case, the shop was empty. She said, "Yes, well, we should be-"

"In fact, if Ira joined the army we'd just have to close this place up,"

Sam said. "Sell it off lock, stock, and barrel, when it's been in the family for forty-two years come October."

"What are you talking about?" Ira asked him. "Why would I want to join the army?"

"Your little friend here thought you'd gone into the army and got yourself killed," Sam told him.

"Oh," Ira said. Now the danger must have dawned on him too, for this time it was he who said, "We should be going."

"She thought you'd blown yourself up in boot camp," Sam told him. He gave another of his wheezy chuckles. There was something mole-like and relentless about that way he led with his nose, Maggie felt. "Ups and writes me a letter of condolence,'' he said. "Ha!" He told Maggie, '

'Gave me quite a start. I had this half-second or so where I thought, Wait a minute. Has Ira passed] First I knew of it, if so. And first I'd heard of you. First I'd heard of any girl, matter of fact, in years. I mean it's not like he has any friends anymore. His chums at school were that brainy crowd that went away to college and by now they've all lost touch with him and he doesn't see a soul his own age. 'Look here!' I told him. 'A girl at last!' After I'd withstood the shock. 'Better grab her while you got the chance,' I told him."

"Let's go," Ira said to Maggie.

He lifted a hinged section of the counter and stepped through it, but Sam went on talking. "Trouble is, now you know she can manage fine without you," he said.

Ira paused, still holding up the hinged section.

"She writes a little note of condolence and then continues with her life, as merry as pie," Sam told him.

"What did you expect her to do, throw herself in my grave?"

"Well, you got to admit she bore up under her grief mighty well. Writes me a nice little note, sticks a postage stamp in one corner, then carries on with her girlfriend's wedding arrangements.''

"Right," Ira said, and he lowered the counter and came over to Maggie.

Was he totally impenetrable? His eyes were flat, and his hand, when he took her arm, was perfectly steady.

"You're wrong," Maggie told Sam.

"Huh?"

"I wasn't doing fine without him! I was barely existing."

"No need to get all het up about it," Sam said.

"And for your information, there's any number of girls who think he's perfectly wonderful and I am not the only one and also it's ridiculous to say he can't get married. You have no right; anyone can get married if they want to."

"He wouldn't dare!" Sam told her. "He's got me and his sisters to think of. You want us all in the poorhouse? Ira? Ira, you wouldn't dare to get married!"

"Why not?" Ira asked calmly.

"You've got to think of me and your sisters!"

"I'm marrying her anyhow," Ira said.

Then he opened the door and stood back to let Maggie walk through it.

On the stoop outside, they stopped and he put his arms around her and drew her close. She could feel the narrow bones of his chest against her cheek and she heard his heart beating in her ear. His father must have been able to see everything through the plate-glass door, but even so Ira bent his head and kissed her on the lips, a long, warm, searching kiss that turned her knees weak.

Then they started off toward the church, although first there was a minor delay because the hem of her choir robe caught her up short. Ira had to open the door once again (not even glancing at his father) and set her loose.

But to look at Serena's movie, would you guess what had come just before?

They seemed an ordinary couple, maybe a bit mismatched as to height. He was too tall and thin and she was too short and plump. Their expressions were grave but they certainly didn't look as if anything earth-shattering had recently taken place. They opened and closed their mouths in silence while the audience sang for them, poking gentle fun, intoning melodramatically. " 'Love is Nature's way of giving, a reason to be living . . .' " Only Maggie knew how Ira's hand had braced the small of her back.

Then the Barley twins leaned into each other and sang the processional, their faces raised like baby birds' faces; and the camera swung from them to Serena all in white. Serena sailed down the aisle with her mother hanging on to her. Funny: From this vantage neither one of them seemed particularly unconventional. Serena stared straight ahead, intent.

Anita's makeup was a little too heavy but she could have been anybody's mother, really, anxious-looking and outdated in her tight dress. "Look at you!" someone told Serena, laughing. Meanwhile the audience sang, "

'Though I don't know many words to say . . .' "

But then the camera jerked and swooped and there was

Max, waiting next to Reverend Connors in front of the altar. One by one, the singers trailed off. Sweet Max, pursing his chapped lips and squinting his blue eyes in an attempt to seem fittingly dignified as he watched Serena approaching. Everything about him had faded except for his freckles, which stood out like metal spangles across his broad cheeks.

Maggie felt tears welling up. Several people blew their noses.

No one, she thought, had suspected back then that it would all turn out to be so serious.

But of course the mood brightened again, because the song went on too long and the couple had to stand in position, with Reverend Connors beaming at them, while the Barley twins wound down. And by the time the vows were exchanged and Sugar rose to sing the recessional, most of the people in the audience were nudging each other expectantly. For who could forget what came next?

Max escorted Serena back down the aisle far too slowly, employing a measured, hitching gait that he must have thought appropriate. Sugar's song was over and done with before they had finished exiting. Serena tugged at Max's elbow, spoke urgently in his ear, traveled almost backward for the last few feet as she towed him into the vestibule. And then once they were out of sight," what a battle there'd been! The whispers, rising to hisses, rising to shouts! "If you'd stayed through the goddamn rehearsal," Serena had cried, "instead of tearing off to Penn Station for your never-ending relatives and leaving me to practice on my own so you had no idea how fast to walk me-" The congregation had remained seated, not knowing where to look. They'd grinned sheepishly at their laps, and finally broke into laughter.

"Serena, honey," Max had said, "pipe down. For Lord's sake, Serena, everyone can hear you, -Serena, honey pie ..."

Naturally none of this was apparent from the movie, which was finished anyhow except for a few scarred numerals flashing by. But all around the room people were refreshing other people's recollections, bringing the scene back to life. "And then she stalked out-"

"Slammed the church door-"

"Shook the whole building, remember?"

"Us just staring back toward the vestibule wondering how to behave-"