Julia Watts - Wedding Bell Blues

“Which brings me to my family. My brothers were what you might call mischievous when they were growing up. Mother and Daddy bought them out of so much trouble with the law that they own the judge of the juvenile court in Faulkner County — he’s practically a house pet. There’s no way Judge Sanders is gonna make a member of the McGilly family take a DNA test. He knows a McGilly’s word is as good as his next payoff.”

“So how are we gonna manage to get this case tried in your hometown?”

“That’s where we come to the part of the plan that’ll make the whole thing work.” Ben cleared his throat and arched an eyebrow. “Lily, will you marry me?”

She had seen the question coming, but she still couldn’t stifle her laughter. “I swore when I was in first grade I’d never marry a man.”

“It wouldn’t be like a real marriage. I’m not gonna take advantage of your virtue or anything. The one time I tried to have sex with a woman, I threw up on her.” He sat back down next to Lily. “Here’s what I’m thinking. We get married, we move to Faulkner County for the time being, convince my parents our marriage is the real thing, give them time to fall in love with Mimi. And that won’t take any time at all, because they’ve got grandsons out the wazoo, but not one granddaughter. We’ll have the case tried there, get joint custody of Mimi, then we can move back here to our respective condos. We can stay married for the insurance benefits or get a divorce, whichever you want.”

Lily’s heart was racing. “You make it sound so easy, but this ...this goes against my whole personal philosophy.” She rolled up her sleeve to show her woman symbol tattoo. “When I got this tattoo, I was nineteen years old. I swore then that I’d always be true to my lesbian identity ... that I’d never closet myself, or use vague pronouns, or —”

“That’s all very moving, hon. But is your pride worth allowing your daughter to be raised a Southern Baptist?”

Lily collapsed with her head in her hands. “Oh god.”

“If it helps, you can think of this as a subversive act. We’ll not just be lying out of self-protection; we’ll be beating the straight people at their own game.”

Lily sat in silence for a moment. Hellish as the plan was, it was the only course of action she could think of that might give them a chance of success ... if they could pull it off. “I won’t have to, like, wear a white dress or anything, will I?”

“Hell, no. We’ll just have a justice of the peace do it. You can wear jeans and a Lesbian Avengers T-shirt for all I care. The thing is, though, in front of my folks and the judge, we’ll have to make it look real. We’ll have to be affectionate with each other, and in order to play well in Faulkner County you’ll have to take my name —”

Lily started laughing so hard she couldn’t get her breath. Tears streamed down her cheeks.

“What is it?” Ben asked.

“I don’t fucking believe it,” she said when she could finally speak. “My whole life I’ve sworn never to let men influence my identity, and now I’m going to be named Lily McGilly.”

CHAPTER 4

Ben’s Lexus sped along the interstate, taking Lily into a world so different it was hard for her to believe they’d been in Atlanta a scant fifty minutes ago. The only traveling Lily had done in the past several years was for book signings. She’d drive to the Atlanta airport, board a plane, and be deposited into another metropolitan area. A native Atlantan, Lily had seen little of the expanses of country that lay between major metropolitan areas.

She looked behind her, where Mimi was snoozing away in her car seat. As always, Lily saw Charlotte’s face in Mimi’s. She hoped she was doing the right thing.

They passed a green sign that read FAULKNER COUNTY. “Last chance to back out,” Ben said.

His tone was only half-joking.

Lily replied, “I’m willing to go through with it if you are. Although I must admit I’m surprised you’re willing to go so far to help Mimi. I mean, you don’t even like kids.”

“Look, I know I’m not the most touchy-feely person in the world, but Dez meant a lot to me. He brought me out into the gay world, and even after we weren’t lovers, he was my best friend. Babies are noisy and erratic and have no control over their biological functions, but that baby in the backseat carries Dez’s genetic material, and I’ll be damned if I’m gonna see her raised in a way Dez would disapprove of.”

“So,” Lily said, “which are we gonna do first, go see your folks or get married?”

“Oh, get married, definitely. If we don’t, Mom’ll try to rope us into having a big church wedding, and I don’t think either of us is up for that.”

“God, no. Weddings are barbaric. I’ve never understood why people think they’re romantic — all that heavy-handed symbolism about virginity and fertility ... it’s about as romantic as throwing a virgin into a volcano.”

Ben laughed. “Well, we’re lucky. In Faulkner County, they have this deal where you can get married in a day. The blood test, the license, the ceremony... you can get it all done in about an hour, if it’s not too crowded.”

“Instant heterosexual respectability in an hour, huh? Pretty amazing.”

Ben put on his turn signal as they approached the exit sign marked VERSAILLES.

“Versailles?” Lily asked.

“Actually, everybody pronounces it Ver-sales. Trust me; it’s more appropriate.”

The interstate exit for Versailles was home to only two businesses, a ramshackle fruit stand selling Georgia peaches and boiled peanuts, and the Lazy J Truck Stop, which, according to its sign, offered both FRIED CHICKEN AND HOT SHOWERS.

Downtown Versailles was a scant block long. All the businesses seemed to be lost in the early

‘60s. The window of the La-Di-Da Dress Shop displayed pastel suits that looked like bargain basement versions of what the queen of widows had worn before she was given the moniker “Jackie 0.” Next door to the La-Di-Da, the Chatterbox Beauty Shop looked as though it might dole out hairdos to match the dress shop’s anachronistic clothing.

The only downtown eating establishment was a diner called the Dinner Bucket. “You know,” Lily said, “somehow I just don’t find bucket to be a very appetizing word.”

Ben pulled over in front of a squat brick doctor’s office. “Yeah, it does sound kinda like slopping the hogs, doesn’t it? And the really awful thing is that nobody in town calls it the Dinner Bucket — they just call it the Bucket.” He put the car in park and looked in the direction of the doctor’s office. “So ... are you ready to bleed?”

“Do we need an appointment?”

“Nope. That’s why you can get married in a day here. They’ve got a lab tech on staff whose only job is to draw the blood of the betrothed — no appointments necessary.”

Mimi was sweaty and cranky from her nap in the car. As soon as Lily took her into the doctor’s office, she got to work making her a juice bottle while Ben waited at the front desk to check in.