the happy couple together.
And now that the deed was done and her friend was officially married, Meg sipped at her Cuban sangria and smiled wistfully at the memory of how the bride’s and groom’s aunts had pinned a pure white lace shawl on the happy couple, a symbol of their eternal connection.
Her own scarlet brocade bridal kimono was no doubt packed carefully away in her mother’s lacquer chest. She hoped her mother had used acid-free, lignin-free wrapping paper, because at the rate Meg was going, that kimono would never see the light of day.
Meg slugged down the sangria and clinked the empty cup onto the bar. It must have had more booze than she thought, since she was getting positively maudlin.
And to top it all off, a mascara-hardened eyelash was poking her in the eye. She tried to rub it out but only succeeded in poking her eyeball with an acrylic nail tip. Tears immediately blurred the ballroom’s fantastic marbled walls and gold-leafed statuary. She widened her eyes and blinked at the elaborate ceiling mural, hoping gravity would boost her tear ducts’ efficiency. Instead, one tear broke free, and the rest followed.
She muttered a curse and headed for the powder room. Rey didn’t need to see her maid of honor sobbing into her sangria.
Meg ran down the marble steps and passed a small cocktail lounge. A beefy man in his fifties lurched into her path. She tried to dodge him, but he stomped on her dress anyway.
“Hey, watch it!” she called, but he was already weaving away. She made a noise of exasperation and marched into the powder room. The attendant looked at her strangely and Meg recoiled at her reflection. “Oh, my God, I look like the school slut after prom night.”
Huge black rings of supposedly waterproof mascara emphasized the bloodshot whites of her eyes. Red and green Christmas eyes. Ho, ho, ho. Her long-wearing lipstick had worn off long ago, leaving only a rim of plum lip liner surrounding her pale mouth. Clumps of hair straggled down her cheeks to frame her inkblot freckles.
“Your dress, it is ripped!” The attendant, an older woman dressed neatly in a black dress with white cuffs, approached her. Meg twisted around and groaned. Not only had Drunken Oaf stepped on it and left a shoe print, he had ripped part of the train right off her waist. If it tore any further, the whole Palmer House Hilton would get a frightening view of her ass.
Meg wetted a tissue under the faucet and tried wiping away the raccoon rings of mascara. The damn stuff had finally decided to be waterproof.
Lupe, as her nametag read, tsked and pulled out a basket. She arranged a packet of wet wipes, a sample tube of lipstick, a powder compact and a sewing kit. “Come,” she commanded, as serious as a surgeon about to make the first cut. “We fix you.”
Meg submitted meekly. “Thank you.”
Lupe wiped her face with a wet wipe. Meg closed her eyes, relaxing as the cool cloth removed the sticky makeup and drying tear tracks.
Lupe threw away the used wipe and handed Meg the lipstick sample. “We make you pretty for your boyfriend.”
“Ha!” The laugh burst out before she could stop it.
“He is the one who makes you sad?”
“No, I poked myself in the eye with my fake fingernail.” Meg held up the offending digit. “I don’t even have a boyfriend.”
“Ah.” The older woman nodded knowingly.
Meg sighed. “It’s not like that. I don’t even want a boyfriend. I have a great job at the university, I have a great apartment—well, it’s tiny but still very nice—and I have my own life, which my mother refuses to admit because she’s still e-mailing me pictures of boring Japanese salar ymen who want someone to cook their noodles and watch their children while they get drunk after work.”
She took a deep breath, noting how her tirade had brought some color into her cheeks. She applied the plum-colored lipstick sample and smacked her lips.
Lupe brushed at the footprint on the green satin. “All mothers, they want children get married, be happy, find love.”
“Find love?” Meg tucked some hairpins into her ’do. “Who said that was necessary for marriage? Not my old-fashioned mother, that’s who. Marriage first to a man from a good family, then maybe love. Or maybe not.”
“Mothers know best.” Lupe threaded a needle with white thread and started stitching Meg’s dress. Not wanting to argue with a woman wielding a sharp needle next to her skin, Meg quieted, powdering her freckles until they were almost gone.
Lupe finished mending and snipped off the thread. “All done.”
Meg examined the back of her dress in the mirror. Even the footprint was gone. “Wonderful. Thank you so much.” She dug in her tiny purse and pressed a bill into Lupe’s palm.
Instead of putting the money into her pocket, the older woman gripped her hand, her dark brown eyes earnest. “Listen to your mother. Find a nice man. The old ways are best.”
She gritted her teeth. The old ways. Her mother used that phrase all the time.
Meg disengaged her hand and barely stopped herself from bowing in farewell. One mention of the old ways and she was falling into the Japanese manners of her childhood. She escaped the powder room, images of Lupe and her mother swirling through her head. She almost heard her mother’s voice scolding her as she walked to the wedding reception. Great, now the woman had perfected telepathy. Psychic nagging was even quicker than e-mail.
Lost in her thoughts, she bounced off a blue wall. The wall turned and she saw one of the most handsome men she’d ever seen. No, she corrected herself, not handsome, exactly, but compelling. Magnetic. He had wavy hair with streaks of blond, brown and red all tumbled together, kind of like an old color photo of JFK. His eyes were bright blue with tiny glints of gold, set in sharply angled, tanned cheekbones.
“I’m sorry.” His deep voice buzzed across her already jangling nerve endings. She stared at him. He mistook her silence for incomprehension and repeated his apology in careful Cantonese.
“Oh. I’m Japanese, not Chinese.” It was nice of him to try, though. How many men apologized in one language, much less two?
“Sorry. I only know a few phrases in Japanese. But one I do know is Hajimemashite.”
Meg tried not to cringe at his accent. “That means ‘I’m pleased to meet you.’”
“Exactly.” He gave her a white smile, revealing a dimple in one tan cheek. “And I hope you’d say you were pleased to meet me, too.”
Meg raised her eyebrows. He certainly was fast on his feet. She wondered if he was fast off his feet as well. “I might be pleased to meet you if I knew whom I was meeting.”
He extended his hand. “I’m Rick Sokol.” She took his hand. Rick’s grip was gentle but enveloped her smaller hand. His right wrist was banded by a gold watch that was expensive, but not ostentatious. She wondered if he were a lefty.
He released her hand and she fought a peculiar sense of loss. “What’s your name?”
“My Japanese name is Michiko.” Where did that come from? She almost never introduced herself to Americans
