Elin Hilderbrand - Beautiful Day

Ann imagined the scene at the hospital. Helen and Jim would be standing hip to hip at the admitting desk, answering questions about Chance.

Date of birth?

April 3, 1994.

Ann remembered the day well. It had been Easter Sunday, and Ann had dutifully gone through all the motions. She had insisted the three boys wear navy blazers, and she’d ironed their khaki pants. They had attended Immaculate Conception; she had smiled and greeted everyone, despite what she knew people were saying about her.

Ann Graham, state senator, her husband ran off with one of the women from their wine-tasting group, he got the woman pregnant… Then there’s Donald Morganblue, who’s sure to take her senate seat, he’s been campaigning like crazy…

Ann had cooked all her special Easter dishes: a honey-baked ham and corn pudding and herbed popovers. The boys devoured the meal, but Ann had simply stared at her food. Jim had especially loved her popovers, and she wondered if he was missing them. Missing her.

The phone call had come at seven o’clock that evening, as Ann was doing the dishes and wrapping up the leftovers and listening to the boys roughhouse in the den. They were high on sugar after so many chocolate bunnies.

“Hello?” Ann had said.

“Ann?” It was Jim calling. The sound of his voice still caused her heart to shimmy with anticipation. She continued to wait for the phone call where he said he was coming back to her.

“Hi,” she said. “Happy Easter.” She was always civil on the phone. Despite all her anger and pain, she couldn’t bring herself to hate the man. She was doomed to love him.

“Easter?” Jim said.

“Yes, Jim,” Ann said. “It’s Easter.” Could he really not know this? Helen was a philistine, that had been proved, but had she brainwashed Jim as well?

He said, “I’m calling to tell the boys that they have a new brother. Chance Oppenheimer Graham, eight pounds, eight ounces, twenty-three inches long. Twenty-three inches, can you believe that?”

Ann had started to sob, and then she hung up the phone. She couldn’t believe Jim had just delivered the news so blithely. Did he not remember when it was she in the delivery room-the first time when Stuart’s heartbeat had dropped dramatically after the doctors gave Ann a shot of Pitocin. The second time when she had popped out not one baby boy but two. Nine pounds, two ounces; six pounds, five ounces; five pounds, fourteen ounces. Stuart had been twenty inches long, the twins each nineteen.

Jim hadn’t realized it was Easter because Helen was in labor and had then delivered a baby. Jim had another son. A new family.

Chance, Ann thought. It was a bizarre name, not to mention unsuitable. That baby hadn’t been born by chance. That baby had been in Helen’s plans for a long time.

Ann heard the strains of the band playing “Witchcraft,” and she decided to head back in, find the boys, and enjoy the party. This was Stuart’s rehearsal dinner; she wouldn’t spend it moping.

She danced like a woman who didn’t have a care-first with Ryan, then H.W., then Devon Shelby, and then, finally, Stuart. She went to the ladies’ room to freshen up and emerged just in time to see Jim, Helen, and Chance coming around the corner. The three of them looked like they had just shared a joke; Helen was laughing. Ann had an urge to fill her pockets with rocks and drown herself in the harbor-but Jim saw her. “Ann! Ann, we’re back!”

Ann let them approach her. She looked only at Chance. “You okay, sweetie?”

“Yeah,” he said shyly. “Sorry about that.”

“It’s not your fault,” Ann said. “You didn’t know.”

“But we know now,” Jim said. “No shellfish for him, ever again.”

“I could have died,” Chance said.

“But you didn’t die,” Ann said. “Though I’m sure it was terrifying.”

“Terrrrrrrrrifying!” Helen sang out. “And now Chance is hungry. He’s starving! Can y’all get him a hamburger?”

Ann thought, Do I look like a short-order cook? Because Chance was going to be okay, Ann could now let her ungenerous thoughts float to the surface: she hated Helen, she wanted to stab Helen in the heart with her stiletto heel, the day of Chance’s birth had been one of the worst days of Ann’s life. She resented that she had been forced to witness Jim and Helen fussing over their son when this weekend was supposed to be about Jim and Ann and their son. Ann was a strong woman, but Jim Graham was her kryptonite. When he’d come back to her, crawling on his hands and knees, begging for her forgiveness, she should have kicked him in the teeth. But she had only felt love and gratitude. She was a saint, not a queen. Helen was a queen: imperious, demanding, entitled. Asking Ann to rustle up a hamburger. Why don’t you find him a hamburger? Ann thought. He’s your son! Ann should never, ever, ever have invited Helen to the wedding. What had she been thinking? She had been thinking that she wanted that thank-you, goddamn it. And while she was at it, a big fat apology would be nice.

Ann said, “A hamburger? Why, yes, of course.” She cast her eyes about the room for a server, someone to ask. Where was Ford from Colgate when you needed him? Ann saw Olivia staring at her, eyes about to pop out of her head and land in her ramekin of melted butter; she saw Pauline Carmichael throw back a healthy slug of chardonnay. She saw Jethro blow her a kiss. Ann decided she would find Chance a hamburger. She would make that happen.

The Rehearsal Dinner

The rehearsal dinner is normally the responsibility of the groom’s family, and there is no reason for me to believe anything will be different in your case. However, assuming your Intelligent, Sensitive Groom-to-Be hasn’t spent every summer of his life growing up on Nantucket, here are my thoughts on the perfect rehearsal dinner.

Offer up the Yacht Club. We both know there isn’t a more picturesque location on the island. Start with passed hors d’oeuvres on the patio, then segue into a classic clambake buffet (make sure the corn is sourced locally from Moors End Farm). Hire a band. I’m going to suggest ONLY STANDARDS here because this will please the older guests. You can have your “Honky Tonk Woman” and “Electric Slide” at the reception. Serve blueberry cobbler for dessert. End at 10 p.m. Resist the urge to go to the Chicken Box afterwards (now I really do sound like a mother)! You want to be well rested for your big day.

No Edge.

The Nantucket Yacht Club was one of the last places on earth with a pay phone, and Margot was tempted to use it. Call Edge���s cell phone, find out exactly what was going on.

She was distracted from thoughts of Edge, however, when Stuart’s brother Chance went into full-blown anaphylactic shock. Margot was pretty far from the center of the action, but she quickly ascertained that Chance had eaten a mussel and his throat had started to close. Someone on the yacht club staff produced an EpiPen, the paramedics showed up, Chance was taken to Cottage Hospital, and Stuart’s father and the woman in the yellow dress-who, it turned out, was Chance’s mother-followed in their car.

Chance’s mother was here. That was pretty interesting.

A hush followed, as tended to happen after unforeseen emergencies, but once it was determined that Chance would be all right, people returned to what they had been doing before. Ordering cocktails! Hitting the buffet line! Margot procured herself a glass of white wine and a plate of food. She knew she should mingle; she should catch up with her mother’s cousins, or with Jenna’s fellow teachers from Little Minds-but she just didn’t feel up to it tonight. She wanted to eat with someone easy and familiar.

There was a seat next to Ryan and the black boyfriend. That would be good conversation, but Margot would be sitting with Ryan the following night. There were empty seats on either side of Pauline and Rhonda-but no, never.

Then Margot saw Beanie flagging her down. Perfect-except for the fact that Kevin would soon appear. But beggars couldn’t be choosers. Margot sat with Beanie.

Beanie said, “Didn’t Nick and Finn come with you?”

“No,” Margot said. “They showed up really late, and they needed to shower and change, so I left without them. They walked here, I guess.”

“I haven’t seen either of them,” Beanie said.

Margot scanned the room. “You’re kidding,” she said. “What time is it?”

“Quarter to eight,” Beanie said.

Margot attacked her lobster, ripping the body apart, pulling the meat from the tail, cracking the claws, and dumping the empty shells in the bowl in the middle of the table. The clambake at the yacht club had been her mother’s suggestion. Margot understood the reasoning behind it-it was a regional specialty, extravagant yet casual. But it was a mess! All these southerners were dressed up. They might not feel like fighting with their dinner.

Margot dipped a lobster claw in drawn butter. Mmmmm. Well, there was no arguing with that.

Nick and Finn, she thought. Still at large. There was only one thing to assume, but even Margot couldn’t go there. Nick wouldn’t. He just wouldn’t. He had a moral rip cord. He would pull it.

Margot managed to get all the way through her lobster and eat half an ear of corn before Kevin appeared, hovering over Beanie’s left shoulder.

He said, “Come on, we have to sit with Dad.”

“What?” Beanie said. “I’m sitting here.”

“I know, but you have to move. Dad wants us to sit with him.”

“I’m sitting with Margot,” Beanie said. “And I’m halfway through my meal, honey. Just sit here, with us.”