Meg Cabot - Queen of Babble Gets Hitched

“Lizzie?” Chaz is looking down at me with a funny expression on his face. “What is it?”

“Can you hear me now?” Mom is asking in my ear. The ear I can hear out of. When I say yes, she says, “Oh good. Anyway, it was very peaceful. She went in her sleep. I just found her there this afternoon, in her chair. She must have dozed off watching Dr. Quinn. You know she figured out how to TiVo it. She had a beer in one hand, I don’t know how she got hold of it. Well, we had a Fourth of July barbecue, she must have sneaked one… Anyway, I just wanted to let you know, we’re planning a memorial service for this weekend. I know how busy you are, but I hope you’ll be able to come. You know how fond she was of you. It wasn’t right that she played favorites with you girls, but you really were always the one she liked best out of all the grandkids—”

The world seems to have tilted. Suddenly, I can’t stand up anymore. I feel my knees give out… but it’s all right, because Chaz has his arm around me and is steering me toward the beer cooler, the lid of which he’s snapped closed. He sits me down on it, then sinks down beside me, one arm around my shoulders, going, “It’s okay. Take it easy. I’ve got you. Just breathe.”

“Gran’s dead,” I say to him. I can’t see him very well.

Then I realize it’s because I’m looking at him through a veil of tears. I’m crying.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “Lizzie, I’m so sorry.”

“She was watching Dr. Quinn,” I tell him. I don’t know why. It’s all I can think about. “And drinking beer.”

“Well,” he says. “If you’re Gran, and you have to go, that’s the way to do it.”

I let out a hiccupy sound, halfway between a sob and a laugh.

“Lizzie?” Mom’s voice sounds in my ear. “Who’s that with you?”

“Ch-Chaz,” I say with another sob.

“Oh, honey,” Mom said. “Are you crying? I didn’t think you’d be so upset. Gran was ninety, you know. It wasn’t as if this was entirely unexpected.”

“It was by me,” I wail. I realize dimly that the booming of the fireworks has ceased, and that it’s grown very quiet all of a sudden. I realize, as well, that the pale blobs I can see through my tears are faces… the faces of everyone at Shari’s party. And that they’re all turned toward me. I fight to regain my composure, reaching up and trying to wipe away my tears with the back of my wrist.

But they won’t stop. They just seem to come faster.

Chaz, seeming to realize the problem, pulls me into a hug. And suddenly I’m weeping against his chest.

“Oh,” Mom says comfortingly into my ear. I’m clutching my cell phone tightly in one hand, and the front of Chaz’s shirt with the other. “Good. I’m glad Chaz is there. He’s a good, old friend and will take care of you.” I don’t mention that my “good, old friend” not five minutes ago was making lewd suggestions about “theories” he was going to illustrate to me back in his apartment.

“Yeah” is all I can manage to choke out.

Because the truth is, until she’d called, I had pretty much been going to accept his invitation.

“Mom,” I choke. “I’m gonna go now.”

“Okay, honey,” Mom says. “I love you.”

And then she’s hung up, and I’ve hung up, and Chaz is saying, “Shhh,” into my hair, and Tiffany has come over and is asking what’s wrong, and Shari is stroking my arm and going, “Oh, Lizzie. It’s going to be all right.”

But it isn’t. How can it be?

Gran is gone.

I never even got to say good-bye.

A HISTORY of WEDDINGS

Why is the third finger of your left hand considered the ring finger? Ancient Egyptians and Romans both believed that a vein from that finger led directly to the heart, so it seemed like the logical position for the placement of the wedding band. Science has since proved this not to be strictly accurate.

But tradition lives on, and that finger is still universally known as the ring finger. And isn’t it romantic to think that our wedding rings are linked to our hearts? Well, by a creepy vein of blood, anyway?

Tip to Avoid a Wedding Day Disaster

It may sound obvious, but try on your rings—both bride and groom—in the days leading up to your wedding. The last thing you want to be doing during your wedding ceremony is squeezing a ring that won’t fit over fingers that have swollen due to nervous last-minute binge eating.

LIZZIE NICHOLS DESIGNS^™

“Here’s another one,” my sister Rose says, dropping the casserole plate down on the kitchen table in front of me unceremoniously. “I think it’s green bean. Or something green, anyway.”

My other sister, Sarah, looks up from the notebook into which she’s recording the names of everyone who has brought something over for us to eat, since we are supposedly so consumed with grief over Gran’s death that we can’t cook. For some of us, this is actually true. The kitchen table is covered with casserole dishes.

“Who’s it from?” Sarah wants to know.

“I don’t know,” Rose says crabbily as she digs through her purse, which she’s left on the kitchen counter next to the sliding glass door to the deck. “I found it on the front porch. Check the card, nimrod.”

“Suck my dick,” Sarah says, snatching the card off the top of the casserole dish.

“Do you kiss your husband with that mouth?” Rose wants to know. Then she lets out a tinkly laugh. “Oh, that’s right. He left you. So where’s Luke, anyway?” Rose turns her attention to me.

“Don’t talk to me,” I say to Rose.

Rose looks at Sarah. “What’s her glitch?” she wants to know.

“She’s not speaking to you,” Sarah says. “Because you called TMZ on her client. Remember?”

“Oh, please,” Rose says with a laugh. “You’re not still mad about that, are you? That should be water under the bridge. Our grandmother is dead. Now, come on. Where’s Luke? Your fiancé? Isn’t he going to come to your own grandmother’s funeral? Or is he too busy with school or whatever? As usual.”

“He’s in France,” I say from between gritted teeth.

“Oh, France,” Rose says with another laugh. “Sure. Why not. France.”

“He is,” I say. Why can’t I not speak to people I’ve resolved never to speak to again? “He’s helping his uncle set up a new investment office. Not that it’s any of your business. He wanted to come. He’s really sorry. But he can’t leave right now.” And besides. We’re on a break. I don’t mention this to Rose, who doesn’t deserve to know any of my personal business. But it’s true.

“Of course,” Rose says. “You know, we’re all starting to wonder if this Luke guy even exists, or if he’s just some guy you’ve made up to make us think you finally got a boyfriend. As if.” Still laughing, Rose opens the sliding glass door and steps out into the cool evening air, not bothering to close it behind her, so all the mosquitoes come buzzing in.

“I hate her too,” Sarah informs me matter-of-factly as soon as Rose is out of earshot. “Don’t pay any attention to her. You have no idea how lucky you are you got out of here. Seriously.”

I am sitting with my arms crossed in front of my chest, holding on to both my elbows. I have been sitting like this since I got home.

I just can’t believe she’s really gone. Gran, I mean. The thing is… I knew she was old. I did.

I just never thought she was that old.

“Well, she just died, Lizzie” is what Shari’s dad had said when I’d asked him how it had happened when he stopped by to drop off a plate of Mrs. Dennis’s Heath Bar Crunch cookies a little while ago. “She was old.”

“But—” I’d been going to ask if there was going to be an autopsy. But a warning look from my mother had stopped me. Mom doesn’t want people talking about cutting up his mother in front of Dad. Which I guess I can understand.

And okay, Gran was ninety, after all. I guess how she died isn’t any big mystery.

But why now? When I need her most? I mean, not to be selfish or anything. But couldn’t she have waited a month or two, for a time when I wasn’t so… confused?

Everyone seemed kind of relieved when Dr. Dennis gave me a little bottle of pills.

“Shari asked me to prescribe you these,” Shari’s dad said, uncomfortably handing them over. “They’re to make you feel better. Now, remember… no drinking alcohol while you’re on those, Lizzie!”

Everyone laughed like Dr. Dennis had made a great joke. And looked at me expectantly, waiting for me to take one of the pills. Which I pretended to, just to get them off my back.

But if they think doping me up is going to keep me from asking the hard questions—like are they going to play Gran’s favorite song, “Highway to Hell,” at the funeral, or aren’t they? — they can just think again. I’m not going to be dismissed that easily. Gran might have been happy to ride through life in an alcoholic haze—she might even have been good at it—but not me.

Never me.

“Really,” Sarah is going on. “You wouldn’t believe what a bitch Rose has turned into. Well, not turned into, because she was always a bitch. But she’s gotten worse with age. You think that thing with her calling the paparazzi on your friend is bad? Just wait. Maybe it’s perimenopause. I saw something about it on Oprah. So Chuck and I are having some problems? He didn’t leave me. He’s just taking some time to work through a few things. Like Rose and Angelo have it so perfect. He doesn’t even have a job. She’s still supporting both of them.”