The Parting Glass

“Here’s the problem,” Megan said. “I’m not doing this just for Nick. I believe in marriage, too. At least theoretically.”

“When we were growing up you didn’t see too many happy marriages up close. You were too busy raising us to pay much attention.”

“Mom and Rooney were happy at times.”

“Well, sure, when he wasn’t hallucinating. Then Mom died, and Rooney flipped his wig altogether and took off for parts unknown. And you were left to carry on.”

“There are plenty of happy marriages in the family. Look at Aunt Deirdre and Uncle Frank.”

Casey went to the dresser mirror to check her makeup. “You were too busy protecting your turf to pay much attention, Megan.”

Megan supposed Casey was right. Their father, Rooney, had abandoned the family when Megan was only fourteen. She had spent the next years trying to do everything a teenager could to keep the family saloon in operation and her sisters together. And she had been scarred by her father’s desertion. At first Niccolo had paid the price.

“I know I was affected by those early years,” Megan said. “But I’m over the worst of that. Now I’m a big girl. I understand why Rooney left. I’m just glad to have him back—more or less back, anyway. I know he did the best he could.”

Casey faced her. “If everybody without mental illness tried as hard as Rooney does, the world would be a pretty spectacular place.”

“It’s not seeing enough good marriages that scares me. It’s seeing one. Yours,” Megan said bluntly. “Lately, that’s what worries me.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You and Jon. I don’t know how you do it. The two of you are happier together than you ever were apart. You make it look effortless.”

“Jon and I were friends in high school.” Casey tugged one shoulder of Megan’s dress lower, then slapped her sister’s hand when she tried to pull it back up. “But what does that have to do with you? You love Nick. You like Nick. What’s the problem? You have what you need, don’t you?”

“You make it look easy, and it’s not. I don’t know how to just fall into marriage the way you and Jon did. Nothing’s ever easy for me, Case. I don’t know about easy. I don’t think Nick does, either.”

“Everybody has to work at being married. Maybe Jon and I make it look easy, but I can tell you there’ve been a few great fights.” Casey’s eyes shone. “And some great make-up sex.”

“What if I give it my all and it turns out I’m not good enough?” Megan turned. “You do marriage counseling sometimes, right?”

Casey, who was the brand-new director of a charitable organization that delivered social services to West Side residents, shrugged. “It’s not my field of expertise.”

“Is this anxiety natural?” Megan bit her lip, then remembered she was wearing lipstick. “For two cents I’d bolt for the door and just keep going.”

“And what if you did? What’s waiting out there that’s so tempting?”

“I don’t want to fail.”

“What would happen if you did?”

Megan considered, but not for long. “I’d die. I can’t screw this up. If I get married, I want it to last. And what if I can’t figure out how to make that happen?”

Casey crossed the room and rested her hands on her sister’s shoulders. “Megan, you don’t have to carry the weight alone. Remember? There are two of you, and I’ve never known two more capable people. You’ll be a roaring success. Someday you’ll be kicking yourself for telling me all this.”

Footsteps sounded in the hallway, and the door burst open.

“Oh, Megan, you look gorgeous!” Peggy flung herself through the doorway. “Spectacular. Oh, I’m going to cry.”

“You’d better not. Don’t you dare.”

“I’ve got to get dressed.” Peggy headed for the closet. “I had to give the baby-sitter instructions, so I’m late. I didn’t have time to get my hair done, and in this wind it wouldn’t have mattered, anyway. But if I pull the top part back and fasten the fancy combs I bought in it, I’ll pass. Besides, everybody’s going to be looking at Megan.”

“Oh, God, I’m getting married.” Megan’s hands flew to her cheeks. “Look, one of you do it instead, okay?”

Peggy pulled her dress from Casey’s closet. It was the same simple design as Casey’s, but in forest green. “I’ll gladly marry Nick. Think he’ll notice the difference?” She slipped off her T-shirt and let the dress slither over her arms and bodice. “I’ll just tell him you changed your mind. He won’t care.”

“Or I could do it,” Casey said. “Then he and Jon can duel for nights in my bed.”

Megan thought if she took one more deep breath she would hyperventilate. “I’ll live through this, right?”

“If you don’t, the Plain Dealer will have one whopping story.” Peggy presented herself to Casey to be zipped. “Any word from Rooney?” she asked Megan.

Understanding and accepting her father’s illness had taken Megan a long time. At some point in the two years since he had returned to his family, she had thrown away the need for an easy diagnosis and settled for the fact that Rooney was not like other men. He had battled hard for sanity, but the years and a dependence on alcohol had taken a permanent toll.

Still, Rooney was no longer homeless, as he had been since Megan’s adolescence. Every night he returned to eat dinner and sleep at Niccolo’s house in Ohio City, a West Side Cleveland neighborhood. He no longer drank, and he took medication that helped him think more clearly. He was sometimes confused, but rarely confused about who his daughters were. He had missed a large chunk of their lives, but he was learning to know them again on his own terms.

“I reminded him about the wedding this morning,” Megan said. “He was up early.”

“What did he say?”

“Nothing that made much sense, but he didn’t seem surprised, like maybe he’d remembered already. Will he get there, do you think?”

“He knows where St. Brigid’s is,” Peggy said. “He can find his way anywhere.”

“Megan, let it be enough that he remembered, okay?” Casey said. “He remembers you. This morning he remembered you were getting married. He wants to be there, even if he doesn’t quite make it. A year ago, when I married Jon, he had trouble remembering my name.”

Megan knew that if they searched for and found their father, corralled him and herded him into a car, he would panic. She considered, instead, the one thing she could control. “There’s still time for me to head for Botswana or the Canary Islands. I don’t care which.”

Peggy joined her, leaning down to kiss her sister on the cheek. She stepped back and wiped away a faint smudge of lipstick. “How about the church, instead? You don’t have a passport.”

“Yes, I do. I made sure of it.”

“You don’t have a ticket.”

“There must be planes to Botswana every hour on the hour.”

“From Hopkins? You’d be lucky to hop a jet to Newark.”

“That would do.” Megan straightened her spine. “You think I’m kidding.”

“I think you’re terrified,” Casey said, joining them. “I never thought I’d live to see the day you owned up to it. Now, are we going to church, or do I let everybody know you’re a pitiful coward?”

“That’s a stupid question.” Megan whirled and took one final look at herself in the mirror. Actually, the view wasn’t as bad as she’d feared. She looked like…a bride. “Let’s go.”

Casey shrugged. “You’re so darned predictable.”

chapter 2

Niccolo was glad Megan hadn’t chosen a formal wedding gown, because then he would have to wear a tux, and he was already afraid his seldom worn suit was going to be wringing wet by the ceremony’s end. St. Brigid’s wasn’t particularly hot. But he was particularly nervous.

“Josh, come here a minute.” He motioned to the gangly young usher who was trying to herd a string of shoving adolescents toward a pew at the front.

Josh obliged, turning over his end of the line to Tarek, another youth, who was dressed in neatly pressed slacks, a sportscoat and shining loafers. Tarek had told Niccolo that this was his first time in a Christian church, and he had made a carefully annotated list of what he should wear, right down to the conservative tie.

“Where’s Winston?” Niccolo asked when Josh joined him in the narthex. “He’ll help keep them in line.”

Josh didn’t quite meet his eyes. “Oh, he’s not here yet. He had stuff to do this morning.”

Winston, Josh, Tarek and all the other kids in the pew, were part of Brick. One Brick at a Time had started out as a bunch of neighborhood pre-adolescents watching Niccolo renovate an old house in Ohio City, and now it was a chartered nonprofit organization that taught basic carpentry and plumbing skills, and remodeled old houses. Home repair and remodeling were secondary to the real skills the participants learned, though: self-control, self-worth, the importance of follow-through, and community service. Brick hobbled along on a knotted shoestring, but Brick hobbled forward.

Niccolo’s collar was in danger of cutting off his air supply. He pulled it away from his throat. “Can you keep them in line long enough to get them to the reception?”

“Sure, they’ll do what I say,” Josh promised. Niccolo didn’t doubt he meant it.

Josh was Niccolo’s biggest success story. Although most of the Brick kids came from safe enough homes, Josh hadn’t been so lucky. He had moved in with Niccolo two years ago to avoid his father’s alcoholic rages, and had blossomed immediately. For the first time in his life his grades were excellent, and his self-esteem was growing. He talked confidently about college now, and Niccolo had no doubts he would do well.

“Do you see the big guy at the end of the second pew?” Niccolo pointed through the doorway toward the front. “With black hair and the pretty woman in blue beside him?”

“Uh-huh.”

“That’s my brother Marco.”

“He looks like you. How come he never comes to visit?”

Niccolo tried to think of a kind way to phrase the unkind truth. “My family wasn’t happy when I left the priesthood. Marco’s been running interference—” He saw that Josh didn’t understand. “He’s been trying to help the others understand that making a change was the right thing for me. Particularly my parents and the grandparents who are still alive.”

“I get it. He doesn’t want to alienate them by coming here while he’s working on their heads.”

Niccolo liked the way “alienate” had just slipped from Josh’s lips. And of course Josh had understood the subtleties of his explanation. Josh was a natural psychologist.

“You’ve got it. But he’s here today, and I’d like him to have a carnation for his lapel.” Niccolo motioned to the one in Josh’s. “Like yours. Will you take it up to him?”

“Sure. Cool.” Josh took a boutonniere from the white florist’s box beside Niccolo. “Anybody else coming? From your family, I mean?”

When Niccolo shook his head, Josh looked perplexed. “They don’t like Megan?” Clearly Josh couldn’t imagine such a thing, since he practically worshiped at Megan’s feet.

“They wouldn’t like anybody I chose. Don’t worry about it. Marco’s here. That’s a start.”

“So even good families can act crazy, huh?” Josh seemed to like that thought. He was smiling a little when he started back into the nave and up the aisle.

“What are you doing out here?”

Niccolo turned to see his best man coming through the door. Jon Kovats, Casey’s husband, was dressed in a dark suit, too, only on Jon it looked perfectly natural. He was a prosecutor, with quiet, clean-cut good looks that gave crime victims faith and an unwavering gaze that gave defendants shivers down their spines.

“Aren’t you supposed to be hiding somewhere with Father Brady until right before the ceremony?” Jon asked.

Niccolo hated to admit the truth, that after Jon had dropped him off at the side door, Niccolo had sneaked into the narthex for a look at the guests. He had hoped his parents would relent and attend, although he hadn’t said as much to Josh.

“I was just getting some air,” he said, “and checking to see if anything had to be done out here.”

“Nick, you can let go of everything for a while. Let the rest of us take care of the details. That’s why we signed on.”

“Have you heard anything from Casey?”

“Anything?”

Niccolo tugged his collar away from his throat again. He had gone from a priest’s dog collar to a working man’s flannels. Ties felt unnatural. “Lately, I mean. In the last half hour?”

“Not a word. Why? She’s helping Megan dress. I’m sure there hasn’t been much free time.” Jon frowned. “You’re afraid Megan’s not going to show up, aren’t you?”

“It crossed my mind.”

“Megan lives up to her commitments. To the point of mania, as a matter of fact. It’s something the two of you have in common.”

Jon knew them both too well. Niccolo couldn’t stop a smile, but he sobered quickly. “She’s afraid everything will change, that I’ll wake up one morning and realize I made a mistake, only I’m too good a Catholic to admit it.”

“Megan? She has a superhero ego. I can’t believe that.”

“Strong ego, yes, but she’s just not sure how to go about being married. And Megan hates being unsure about anything.”

“Just Megan? Or you, too?”

Niccolo thought the question was insightful, but he wasn’t surprised. He and Jon had become close friends in the two years they’d known each other, and Jon was a master at uncovering secrets.

“I’ve never been married, but I plan to work hard at it,” Niccolo said.

“Whoa there. Not too hard, or you won’t have any fun. It’s not a job, it’s a relationship.”

“She deserves the best. A hundred percent. Two hundred.”

“She deserves a man who’s enjoying himself.”

There was a commotion at the door, and Niccolo turned. A distinguished-looking man with silver hair was helping a plump, attractive woman through the doorway. For a moment Niccolo stood absolutely still; then he turned back to Jon. He cleared his throat. “Jon, come with me, will you? I’d like you to meet my parents.” He glanced at the doorway again. “And my grandfather.”

Jon was a good enough friend to understand the significance of those words. He clapped his hand on Niccolo’s shoulder. “Do you believe in omens?”

“I’m too Catholic not to.”

Megan had refused a limousine. Didn’t understand the point, didn’t want the fuss, and refused to spend the money. Neither she nor Niccolo was ever going to be rich. There were better uses for their dollars.

She had refused rides with family, turned down Jon’s offer to ferry her in a friend’s fire-engine-red convertible, refused everything, in fact, except the simplest solution. She, Peggy and Casey would ride to the church together in Casey’s car.

She just hadn’t reckoned with a flat tire.

Now the sisters stood outside Casey’s house and stared forlornly at the evidence.

“There’s debris all over the roads from the wind. I guess I drove over something on the way back from the saloon,” Casey said.

“Yeah, like a railroad spike. That tire’s a pancake.”

“And I sold my car,” Peggy said. “I hitched a ride over here from Uncle Den.”

“Charming.” Megan kicked what was left of the tire, most likely doing permanent damage to her ivory pumps. “I don’t suppose either of you wants to change this?”

“In this dress?” Casey looked down and shook her head. “Not a chance.”

“We’ll call a taxi,” Peggy said.

“This isn’t Manhattan. Nick will be married to somebody else by the time one gets here.” Megan kicked the tire again, shoes be damned. “Maybe somebody’s still left at the saloon. Casey, can you find out?”

Casey dug in her purse for her cell phone and made the call. They all stood perfectly still, waiting until she flipped it closed and shook her head. “It’s a miracle. They’re all on time for the wedding. Everybody but us. Jon’s already there with Nick, and I’ll bet his phone is off.” For good measure she punched in more numbers, with no success.

“Do you know your neighbors?” Megan looked around. “You must know somebody by now.”

Casey inclined her head to the left. “They’re out of town.” She inclined to the right. “I’m taking in their mail and papers.” She nodded to the house across the street. “They’re on the wrong side of one of Jon’s cases and about to move to a secure location. And the house next to theirs is empty.”

Megan peered around her, mind whirling. Casey and Jon had purchased one of Niccolo’s Ohio City renovations. The house, a brick Colonial Revival with classical detailing, suited the busy couple perfectly, and best of all, it was only four blocks from Niccolo’s house on Hunter Street.

“Okay, let’s hike it, then. We’ll get Charity.”

Her sisters groaned. Charity, Megan’s dilapidated Chevy, was renowned for its bad temper. Charity only began at “home.” The joke was rarely funny.

“Got a better idea?” Megan demanded.

“Well, we’ll see if Charity feels at home at Nick’s. If she doesn’t, maybe your neighbors will be more helpful than Casey’s,” Peggy said. “Let’s march.”

Megan started down the sidewalk at a fast clip. She heard her sisters behind her, but she was on a mission now. She had said she would marry Niccolo, and it was too late to call off the wedding gracefully.

They tramped in silence, three women in ballerina length silk dresses and hair whipping in the accelerating wind.

“It’s going to rain,” Casey said, a block from Niccolo’s house. “God, I hope we get to the car before it does.”

“It better not rain!” Megan marched on.

They turned down Hunter, and Megan could just see Charity at the end of the block in front of Niccolo’s—her—house. “Lord, let her start.”

“This really is a red-letter day. That was a prayer,” Casey said. “Megan’s praying.”

“I’ll have you know I’m in tight with the Lord. I had to be to get married in the church.”

“At least temporarily. Did Father Brady faint when you joined him in the confessional?”

“Father Brady is nicer and apparently more optimistic about my soul than you are.” Megan was afraid to look at her watch. They were cutting this close, and it was going to take some real time to repair all the wind damage.

The raindrops started just as they got to the car, but Charity started with the first turn of the key.

“Do you believe in omens?” she asked Peggy, who climbed in beside her.

“I’m too Irish not to.”

Megan double-parked Charity at the curb, but she didn’t turn off the engine. The small parking lot looked full and altogether too far away from the entrance she planned to use. St. Brigid’s had a side door just past the sanctuary that led to a stairwell. One flight up there was a room where the brides usually dressed—and now she fervently wished she’d decided to use it. Once upstairs and ready, she could make her entrance through another stairwell into the narthex and eventually up the aisle to meet Niccolo and Father Brady.

Too bad she hadn’t packed her hiking gear.

“We can do this.” She took a deep breath. “I’ll leave the key in the ignition. The neighborhood’s tough enough that maybe somebody will steal her. Once they see what they’re into, they’ll park her somewhere nice and safe until I can find her again.”

“We’re still fifty yards from a door,” Casey said from the back seat.

“It’s only sprinkling.”

Peggy wiped the foggy windshield with her fingertips. “You know what? You’ve lived here too long. By anybody else’s standards, that’s a downpour. And you hate getting wet.”

“Megan,” Casey said, “nobody will steal Charity, and you’re going to get towed if you stay here.”

Charity chose that moment to sputter and die.

“Looks like I don’t have a choice, and I’d rather bail her out of the impound lot than be late for my own wedding.”

“At least your ambivalence disappeared,” Casey said.

Megan didn’t bother to correct her. “Can you two get yourselves inside?”

Peggy had been scrounging under the seat for an umbrella. She held one out to Megan, a poor cousin of the species but still useful. “You go ahead. The weather’s only going to get worse. I’ll see if I can start this monster.”

“I’m not walking down the aisle without you. You have to hold me up.” After a lot of speculation on who should accompany her on the trip down the aisle, Megan had asked Casey and Peggy to walk just a step ahead of her, more escorts than attendants. She had a dozen male relatives who would have been happy to do the honors, but she had chosen her sisters instead. The man who should have walked with her wasn’t up to the task.

Megan gauged the distance and the raindrops. “Which should I ruin? My pumps or my panty hose?”

“I brought extra panty hose.” Casey was leaning over the seat now.

Megan removed her shoes and opened the door. “See you inside.” She flipped open the umbrella, and in stocking feet she sprinted across the grass to her favored entrance. At the door to the stairwell, she shook like a spaniel, closing her eyes and the umbrella and letting the raindrops fly. When she opened them, her future husband was staring back at her.

“Nick!” She put a hand over her heart. “What are you doing here?”

“Checking to see if you’d deserted me at the altar.”

She stared at him. The dark suit set off his wide shoulders, black hair and neatly trimmed beard. With his olive skin and Roman centurion features, he was the perfect finale to any walk down the aisle.

“You weren’t supposed to see me like this.”

He was smiling now. “I remember the first time we spent an evening together. Do you?”

At the moment she wasn’t sure she remembered her own name. She stared at him, this gorgeous, masculine human being who wanted to share her life.

“You invited me home after a day at work,” he said, “and you were exhausted. So you took a shower while I waited, and when you came into the kitchen your hair was wet. Sort of like it is now. And I was flattened by desire.”

“Flattened?”

“Metaphorically. More or less the opposite of my real state, I guess.”

She smiled. “I’d forgotten.”

“So I have a thing about seeing you wet. And dry, for that matter. Just seeing you.”

“Oh, Nick.” She wanted to fall into his arms. Instead she spread her skirt, holding it out with both hands like a little girl in petticoats. “Are you sure you want to go through with this? I’m not much of a bargain.”

“We never get guarantees, but I think you’re a pretty safe bet.”

“I’m a mess. I’m dripping, my car’s probably going to be towed, and I’ve ripped my stockings into shreds.” A hand leaped to her hair. “And I lost my damned orange blossoms.”

“Good. You look perfect the way you are.” He paused. “Although my mother and father will be more impressed if you put the shoes on your feet.”

“They came?”

He nodded.

This time she did fall into his arms. Casey and Peggy arrived just as they finally stepped apart. “Peggy got Charity parked. We—” Casey stopped when she saw Niccolo. “Get out of here,” Casey told him in mock horror. “Go wait where you’re supposed to. This is bad luck.”

He grinned with no contrition.

“Scoot!” Casey gave him a mock shove. “Go tell the organist to do another round of ‘Jesu Joy of Man’s Desiring.’ Give us ten minutes.”

“Five.”

“Seven. Go!”

“Bye…” Megan watched him leave. Nick turned in the doorway and blew her a kiss.

“Megan!” Casey grabbed her shoulders and turned her toward the stairs.

They were ready in ten minutes, panty hose changed, hair dry enough. Megan entered the foyer flanked by her sisters. Through the door into the church she could see that Nick, Jon and Father Brady had already entered from the front. The orange blossoms had been restored—Casey had rescued and pocketed them early in their walk—and even Megan’s shoes had been wiped clean. She was ready.

“Do you think Rooney made it to the church? Do you think he’s here somewhere?” Megan positioned herself at the doorway. Heads were beginning to turn.

“He wanted to be,” Peggy said.