Nancy Culpepper Read Online Free PDF Page B

another.”
    Suddenly, Laurie and Ed were stomping on wine glasses wrapped in cloth napkins, and then with a cry of relief that the glasses broke successfully, they virtually leaped into each other’s arms. The Gypsy music began. Nancy was crying, at last.
    At the reception in the cafeteria, she found a price tag dangling on a nylon thread inside the cuff of her silk blouse. Jack bit it off, discreetly, and she pulled out the end of the thread.
    “Minnie Pearl,” he teased. Nancy smiled nervously. Umbrellas drifted past the windows. The stained glass over the doorway was an abstract design—broken lines like shattered glass.
    During the day, while Jack took more pictures, and the people milled around her, Nancy forgot for indeterminate stretches of time the news from home. When it occurred to her, rushing forward in a little replay of the conversation with her mother, she still felt awkward, almost puzzled. The rain was pounding harder outside, and the hum of voices blended with it. Everyone seemed happy. Two older women were thrilled to learn that Nancy lived in Pennsylvania. One of them cried, “Oh, we go to Pennsylvania! Once a year we go down to New Hope, and sometimes at midnight our friends take us across the state line to play Midnight Beano.”
    “It’s lots of fun!” said her companion, who had red lipstick smeared around her lips.
    “And then after that they take us shopping at a discount store there.” The woman grasped Nancy’s arm and said, “It was such a lovely ceremony, especially when Laurie’s father made that little speech.”
    “That was touching,” said the other woman. “I clean for Laurie. Ed has allergies and can’t stand a speck of dust.”
    “That poem was odd, though. Wasn’t it odd?”
    “Ed is very sensitive.”
    Nancy found Jack changing a lens. “The lighting’s wrong,” he said. “I need my bright lights. Look at all the shadows.”
    “It’s appropriate, though, for the weather today,” said Nancy, seeing the shadows, the jewel-light of the stained glass. The people, dressed for the autumn beach in wool and corduroy, looked like faded autumn leaves. She said, “I just talked to some women who go to New Jersey to play Midnight Beano after they go discount shopping! Can you imagine! They were delightful.”
    “You seem to be enjoying yourself,” Jack said.
    “Should I?”
    “Sure. It’s a wedding.”
    “It’s a wonderful wedding.”
    Nancy and Jack were laughing the way they had the previous day.
    They ate at a table with Karen Bordon, an acquaintance from graduate school. Nancy barely remembered her, but Karen said Nancy had once given her a ride to Pittsfield. Karen operated a camera for a Boston television station. She called herself a camera person. The man she was with, Malcolm, worked in color processing, and Jack and Malcolm and Karen talked in technicalities about film while Nancy concentrated on the food, which had been catered by a Beacon Hill restaurant Nancy and Jack used to go to. There was food at funerals too, Nancy thought. The neighbors would bring hams and pies and cakes.
    Later, Nancy telephoned the airlines, rechecking the schedule. There were still no seats available, and now flights were being canceled because of the weather.
    Nancy sat with the telephone in front of a window. She saw Jack out on the beach with his camera, aiming at the foggy scene. She imagined gray, empty space in the pictures.
    On the telephone, Nancy’s father didn’t protest when Nancy explained the difficulty of the travel schedule. She promised to come down later to help them get adjusted and to help her mother clean out Granny’s room.
    Nancy repeated to her mother, “The airline schedules are erratic because of the strike. I wish you’d put it off till Monday.”
    “We’ll get a better crowd on Sunday. We’ll just have a handful anyway. Everybody her age has died off. All the pallbearers on her list are dead, or else they’re down in their back. Remember