Like Dizzy Gillespie's Cheeks

Seventy-six

By the time I made it to Kate's, it was 6:30. We had a half an hour to make it to the wedding. I was totally shaken, drained, and disheveled. Once I made it out of the cab, the cool, brisk air revealed something I hadn't noticed in the cab—a rip in the seat of my expensive tux pants. In the panic of shoving and maneuvering my leg through Lee June's plastic hole, so to speak, I obviously ripped the butt out of my pants. I couldn't tell how significant it was, but put it this way, I fit my hand through it, as well as felt the sensation of having a central air conditioning system attached to my ass.

I was buzzed up to Kate's and slowed as I approached her door. I paused there for a moment, contemplating what the night meant—analyzing its significance. I didn't get far because, to my surprise, Kate opened the door. Her splendor made me motionless. She stood before me with a wisp of hair stuck to her lipsticked mouth, wearing an oxblood red spaghetti-strapped dress, and no shoes. To put it bluntly, she looked hot in her simplicity.

"What are you doing?" she asked, slowly removing the wisp of hair.

I stood blankly looking at her, still stunned at how beautiful she looked.

"What are you doing? How did you know I was at your door?" My standard, answer a question with a question.

"I didn't, I was just opening the door, so you'd know to come in when you got here ... Why are you wearing women's sunglasses?"

The sunglasses, I forgot I had them on. No wonder it felt so dark out. With my head tilted forward in shame, I pulled them off slowly and looked up at Kate. She just stood there, looking at me with all her radiance.

"What's the problem?" she asked.

"This!" I pointed between my eyes.

"Jesus Christ, you'd better get in here before the neighbors see you ..."

She grabbed my arm, pulled me in the doorway, and gave me a big kiss on the lips.

"You, Mr. Greene, are a freak. Big whoop—You've never had a zit before?"

"Oh sure, I've had a zit before, but frankly, I've never had one of these before ..."

I turned around, bent over, and displayed the added air infiltration system to my pants. Naturally she laughed, but unnaturally, her laugh was out of control.

"It's not that funny."

She was laughing so hard she couldn't get a word out. I started getting annoyed—I felt like there was a lot to do and not a lot of time to do it, and she was spending it laughing at me, which, under normal circumstances, would be fine, but under these circumstances, it wasn't.

"Stop laughing," I insisted. "You need to help me sew it up."

"Sew it, what if we stapled it?" She laughed at herself.

"Please, I'm serious. Are you on some sort of medication?"

"I'm sorry ... I'm sorry." She closed her lips tight, as though that would prevent her from laughing. It was like a church giggle: once you start, and you know you're not supposed to laugh, it just gets worse and worse. And the thing that pissed me off even more was that I started to laugh along with her.

So there we were ... she, looking totally sexy in her last-day-of-the-year outfit, me, looking basically like a dork, with a red pustule in the middle of my head and a huge gapping hole in my pants while we both sat on the couch and laughed hysterically. I lost the giggles quickly as soon as I looked at my watch and it revealed the time was 6:40.

"All right, twenty minutes to matrimony, and we have several things to accomplish."

Her laughter subsided, but I could tell by the crooked smirk on her face she could break out any moment.

"And what would those things be?"

"Eradicate a zit, eliminate a crater in my pants, and find me a bow tie."

"All right ... hang on. Let me get my shoes on, grab my jacket, and gather up some supplies, and we'll be on our way ... now where did I leave that damn stapler ..." she said, laughing as she left me in her living room. "Make yourself at home. I'll show you around later," she yelled from what looked like her bedroom.

I looked around but really couldn't concentrate on anything I saw or took in. I was too uptight. I looked at photographs and artwork, checked out her books and CDs, but nothing registered, so I couldn't tell you what I saw or what kind of taste she had. Really the only impression that stuck with me was that she was very neat and organized. And it smelled good. She had a bunch of candles burning, which made the place smell sweet, and provided a sort of calming feel.

I made my way into the kitchen. It was small but had a great view of the lake. I grabbed a mug off the coffee mug tree. She, like me, had a varied collection of mugs, and not wanting to take the time to analyze each and pick out an appropriate theme, I grabbed the one closest to me, which was white and said, "Snow storm in Chicago." I opened the fridge looking for bottled water and found what I felt was a lot of food for a single woman. Maybe she was having people over soon, maybe she just had people over and they didn't eat much, maybe it wasn't any of my business.

Just as I was bent over dispensing water from the Brita four-gallon dispenser into my "snow storm" mug, Kate startled me with a bellow so loud that it shook water clear out of my mug.

"Allll aaabboooaaarrddd," she yelled.

I turned around quickly, and with the arch of the doorway framing her like a picture in Vogue, and the diffused light from outside cast upon her face like an angel, she stood there with a bow tie around her neck, holding a pair of sweat pants.

"Well, we better get going."

I downed the water. "That bow tie for me?"

"Yep."

"What the hell's with the sweat pants?" I asked.

"So you'll have something to wear while I sew your pants in the cab. Let's go ..."

I had no comment for Kate. She had somehow taken control. I felt like a kid following Mommy around, knowing that everything will be fine if I just do as I'm told. I felt mellow. Melancholy. Pensive. Thoughtful. "Bags' Groove" kept playing in my mind. I kept thinking of Ben. Knowing that he would've loved a New Year's party. I guess the grieving was still happening. Why wouldn't it? To my knowledge, it only started a short time earlier in the shower. At this rate, I was bound to cry at the wedding.

I followed Kate quickly to the door. "I like your place ... what I saw of it, that is."

"What you haven't seen is even better ..." she said with a wink.

I got a little flash of anxiety mixed with excitement, imagining that her implication was sexual.

"Do I know you? Are you sure your name isn't Liz?"

She pushed me out the front door to the hallway. "Get outta here, asshole. We're gonna be late."