“She said you took her to Picholine,” Doug said. “Plied her with good champagne and an expensive bottle of wine, and then you asked her to stay over at your apartment for the first time ever. It was intoxicating for her, she thought the two of you were finally getting serious. Of course after a night like that, she would have done anything you asked. You knew exactly how to play it.” Doug cracked his knuckles; he wanted to sock Edge right in the mouth. This kind of violent urge was foreign to Doug. Despite the thrill he got from beating someone verbally in the courtroom, he had never wanted to hurt anyone physically, much less his own partner, his closest friend. “You’re no better than the creeps we see in the office.”
“Come on, Doug.”
“I’m not even angry about the relationship,” Doug said. “If it had worked out, if the two of you made each other happy, I mean, I might have been a little uneasy at first, but I would have gotten over it. But the fact that you disrespected my daughter, that you used her, that you two-timed her with Rosalie, that you brought Rosalie here without telling Margot about it, that you hurt her, Edge, you hurt my daughter: that I cannot excuse.”
“Doug,” Edge said. “I’m sorry.”
“You’re not sorry,” Doug said. “You have preyed on women for the thirty years that I’ve known you, and I didn’t judge you. I let you go about your business. I watched you divorce Mary Lee and marry Nathalie and divorce Nathalie and marry Suki, and divorce Suki. I stood by your side, I gave you good counsel, I was your friend. But today your victim is my child, and you’re lucky I don’t beat the crap out of you right here and now.”
“So are you telling me you’ve never hurt a woman before?” Edge asked. “You’ve never broken anyone’s heart? What’s up with you and Pauline, anyway? That was a pretty dramatic exit from the church. Want to tell me what that was about?”
Doug narrowed his eyes at Edge. He was one of the finest lawyers Doug knew, so a cross-examination shouldn’t surprise him. And yet Doug was taken aback. Obviously everyone at the ceremony had seen Pauline leave in tears, but Doug had assumed they would let it remain a private matter. He knew why Pauline had run from the church. He was as transparent to her as a piece of glass; she realized he didn’t love her anymore and that, possibly, he had never loved her.
Doug took a deep breath. Beth, he thought. She had died and left him to flounder through the rest of his life.
How to answer Edge? How to differentiate himself? Yes, he had hurt Pauline a little already, and he was about to hurt her a lot more. His affection for her, his desire to be with her, his stockpile of patience and goodwill, his like of her-intense as it was at times-was depleted. His emotional reservoir, where Pauline was concerned, was empty. This happened between husbands and wives every single day in every country in the world. How many hundreds of times had Doug heard a husband or wife say, “I don’t have a reason. I am just done.” And Doug, and Edge, and every divorce attorney worth his or her salt, would accept that answer without judgment. After all, human beings couldn’t control how they felt. If they could, everyone would most certainly decide to stay madly in love their whole lives.
“I don’t want to talk about Pauline,” Doug said. “This isn’t about Pauline.”
“I never said it was about Pauline,” Edge said. “I just wondered if you had ever hurt anyone.”
“Well, I never lied to anyone,” Doug said. “I never cheated on anyone. I never led a woman on.”
“I wonder about that,” Edge said.
Doug ground his molars together. “I want you off this property in five minutes. No. Less than five minutes.”
“What?” Edge said. “You’re throwing me out?”
“I want you and Rosalie to leave immediately.”
“I can’t believe this,” Edge said. “I can’t believe you’re throwing me out.”
“She’s my daughter, Edge,” Doug said. “And you hurt her.”
“What if the roles were reversed?” Edge said. “Margot is young and beautiful. What if she had hurt me? She might have, you know, and I would have had to live with it. Every relationship comes with risks.”
“You would have been fine,” Doug said. “You always are. Now get out.”
“Thirty years of friendship,” Edge said.
“Only family matters,” Doug said, and he headed back into the tent.
A few minutes later, Stuart and Jenna cut the cake, they fed each other nicely (as Beth had suggested in the Notebook; Beth strongly disapproved of shenanigans with the cake), and then it was time for Jenna to throw the bouquet. Doug watched Margot gather up the single women-Autumn and Rhonda and all of Jenna’s schoolteacher friends. Doug wanted Margot to catch the bouquet. He wanted to see Margot meet someone worthy of her in a way that neither Drum Sr. nor Edge was worthy.
When she had come to the end of her story about Edge, she had said, I don’t believe in love, Daddy. I just don’t believe in it.
And Doug had said, What about your mother and me? We were in love until the day she died. I’m in love with her still.
I guess what I mean is that I don’t believe in love for me, Margot said. Some people are lucky that way-you and Mom, Kevin and Beanie, Stuart and Jenna-but I’m not.
Oh, honey, Doug had said. He wanted to refute what she said, but he knew the truth. He had seen families broken and children caught in the crossfire. He had facilitated the dissolution of households and corporations and dynasties. He had brought about thousands of endings. Some of those stories continued on in a happier way-every Christmas he received dozens of cards from clients who had remarried. But not everyone ended up this way, of course. Doug had a client who had married and divorced five times. Some people tried and tried but could not succeed at love. Was Margot one of those people? God, he hoped not.
Catch the bouquet, he thought.
The bandleader had some kind of corny procedure to follow as the girls assumed the ready position. They looked like the offensive line for the New York Giants. Jenna turned her back and raised her arms over her head and flung the flowers through the air.
There was a great burst of animated laughter. It seemed that, out of nowhere, Stuart’s brother, Ryan, the best man, had appeared and caught the bouquet. He held it up in a triumphant fist, and everyone cheered. Then Ryan pulled his boyfriend up from his chair and kissed him on the lips and the band launched into “Celebrate,” by Kool & the Gang.
And Doug thought, Unexpected twist there. But okay, why not?
He found Margot a few minutes later, licking thick white buttercream off her forefinger.
“That was so great,” she said. “Ryan.”
Doug said, “I had a talk with Edge. I asked him to leave.”
Margot pressed her pretty lips together, and her ice-blue eyes filled with tears. “Thank you, Daddy.”
“I know you’re forty years old,” he said. “But as long as I’m alive, I’m here to take care of you.”
Margot set down her cake plate and gave him a hug. When they separated, she wiped her eyes and said, “And now there’s someone I need to apologize to.”
“Yes,” Doug said, as he scanned the tent for Pauline. “Me, too.”
THE NOTEBOOK, PAGE 40
Thank-You Notes
When you order the invitations, you should order the same number of corresponding cards (white or ivory, with the same seashell or sand dollar on top, blank) to use as thank-you notes for your gifts. Try, try, try to send them promptly, the same day the gift arrives if possible, and add at least one personal line to each card. Your Intelligent, Sensitive Groom-to-Be should share this responsibility, but honestly, honey, I have yet to meet a man who can write a decent thank-you note.