Blackburn stood. This was none of his business.
There was a squeal, and then the stall door flew open. A man and a woman tumbled onto the floor at Blackburn's feet.
The man looked up. "Lost our balance," he said.
Blackburn recognized him. He was the groom. His tuxedo pants were down around his knees. His ruffled white shirt was twisted.
The woman underneath the groom was not the bride. She was wearing a yellow dress that was bunched around her waist. The woman looked up at Blackburn in terror and struggled to pull up the top part of her dress.
Blackburn wanted to leave, but he couldn't. The woman's head was in front of the rest-room door, so he couldn't open it without braining her. He leaned back against the sink to wait.
The groom untangled himself and stood. Blackburn averted his eyes while the groom pulled up his underwear and pants. The woman was still adjusting her dress while lying on the floor. When she finished, the groom lifted her to her feet and handed her the high heels and pantyhose. She opened the door a crack to peek into the hallway, then hurried out. The door swung shut after her. Blackburn stepped forward and put his hand on the knob.
"Hang on a second," the groom said.
Blackburn paused. "Why?"
"I want to explain." The groom took his tuxedo jacket from a hook inside the stall and put it on. One lapel had an orange stain and a smear of white frosting. The groom produced a flat pint bottle of Wild Turkey from an inner pocket, took a drink, and offered the bottle to Blackburn. Blackburn shook his head and started to open the door. The groom pushed it shut.
Blackburn took his hand from the knob. "Last guy who did that," he said, "can't tie his shoes now."
The groom stepped between Blackburn and the door. "Look, I can understand you being pissed off as a first reaction," he said. "You're Eleanor's cousin, right?"
Blackburn said nothing. He put his hands in his pockets as a precaution. He didn't want to hurt the groom. There were a lot of people between the rest room and the parking lot, and he wasn't armed.
"Okay, you don't have to say anything," the groom said. "And I'd appreciate it if you wouldn't say anything to Eleanor either. It wouldn't make sense. Once you stop being pissed, you'll see what I mean."
"I don't follow," Blackburn said.
The groom tapped his wedding ring against the whiskey bottle. "You married?"
"I was," Blackburn said. He assumed that Dolores had arranged a divorce by now. If she hadn't, it was all the same to him. They were divorced as far as he was concerned.
"Was," the groom repeated. "Man, then you've got to know what I'm talking about." He took another drink. "What's your name?"
"Carl."
The groom extended his right hand. "I'm Steve. But I guess you knew that."
Blackburn kept his hands in his pockets.
The groom lowered his hand. "Well, shit, Carl. Remember getting married? You stand up there with this girl, in front of a church full of relatives, and the preacher makes you swear to 'forsake all others.' And that ain't natural, but there's all those relatives, so what are you gonna do? You're trapped. And then an hour later-"
"You're banging somebody in the bathroom," Blackburn said.
The groom grinned. "Not on purpose. But there in church, I was thinking, Man, is that it? I mean, look, I'm not ashamed to say that I love Eleanor. I don't want to be married to anyone else. You know?"
"If you say so."
"It's the truth. But women, you know, their brains are screwed. They think that being in love and getting laid are the same goddamn thing. And it ain't so. Am I right?"
Blackburn considered. "I don't know that women think they're the same."
The groom took another swig of Wild Turkey and shook his head. "Well, when you marry one of them, that's what she thinks. At least, that's what Eleanor thinks."
"How do you know?" Blackburn asked. "You only just now married her."
The groom shrugged. "We talked about it when we got engaged. I mean, she talked about it. She's got this little girl's idea about one man, one woman, happily ever after, all that fairy-tale bullshit. It's a weird attitude for her to take too, because before we got together, she wasn't exactly-" He hesitated. "Well, shit, the truth's the truth. She wasn't exactly, you know, a virgin when we started dating."
"So?"
"Exactly my point," the groom said. "Everybody screws around. It's like eating or breathing. It doesn't mean anything. Getting laid is just getting laid, and that doesn't change because you have some piece of paper. It doesn't mean you don't love your wife. It's not like you're going to leave her or anything. Right?"
"Guess not," Blackburn said. He glanced at the stall. "But it does seem like you're getting a head start."
The groom snickered. "Oh, yeah, well. That was Cindy. We went steady when I was fourteen, and we never did much back then, so we were sort of wondering how it would've been. You know. Last chance to find out. Doesn't mean anything."
"If you say so."
The groom drained his pint and shoved the bottle into the wastecan. "The thing is, see, I told Eleanor I'd be faithful. And I will be, in the true sense of the word. I'll take good care of her, and I'll never hurt her. So I'm asking you not to tell her about this. It'd just upset her. It shouldn't, but it would. That's the way she is."
"She won't hear it from me," Blackburn said.
The groom reached out and squeezed Blackburn's shoulder. "Thanks, man," he said. Then he opened the door and went out.
Blackburn shut the door, then went into the stall and shut that door too. He wiped the toilet seat with a strip of tissue and sat down to think. The groom's philosophy almost fit what had happened between him and Dolores, except the genders were reversed. Maybe that meant that men and women were, in fact, alike. Maybe the normal condition for both sexes was a constant desire to copulate with as many different partners as often as possible, which would mean that people like him and Eleanor were mutants. Maybe it was perverse to fixate on one person and to want that person to return the perversion. Maybe he had been unreasonable to expect Dolores to refrain from fucking hairy strangers in the middle of the day, and Eleanor was being unreasonable to expect Steve to refrain from fucking Cindy at their wedding reception.
Maybe. He couldn't decide. The issue was complex, and he had too little information. He needed additional input before he could make up his mind.
He left the restroom and went to the end of the hall as "The Tennessee Waltz" began playing in the main room. He watched the bride and groom take their spotlight dance. The bride's dress swirled, and the groom's hair was mussed just enough to make him look charming. They gazed into each other's eyes and grinned. As the song ended, they kissed, and their friends and relatives applauded.
The next song was also a waltz, and other couples joined in the dancing. Blackburn entered the room and walked around the dancers to the cake table. He ate a third piece of cake while he watched the dancers turn and twirl. The frosting was already starting to get crusty, but Blackburn didn't mind. He ate yet another piece after that, and drank two more cups of punch. By the time he finished, a dollar dance was in progress. For a dollar, anyone could dance with the bride. The collected money would go toward honeymoon expenses.
Blackburn took his remaining cash from his pocket and counted it. Four dollars and sixty cents. Spending a dollar here would make reaching Kansas City a real stretch. On the other hand, he wanted to talk to the bride, and this was his best chance. He put three dollars and sixty cents back into his pocket and got into the dollar-dance line.