I wore a suit, a hired one from a phone number in the catalogue. Tilda measured me for it during my experimenting with standing. Three months after the leprosy set in the pain was dulling enough for relearning to walk. Up the hallway I’d go, then back to bed and a pillow under my heels for draining away pangs. I practised walking twice a day in preparation for the aisle, for waiting at the altar and saying vows and escorting Tilda on my arm out of the church and into married life.
The arrangement was that Reverend Giles Hugg from Scintilla’s All Faiths Congregation would do the honours for a $40 gratuity and keep it hush-hush so there’d be no sightseers. The Gazette would want to be there with a photo for its social page if word got out. Tilda didn’t want people nattering about how lovely she looked for someone with a mastectomy. I certainly didn’t want the attention. I was managing to walk again, yes, but only with a walking stick in each hand. Tilda bought me black wooden ones from the Salvos—less medical than the steel kind from Philpott but walking sticks nonetheless, like an old codger. I had put on belly weight too, from being bedridden and having my appetite return. I had, in other words, aged. I found seven grey hairs in the mirror: three on my left temple; four on my right. There were signs of sagging below my eye sockets.
My responsibility was getting a ring for her. I didn’t need one—rings are optional on males and we had to be sensible and scrimp on spending. The symbol of a wedding ring was essential on women, Tilda believed. ‘It’s like saying, Colin is my husband. It’s saying, World out there, I’m the love of his life.’
She gave me her finger size—her good hand’s finger, a finger she would display like a normal wife: 13 millimetres diameter, which turned out to be size C in jewellers’ language. Not that we had a jeweller in Scintilla. We had O’Connor’s Manchester, which sold everything for the home and human, including orthopaedic footwear. And down the very back, in a knee-high locker, cheap watches, necklaces, bracelets and ear studs. In a locker inside the locker, accessed by brassy key, was a felt container which opened out into rows of rings of gold and silver. Wedding rings, engagement, eternity.
Of the three that fitted Tilda’s measurements there was a plain gold band, price $75, which came in a little domed presentation box and included a tag saying nine carats. Me and my sticks hobbled down Main Street twice before I finally decided on the nine carats over a thicker band with a speck of diamond in it but not as much reflective shine.
It was probably the O’Connor girl who informed the town—Shona or Sheena or whatever her name is. The one with powder so densely applied it makes her face look dirty. ‘When’s the happy day?’ she asked.
‘We’re keeping it very quiet.’
‘Oh, do tell.’
Never confide in country people.
Chapter 57
The ceremony would start at 11am. Tilda was having her hair done at Tracy’s Salon before breakfast, which would give me time alone in the bathroom to make myself presentable. I was able to bathe on my own now—my legs tolerated water and floated painlessly under the surface provided the temperature was cool. I could step out and onto the bath towel without help, and bend and rinse dead skin from the enamel without losing my balance or feeling leg blood scalding me.
I was to dress by nine and wait at the back gate for Reverend Hugg, who had kindly offered transport. He and I would go to his house for morning tea while Tilda dressed in her masterpiece, put on her face and picked a dewy posy of flowers from our backyard for her aisle walk: lavender sprigs were in the purple of health after spring rains; oleander bloomed pink; bottle-brush was scarlet and bristling. She’d make her own way to the chapel by van so I wouldn’t see her bridal look until vow time.
Reverend Hugg was worried about the van part of proceedings. What if the rickety wreck broke down? What if we stood there at the altar, he and I, and there was no Tilda? He’d put fresh batteries in his cassette player and said it would be a shame if only flies and magpies got to hear the wedding march. Also, he was booked to umpire junior cricket in the afternoon—any dallying would cause him inconvenience.
He needn’t have worried. The van did its bit. We heard it pull in through the church gate with a salute of backfires. The reverend stood to attention and nodded his relief to me. He touched a knuckle to his nose to wipe away bat odour. He lit two candles and smoothed the cloth he’d brought to cover the bat-stained altar table. He didn’t care whether we were believers or not, if we were going to get married in a house of God there had to be a Bible and crucifix present or we could get someone else. His cross and Bible were between the candles. He nudged them together as if aligning sensitive instruments. He was the fidgety type, short in stature, big on baritone speaking. His head was a pincushion of hair transplants still healing, pubic-like strands slicked across his skull as if he thought no one would notice. He pressed play for the organ music and immediately had to turn it down because of echoing in the empty pews.
There she was, the long white stem of her. Her arms were webbed in lace, with oversized lace cuffs in a glove effect to conceal her sleeve and gauntlet. She stood in the narrow door arch holding her posy above her waist like a nervous offering. She smiled but it was a flinching, embarrassed kind. I could see the problem. There were people behind her, half a dozen elderly women. I couldn’t name them but I knew them by sight. ‘Biddies’, they were called behind their backs in Scintilla. ‘Ladies’ to their faces, but ‘biddies and busy-bodies’ behind. They tugged and pinched their cardigans over their bosoms, patted their candy-floss perms because Holly was there too, camera over her shoulder, blinking heavenward for the best lighting, positioning the camera tripod used for steadier social-page portraits.
The biddies clumped themselves together to be photographed, granny-stepping through the door after Tilda. She took a deep breath and proceeded towards me. The nuisance of impostors would have to be ignored. Reverend Hugg directed me to extend my arm and invite her to be at my side. He stood on his toes and pointed for everyone else to settle in the rear pews and be quiet. He put his finger to his mouth and gave the order: Quiet.
I put both walking sticks into my left hand and bid Tilda come embrace my right elbow. I felt compelled to touch wood that she would look just as fragilely beautiful up close as she did slow-stepping from the door; that she would not become tearful from all the smiling and worry about tears melting makeup. I touched wood that I would not appear unlovely suddenly to her with my hunched reliance on walking sticks. That there would be no scene of second thoughts for the biddies and Holly to dine out on for months. Wooden walking sticks at least mean you’ve always got the touchings close at hand.