FOR A SKIPPING ROPE
by Sue Scott
Alison stepped onto the velvet runner; her arm linked through her father’s. She stared down the length of the church to the altar where her fiancé and Father McKinney waited, surrounded by the wedding party. Nine bridesmaids…insane.
The organist struck a chord and everyone in the church turned Alison’s way, hundreds of blank moon faces in the candlelight and stained glass gloom. A trickle of sweat ran down her back. Thank God…er…goodness the open-backed dress was hidden by seven feet of veil.
The distance to the altar stretched, narrowing in the center like pulled taffy, and Alison felt herself being sucked backward through the long year of plans to last April. She’d been sitting on a swing, laughing, when Eric Bent over her and held out the ring. The thing she’d dreamed of happening her whole life. The white picket fence and…a yard filled with broken toys, screaming kids and dog crap. No, no, that wasn’t right!
The organist pounded out “Ave Maria,” and Great-Aunt Lulu began to sing in a croaky voice. Alison’s father took a step and when she didn’t move he gave her arm a gentle tug.
“Got the jitters?” he asked out of the corner of his mouth.
Alison looked at him. Down at him. She’d been taller than her father since high school. She noticed the gray hair in his ears for the first time, old man’s ears with crinkly lobes. When had that happened? And then she was seeing Eric in forty years when they were both nearly seventy. Would he stand straight like her dad or be stooped, pants under his armpits and bone-thin legs with blue veins showing through the paper skin? Her grandfather Shaw’s legs, sitting in his wheelchair with the bathrobe parting accidentally on purpose to show off a shriveled flat…ooh, why was she thinking about that? Alison shuddered.
A rustle went around the church as people commented on her immobility. How did the walk go? Step together? Step step together together? Oh damn. Now she’d thought about it too much and the idea of moving at all was beyond ridiculous. God could smite the roof with lightning and she’d stand here among the flames.
Well that was stupid. Of course Eric the Wonder Dog would bolt down the aisle shouting, “Hang on dear Alison, I shall save you from peril!”
In the front pew her mother did a half-crouch to get a better look. Alison saw her parents exchange that “What’s up with her? I don’t know, she’s your daughter!” volley of glances.
She tried to swallow a mouthful of saliva. And of course she couldn’t get her throat to work. “Ack ack.” Oh geeze, she sounded like she had a hairball.
“Ali, sweetie? Come on, lets go sit down,” her father tried to lead her back into the antechamber.
She’d turned into cement; she’d thrown her anchor and wasn’t drifting. Eric’s best man leaned over and whispered to him. Eric shook his head. Mark had never liked that Alison had usurped his cushion on the couch. What a whiner.
Alison squeezed her eyes shut. Please, God, all I want is to be outside with a skipping rope. Make me six and not think about this day and not be in this place in this frozen position with three hundred people staring at me.
Maybe she could faint. Alison willed herself to drop to the floor in a poof of taffeta, but no luck. She imagined an aquarium of cool water, diving in and lying on the rocky bottom like a lazy fish.
Her mother hustled up a side aisle now, coming around the back, a rear attack. “Irv, what’s the matter here?”
“No idea. She won’t budge, that’s all.”
Alison didn’t say anything. Lazy fish couldn’t talk.
“Ali sugar, do you need to sit down?” her mother whispered through a huge fake smile. Good old mom. The insane _expression on her face almost made Alison giggle.
Almost, until she saw Eric’s worried expression. Sweet Eric, a fun guy who loved her.
Mom: “Such a nice boy, dependable and responsible. He’ll make a faithful husband sugar.”
Danielle, best friend: “Ali you bitch. I’m so jealous I could spit. Does he have a brother?”
Eric: “I love you Alison my Alison. All I want is for you to be my wife.”
His brown eyes, hopeful, would be so hurt, little boy eyes. And the catch in his laugh like a child’s, innocent and delighted.
She met Eric’s gaze. His one-sided grin was encouraging. He’s happy, she realized. Why did that surprise her?
Behind Alison her parents were having a whispered fight.
“What’re you going to do Irv?”
“No, what’re you going to do Shirl? This isn’t my department. You’re supposed to handle all ‘female problems.’”
“That was Ali’s menstruation, Irv. That was birth control. Not her standing like a lump when the wedding’s ready to start and …”
“I could find a dolly, cart her up the aisle.”
“Not funny Irving, not funny at all.” Her mother sniffed.
That broke Ali’s spell. She smiled at Eric and a sigh went around the church, people shifted their butts on the pews, ready to settle in for the wedding. The organist and Lulu started “Ave Maria” from the beginning.
Alison turned to her parents, who were flapping and hissing at each other like angry geese.
“Mom, dad,” she said, “I love you.” Alison handed the bouquet to her mother and kissed her powdery cheek, breathing in the scent of White Shoulders. Then she turned to her father, kissed him and handed him the engagement ring. “Tell Eric I’m sorry will you? I’m not ready for an Easy-Bake life.”
She kicked off her heels, hoisted up the yards of skirt and ran out of the murky church, not giving a damn about the hundred dollar hosiery that would shred the instant she hit the sidewalk. Sprinting away, Alison laughed for the joy of spring sunshine and freedom.
“Taxi!” she waved one down at the corner and piled in. The driver turned to stare at her, his mouth hanging open. Ignoring him she said, “Take me to the nearest place I can buy a skipping rope.”
Sue Scott sometimes produces a story, but mostly orbits the planet. She can be reached through NASA.
