Homecoming (Part Two)
"I am thinking it's a sign that the freckles in our eyes are mirror images and when we kiss they're perfectly aligned. And I have to speculate that God himself did make us into corresponding shapes, like puzzle pieces from the clay. True, it may seem like a stretch, but it's thoughts like these that catch my troubled head when you're away, when I am missing you to death..."
I had my phone open and poised, set to capture whatever it is that lay beyond the words, whatever it was I felt I couldn’t express. Every vista that grabbed my attention, every lonely stretch of road that seemed to murmur my insecurity, I grabbed a picture of. I was the impotent writer, the guy who – last time he was here – remarked casually that it was a nice view and then spent months kicking himself for being unable to find the words. Again I was defeated, though I didn’t know it at the time. The camera in my phone, so able when it came to snapping off shots of my walk home from work, found itself overmatched when it came to capturing the view from Interstate 15 through a windshield smeared with dust and dead insects and bird shit, burning beneath the glare of a distant but powerful sun. The images that seemed so striking at the time were eventually rendered blurred and indistinct. There were some good shots there, but nothing to give power to my feelings, nothing to hold those moments that so enthralled me.
I forget what we were listening to, what we said. The last time we were here, it seemed there was time to deconstruct and analyse. This time, there is nothing but that white-hot sun and the thing we’re going to do. This is the kind of sky you expect to see vultures circling in, the kind of commitment you can never turn back from. This is a road you can only ever travel once.
Vegas is like returning to the scene of a crime, but not in a bad way. It’s a feeling that we did something terrible here once that no-one ever found out about, like we’ll be okay so long as we wear shades and keep our hats down real low. This time Jennifer made the reservations and has to speak to the girl at the desk. I’m just here to laugh at her parking and then lurk in the background like the token English guy in some bad movie. Any minute now, I think, my henchmen will jump out from behind these pillars and I’ll reveal that it was a set-up all along, that I only went along with this charade because I want the forty million dollars sitting in the safe downstairs.
It doesn’t happen. As much as I want to suddenly be a cackling Hans Gruber, I remain a nervous Michael O’Mahony. We go to a room startingly reminiscent of the one we shared the last time and I call the chapel to let them know we’re here. They offer us an earlier slot and I damn near drop the phone, overcoming a sudden panic attack to tell the guy that the one we have is just fine, that we won’t be ready. We could have made the time he offered, but I’m not prepared for that. I need time to breathe, to stand in front of the bathroom mirror in my suit and tell myself that I’m doing the right thing for the right reasons. At this stage of the game, despite the surety I’d found when I was still at home, I’m as nervous as I’ve ever been. Nervous, in fact, is not the word. Terrified is closer to the truth.
Still, somehow I get myself ready, though I have no recollection as to how. Somehow I sit kneading my keys and fretting about the papers I’m supposed to have until Jennifer emerges from the bathroom and takes my breath away. Now I understand why it is that the groom isn’t supposed to see the bride until the ceremony. It awakens every doubt I ever had about this stunning girl being too good and too special for me, every bad dream where we got to the altar and she suddenly realised that I was the loser guy redeemed only by a talent for putting the words together in the right way. I am not good enough for her. I am here by some freak collision of mighty coincidences. At some point, she will look at me and realise she is making a mistake, and I will crawl back to the lonely life that was always my destiny. Jennifer. Jesus, Jennifer. Beautiful, wonderful Jennifer. Please God, I have never asked you for a single thing, but if you let this be real, I will forever be your humble servant.
This girl takes my arm and lets me lead her past all these desperately admiring casino glances, all these chancers hoping for just one lucky fall of the die. I feel like the guy who just keeps on rolling sevens, who has a goddess on his arm and some deity smiling down on everything he does. I feel lucky, blessed, charmed. I feel spectacular. I feel like everything bad that ever happened to me was purely to make these moments feel as special as they are. Amongst the gamblers of Vegas, I have hit the ultimate jackpot. I am ten feet tall and there are six of me and everywhere you turn you see only my smiling face. I win, and fuck everything and everyone else.
Outside we wait, our uncertainties dampened by the guy who’s seen it all before, who tells us when and where our ride will turn up. We hold cold, sweaty hands. Right on time, the limo shows. The driver shows us in and it’s not as luxurious as expected, not as bright and warm. He gives us forms to fill out and then drives us to the courthouse, where he tells us it’ll be forty minutes to an hour and then drives away. We go inside and nobody else is dressed for the occasion. It’s all jeans and T-shirts and bad humour about making mistakes. Even here, though, I feel like the winner. Maybe I’m the only guy getting married tonight, the only guy going through with the thing right here in this city, but that’s cool with me. I’ve got Jennifer on my arm and that’s enough, I’m sure, to make all the other husbands in the queue consider their options.
Faster than the driver predicts and we expect, we’re outside and I’m once again calling the chapel to let them know we’re waiting. On the steps of the courthouse, we stand dressed for marriage and lighting inappropriate cigarettes. It feels silly and yet somehow right, just another detour on the strange road that brought us here, a road that continues to twist and turn when it’s least expected. Finally the driver returns and this is it, no more forms and queues, no more promises and waiting. When we get out of the limousine, we’re getting married. There’s no longer an exit.
We get out of the limousine and a slimy guy is waiting for us. Tall and slimy, that’s all I remember. He directs us inside and into the chapel, leaving us standing awkwardly until the minister appears. I’m looking at the soft focus whiteness of the place, at the piano that sits in one corner, at the arch of twinkly lights and pale flowers that curves over the spot we’ll stand to take our vows. I’m waiting for a fat guy with sideburns and a jumpsuit to jump out and start singing Love Me Tender.
Instead of Elvis, though, we get a little old lady who strides up to the altar like she’s done this ten million times before. She confirms that we’re the couple she thinks we are and then places us by the door with violent hand gestures I later realise were because they were recording everything. Then she pushes a button on the portable tape recorder she’s carrying and it’s the Wedding March in gloriously cheesy mono, accompanied by furious hand gestures that guide us up the aisle and into her presence.
She’s good, I’ll give her that. In fact, she’s the only really genuine thing about the whole experience. Not once while she’s speaking do I feel like we are going through something scripted. Even when talk of God makes me realise that we are doing the ceremony in a way I would normally abhor I am only slightly distracted. She gives me my lines and I repeat them with feeling, only laughing when I cannot get Jennifer’s ring onto her finger without some effort. I say I do. I say in sickness and in health, till death do us part. I notice that she says husband and wife and not man and wife. Somehow, that reassures me.
Afterwards, the tall, cheesy guy comes in and asks us to stand in crap poses so he can take photos. I’m thinking that this is only for the family. I’m thinking that I’m married, that I’ve done it. All my doubts have faded away. I know that I am here with the right person for the right reasons. Everything I ever did, right or wrong, is somehow validated because it got me here. I love her. Yes! I made it. I’m alive and I was right. I waited and waited and when I finally broke all those promises I did it out of love, I did it the way I dreamed I’d do it. I am vindicated and broken all at the same time. I am the boy I always wanted to be and the boy that fell on the way. All I know is that the arm in mine is the right one. The loser in my head, against all expectations, has finally won.
I’d intended to carry Jenn across the threshold of our room. I’d intended a real wedding night. Like everything else, though, it goes against the grain. We go back to our room and change before heading back to the bar. We get drunk and play the slot machines. We eat where we ate before, at Lucky’s, the most aptly named diner in the history of eateries. I’m so exhausted that it’s all I can do to keep myself upright in the elevator that takes us back to the seventh floor. There is time to undress, to fall into bed, to murmur conversation about the amazing thing we’ve done. Then there is sleep. I don’t dream. I don’t need to anymore. In my head I am still wide awake. I am in the chapel. The little old lady is talking about God and commitment and till death do us part, and all I can say, all I can feel, is I love you. I love you, I love you, I love you.
Finally, I’m home.
I had my phone open and poised, set to capture whatever it is that lay beyond the words, whatever it was I felt I couldn’t express. Every vista that grabbed my attention, every lonely stretch of road that seemed to murmur my insecurity, I grabbed a picture of. I was the impotent writer, the guy who – last time he was here – remarked casually that it was a nice view and then spent months kicking himself for being unable to find the words. Again I was defeated, though I didn’t know it at the time. The camera in my phone, so able when it came to snapping off shots of my walk home from work, found itself overmatched when it came to capturing the view from Interstate 15 through a windshield smeared with dust and dead insects and bird shit, burning beneath the glare of a distant but powerful sun. The images that seemed so striking at the time were eventually rendered blurred and indistinct. There were some good shots there, but nothing to give power to my feelings, nothing to hold those moments that so enthralled me.
I forget what we were listening to, what we said. The last time we were here, it seemed there was time to deconstruct and analyse. This time, there is nothing but that white-hot sun and the thing we’re going to do. This is the kind of sky you expect to see vultures circling in, the kind of commitment you can never turn back from. This is a road you can only ever travel once.
Vegas is like returning to the scene of a crime, but not in a bad way. It’s a feeling that we did something terrible here once that no-one ever found out about, like we’ll be okay so long as we wear shades and keep our hats down real low. This time Jennifer made the reservations and has to speak to the girl at the desk. I’m just here to laugh at her parking and then lurk in the background like the token English guy in some bad movie. Any minute now, I think, my henchmen will jump out from behind these pillars and I’ll reveal that it was a set-up all along, that I only went along with this charade because I want the forty million dollars sitting in the safe downstairs.
It doesn’t happen. As much as I want to suddenly be a cackling Hans Gruber, I remain a nervous Michael O’Mahony. We go to a room startingly reminiscent of the one we shared the last time and I call the chapel to let them know we’re here. They offer us an earlier slot and I damn near drop the phone, overcoming a sudden panic attack to tell the guy that the one we have is just fine, that we won’t be ready. We could have made the time he offered, but I’m not prepared for that. I need time to breathe, to stand in front of the bathroom mirror in my suit and tell myself that I’m doing the right thing for the right reasons. At this stage of the game, despite the surety I’d found when I was still at home, I’m as nervous as I’ve ever been. Nervous, in fact, is not the word. Terrified is closer to the truth.
Still, somehow I get myself ready, though I have no recollection as to how. Somehow I sit kneading my keys and fretting about the papers I’m supposed to have until Jennifer emerges from the bathroom and takes my breath away. Now I understand why it is that the groom isn’t supposed to see the bride until the ceremony. It awakens every doubt I ever had about this stunning girl being too good and too special for me, every bad dream where we got to the altar and she suddenly realised that I was the loser guy redeemed only by a talent for putting the words together in the right way. I am not good enough for her. I am here by some freak collision of mighty coincidences. At some point, she will look at me and realise she is making a mistake, and I will crawl back to the lonely life that was always my destiny. Jennifer. Jesus, Jennifer. Beautiful, wonderful Jennifer. Please God, I have never asked you for a single thing, but if you let this be real, I will forever be your humble servant.
This girl takes my arm and lets me lead her past all these desperately admiring casino glances, all these chancers hoping for just one lucky fall of the die. I feel like the guy who just keeps on rolling sevens, who has a goddess on his arm and some deity smiling down on everything he does. I feel lucky, blessed, charmed. I feel spectacular. I feel like everything bad that ever happened to me was purely to make these moments feel as special as they are. Amongst the gamblers of Vegas, I have hit the ultimate jackpot. I am ten feet tall and there are six of me and everywhere you turn you see only my smiling face. I win, and fuck everything and everyone else.
Outside we wait, our uncertainties dampened by the guy who’s seen it all before, who tells us when and where our ride will turn up. We hold cold, sweaty hands. Right on time, the limo shows. The driver shows us in and it’s not as luxurious as expected, not as bright and warm. He gives us forms to fill out and then drives us to the courthouse, where he tells us it’ll be forty minutes to an hour and then drives away. We go inside and nobody else is dressed for the occasion. It’s all jeans and T-shirts and bad humour about making mistakes. Even here, though, I feel like the winner. Maybe I’m the only guy getting married tonight, the only guy going through with the thing right here in this city, but that’s cool with me. I’ve got Jennifer on my arm and that’s enough, I’m sure, to make all the other husbands in the queue consider their options.
Faster than the driver predicts and we expect, we’re outside and I’m once again calling the chapel to let them know we’re waiting. On the steps of the courthouse, we stand dressed for marriage and lighting inappropriate cigarettes. It feels silly and yet somehow right, just another detour on the strange road that brought us here, a road that continues to twist and turn when it’s least expected. Finally the driver returns and this is it, no more forms and queues, no more promises and waiting. When we get out of the limousine, we’re getting married. There’s no longer an exit.
We get out of the limousine and a slimy guy is waiting for us. Tall and slimy, that’s all I remember. He directs us inside and into the chapel, leaving us standing awkwardly until the minister appears. I’m looking at the soft focus whiteness of the place, at the piano that sits in one corner, at the arch of twinkly lights and pale flowers that curves over the spot we’ll stand to take our vows. I’m waiting for a fat guy with sideburns and a jumpsuit to jump out and start singing Love Me Tender.
Instead of Elvis, though, we get a little old lady who strides up to the altar like she’s done this ten million times before. She confirms that we’re the couple she thinks we are and then places us by the door with violent hand gestures I later realise were because they were recording everything. Then she pushes a button on the portable tape recorder she’s carrying and it’s the Wedding March in gloriously cheesy mono, accompanied by furious hand gestures that guide us up the aisle and into her presence.
She’s good, I’ll give her that. In fact, she’s the only really genuine thing about the whole experience. Not once while she’s speaking do I feel like we are going through something scripted. Even when talk of God makes me realise that we are doing the ceremony in a way I would normally abhor I am only slightly distracted. She gives me my lines and I repeat them with feeling, only laughing when I cannot get Jennifer’s ring onto her finger without some effort. I say I do. I say in sickness and in health, till death do us part. I notice that she says husband and wife and not man and wife. Somehow, that reassures me.
Afterwards, the tall, cheesy guy comes in and asks us to stand in crap poses so he can take photos. I’m thinking that this is only for the family. I’m thinking that I’m married, that I’ve done it. All my doubts have faded away. I know that I am here with the right person for the right reasons. Everything I ever did, right or wrong, is somehow validated because it got me here. I love her. Yes! I made it. I’m alive and I was right. I waited and waited and when I finally broke all those promises I did it out of love, I did it the way I dreamed I’d do it. I am vindicated and broken all at the same time. I am the boy I always wanted to be and the boy that fell on the way. All I know is that the arm in mine is the right one. The loser in my head, against all expectations, has finally won.
I’d intended to carry Jenn across the threshold of our room. I’d intended a real wedding night. Like everything else, though, it goes against the grain. We go back to our room and change before heading back to the bar. We get drunk and play the slot machines. We eat where we ate before, at Lucky’s, the most aptly named diner in the history of eateries. I’m so exhausted that it’s all I can do to keep myself upright in the elevator that takes us back to the seventh floor. There is time to undress, to fall into bed, to murmur conversation about the amazing thing we’ve done. Then there is sleep. I don’t dream. I don’t need to anymore. In my head I am still wide awake. I am in the chapel. The little old lady is talking about God and commitment and till death do us part, and all I can say, all I can feel, is I love you. I love you, I love you, I love you.
Finally, I’m home.
posted by Michael at 11:42 AM
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