8> Friday: Rehearsal
Michael didn't understand why they had to rehearse for a pretend wedding, but in the end he was glad they did. Mouse had insisted. She had said it was part of the whole schtick, and a girl only gets married once, so they were going to do it right. He gave her an annoyed, sidelong look when she said it, so she leaned up to whisper "I love you" into his ear, and then gave him a quick kiss, and then dragged him along by the hand. He'd had no choice.
The rehearsal was simple enough. The wedding hall was the main room in Jeff's rather large apartment. A soft white light filled the room from a line of high windows along one wall. They offered a wonderful fifteenth floor view of the snowbound city, with a brooding white-gray cloud covered sky as a backdrop. You could even see a sliver of Lake Michigan between the other buildings. Being a successful lawyer had its obvious advantages. He apparently had a lot more to offer Tania than wild sex.
Jeff had graciously agreed to let all of the room's furniture be moved into his bedroom, opening the room up like a small hall. Mouse joked that it was the only thing that she could get on such short notice. Michael waited along one wall, near the "altar", which was merely a folding card table covered with a white table cloth. Chairs were arranged appropriately along the sides in rows, with an aisle down the middle. For the rehearsal, only Alicia, Tania, Jeff, Mouse and Michael were there. Tania was acting as justice of the peace, Alicia was maid of honor, and Jeff was the best man.
It started with Mouse theatrically coming out of the bedroom hallway and striding up the aisle, loudly singing the "dum, dum da dum" wedding march by herself. Halfway through she decided that was too silly. She looked at Jeff's collection of music. He surprised her by quickly recommending some classical selections, and after sampling just a few she had settled on one that she liked.
They went through the motions for everything, with lots of joking and giggles and smart comments. Every few minutes someone would have an idea to make things more entertaining, and they'd joke some more and get carried away, then eventually abandon it. Michael liked that. Keep it simple. Complicated meant there was more to go wrong.
The biggest problem at the rehearsal came when Tania asked for Michael's full name. It hadn't occurred to either of them that this game would require it, but of course it did. Tania had to say something. She started to. She started to say, "do you, Michael...". And then Tania realized that she didn't know his last name. So she asked him.
It should have been simple. When someone asks you for your last name, you just tell them. You don't stutter. You don't hesitate. It's not a difficult question.
But your last name is never already the same as the woman you're dating, and obviously fucking, and pretending to marry.
Michael froze. Mouse froze. The whole room waited.
While Michael grappled for a name, a safe name, any name, he looked to Mouse for help. She recovered sooner than him, but showed no sign of coming to his aid. She seemed to enjoy watching him squirm.
"Campbell," Michael blurted finally, relieved to escape, no matter how awkwardly. There was a Campbell at their warehouse in the suburbs. It was a common name. It seemed a safe choice.
Tania eyed him for a moment.
"Sorry, I just, I just started..." Michael began lamely, feeling the need to explain his clumsy pause.
"I just started thinking the words 'Mr. and Mrs. Michael Campbell', and I kind of freaked." he finished, lamely he thought. "It sounded so... intense."
Mouse was grinning at him. She discreetly slipped him a quick wink, as if to signal that she thought he'd done well.
Tania still eyed him, but eventually went on. "Do you, Michael Campbell, take this woman, to be your playfully wedded bride..."
And so it continued. And then came time to kiss the bride. Mouse and Michael were still self conscious about kissing in front of other people, so they leaned in to give each other only the quickest peck on the lips. Somehow, the act of letting people see them show their incestuous lust was just too difficult to do. Michael couldn't explain it, not with everything else that had gone on, not even with Tania having listened to their sessions through her walls. And yet they couldn't do it.
"Okay, that was lame," Alicia chimed in. "That's how I kiss my brother."
Her choice of analogy made both Michael and Mouse blush, which made them even more self conscious, which made them blush more. Michael felt his cheeks burning with heat.
"Yeah, come on, kids," Tania put in. "Let's see some tongue action there. I'm not presiding over a Puritan wedding."
Mouse and Michael obediently leaned into each other. They hesitated for one more moment, looking each other in the eye, steeling themselves, and then locked lips in a slightly longer, only slightly more passionate kiss. Michael could feel himself wanting to let it grow into more, but they still separated quickly.
"I don't think there was any tongue in there," Tania observed with disappointment. She stared at them a moment longer, but when they showed no sign of giving her a better performance, she sighed in theatrical resignation and continued.
"I present to you all," Tania announced, looking up and around the empty room, "Mr. and Mrs. Michael Campbell."
"No!" Mouse interjected, startling them all. "No, I don't like that."
Everyone blinked in confusion, everyone except Michael. He knew where she was headed.
"Dear," Michael started, trying to steer her away from dangerous waters.
"No," Mouse said firmly, glaring at a blank spot on the wall. "I want to be Mr. and Mrs. Michael Castillo."
"You can't do that," Alicia protested. "You can't make him use your last name. You can be Mr. Campbell and Mrs. Castillo, which is very un-romantic, or Mr. Campbell and Mrs. Campbell-Castillo, or Castillo-Campbell, or whatever. But he can't become Mr. Castillo."
"Are you through?" Mouse asked, sounding as if venom was ready to drip from her teeth.
Alicia held her tongue. They all knew about Mona's temper.
"It's my wedding and my game and my rules and I can do whatever I want. Michael has to do it, too, because if he doesn't I'll lie in bed on our wedding night like a three day old fish," she said.
Tania was the only one that laughed. She quickly voiced her feminist opinion. "I agree with Mona. It's about time women completely turned the tables. Let Michael take her last name."
"I don't care," Michael said as soon as he could get a word in. Jeff raised his eyebrows at him, as if goading him to do battle, to champion the vanishing rights of men everywhere.
"I really don't, it's not a big deal to me," Michael said. Actually, he hated the idea of doing this with a fake name, too. If they had come this far, if they were going this far, then he wanted it to feel real when they did it. He didn't want his little sister introduced as the wife of some other, unknown man. It was too weird, he thought.
Too weird? He knew he was losing it now. He was pretending to marry his sister, but using an assumed name was too weird.
"Okay, so it's settled, we'll be introduced as Mr. and Mrs. Michael Castillo," Mouse concluded.
"I present to you all," Tania intoned, looking at Mouse with an approving grin, "Mr. and Mrs. Michael Castillo!"
Michael and Mouse turned to face the empty chairs. They held hands, and she leaned onto his arm, beaming.
They all applauded politely. Tania put two fingers in her mouth to deliver a loud catcall of a whistle.
* * *
After the rehearsal, the five of them opened a bottle of wine. They sat around talking about all sorts of things. They were just killing time until the rehearsal dinner. Near six o'clock they rearranged the chairs around some more card tables. The guests started to arrive. There weren't many, Michael noted happily. A delivery man came to the door with a stack of pizza boxes.
"We're sparing no expense, I see," Michael said.
"Well, the groom's family is supposed to pay for the rehearsal dinner, and the father for the wedding. And that's you, both. So if you want to spring for something more elaborate, go right ahead."
"No thanks. Anything else I have to do tonight? Other than find some way to satisfy you," he added, trying to keep the leer out of his voice. He felt like he'd missed something there, but couldn't make the connection.
"You have to give a toast."
"The groom doesn't give a toast, at either the wedding reception or the rehearsal dinner," Michael said smuggly. "I know, I've been through it once."
"The bride's father does," Mouse answered, equally smug.
Michael made a show of swallowing his tongue. "Excuse me?" he finally got out.
"We need someone to be my father tonight," Mouse said, choosing her words carefully in front of her friends. She almost said "to be Dad", but caught and subdued that thought quickly enough. She had then wanted to say "be my daddy," but she didn't trust Tania nearly enough to do it in front of her.
"We all figured, that since you were the oldest..." Mouse started.
"And because you look sort of like Mona," Alicia chimed in.
Mouse glared at her for adding that discomforting observation, although Alicia clearly and thankfully had no idea why it annoyed her so much.
"And because you look like maybe you could be my father," Mouse continued delicately, with another restraining glare at Alicia, "age-wise."
"And because sometimes Mona calls you 'daddy'," Tania interrupted, grinning.
