Originally Featured at The William & Mary Review
A Work of Fiction by O.G. Rose
Can I join you? I love a porch at night, listening to frogs. Thanks for the water waiting for me. Do you like my dress? My husband will think the yellow matches my honey hair and black eye. I got married this morning. To Mr. Bumblebee: cerulean eyes, lover of navy suits. Sometimes he’s so annoying, always heading to work. He buzzes like this — buzz — and I call him out on his bull, and we laugh. He’s so wonderful. Forty’s not too late for wonder.
I went to see my favorite blue house in town today: two stories, surrounded by a black fence, the best Charleston offers. There was a pineapple in the pediment over the door, so I found a key under the doormat and went on in. There was a piano in the living room instead of a television. My husband and I could live on the top floor. There was a guitar in a room with a Superman comforter on the bed, and after I took off two strings, I found I could pluck it like my ukulele.
Most people get tricked and stuck in houses — porches rot — but a pineapple was engraved over the handle of the door on the way out, welcoming me to leave. I made my bouquet out of the borage growing up the metal fence around the front yard. The wedding was simple and sweet; in my head, I played the melody I plucked. It was in the garden of lavender I frequented across from the blue house. Like anything that matters, the ceremony didn’t take long.
After I divorced my ex-husband, I promised myself that if I ever had that special feeling again with someone, and he asked me to marry him, I would do it without asking any questions. When I saw Bumblebee, that feeling started in my mouth and fell down my throat like something I had to swallow. I have two daughters: one of them is a sarcastic brat while the other is sweet. At forty, I realized they got all their annoying traits from me. Funny how life works, being married before my own flesh and blood. I wanted it to be a surprise.
Bumblebee is so wonderful. I used to hate my ex-husband, but one day it felt like all the walls fell, and this overwhelming forgiveness flowed in. I figured that life was too wonderful to cry and not laugh too. That’s what I did this morning at the wedding. The funny thing was that Bumblebee didn’t bring his body. I whispered vows in the open air, holding my bouquet by myself in the garden. His body was stuck in the blue house holding his wife, watching. After that, I walked to you. It’s been a beautiful day. How things supposed to be. Thanks for the water. I love good nights.
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