Stealing the Thunder

"I now pronounce you man and wife."

Zachary Crane applauded with the others as Meredith Trinette Levine—well, Meredith Trinette Chambers now—threw her arms around her husband and kissed him soundly. Across the dais, Christa Sternbacher grinned, clapping as best she could around her bridesmaid's bouquet; behind her, Arie had simply tucked hers under one arm. He couldn't see Derek because he was behind him, and Sajel and Jane and everyone's parents were tucked into the congregation somewhere, along with the thousand other people who had arrived—what, had they just invited everyone they ever met?—but he was sure they were cheering too.

Brandon and Meredith were just like that.

As the procession started out, the best man and maid of honor linked up behind the happy couple, Zach offering Christa his left arm. He fought to keep his right hand from checking his pocket. It had done so far too many times already in the past two hours. "They look really happy," he said.

"They do," she agreed. "And Meredith hardly shows at all."

"Well, it's only been three months."

"Yeah. But I know she didn'twant to show."

"It wouldn't've mattered," he said. "Everyone knows."

"It would've mattered toher," she said, giving him a disparaging glance.

Zach repressed a sigh. For the millionth time this summer, he wondered if he would ever truly understand the female mind. With Christa and Meredith up to their ears in wedding preparations ever since they'd come back to Mount Hill, he'd had plenty of chances to discover just how out-of-touch he was.

He glanced Brandon—or rather, the back of his head, which was all that was visible outside the massive tuxedo.He doesn't seem confused. It's been smooth sailing for him, really. He fought a scowl.The back of your head doesn't have to look so insufferably smug about it.

Christa peeked at him. "Is everything okay, Zach? You've been... Jumpy, recently."

Zach kept his face impassive with an effort. "It's just, you know, the wedding. We'veall been jumpy, recently."

Christa gave a rueful laugh. "Yeah, no kidding. Well, at least we get to relax now. A nice, sunny week at a four-star hotel with nothing on our minds."

Nothing onyour mind, maybe.

The reception dinner was plagued by the traditional delays—servitors tripping over each other, the wrong foods ready at the wrong times, the DJ's equipment throwing sparks. Zach found himself in a chair in the corner, glowering. Christa was with Brandon and Meredith, entertaining guests in the center of the room. It was a role to which they were uniquely suited. Brandon and Christa had always been the most outgoing of them all, with Derek a close third; Zach, though he could make them laugh with the best of them, often found himself needing room. It had taken Christa months to convince him that humor was a form of defense for him, not friend-making. Or, at least, notjust friend-making.

Derek, roaming, found him. "Everything all right, Zach? You seem... Really gloomy today."

Zach scowled. "Is it that obvious?"

"Something wrong with Christa?"

"Christa? Noooo. No."Nothing at all. Except for how sometimes I think I barely know her. "It's..."

Derek blinked at him in that damnably perceptive way he had.

Zach sighed. "You know, you're the second person to ask me that in half an hour. And you're the first person I'm going to tell the truth to.

He was half afraid the other man would crack a joke, but Derek was more sensitive than Zach had given him credit for. Though he did try a small poke. "You'd rather tell me than Christa?"

"Well. Ican't exactly ask Christa aboutthis." And he dug in his pocket for the ring.

Derek said nothing.

"It was my grandma's," said Zach. "She was going to give it to my first-born uncle, but there neverwere any uncles, so she gave it to my mom, to give to me."

"And now you're..."

"I've been stressing over it formonths, man."

"Kind of weird timing, isn't it? I mean, with Brandon and Meredith—"

"Well, yeah, but, on the other hand, what better time?"

"Are you sure they aren't just, I dunno, influencing your mindset or something?"

"Me? Naaaw. Derek, I've been planning this foryears. Well, maybe notplanning, but I've known it'd happen. For... Well, at least since we've been in college." It was something he hadn't even admitted to Brandon.

Someone else might've made a poke at him, but Derek simply nodded. "She's definitely something."

"She is," Zach agreed, staring at the floor. "I just... Sometimes, when I see her laughing, or talking, or helping Meredith deal with some annoying salesperson, or... I have no idea how I got this lucky. To fall in love with a woman so..." He ran out of adjectives on the first try.

"And to have her fall in love with you," Derek finished.

Zach gestured. "Yeah."

"So," said Derek. "Now you gotta just wait. And, you know, not steal Brandon's and Meredith's thunder."

Zach laughed darkly. "Yeah, with this thing burning a hole in my pocket." He tucked the blue box away again. "I've had it for a month, you know? And we just... There's never been time. She's been so busy with the wedding—"

"We'veall been busy," Derek said, smiling. "Does anyone know?"

"Well, my mom does," Zach said, "because I had to ask her for this, but other than that..."

Derek nodded. He understood. "And, is there anyone else you'd like to have know?"

Zach blinked at him. "...What?"

"As in," Derek said, "during the dancing and festivities and so on, is there anyone who should be coincidentally sent your way?"

"Oh," said Zach. "Oh. Naw, that's... That's all right. Thanks."

Derek smiled. "You sure? We could get Gavin in on it, for old times' sake."

"Gavin?" Zach said. "Is he here?"

"Sure is," said Derek. "Look over there, by Stasya and Camille and, um, whoever that is. I don't know him, he's from Greenfield."

"Oh yeah," said Zach. "Hunh."

"Just remember, you gotta do the toast," Derek said. "Best man's rights."

"Oh fuck!" said Zach.

"Don't worry, you did great at the rehearsal dinner last night," Derek said. "Do you remember what you said?"

"No!" said Zach.

Derek looked like he was trying not to grin—trying, and failing. "Well, good luck with that."

"Thanks!" said Zach ascerbically.

When everything was finally in order, Christa bustled the procession into place. She had agreed to take on most of the administrative duties of the night, which Meredith had given over gratefully. The DJ was on his microphone, drawing people into the dining hall. "If everyone could take their seats? If everyone could— Thank you. All right then, thank you." Zach glanced over: he recognized that voice. Sure enough, the mop of curly hair, the grin, the lanky frame—Gavin Strickland as MC? Would wonders never cease. "Well, folks, it looks like we're in for a long haul, speeches, wedding party, dancing, so on, so in the interests of world peace, the bar is offering free drinks for the next five minutes—" It was a tasteless joke, but a lot of people laughed—which meant all was well, as far as Zach was concerned, except for how Christa gave Gavin a mighty glare. Well, he supposed you couldn't please everybody.

"The parents of the bride," said Gavin, "Mr. and Mrs. Roger Levine." Meredith's parents entered the room, proud and happy.

"Now, as I understand it, the groom's parents have been something of a stick-in-the-mud about all this, but someone has kindly—and bravely—agreed to stand in for them. So, as the pretending-to-be-the-parents-of-the-groom: Dr. Yvette Zelvetti."

Their high-school principal came past them, grinning from ear to ear.

"You're not his mother!" Derek exclaimed. "I've met the woman, you're not his mother!"

"No, 'course not," said Dr. Z, giving him aduh expression in return. "I'm his father!"

"The bridesmaid and groomsman, Arie Chang and Derek Strong."

"I hope they're gonna be okay with each other," Christa murmured above the applause. "I asked Derek if he wouldn't rather sit where I am, but he said that we should be together."

"Brave of him," said Zach. Things had not been especially good between Arie and Derek since their explosive break-up just before college started. Zach didn't precisely know what had caused it; only two people did, and they weren't talking. To sit next to each other—these two who had probably once been sure that one day, they'd be in the center seats of the head table, together, these two who were now hardly sure of anything except that they never would be—that took more courage than Zach thought he had, unless he was drunk. And maybe even then.

"The best man and the maid of honor: Zachary Crane and Christa Sternbacher!"

Zach felt Christa's hand tighten on his own. He glanced down and saw her beaming.

He felt very strangely exposed as they crossed the room.

"And, finally, ladies and gentlemen, if we could stand and welcome the happy couple themselves, Mr. and Mrs. Brandon and Meredith Chambers!"

And there they were: Brandon in his tuxedo of dusky blue, Meredith in sheer white, both radiantly happy. Brandon appeared to be struggling to keep a loopy sort of grin from his face, and not precisely succeeding; and Meredith had the sort of inner glow a woman only got from being three months along. There was clapping, and cheering, and the clinking of glasses.

God help us, they're children, Zach thought.

God help us, we'reall children.

The food was good; Mr. and Mrs. Levine had spared no expense, and Brandon and Meredith had dipped into their own savings besides. And there was alcohol, even though most of the guests weren't yet twenty-one and Meredith in fact was still nineteen. Zach didn't care; he thought he might need it.

Christa nudged him. "It's time."

Oh great.

He stood up, and someone handed him a microphone. He couldn't help feeling that everyone could see the bulge in his pocket from the blue velvet box, though he had checked himself in the mirror several times to make sure it didn't show.

"Okay, um. I guess I've got to upstage Gavin over there. Of course Christa over here probably chose him just to make my life difficult." Everyone laughed, and he felt better.

"When they, um. When they told me I'd have to make some sort of speech at this little thingamajig, I was a bit, umm. A bit worried. Uh. Especially when they told me I couldn't write it down and read off a paper." Laughter. He'd actually ended up rehearsing for about three hours, and he had somevague idea of what he wanted to say. Not much of one, though. "But, I mean, come on. How do you explain what you think of two of the best people you know?

"I met Brandon in eighth grade, through a friend of mine. I didn't know him very well, 'cause he went to a different school at the time, but Rob said he'd be attending Mount Hill High in the fall. Brandon was pretty quiet back then, but he laughed at my jokes and I laughed at his and we both liked video games, and we were, you know, thirteen at the time. What else are you gonna ask for?" Laughter again.

"But it wasn't too long before my opinion of him changed. Some of you may not be aware, but when he was fourteen, Brandon tried to kill himself. Now, I realize that's really dark stuff to bring up at a wedding, but I'm doing it for a reason. I also, believe it or not, checked with our Mr. Chambers over here to see if it was okay to bring it up at all."

"And I didn't say Yes!" Brandon shouted, grinning, setting off another welter of laughter.

"Yes you did!" Zach retorted. "All right, so. Contrary to what this liar over here is trying to tell you, hedid give me the okay to go and talk about it. And I'm going to, at least a little, because I think that the day I went to see him in the hospital was the first day I really met him.

"I came in with Sajel and Rob and Anna, just the four of us with my mom as a chaperone. Probably she was the only thing that got us in. I mean, you know, four scrawny teenagers, come to visit someone in the psych ward? But thank God for my mom, because they let us in, and about five minutes later we were looking at Brandon. He was strapped into this sterile white hospital bed in one of those blue paper gowns they make you wear, and there was machines and the television and a lot of electricity in the air, and he looked about two feet tall.

"And he woke up and said, 'Wow. You're the first people to come visit me.'

"And I said, Where are your parents?

"And he said, 'They don't care about me.'

"Brandon's a family man. He loves the people around him maybe more than he loves himself. I didn't know that at the time, but I think maybe I understood it, subconsciously. Because from then on, I was his friend. I just... Couldn't leave him like that. Not being swallowed by that hospital bed in a room smelling of rubbing alcohol. No one could've, probably. But only the four of us came. And of course we don't talk to Rob and Anna anymore, but I never liked 'em anyway." Laughter.

"So, folks. Here we are. Six years later. He's not in a hospital bed anymore. Fuck, he's, he's getting married. Look at him. He's sorta smirking at me. Okay, Brandon, stop that, I'm embarrassed enough as it is." Laughter.

"But, folks. He's come a long way. And a lot of that is because of the woman who is, coincidentally, sitting next to him.

"I've actually known Meredith for a lot longer than I have Brandon. We've gone to the same schools together since I was a fourth grader, when I moved into the area. I didn't know herwell, especially because she was in a lower grade than me, but you know how it is with people you've spent years with—you pick things up about them. I knew she was musically talented, I knew she got good grades—once we got into seventh grade she started vaulting into all the advanced classes, so I saw her more and more, and then she skipped eighth gradeentirely and entered Mount Hill the same time I did. And... She always seemed busy. Like, you know, How does she possibly get all this done? Doesn't she have anyfriends?

"Well, the answer was... Not particularly. Her best friend, Stasya Fyodorevna, got left behind when she came to high school a year early, and I can't imagine it was easy for her to acclimate. Actually, I know it wasn't, even after she got everything stabilized. Because, about a year after Brandon tried to commit suicide, Meredith tried the same thing."

There was silence again. Brandon looked at his wife in amazement.

"This one I definitely had to check with Meredith on," Zach said, "because up until about five seconds ago, Meredith had kept it so quiet that only nine people in the whole world knew about it, all of whom are up here at the head table. But Meredith said she wanted people to know. And that, since I was blowing all the juicy gossip on Brandon, I might as well do it for her as well." Subdued laughter.

"So, let's take a look. Two people, both feeling lonely. Both misunderstood. Both at extreme odds with their parents much of the time. Both outsiders in the notoriously cliquish hell known as high school—Meredith for her brains, Brandon for being the freak boy. Is it any wonder these two got together?

"But most stories end there. They got together, it didn't work, they broke up. That's obviously not howthis story ends. Because Brandon and Meredith, together, managed to bring out a lot more of each other, and themselves, than anyone thought they could. Than any of us even knewexisted.

"And so, here we are. Six years later. All the secrets are out. They wanted to come clean, through me, and say, this is who we were. Because now they're something different. They're not Brandon Chambers and Meredith Levine anymore. They're Brandon-and-Meredith, Meredith-and-Brandon, the Chamberses. Together.

"Six years ago, looking at that hospital bed, I didn't think I'd ever see Brandon smiling the way he is now, unless they put him back on Vicoden. And seeing Meredith, that shy girl with no friends, I didn't think anyone would ever be able to reach through that shell of busyness and bustle and touch her heart.

"Well: I was wrong.

"And that makes me really glad."

He reached down with his other hand for his champagne glass. "To Brandon and Meredith. May there be many happy years ahead, for both of you."

A chorus of agreements and clinking glasses.

"And can I sit down and stop embarrassing myself now?" Laughter, and Gavin triggered a rim shot sound effect from the sound board.

Zach sat down, and Christa squeezed his hand, and Brandon said, "You embarrass yourself? What aboutme?—having to listen to you waxing rhapsodic about me and Meredith for half an hour."

"Aww, come on, you know you love it," Zach said. "Besides, that only took five minutes."

"Well, just you wait," said Brandon. "When I'm best man atyour wedding, I'll have some choice things to say, I tell you that."

Zach felt a stiffening moment of panic. He hadn't told anyone except Derek—how did Brandon know? Derek knew to keep his mouth shut, didn't he?

Or maybe Brandon was just bantering. He and Meredith had always seen the bonds between their friends with great clarity; it might be obvious to them what Zach was thinking. And besides, when he and Christadid get married (because God only knew they were going to eventually), whoelse was he going to choose to be his best man? Sajel? (Well, thatmight work, but they'd have to change the terminology. Best woman? Maybe he should do it, just to annoy Brandon.)

Mrs. Andrea Levine had the microphone now. Her hair was the color of steel wool; beside her, Roger Levine's hair was a waxy white.

"Hi there. For those of you who don't know me, I'm Andrea Levine, Meredith's mother. With that in mind, I'd say it's safe to say I've known her for a little longer than most of you." Zach laughed with all the rest.

"I wanted to touch a little bit on what Zach said. Sometimes parents are the last to know when something's going on in their kids' lives, and that was the truth in our case. We didn't have any idea how unhappy Meredith was until the night she came to us and said, 'Mom, I slit my wrists and I need to go to the hospital.' We honestly had no idea.

"I've never met Brandon's parents—I don't think they've been back to see him since he was a junior in high school. But he, and those friends of his whohave met them, told me enough about them that I don't think they were very good ones. Which raises the question: if it takes bad parents to make someone as unhappy as Brandon, what does that make me and my husband?"

There was silence.

"A few nights after Meredith's unexpected trip to the hospital, Roger and I stayed up talking almost all night. We had no idea where we'd gone wrong—our older son was already away at a drug rehab facility, and now we'd almost lost our daughter. It wasn't a fun night. And we made the decision then and there: Whatever it is we're doing wrong by our kids, it needs to stop.

"I don't know if it did. But, we've gotten a lot closer to Meredith since then, which I'd call at leastsome sort of success. And, after Brandon came into her life, we got quite a bit closer tohim as well.

"Now we've come to the moment every mother awaits and dreads in equal measure: the time when she gives her daughter away to someone else. Now she isn't part of our lives anymore; now all her hopes and fears and dreams are invested in someone else. But I prefer to think of it another way.

"Meredith, though your house and home are with another, you will always have a home with us. And Brandon: we've known you ever since you came to pick Meredith up that bright October afternoon. We've loved you, because Meredith loves you and because you love her, but we've also loved you for yourself. And you, too, will always have a place with us. You, too, will always be a member of our family."