Page 10 of Delayed Intention
I look over at Ginger. “What in the hell did you eat?” She blinks at me innocently, tongue hanging out of the side of her mouth. She must have been fed human food at some point. “God, that stinks.”
I lower all the windows for a few minutes when a phone call starts to come in. On the dashboard, Mom’s face appears, and I raise the windows back up while I give Ginger a withering look. “Please spare me while I’m on the phone with your grandmother,” I mutter before I answer the call.
“Hey Mom, it’s early for you. How are you?”
“Hey there Joshua dear. I’m out for a walk this morning. Guess who I’m with?” I can hear that she has me on speaker phone and, knowing she’s visiting in Lincoln, there was only one answer. “Dr. Rose Haddad. How are you, Dr. Haddad?”
“Oh, Joshua, you can call me Rose. I’m well. Not as young as I used to be but not as old as I could be.” She laughs at her own joke. My mother’s best friend is almost 12 years older than my mom but stays active. She’s been fortunate in her health. Thank God, they both have.
“Just having a nice visit with Georgette. She tells me you’re still working out in Western Nebraska and Wyoming. Still with that practice that has all those free clinics?”
“Yes, Mam.”No way I’m calling her Rose.“Rural medicine is never dull, as you know. I should warn you both, that I won’t be on the call for long because I’m driving home—I’m already back in Colorado and may lose you in the mountains.”
“Well, dear,” Dr. Haddad continues, “I’ll get to the point then. I’m sure you received a notice for my grandson Edmond’s wedding this June?”
“I did, and have it marked on my calendar.” The truth is I haven’t been home in so long. I don’t have it, but my sister mentioned it. “You must be happy that one of your grandkids will be getting married out west. I’m sorry I missed the other weddings that were back east.”
Of course, I’m being polite, but the truth is I am not particularly thrilled to go to Eddie’s wedding. Truth be told, I wasn’t sorry to have missed those other weddings at all.
Since I joined the Public Health Service to pay for medical school and was committed to serving after I finished residency, I missed all four Mendes family weddings. I had a built-in excuse, which suited me fine. Dr. Ellen Mendes, Rose’s eldest daughter, doesn’t speak to her mother but invites her to big events, presumably to save face in the community. Rose, of course, would never miss a grandchild’s big day. I’ve never understood how such a loving and vibrant woman like Rose could have such a bitter woman for a daughter.
“The thing is dear, as it says on the invitation, they were planning on getting married in Nebraska, but now they want to do everything in Estes, if you can believe it?”I have a feeling I know where this is going.
“So that brings me to you. I’ve heard from Eddie, you see. As a favor to me, I was hoping to recruit you to help with some of the planning. Nothing too time-consuming, I know you’re busy, dear. It’ll be just a little help checking out some venues and tasting some food. What’d you say?”
I want to say, fuck that. I can’t think of anything I’d like to do less than help plan a wedding, let alone the wedding of one of the Mendes clan. But Rose Haddad is like a second mother to me. I can’t say no. Besides, since Ellen has shut her mother out, her children have kept their distance. The fact that Eddie reached out to Rose must have delighted her.I can try to offer an alternative narrative.
“I’d be happy to help you, Dr. Haddad, but doesn’t Eddie want to plan his wedding? Or maybe his fiancée does?”
“Oh, they have some definite ideas, dear, but you know how it is—they’re both on the East Coast and are both surgeons, so they’d like help with some of the details that need someone to be on site. They’ll plan the bulk of it, you just need to eyeball a few things.”
Well, this is classic Mendes family shit. Eddie had always been an asshole and while I owe him nothing, this is Rose and my mother asking me. I roll my eyes, only because they can’t see it.
“I’d be willing to help any way I can. Will you be coming down? Or is the couple come into town for any of the planning?”
With that, my phone drops the call. This leaves me wondering… Why in the hell would Eddie Mendes want to get married out here? His family hasn’t been up to Estes in years, and they have had almost no contact with Rose, that I know of. Maybe his fiancée is connected to the area in some way. Whatever their reasons for wanting it, I’m now part of the planning committee.Wonderful.
The Mendes faction of the family has always lived back east, in Maryland, and in the past, years ago, they’d spend at least two holidays and part of their summer vacation in the Midwest. Over the last nineteen years, since Ellen shut out her mother, their visits have ceased.
They are an intense family. The elder offspring, Tamar, Daniella, and Joe, are all older than I am and were ultra-competitive. I never much cared for them. Roselyn was alright. She was the funny one, but her humor didn’t tend to be cruel, which was impressive if you knew any of the others. I always kind of assumed they were all a little mean because they were unhappy. Their parents fought all the time, and I’ve always been surprised they stayed together. My own father left when I was sixteen, and at the time, I thought it was the worst thing that could happen. Now, with more experienced eyes, I’m happier than ever that he has not been in our lives. The best thing that ever happened to my mother, honestly.
And then there’s Lily Mendes.
I hadn’t thought of her in a while. There was a time when I thought of her as my best friend. But there was that summer, in 2005, when I was foolish enough to make a play for her. I had thought she was the nicest one of the bunch. But she ghosted me after we spent an entire night talking, among other things. Honestly, it hurt at the time, but we were kids. Never bothering to call me or even send me a text message ever since is what bugged me. Turns out she has the same ice in her veins as I always imagined her mother does.
Well, I moved on. After that summer, when I got back to school, Annie Murray, a cheerleader, set her sights on me. We went out for the next two years. We broke up for college in a mutual decision that didn’t sting at all. After what happened with Lily, I discovered that the less I invested, the better.
After Annie, there was a string of girls in college. That was a good time. In medical school, I had an on-and-off thing with a classmate, Kate. She was very beautiful and, like me, wanted to be casual. She dumped me after three years for one of my classmates, but by then, it was a relief for it to be finished, since we fought more than we didn’t. Since then, all I want is the occasional unattached encounter. Instead, I find women like Rachel and Lara—no matter what they agree to in the beginning, by the end, I piss them off. I hope the online trolling from Lara is just directed at me and doesn’t affect the rest of the practice. Maybe she was full of shit and won’t take any action.
When my sister told me about the announcement of Eddie’s wedding, it crossed my mind that I would see Lily again. After all these years...
There will be no way for her to avoid me at her own brother’s wedding. I wonder what, if anything, Lily will have to say for herself. Probably nothing. I can’t believe I’m even thinking about this—it was high school, for God’s sake. There’s every likelihood that she’s moved on just like I have.
Mercy
Lily, Lincoln, October 2024
Nona is chatting away on her old house phone with my mother, of all people. Before today, they hadn’t spoken more than two words in nineteen years. The phone is old-fashioned, the kind attached to the wall with an extra-long coiled cord. As she flits around the kitchen, I’m sitting with a mug of tea at the breakfast bar, waiting to see how it goes.
