"After the Gazebo"

Photo by charlesdeluvio“After the Gazebo” was originally published in the collection, After the Gazebo: Short Stories. New York: Rain Mountain Press, 2015. Print. It’s also featured Great Writers Steal: “What can we steal from After the Gazebo.” This piece was republished in Germ Magazine, Change Seven Magazine, Fox Chase Review, and The Original Van Gogh’s Ear.After the Gazebo© Jen Knox

She felt it in her toes that morning—dread that she would shove into ivory heels and dance on beneath heavy clouds. He felt a surge of adrenaline that he thought must accompany every man on his wedding day.

Everything had been set into motion when they adopted a pug abandoned in a nearby apartment complex. They were unsure they’d have the proper amount of time to devote to the puppy, but the pug’s bunched face and little square body endeared them. It would be a responsibility test, a trial run before they had children.

The pug had dermatitis between his folds, which cost money to correct, as did his shots and medications. It was enough to tear a small hole in the couple’s new car fund, so they had to reevaluate the year and model. The older car they selected had good reviews, and the salesman even admitted—after realizing they had told him their actual budget—that it was more durable than the newer ones. They sped off the lot, drove the periphery of the city and metro areas, and stopped for Jamaican jerk chicken at a restaurant they agreed they must return to regularly.

They took the pug to the dog park on Saturday mornings. He enjoyed overeating and watching Animal Planet. They babied and indulged him, learning everything about the breed and how best to care for him. They decided on a name after reading that the strange little forehead wrinkle pugs share is referred to as a prince mark because it resembles the Chinese symbol for prince.

She got a corporate job that replaced her occasional gigs as a yoga instructor. She hated the work but made friends, fast, and thought it an okay trade for now. He too had a corporate job, and he rather enjoyed it.

They made resolutions often. They both wanted to be somewhere else but were unsure exactly where. They lived near his family but far from hers, so they spoke of moving somewhere in the middle. Her sister would call some nights, crying because her husband was out late again. She longed to go watch bad movies and make orange cinnamon rolls with her sister, tell her she deserved better.

Her mother, an artist, presented her with a black and white painting of Prince when she arrived at the hotel. She loved it. Her sister offered an apologetic hug, explaining her husband couldn’t attend due to work.

Prince refused to wear the doggie tux. She understood his apprehension and clipped a bowtie on his collar. She hoped her fiancé would remember to pack the collapsible water dish. His father was picking him up. His mother was in a wheelchair after having reconstructive foot surgery. She was a loud, beautiful woman. Her three grown children, husband-to-be included, had blinged out her chair while she was in surgery so that it now resembled a throne.

The gazebo was perfect. Nothing was overdone. The couple didn’t see each other until the vows. The sky was overcast but with no threat of rain. The clouds framed them in pictures. The couple kissed. Prince jumped up and down. His mother danced from her chair. Her mother sketched the children’s faces. Her father smoked cigars with his father as they talked about drone strikes and then football and then the quality of their cigars.

The recall notice hadn’t reached the couple because they’d forgotten to write the apartment number down on the paperwork, and his email had filtered the e-copy to junk. This would strike the parents as ridiculous, seeing as how all the bills had reached them just fine. The recall notice concerned hyper-acceleration and asked that all owners of the make and model and year get their cars checked. The parents would file a lawsuit, and they would become quite rich. 

His mother’s foot would heal, and she would walk with only a slight limp to the two graves that sat alongside the back of the yard by an old, abandoned house the city was unsure what to do with. The family would gather here on the anniversary of the couple’s wedding, and they would sob and laugh and smoke cigars.

The money would not reconcile the odd chain of events—how the car surged due to faulty brakes, how the SUV that was taking over the lane eventually did see them but the momentum of the shift had caused the tail end hit. It was a slight hit that sent the couple’s small car spinning into the median strip. It was instantaneous for him. It was drawn out for her. She had that brief window, a chance to say goodbye. She’d told her sister that she knew, somehow, that she had dismissed it as cold feet, but she knew.

The family was smaller now. The sister divorced, and Prince rested his wrinkly head on her belly as she cried. Until his final days, Prince would continue to comfort the sister, but he would never jump up and down for her. Instead, he would conserve his energy and spend every night at the door, waiting, unable to believe in fate.

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