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heard it, I actually always looked forward to this story because it reminded me about what I’ve always loved most about my mom. (Aka Sadie Meredith Everett. Born 1949, Reading, CT. Steadfast Virgo. Former schoolteacher.)
    Sadie’s favorite part of the story wasn’t—nor had it ever been—the arguably cute moment at the end when I said that I didn’t want to marry the stranger. It was the beginning.
    When I picked her first.
    I found my mother now in the kitchen, standing at the kitchen counter in her silk robe, fixing a ridiculously large platter of fruits and cheeses and crackers. She didn’t look up at first when I walked in, which gave me a chance to watch her: her hair pulled back, sharp cheekbones, little elbows. I walked up behind her and put my hands on her shoulders. She was so little, my mother, much smaller than me, finer, with bones as tiny as pearls. It didn’t seem to matter how many times I did it. It still scared me when I touched her.
    “They’re sleeping in sleeping bags down there,” she said. “They won’t even take my blankets. I can’t even talk about it.”
    “We don’t have to talk about it,” I said into her shoulder.
    “But don’t you think that’s bizarre?” she said, turning and looking at me—wild-eyed, devastated. “He doesn’t even let her talk, really. He looks at her like she’s crazy when she opens her mouth.”
    “What does that have to do with your blankets?”
    “I think she wanted one.”
    I gave her shoulders a final squeeze and walked around to the other side of the counter, leaning up against it. I kept watching her. I was worried that she was going to ask me how the fireworks were. Knowing, if she did, she would hear too much of the real answer in my voice.
    “What’s going on?” she said, looking up. “I feel your eyes.”
    “You don’t feel anything,” I said, too quickly, and with a little more force than necessary. What else was I going to say, though? I’m looking at you like this because out of nowhere, actually, Josh told me he might be in love with someone I’d never even heard of before tonight. Interesting turn of events, no?
    She looked at me for another second before returning to her cutting, unconvinced. “I know when I feel eyes,” she said.
    I shook my head no, and tried to figure out how to change the subject. The first thing I could think of was my documentary—the entirety of my fishermen’s wives footage, all 107 interviews on thirty mini-DV tapes, sitting in the trunk of my car. I had run back into my house at the last minute that morning—pre-tackle shop—gathering the videotapes up to bring them home with me. This was due to a fleeting fear that the Narragansett house would burn down in my absence, the only copies of all of my research going up in flames. It was a baseless fear. I knew that somewhere inside. Except that I hadn’t not slept in that house for so long that part of me did believe it was actually possible it would self-destruct in my absence.
    “You know, I brought the fishermen’s wives footage home with me. To show you guys,” I said quickly, before I could change my mind.
    Maybe this wouldn’t be the worst thing—showing the tapes to my family. Maybe when they watched it, they would think the footage was brilliant. And they could explain to me what I was missing.
    “Not tonight, Em,” she said. “Dad’s already at the bachelor party.”
    “He’s what?”
    She shrugged. “He just thought someone needed to be there to welcome everyone,” she said. “And you two didn’t exactly seem to be doing great on timing tonight.”
    This was true. But I hadn’t even known my dad was planning on going to the bachelor party in the first place. It was hard to picture him holding down the bachelor party fort, casually ordering drinks and making small talk with Josh’s friends. I pictured him calling home every few minutes to ask my mother what he was supposed to do next.
    “You know,” my mom said,