Simone waved back, then turned as the screen door flew open and Amy, in her white pinafore with a pink sash, bounded out onto the porch.
“Slow down,” Mrs. Caputo warned. “Flower girls have to stay neat and tidy.” After looking over Simone one last time, she said, “Maybe we should go over.”
Simone found, to her own surprise, that her feet wouldn’t budge. She felt as if she were waiting, waiting for the one thing that would have made the day complete, but which she knew would never come. She longed to feel her father slipping his arm through hers and escorting her across the sun-dappled street and into the arms of the man she loved. Despite all the joy she felt, there was a hollow place in her heart that only he could have filled.
“What is it?” Mrs. Caputo asked.
“I wish my father could have been here.”
“I’m sure he would have been very happy that you’re marrying someone like Lucas.”
“I know. I’m very lucky indeed.” Squeezing her arm, Simone said, “Have you heard from Tony this week?”
“I had a letter yesterday, from some Pacific island that the censors blacked out the name of. But it said he was fine, and working on a ground crew.” She took a deep breath and stared into the middle distance. “The Germans have surrendered. Why can’t the Japanese?”
“They will,” Simone assured her. “I’m sure it will be soon.”
“It better be,” she said. “But no more talk about war. Today is all about peace and love and harmony.”
“To peace and love and harmony,” Simone said, as arm in arm they descended the porch steps and crossed the quiet street.
At the house, Helen ushered Simone into the front parlor, where Einstein’s flimsy music stand teetered beside the grand piano, while Mrs. Caputo went out in the backyard to make sure Amy wasn’t creating havoc. Simone was listening to the voices of the guests — only a dozen or so of their friends and colleagues, along with Lucas’s family — when Einstein himself shuffled into the room. He was wearing a rumpled seersucker suit, with a red carnation pinned askew to the lapel. On his feet, he wore moccasins with no socks, and his shaggy white hair was whipped into a froth like cotton candy.
To her, he looked as handsome as any movie star.
“It is an honor,” he said, taking both of her hands in his, “to give away such a beautiful bride.”
His skin was as soft as chamois, and his drooping dark eyes, under Olympian brows, were filled with affection and kindness.
“The honor is all mine, Professor.”
Helen poked her head in the door and said, “It’s time,” then whisked the sheer veil down over Simone’s eyes.
From the garden, she heard the opening strains of the wedding march, played by the string ensemble that often assembled in the front parlor. Einstein crooked out his arm, and she took it. The kitchen, which they had to pass through, was filled with platters of food under sheets of wax paper, and something was still baking in the oven. A timer was ticking. Helen held the screen door open as they carefully descended the back steps and then threaded their way down the aisle between the guests, all of them standing now beside the white wooden chairs that had been borrowed from the university. The Princeton president and his wife beamed from the back row.
Directly ahead, in front of the leafy green arbor which had been hastily erected to camouflage the garage, she saw Lucas, standing with his hands folded, in a suit as black as his eye patch. His younger brother, the best man, reached around to straighten his bow tie. Lucas didn’t even seem to notice — his gaze was fixed on her as Einstein escorted her into the presence of the university chaplain, who had been enlisted to perform the ceremony. A lace canopy had been erected to shield them from the hot sun.
When the minister intoned, “Who gives this woman to be married to this man?” Einstein cleared his throat and declared, “I do.” Disengaging his arm, he repeated, “I do,” then retreated to the seat Helen was patting.
The moment Lucas stepped beside her, she felt as if her shelter were complete. The canopy might ward off the sun, but it was having Lucas at her side that made her feel protected, fulfilled… loved. She glanced up at him, and though she saw that his tie was still askew, she resisted the urge to straighten it. There would be a lifetime to indulge such impulses.
The minister was extolling Holy Matrimony, “which is an honorable estate, instituted of God, signifying unto us the mystical union… ”
But she barely heard him; it was as if her ears were stuffed with cotton balls. As he continued — expatiating on the bonds of love, the responsibilities of marriage, the affection and understanding that a man and wife must always show one another — Simone remained in the warm embrace of this comforting cocoon, this sacred place where she felt engulfed by nothing but love. Feeling Lucas’s hand search out her own, she wove her fingers through his, only to glance down, beneath her veil, and see that his hands were nowhere near hers at all. They were still folded in front of him.
For a moment, she was puzzled, but, to her own surprise, completely unalarmed. The touch was a tender one, and on the vagrant breeze that stirred the canopy overhead, she’d have sworn that she smelled the familiar scent of her father’s sweet Turkish tobacco and sugary tea. Although she knew that anyone else would say that she was just imagining it, or that it was the aroma from the myriad flowers filling the garden, Simone knew better.
Her father was there, and he was giving his blessing to her marriage.
Tears welled in her eyes, and under her breath, she said, “I love you.”
Overhearing her, even as the minister prattled on, Lucas did take her hand in his, displacing the ghostly touch.
At the minister’s request, Amy skipped forward, holding a pink satin cushion to which the rings were affixed with safety pins. The best man detached them, while Amy swirled back and forth in excitement.
“With these rings,” the minister announced, “we seal the vows of marriage and represent the promise of eternal and everlasting love.” Turning to Lucas, he said, “Please repeat after me.”
Then she heard the time-honored words—“to have and to hold,” and “for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health”—and could scarcely believe it when she felt the ring being slipped onto her finger.
After the minister had repeated the vows to her, she took the second ring and placed it on the little finger of her groom; his fourth finger had been broken beyond repair. Looking up at him, she prayed that she would never forget the stray shaft of sunlight piercing the lace overhead, and the way that it threw his face into light and shadow, the silk fabric of his eye patch glistening, the black curls of his hair unfurling over his forehead, the sideburns a stark white ever since the lightning strike. There was a tiny nick on his cheek where he must have cut himself shaving that morning. She longed to kiss it.
“Those whom God hath joined together,” the minister declared, “let no man put asunder. By the power vested in me by the state of New Jersey, I now pronounce you husband and wife.” There was a short pause before he added, “You may now kiss the bride.”
Lucas lifted her veil, bent down, and gave her a quick and self-conscious peck on the lips.
Adele Gödel called out, “Ach—you can do better than that!”
And so he did, this time slipping an arm around her narrow waist and drawing her toward him. There was laughter and scattered applause, and she heard the string ensemble starting to play again for her walk up the aisle. They had no sooner joined hands and turned toward the guests — Einstein was clapping, with a big grin lifting his moustache — when several cars came careening down the alley, horns blaring, and screeched to a halt at the garage. A gang of interlopers, clutching pads and pens, piled out, some with cameras slung around their necks, and stampeded into the garden. All of them had press cards stuck in their fedoras, or clipped to the lapels of their sweat-stained suit jackets.