Months of work all set to culminate in a single grand performance; one take that will serve as the crown jewel in a beautiful, yet incomplete setting of moments highlighting a relationship that is far from its end.
I think about the other jewels in my life with Jesse as I tip around the home that isn't my own, grateful for his mother's hospitality but unable to sleep hours before the day that will be almost completely mine. I don't see other frames like the one we're hours from capturing. Unlike the single moment our wedding will be, the other jewels are montages, glinting through my mind in flickering shimmers...
The way that my hand has been finding his and his finding mine for the last ten years, twining our fingers on walks or drives, in crowds, at dinners, events, and banquets, while we're thoughtfully tangled on the couch or recklessly tangled in bed...
The way that we swim deeply in the pools of each other's talents and traits, appreciating efforts on stage and screen--behind and in front of the camera, reveling greedily in sleepy lullabies and soft affirmations, delivering unending praise to egos that can't grow any larger...
The way that we've pried one another apart and wedged into the gaps we created, accepting that he would became the one who feeds me on those days where I still don't think about food and I would became the one who never lets him construct walls around the things he's feeling...
Ten years feels like a lifetime for two people who seemed to have settled on one another long ago. We could have married right after high school, at some point in college, prior to moving in together, before having a child, or at any point throughout the years when our bond showed no signs of breaking. We'd already imagined a lifetime together--not in those exact terms the whole time, but we couldn't see an end in sight. We promised not to give one another up at 17 and 18 and embraced being selfish with each other even back then. To me, a wedding has been little more than a giant party with both of our families to confirm what we already knew.
I walk past windows overlooking a city that doesn't hold still. I've brought as much of Los Angeles here that I could. I've sprinkled LA around our home in Tribeca in the form of warm colors, seashells, sunlight, and California poppies, all of which have worked their way into the details of our ceremony. I've also invited as much of my family as I could to witness my nuptials, a wave from the west that has comfortably blanketed the days and evenings leading up to today.
Aunts and uncles and cousins abound; the Mottas are here in full force, descending on the city many of them view as the cold, cluttered, constricting opposite of the stretching valleys and depths of land along the California coast they're used to. I felt the same way about New York once upon time. I saw it as this lingering creature, one that I knew would always call to Jesse in one way or another and force me to make peace with the locale. Now we've come to an agreement, New York City and I. We don't see eye to eye about the underground deathtrap, the street meat, the snow-covered winters, the constant noise, the almost mythical beaches, yards, and outdoor pools, the suffocatingly close living quarters, or the stunning lack of visible stars at night... However, there's more here to love than there is to hate and the things I love here are things I refuse to live without.
I only argued a bit when everyone insisted I sleep alone so that I could rest, but I still seek out my daughter and find her blissfully asleep and cuddled against her aunt.
Although I prefer Vivi to sleep on her own so that Jess and I don't lose our bed, I don't even think to pry her from Pepper's arms and I hope that their connection soothes that part of my big sister that wrinkles when she talks about her attempts to have a child of her own. Madeline has been...surprising in those conversations that lob between my still feeling my way around as a mother and Pepper's unyielding desire to become one as the three of us string together a system of support knotted tighter by our shared love of each other and the little girl who has found a way to change all of our lives without trying at all.
In a few hours, I know Vivi will run to my mother when she arrives to get ready for the day, having chosen to stay in her hotel suite to ensure that my father wouldn't spend the entire night working, and I will see that softness I never recognized in Madeline until Vivi existed. I promised my mother that she could help get Vivi ready and I am glad to not worry about the task of chasing around my very curious and very mobile almost sixteen-month-old to get her into the "ball of fluff" dress my younger brother so lovingly dubbed her outfit for the big day. ...Basil's snark is another thing I am glad to be momentarily rid of as he has promised me a full 24 hours where he won't push any of the well-worn buttons he's created over the years.
Back in my temporary bedroom, I eye the garment bag protecting the most perfect thing I have ever designed and will ever wear. I don't need to part the zipper to know what's housed inside. The handmade dress isn't white. Not quite. Audrey and I spent hours on the color, choosing an exact shade that would suit my skintone, complement my eyes, and pair well with--while simultaneously standing out against--a million little details I've spent far more hours pouring over. Both Audrey and I have always understood the importance of little things, registered that something being understated wasn't the same as it being nonexistent. Her eye for detail has always been admirable and it was easily the first thing I noticed about my other half's mother upon meeting her many years ago.
We both notice the way her son will always attempt to mask his sentimentality, though we're both well aware of its existence. I know it will be on full display during our celebration, communicated loudly through shared vows and toasts, quietly through whispered exchanges in any semi-private moment we can grasp, and silently through each gaze and touch I'll share with him throughout the day.
I find my way back to bed and I am fully settled with the fact that I no longer enjoy sleeping alone. I accept that I am spoiled beyond belief by someone who has already vowed to spend the rest of his life keeping me that way. And as my fingers ghost the empty half of the mattress I lie atop, I smile knowing without a doubt that my current state is one that I'll rarely experience ever again.
Tagging → Sugar Motta [With: Al Motta, Jr., Madeline Motta, and Viviana Rose Motta-St. James]
Time Frame → Afternoon – [05.13.17]
Location → The Mandarin Oriental Hotel | Manhattan, NY
General Notes → I can explain
The script needed work.
"Jesse and I are already married."
Before Al and Madeline became too focused on their only grandchild, Sugar planned to inform her parents that, nearly four years prior, she privately married the man she was set to publicly wed in a matter of weeks (Al and Madeline's primary reason for a lengthy stay in New York). With both parents on the floor of their suite at the Mandarin, spread out with toys, stuffed animals, and a freshly napped and fed 15-month-old who was happily wobbling between the pair on little legs that were growing more and more confident every day, Sugar's window had firmly closed. Her plans, although well-crafted, needed to be edited. The edit came in the form of a quick announcement after informing Viviana's playmates that she had something to tell them, though they'd probably already seen the rumors swirling around the subject.
When neither parent stopped playing Sugar decided to continue, "We were out with friends one night...we got very dr--inebriated...I proposed...and we walked to a 24-hour chapel and decided to make things legal." She was sure that if a bad reaction was coming, it would be tempered thanks in part to her firstborn. She unintentionally stole the move from Jesse, who had their daughter in tow when he confirmed their martial status to his parents weeks earlier and though Vivi rarely left Sugar's side, she knew from the moment she entered the top floor hotel room with the little one who practically jumped from her stroller and into Al's arms that the baby's presence would always be more helpful than harmful.
"Since this secret has caused more than enough trouble in my life due to its pinching of several of my relationships, I wanted to be sure that you both knew prior to the wedding." Finishing up her spiel, Sugar straightened her back in the armchair where she rested, fiddling with the pink, heart-shaped stone in the engagement ring she wore and steeling herself against whatever reaction was coming.
Al's eyes flicked Sugar's way but Madeline was the only one to respond with a swift, "Oh, we knew that."
In Al's defense, Viviana was busy smacking a small hand against his mouth, giggling each time he blew a big puff of air in her direction, shaking his head and imitating a horse.
"You knew?" The response was unexpected. Granted, there wasn't much Sugar felt like she could expect at present. This was the first time in her life she could ever recall seeing her parents making themselves comfortable on a floor, a space they occupied minutes after Sugar and Viviana entered the room, the little girl ready to excitedly play her way through the toys in the baby bag Sugar carried as well as the shopping bags and suitcase full of presents Al and Madeline had waiting.
Madeline nodded, curving closer to her husband and grandchild as she reached out to fix the bow nestled in brown curls. "We knew. We have known for years. I hope you were not agonizing over telling us that, dear. While I know that it is still generally a secret, it is not a secret to us."
"Years? Whe--How--Who told you?" Sugar checked through the mental list of those who knew, quickly blaming her younger brother for sharing the news when she recalled his declared intention to do exactly that.
Her framing was all wrong.
"Rosemary told us," Madeline explained. "I had several visits with her during those final weeks before she passed. We talked for hours... more than we had in over thirty years."
Sugar's surprise stitched into the questioning expression she wore as Al tapped in, his face finally free from the chubby fingers that were now wrapping around Madeline's pearls. Al's mother's name was still spoken often, two years after her death, Rosemary remained a constant in all of their lives. "She wouldn't let anyone see her outside of her care team," he began, "My dad barely made the cut, and he was still working a bit up until the day she died so his time was even limited. Your mom was persistent, though--more than I ever could be. I didn't have the strength..."
Madeline's touch was so well-timed Sugar would have called it staged, her hand clearly meant to soothe as she brushed it over her husband's back, picking up where he left off. "I showed up every day until she let me in. I could not stand the idea of her slipping away by herself without anyone she loved at her side. As...prickly as we were with one another, her being alone felt wrong. Those last few days, not everything she said made sense and there were a lot of aimless tales and names she called me that were not mine. At first, I thought it was all a sign of her fading out, but she was so clear that day she told me about your marriage... She told me that I was the worst talent scout she ever hired--she was right about that." Madeline's smirk was warm, a smile Sugar was getting used to seeing over the past year. "She was also right when she said that she knew when she met me that your father would never give me up."
"Hasn't happened--and never will," Al confirmed while Vivi began to move in the midst of Madeline's pause, heading toward a remote control on the coffee table that Sugar pulled back as Al moved to his knees to crawl behind and capture the baby before she could reach any of the objects in sight that were temporarily more interesting than toys.
Watching the interaction, Madeline went on, swinging a curtain of dark hair over her shoulder to face Sugar. "In my opinion, not everything she said was spot on. Rosemary claimed that something between you and I was broken and that her relationship with you probably exacerbated that. I did not agree. Still, there I was, finding it impossible to call you to talk about any of this. She said that as hard as she tried to mold you into everything that she was--because she was afraid you weren't picking up enough from me--that you had so much of me--and your father--in you that she never would have succeeded totally. In her eyes, your marriage was all us..." Her smile widened as she watched her husband bouncing Viviana in the air, "The story you told her--about the inebriated knot you tied-- it gave her flashbacks to the yoga instructor slash English major her son met in a horrible little nightclub during his final spring break."
"The same couple who caused a shitstorm in the tabloids a few months later when that beautiful, well-spoken, witty, and charming Alabama-native walked down the aisle just pregnant enough for everyone to notice to meet her unapologetically smitten fiancé of three weeks who she'd only known for less than a year." Sugar thanked her father with a tilt of her head for mouthing his expletive, her gaze bouncing back to her mother to continue watching the back and forth she was an extra in.
Madeline laughed, "I was almost too pregnant to walk the stage at my own commencement and we just had to get married before I started my Spring semester at Huntingdon... I knew your mother was a force of nature when she practically planned our entire wedding in a weekend--around Christmastime no less, not that the holiday ever meant anything to your family. Do you remember what she asked us before she started all the commotion?"
Al's nod was immediate, "Is this the story you want to tell and who you want to tell it with? I didn't even have to think about it...it was."
"Still is," Madeline finished and Sugar could have sworn she witnessed a blush deepening her mother's skin as Al held Vivi with one hand and used his free one to scoop up his wife's fingers to press a tender kiss to her knuckles.
At least her leads were cooperative.
Cooperative and in rare form, romantic comedy-ing their way through one of the handful of in-person visits they had with their granddaughter since her birth, though they were never short on video calls from Los Angeles, participating in a robust schedule of virtual storytelling and check-ins that Sugar was happy to accommodate--though she had to draw the line at script reads and her father's efforts to make Viviana the youngest person ever with an EP credit to their name.
On a roll with sharing, Madeline kept going, "At any rate, Sugar, your confession about your wedding must have linked her through to all of those fond memories. That's when I thought there was probably some truth to what she shared. So I brought the news back to your father, we did some light digging, and eventually we were able to locate a marriage certificate sporting a signature that is unmistakably yours."
"Still putting that heart at the end of your Motta," affirmed Al.
"It's part of the brand," Sugar offered with a shrug. "Why didn't you say anything?"
Capturing Vivi as she ambled her way, Madeline paired a shake of her head with pursed lips, questioning, "What was there to say? If you were interested in acknowledgement you would have sent announcements, no?"
"Why didn't you say anything?" Al picked up, "You didn't want that to be your story?"
It was a fair question and though it was posed lightly, it still gave Sugar pause. Certainly, she spent time thinking about the stories that would accompany she and Jesse's random nuptials. However, a lack of preparation for the event didn't make it any less desired. That had always been clear. "No, that's not the case," she replied after a moment of thought spent watching her mother tickle Vivi, inspiring even more of the baby giggles Sugar--and she was sure everyone else--had a weakness for. "I have no regrets about marrying Jesse nor do I regret the way it happened. If anything, it's proof that even when intoxicated, I still know exactly what I want and go after it. We kept it to ourselves because so much of our lives is a spectacle--everything is documented and commentated to death. I wanted a moment that could just belong to the two of us...and the two friends who were just as inebriated as we were when we made the decision. We thought about getting a divorce so we could do things the proper way, but doing so didn't make sense. We were going to marry anyway--we were sure about that. So why undo it just to do it again?"
"You are doing it again," was Al's only offered correction to his daughter's admission, his attention shifting to rustle around a shopping bag and produce several stuffed toys.
Ready to object to even more gifts, Sugar decided against it, choosing to explain her choice instead. "Second wedding, but the first one where everyone we want there will be there. It's a repeat in some sense, yes, but it certainly won't be the same experience with all of our family there. That's the part we didn't get right the first time."
A few reshoots were necessary.
Stealing attention, a task she was becoming an expert at, Viviana babbled while she inspected the new additions to an already well-populated field of presents. The trio watched her getting acquainted with her new friends, but both Madeline and Sugar set matching sets of brown eyes on Al when he heaved a dramatic sigh, claiming, "I always knew we'd end up here, one way or another."
As if she already knew where he was headed, Madeline folded in her lips to quell a laugh before she spoke. "You did not predict that our daughter would get married in secret."
His head shook, "No. But I predicted that her singing and dancing, curly-haired companion would probably lead her astray one day." His head shook as he blew out another dramatic breath, adding, "Entertainers..."
Sugar interrupted the banter this time before it picked up too much steam. "I proposed to Jesse that first time. If anything, I'm the bad influence who convinced my very handsome, very talented, very sweet, singing and dancing, curly-haired companion to marry me within minutes of asking."
Shifting to his stomach to meet Viviana's eye level, Al taunted his daughter, "I know that your influence is mighty and powerful--which hardly explains why my little Strawberry's eyes are blue instead of brown--but I was still a little worried."
Sparing none of her husband's secrets, Madeline spoke up, "A little is an understatement."
Al's laugh preempted his rebuttal, the deep sound spurred on by the baby girl in front of him whose giggle was inspired by his. "It was a very natural and very normal amount of worrying, Plum. You were different when you came home with him that Memorial Day before you left that school in Ohio... If I look back at that time, something was shifting in you all along, but I didn't notice it then. I still don't know how well I can describe it now--but I felt like I've been relearning you since."
Sugar dipped her head in understanding, knowing all too well the changes she underwent during her year and a half away from home. "I think I did change, which is supposed to be the purpose of a reform school. What did you think was different about me?"
Al was quiet a moment, thoughts almost visibly churning while he twirled a stuffed giraffe for Viviana's benefit, eventually starting, "You were more...just...more. I mean, clearly you'd gotten close to someone--that part was obvious. The rest--it was slight. When you laughed or smiled, there was joy behind it, not obligation. You were happy. I know that wasn't all Jesse, but I could feel he played a part." A spark of realization seemed to light Al's face as he went on, brightening him further. "When you two spent that summer in the Malibu house--I think that was his second or third time out in LA with you--remember that day I picked him up after dinner and I took him for that drive down Mulholland? It was dark, I drove fast--took the curves like I used to before I knew better--hammered him with questions the whole way through. I figured if he made it all the way home with you, you'd probably already put him through his paces, but I had to--I wanted to see if I could shake him. I didn't want you to go any further with him if you didn't have to and end up losing a part of whatever it was you found in Ohio...of all places."
Sugar had heard about the drive, and she was no more amused by it then than she was now, but it was easy enough to chalk it up as a form of parental protection that didn't unnerve her normally bold boyfriend. "He came back to me in one piece and he didn't go running back to New York," Sugar bragged. "Why were you still worried?"
"I'd never seen you so attached to something outside of that nameplate my mother gave you. I had to turn a plane around when you were 10 because you left it in a cupholder in the back of the car we took to the airport... You know, I hope Vivi inherits your shrieking so you can understand what you put me through." More laughter pushed out of Al, whose cheeks were being smashed by Viviana as he continued to make faces for her, his voice rising a few playful octaves as he spoke directly to her. "Gonna give Mommy everything she gave Pop, yeah? Gonna scream your pretty little heart out? Isn't that right, Strawberry?"
Sugar's eyes narrowed, a smile quickly breaking her fleeting glare. "Thankfully, Vivi hasn't reached the banshee portion of her life yet..."
"Terrible twos are coming, dear."
The jokes needed a punch up.
Madeline's addition tempted the return of the glare, but Sugar held off. "You were saying, Pop, about my attachment to Jesse?"
"That it was unlike you, and probably the biggest abnormality I noticed," Al went on. "You praised him, said that he was sooooo talented and sooooo funny. All I could think about was the two of you running off to travel the world together the moment you turned 18. It was very natural, very normal, very healthy, and very handsome worrying. I was concerned that he would keep you from being everything I knew you could be and you'd end up following him around as he tap danced his way across Europe."
Unfinished with her husband and the little girl who was leaving him behind to make a return to Madeline, the older woman added, "I said it was silly--although incredibly handsome--of him to think that anyone could keep you from any life that you imagined for yourself. You wanted to educate yourself and to figure out your place in the industry without us planting you exactly where we wanted you to be. You did all of that and then some, with Jesse by your side."
Grasping at the final say on the subject, Al moved to his knees again, arms wide to embrace Vivi upon yet another return. "But he has moved both my Strawberry and my Sugar Plum to New York permanently, it seems, so he still isn't to be trusted entirely."
"There would be no Strawberry without him," Sugar noted, flashing a wide smile to the Strawberry in question who seemed to finally remember her mother's presence when little arms reached in Sugar's direction. "Lucky for you, I trust him enough for all of us. We still might run off together, but I can assure you that it will be my idea when we do."
If nothing else, the director was a match for the project.
Adventures with Vivi are beginning to get a lot more exciting now that a certain little honey bee doesn’t spend 75% of her time napping. However, we will never reach our full adventure potential unless she stops claiming the attention of every single person she meets. It’s hard to get anything done when everyone around her is melting.
