The City of Rossford

“NO! NO! NO! Absolutely not! Do NOT do it!”

Up the aisle, unkempt, tie undone, hair a mess, stomped William Klasko.

“What the…?” Kevin started.

“Don’t do it, Layla,” Will said.

“Yay!” Dylan Mesda cried.

“I knew it,” Aidan Michaelson muttered in the first row, and beside him his sister, Annelise, nodded her head.

“I never liked him anyway,” Maia said, a little too loudly.

“You don’t love him,” Will said. “You don’t love him like you should. And you don’t love him like you loved me. Or Aidan for that matter,” he gestured to the Michaelsons. “So… don’t do it, Layla.”

She stood looking at Will, and when she said nothing, Kevin looked at her.

“Layla?” he said.

“Uh…” she opened her mouth, eyes still on Will, and then she turned to Kevin, blinking.

Kevin looked at her hard.

“I’m…” Dan Malloy began, “sort of at a sort of loss. You know?”

“I’m not,” Kevin said. He reached down, snatched the ring off of Dylan’s pillow, and stomped off the altar, down the aisle, and out of the church.

Layla stood on the altar looking down at Will, and then down the aisle to the open doors through which Kevin had departed. Now other members of the Nelson family were getting up to follow him.

“If she gets up and runs after that niggah,” Lula muttered.

But it was Fenn who got up, walked the little steps to the altar and touched his niece’s wrist.

“If you cared that much,” he said. “You wouldn’t be standing here with that stupid grin on your face.”

In the social hall, Fenn sat down beside his niece.

“I’ve been trying to call him,” she said, closing the cell phone.

“By trying to call, do you mean thinking about doing it and then shutting the phone off?”

Layla looked at him, smiled sadly, and said, “I think that’s just what I mean.

“Well…” she said, “who knew?”

Chay walked by, miserably, and slipped a wad of money into Fenn’s hand. Fenn stuck it in his pocket.

“You knew, I’ll bet,” Layla said while Barb Affren walked by and slipped another bill into Fenn’s pocket.

“It’s why I made sure Hoot paid for it. I had an inkling it wouldn’t happen,” her uncle admitted. “Or rather an inkling that it shouldn’t happen.”

“Cause he wasn’t one of us?”

“No. Because you didn’t love him like you should have.”

“And Will?”

“It’s not about Will,” Fenn said. “It’s about you not making a mistake or doing something it will take a hell of a lot of time and money to undo.”

“But Will…”

“Young lady, from the way you looked at him, you need to have a serious talk with Will.”

“I need to slap him.”

“That too.”

“Fenn…?”

“Yes?”

“Do you remember… a long time ago, at Saint John’s, when you and Todd did your ceremony?”

“Yes. You were my Maia. You were my little flower girl.”

“Yes,” Layla said, leaning against him. “Well, if Tom had done what Will did…?”

“Tom wouldn’t have done would Will did.”

“But if he did?”

“But he didn’t.”

“But…”

“Layla,” Fenn said in a voice that told her this was a road they were not going down.

“What do I go and tell all of those people?”

“My dear, you and Julian, and even Claire now, are Lawdens, which is too bad but largely incidental. You are all Houghtons, and my nephew and nieces, and that means you get up and you put a good face on it.”

He straightened her collar and touched her cheek.

“We’ve got tons of shrimp that’ll be bad by tomorrow, a lobster, and a cake as big as a house. You go in there and tell them you’re having an “I dodged the bullet party.”

“Layla,” Annelise said, Aidan beside her, “your wedding was the bomb and so is the party—”

“Thank you?” Layla said.

Aidan laughed and kissed her on the cheek.

“That boy you let go just found out too late something I knew all along.”

“But anyway,” Annelise continued, “we’re taking Radha down to the police station. You heard all about…”

“Yeah,” Layla nodded, subdued. “It makes this fiasco funny.”

Annelise nodded and said, “I’m taking as many shrimp as I can fit in my purse. I just wanted you to know that.”

“Do you think I should come down?”

“To the station?” Aidan said. “I don’t even really think we should come down.”

“That’s the difference,” Annelise said, cutting into a large piece of chocolate cake, laying it down and sandwiching it between two Styrofoam plates, “between men and women.”

“One of us minds our business and the other doesn’t?”

Layla told Aidan, “Well, today I’ll mind my business. Good… luck. Or… whatever I should say. Today’s a confusing day. I don’t know what to say or do lately.”

“May I suggest?” said Aidan, “that whatever you say and whatever you do, both happen around Will Klasko?”

As her friends left from the large door of the social hall, Dan Malloy, on his way through the small door that led into the church and the school asked, “Do you need to talk?”

“No,” she answered. “And… why do you have that look on your face? You never liked him, did you?”

Dan was wearing his spectacles that day and he pushed them up and said, “Well, I always liked Will.”

“You can’t hide in there forever,” Sheridan Klasko shouted.

He tapped on his brother’s bedroom door again, and then sat on the floor beside Chay.

Chay turned to him.

“You can’t just make a big announcement like that at a wedding,” Chay said through the door, “and then run off.”

The door opened and Sheridan jumped up.

“What?” Will said, looking down at both of them, “do either one of you know about love?”

But before they could answer, Brendan sprinted through the door and closed it behind him.

“He’s fast,” Chay commented.

“What?” Will said inside of his room, “was that?”

“That was me waiting for you to open this door so I could get in. We need to talk.”

Will looked at Brendan.

“When I had all of my love woes, you always listened to me and now—”

“And now I have to listen to you again?”

“You’re so not funny when you’re crabby. You know that?”

Will made a disgusted noise and sat on the bed.

“What have I done?”

“You’ve broken up a very expensive wedding.”

“I’ve ruined a life.”

“From the look on Layla’s face, and the quickness that Kevin guy walked away, I’m gonna take a wild guess and say you may have saved more than you ruined.”

“I don’t feel like a savior.”

“No, you feel like a fool.”

Will looked at him.

“And I totally get it,” Brendan continued.

“You knew I’d do something like this.”

“I had a strong suspicion you might fuck things up. I was kind of hoping you would.”

“So… now what do I do? Do I get up and be a man, find Layla and talk this out? Or do I bunker down and wait out the storm?”

“Well, how long before you go back?”

“Oh.” Will was startled.

Brendan raised an eyebrow.

“Didn’t you know…? I’m here. I’m here to stay. I’ve been hired by IPS. I’m not going back.”

“Well…” Brendan said, a smile spreading over his face as he rubbed his hands together.

“Yeah.”

“You and Kenny. Both staying. Thank God.”

After some thought, Brendan added, “Under the circumstances I think you’ve done enough for the day. Maybe you should wait it out.”

“You all shouldn’t have come,” Mark said. “I appreciate it, but you shouldn’t have come.”

Annelise looked from Aidan to Radha.

“Babe,” Mark said, “this is between me and Russ. And… Now that they’ve asked questions I gotta ask some questions. Officer, can I go in and talk to him?”

The police officer nodded and Mark patted Radha on the shoulder, and then went through the doors.

“Whenever I saw a police station on a TV show,” Annelise began, looking around, “I always thought how much I would hate being in a real one.”

“And?” her brother looked at her.

“I really do hate it after all.”