The Virgin's Secret Marriage: Post 8

apologies! but posts in March and April, sigh, could be a bit short and/or slapdash, due to a truly wacky/busy spring semester

Chapter 5: Mawage is what bwings us togeva today

Since Joe and Emma can think of NO OTHER PLAN to allow gossip to die down and keep Joe on the Carolina Storm, they are going to get remarried/stay married. There’s just NO POSSIBLE WAY THAT THIS CAN GO WRONG. Clearly.

They’re in Emma’s apartment, awaiting their guests. I’m impressed that they can get people to Emma’s place so quickly, frankly—not just their guests but their officiator, too.

She knew their mothers were going to be too happy about him neglecting to use his razor (62).

Oh, I don’t know. I suspect they might overlook that particularly flaw, what with whole suddenly getting married thing.

I don’t know what the “happy” couple told their guests (Emma’s parents, Joe’s mother, Joe’s attorney, and the Storm’s head coach) to get them there, but it wasn’t that they’re getting married. Nope, that’s saved for in person, just before the arrival of the photographer and minister.

To their credit, Joe and Emma don’t try to convince their families that they’re in love or that they’ve actually been having this secret marriage for the past seven years—they’re upfront that this is to quell the gossip. But when Joe’s mother protests that they don’t love each other, Emma says that they once did and that they’re “hoping those feelings will come back to [them] if they spend time together” (63). Which, given that after criticizing Joe’s unshaven-ness, Emma says she’s intentionally not wearing anything borrowed, blue, old, or new in order to “jinx their nuptials and prevent any real emotional involvement on either side,” I’d say that that that part is a Big Ol’ Lie (62). But it’s hard to tell, because of course Harlequins, no matter which line a title is in, are inherently conservative in that the main couple is going to love each other Happily Ever After (HEA) by book’s end, so I can see how it’d be confusing to write. Emma says she doesn’t want any emotional attachment on page 62, but she’s really lying to herself (in Harlequin HEA terms) there and it’s telling the truth when she thinks she’s not on page 63.

Or maybe writing the book took about as long as the actions in the book and thus it was hard for the author to keep straight.

Before the minister arrives, Saul takes Emma aside to chat with her. She expects him to criticize Joe’s character, but instead he informs her, point blank, “You don’t have what it takes to be a hockey player’s wife” (63). Emma did not see that coming, and to be honest, neither did I.

Then again, Emma’s response includes “her lower lip slid out in a dissenting pout” (63) so he might actually be right. If Emma’s reaction is to sulk like a child, she doesn’t have what it takes to be anyone’s wife, well above the age of consent or not.

If you’re wondering what Saul’s logic is, he declares that Emma has been pampered and in the spotlight her whole life and as a hockey player’s wife she won’t be (in the spotlight at least) and that her husband will be away all the time, tempted by groupies, concerned mainly with what happened during his games, and prone to injuries. That seems a very one-sided way of looking at the situation, but I suppose Saul isn’t technically wrong.

Joe overhears this diatribe and calls Saul out on it, saying it’s a dark view. Saul’s response is to say that his directive to Joe to fix the situation did not include marrying Emma, and Joe goes on the attack, saying that he knows that Saul hoped he’d either quit hockey (yeah right, like any NHLer would voluntarily?!) or at least ask to be traded. Saul’s reaction is to tell Joe that he’s slightly less dense than he’d expected, with “something akin to respect coming into his penetrating gaze” (65). That could have been phrased a lot better, but even barring that, it’s a weird moment. So Joe standing up for himself makes Saul respect him? We’ve never been told that Joe didn’t stand up for himself before (although I suppose there haven’t been details about what happened the first time around.) Still, I don’t see how Joe could have done anything that first time around, at least not once he’d returned Emma to her dorm. I think if the two of them had decided to go for it, full speed ahead and damn the torpedoes, then maybe Saul would have respected him more?

At any rate, the wedding happens, and because the press is there (the local news station in the hopes that this will get them to stop following Emma and Joe around), Joe’s kiss to Emma at “you may kiss your bride” involves bending her over backwards so that she has to hang onto him. There’s no indication of whether the news people believe the kiss, but their mothers do, to the point where they’re speculating over the marriage being successful.

(Can you believe this STILL isn’t the end of chapter 5? Or that all this has happened but we’re only 67 pages out of 205 into this book? I seriously cannot imagine what all will still happened as I’ve only read to the end of this chapter. I’m sure more wackiness will ensue.)

Her Man Advantage: Post 17

Chapters 13: Meanwhile, in the Subplot…

Chelsea really had been volunteering at a homeless shelter during the airing of Double Overtime’s first episode; that wasn’t just a convenient excuse for her to continue avoiding Vinny. But apparently Misty, the other groupie, didn’t know that and assumed that Chelsea had seen the episode and is now mad at her.

Chelsea had actually recorded the episode on her VCR. I get that she’s been homeless and bought all her belongings used but I’m surprised that she’s found a working VCR. I thought I was the last person to have one of those (although I can now no longer use it since I don’t have a tv that will allow it… I digress.)

She was happy with her tag-sale furnishings and Craiglist purchases for the most part… (127).

I think the author must be from New England. I have never heard anyone in Pennsylvania (where I grew up) refer to a “tag-sale” (I had no idea what those were when I first got to Massachusetts for college.) They’re just yard sales or garage sales in PA.

At any rate, the thing that Misty is worried about is, surprisingly, not about Vinny. Instead, Misty had spoken directly to the camera about Chelsea’s “dream of running a shelter geared toward women and children” (127). And she has good cause to be worried, since Chelsea is quite upset that Misty “broadcast [her] dreams on television” (127). She’s upset about losing her privacy, something she never had during all her time homeless.

Misty at first claims she didn’t know that the footage would be used but within a few sentences she turns around and announces that she did it on purpose in the hopes that putting Chelsea’s plans into the public consciousness in the hopes that “by morning, some rich philanthropist is going to want to donate a jillion dollars to make sure you have the chance to do good in the world” (128).

I would say that that’s not how things work. It’s one soundbite on a documentary tv series that I really can’t imagine is going to be all that widely watched (the plan for making a financially successful show notwithstanding) and not even given by the person who wants to do the good in the world. On the other hand, this book has been absolutely littered with wildly improbably things, so let’s find out if within the next 20 pages Chelsea gets her dream…

What does happen for sure is that Chelsea paused her VCR’s playback on an image of Vinny. This is enough for her to realize she’d made a mistake by breaking things off even though she was scared. Remember, though, the days when you used a VCR and you paused things? The almost certainly super-awkward pose of the person on screen? The weird wavy lines that went through the image? She slightly shaking picture?

Chelsea confesses her fear and Misty points out that everyone is scared to meet their SO’s parents, let alone girls who have had, shall we say, challenging past lives. There’s some wibbling and some touching of the tattoo of Vinny’s number (over her heart, of course) but Chelsea decides she’s going to ask Vinny for a second chance.

Her Man Advantage: Post 15

Chapters 11: All the Angst

The next morning, Jennifer is at the practice rink, in the conference room, in order to get some work done. Her little sister, Julia, the one whose bullying experience is driving Jennifer to get funding to make the documentary on online bullying, gives her a call.

Back when we first met Jennifer, the text described the situation with her sister only minimally, and it came up again in conversation with Axel a bit later. At that point, Jennifer described it as her 15 year old sister having a crush on an older boy. Some junior girls discovered this and made a fake Facebook page for him, and started messaging her (as him) as if he liked her. Then they printed out all the private messages and circulated them around school (which seems like an unnecessary step—why not circulate them, y’know, on facebook?) When the boy found out, he was a jerk, too, making things worse. Jennifer helped her sister get into a new school.

“I had hoped she would stay and fight through it, but she just wanted to get away. She’s at a new school now and seems to have put it behind her” (82).

Thirty pages later, when Jennifer gets this phone call from Julia, she learns that her little sister is not, indeed, settling in, but in fact hates her new school and wants to go back to her old one. Her sister is conscientious enough that she’d tried to talk her principal into giving Jennifer (who paid for the private school) a partial refund on the tuition, although he’d refused, and has decided to get a part-time job in order to pay Jennifer aback.

Jennifer’s reaction is to refuse.

“I want you to attend a school where you’ll be happy. Where you don’t have people whispering behind your back” (114).

But Julia insists and even, quite logically, explains that she’s over it and that if she hadn’t freaked out, the school probably would have gotten over it quickly.

The first time I read this, I, in fact, misread it, thinking that here Julia was claiming that Jennifer had forced her to go to a school she didn’t want. (She does say “I know you would have liked to attend a school like this, but it’s not for me” 114). Which would have irritated me as it would have meant either the author forgot what she’d written earlier (that Jennifer wanted Julia to stay and fight) or that Jennifer willfully misremembers the situation. Instead it’s a bit more nuanced, which is good. It seems like Julia freaked out, along with Jennifer being protective, and since then Jennifer has embraced the new school thing. For example, she questions Julia on how she can get decent grades “with the distraction of online gossip and negative cliques using social media to wage a smear campaign?” (114) which … is not how I think you should be chatting with a 15 year old. That reads a lot more like the pitch one throws to financial backers of your social campaigning documentary…

And speaking of documentaries, Jennifer even says she’s got a film project in the works about this sort of thing and Julia panics and demands that Jennifer not do the film. She insists she won’t be “one of [her] causes” (115).

So this leaves Jennifer in a tizzy. But as readers, we know it also leaves an open door for Jennifer to find a new project that will enable her to stay with Axel. Because there’s only 30 pages of novel left, so we’ll have to wrap things up in another 15 or so. She doesn’t get time to ponder the situation, however, as Chelsea comes in, looking for coffee.

I’m a little curious as to why a woman who works at the arena gift shop is wandering into conference rooms in the practice rink looking for coffee, but apparently she’s there a lot and knows where all the ingredients are. This isn’t explained—it may just be something she’s picked up as a Magical Groupie being allowed to go wherever she wants. Or maybe the author forgot that the practice rink and arena are two separate things.

But has Chelsea gotten her car back since it’s early the next morning? If so, where are the other groupies? If not, how did she get here? Although she did say her apartment is close to the rink, so okay, she could have walked. But if so, why bother? Given the way she left things with Vincent a few hours before, and having gotten no sleep, as she tells Jennifer in a moment, is this really a practice her groupie-self needs to be at? Is she literally at every public practice? Because if yes, that’s not being a groupie, that’s being a stalker.

(Also, it just occurred to me one of the reasons why the author might have chosen to create a fictional Philadelphia team instead of using the Flyers. The Flyers don’t practice in Philadelphia, they practice in New Jersey. Of course, paying the NHL for the rights to use “Flyers” probably had something to do with that, too, but the book does reference the Stanley Cup and the NHL specifically, unlike Body Check.)

Anyway, Chelsea, despite the narrative assuring us earlier that she’s intensely private, tells Jennifer that she had a misunderstanding with Vincent and that they’ll not be a story for the documentary. This surprises Jennifer, having seen them be all Displaying Public Affection on the plane the day before. This leads to Chelsea asking rhetorically what if they just can’t get through all the obstacles, and Jennifer is in agreement, given her own situation. So this Scene of Woe and Angst closes the chapter.