Once and for All(11)
“You’re forgetting the pergolas,” he said mildly. “We didn’t insist on them, and the fluttering tulle, purely for the looks of it.”
“We’ll need a lot more than fluttering tulle to deal with this,” my mom grumbled, dabbing at her (not sweaty, from my view) brow. “But that’s tomorrow. Let’s find the caterer and see how this dinner is shaping up. Louna, can you start the unloading? The ballroom door is supposed to be just over there, behind the Dumpsters, and unlocked. They’re expecting us.”
Great, I thought, even as I nodded. They’d go into the A/C to talk tiki torches while I schlepped boxes of centerpieces, my mother’s preferred table linens, and glassware across a hot parking lot. I could still hear her complaining as they walked away.
That night, the rehearsal went well, with only a few basic wrinkles. (Meltdown from flower girl, bossy wedding planner wannabe aunt of bride, impatient officiant. This last was a pet peeve of us all. Nobody liked a snappy minister.) By the time Margy and her groom, Josef, play-walked down the aisle together, with her carrying the bouquet of ribbons from her bridal shower, everyone was ready for a drink. As they adjourned to the beach, my mother had the caterers waiting with trays of champagne, the tiki torches lit and flaming around them. Let the party begin.
“Well, that’s done,” she said to William, giving a cordial-but-not-exactly-warm nod to the bossy aunt as she passed us. “Here’s hoping the actual event goes so smoothly.”
“That was smooth?” he asked, his eyes following a bridesmaid in wobbly platform sandals who was trying to navigate the steps to the beach. “Just once I’d like to get an officiant who was happy to do their job.”
“Like you’re always happy to do yours?”
“Exactly,” William replied. A pause. Then they both laughed, as if this was hysterical. I rolled my eyes, turning back to the party as two of the groomsmen walked by us. One of them was about my age and built like a football player, with dark hair cut short and blue eyes. The kind of boy that you can easily picture as a little kid, that cute. As he passed by, he smiled at me, and I felt my face flush, even as I tried to imitate my mother’s efficient, businesslike nod in return. Once he went down the stairs to the beach, I realized William was watching me, amused, and felt embarrassed all over again.
After the dinner, the guests moved the party to the hotel bar and, thankfully, out of our jurisdiction. I helped my mom, William, and the caterers break down the tables and chairs, then brought a purse, a phone, and a monogrammed flask to the hotel lost and found. (Someday, I’d write an entire book about the things people left behind at weddings. I just had this feeling it all meant something.) By ten thirty, I was back in my room eating a pack of crackers from the vending machine and texting with Jilly, who was in a hotel room with Crawford watching a marathon of swamp fishing shows while the “youngers” (her term) all slept.
SO BORED, she reported. IF I SEE ANOTHER CATFISH I MIGHT SCREAM. TELL ME YOU ARE GOING TO GO OUT AND DO SOMETHING EPIC TONIGHT.
OF COURSE I AM, I wrote back.
SURE. I BET YOU ARE IN BED ALREADY.
I balled up the cracker wrapper, threw it in the general direction of the nearby trashcan, and missed.
I’LL DO EPIC TOMORROW. PROMISE.
YOU BETTER. IF I CAN’T, YOU HAVE TO!
I made a face. This was a familiar rant from Jilly, who had been long convinced that I squandered the relative freedom I enjoyed as an only child of a single, non-food-truck-owning parent. In my shoes, she was fond of telling me, she’d be the kind of person who was always out Doing Stuff and Making Things Happen. (The specifics of what, exactly, these terms meant were never explained; as with any fantasy, vagueness was part of the appeal.) Moreover, it wasn’t just a waste of my life but of hers as well, that I willingly spent time away at the beach sitting in bed watching a news special about a murder mystery while covered in cracker crumbs. I wasn’t Jilly, and never would be, but I would have given her some of my open hours if I could have. She definitely deserved them.
The next morning, I went for an early run and jumped into the hotel pool before showering and meeting my mom and William for our scheduled nine a.m. strategy breakfast. Over a table of pastries, coffee, and fruit, we synchronized schedules, divided up our to-do list for that morning, and went over the cheat sheets I’d printed out in the hotel business center. By ten thirty, I was back in one of the vans, navigating the streets of Colby in what was basically a glorified scavenger hunt. According to my (bullet-pointed) list, we needed a hardback, attractive but not too embossed bible (the family one had been forgotten back in California), four black bow ties, and “two rolls of pennies, preferably polished.”
These items could have been challenging to procure even back in Lakeview, which had several malls and a thriving retail district downtown. Colby, however, offered up much less in terms of options, which was why an hour later I’d only gotten the bow ties. Lillie’s Occasions, the only formal wear place, did not look kindly on renting out accessories last minute. I had to promise they’d be returned by noon sharp on Sunday, pay twice the normal price, and slip the owner forty bucks cash before she’d let me take them, and even then I could feel the stink eye on me all the way out to the parking lot. So I was already visibly beaten down by the time I found a bible at the local bookstore and basically pleaded with them for some rolls of pennies from their safe, which they gave me purely out of pity.