Chapter 14
Fourteen
‘This way,’ Eva said, her tone warm and professional as she led Serena and her mother along the gravel path. Serena was an American marrying a British city boy. She was already filming.
Eva’s hand rested on the cool iron handle of the greenhouse door. Just for a second, she paused, thinking, I don’t want to show you this. Then she pushed the door open.
Warmth and light greeted them. It poured through the curved glass ceiling, stopping Serena in her tracks. ‘It’s sooo cute,’ she breathed to her phone. ‘Like, cottagecore.’
Her mother squinted. ‘Is it always this… green?’
‘Yes,’ Eva said plainly. She clasped her hands loosely in front of her. ‘It seats up to eighty comfortably,’ she said. ‘We’d string lighting through the beams. Long banquet tables work beautifully in here. It’s very atmospheric in the evening.’
Maddy had stood exactly where Serena was standing now. She hadn’t said much. She hadn’t had to.
Serena’s mother pursed her lips. ‘Is it climate-controlled?’
‘Within reason,’ Eva replied. ‘But it’s surprisingly comfortable, even in late summer.’
‘The thing is,’ Serena said, lowering her voice conspiratorially, ‘I saw this TikTok where someone did their reception in a greenhouse, and it went viral. It’s very now.’
Eva nodded. ‘It photographs beautifully.’
That was true. Light did half the work for you in here. It softened everything.
Serena’s mother walked a slow circuit of the perimeter. ‘It’s smaller than the ballroom.’
‘It’s more intimate,’ Eva said.
‘Oh my God,’ Serena said suddenly. ‘Imagine a neon sign with our surname.’
Eva kept her smile steady. A neon sign. For the love of…
‘Can we hang things from the ceiling?’ Serena asked.
‘Within weight restrictions,’ Eva said.
‘We could do, like, hanging installations. Or white draping to make it less… green.’
Less green. Eva needed to check out even further from this situation if she had any chance of hanging onto her sanity.
‘And it’s different from the ballroom,’ Serena went on. ‘Everyone does ballrooms. This feels unique.’
Maddy had thought the same. And yet, the reasoning was a world apart. Maddy had wanted a place where she felt comfortable. Serena wanted to compete with other weddings.
Serena turned to her mother. ‘I think this is it.’
Her mother looked doubtful for exactly three seconds, then recalibrated. ‘If that’s what you want.’
The decision was made. No committee meetings. This girl got whatever she wanted. It was the kind of thing that made things simpler. Until she couldn’t get what she wanted, of course. Then you were in trouble.
‘It’ll look amazing on socials,’ Serena breathed.
As if Eva had needed to know that’s what this was all about for Serena. She made a note on her tablet. ‘Shall I put in a request for your date?’
‘Definitely.’ She gave Eva a date. It wasn’t Maddy’s date, that was gone. Not that she needed it now. They’d signed on for Hawthorne Manor.
And the greenhouse did not belong to Maddy. It did not belong to anyone. It was a venue space, a line item.
Still.
As Serena wandered toward the door, Eva lingered a moment longer beneath the glass arch.
Weeks ago, Maddy had stood beside her here, happy. Eva had wanted it for her. But she couldn’t make the call for her. She couldn’t be a white knight for her. Maddy was just another bride.
Yet, there had been the texts.
Eva had stared at the first message longer than she should have. She didn’t do this. She did not provide emotional support via WhatsApp to half-naked brides in changing rooms.
She put the phone down. Then picked it back up again. It was still professional, technically. It was wedding-related. Not on the agreed terms of their contract, but hey, a little freebie wasn’t the end of the world. It fostered goodwill.
But it wasn’t friendship. She never made friends with the brides she met. At the end of the event, there were hugs, sometimes tears, and then a polite fade into the distance.
But then Maddy had sent the photo of the ivory dress.
There you are, Eva had typed.
It had been too personal. She’d known it the moment she sent it.
Now, standing in the greenhouse with Serena’s decision locked in, Eva realised it had been their final communication. Maddy had said nothing more.
As Eva stepped back out into the afternoon light outside the greenhouse, Serena, blathering on about ‘important hashtags’, Eva’s phone buzzed in her coat pocket.
Her pulse jumped before she could stop it. It was an email. Linen supplier. Eva exhaled slowly and slid her phone back into her pocket.
You don’t make friends of brides, she reminded herself. You don’t need a reply from Maddy.
She walked toward the car park, invisible to Serena and her mother, now discussing colour palettes.
But as she reached for her keys, a quieter thought edged in, unwelcome and unbidden.
But you don’t want to be her friend, do you? You don’t want that at all.