Chapter 14 Enter Momzilla #3
“Mandy, hand me that flower,” I demand. After a little janky work with spare floral tape and the barrette I’ve clipped to my pant loop, I have the start of a flower crown.
“Bulan, why don’t you go to the ceremony site—Stonehenge has to stay intact, keep your eyes on it!
—and wait for me. I’ll be there in a few minutes. Come with me, Mandy.”
Tugging a plaid tablecloth off a reception table, I slide into the middle of the rapidly escalating conflict between Hell-Mother and daughter with Mandy in tow.
“Hi, Fi!” I say brightly. “You’re gorgeous! Wow. All you need is your hairpiece!”
“What are you—” The Hell-Mother pauses, mid-storm, to glance at the offering in my palm. “That ‘hairpiece’ is hideous.”
“I love it,” says Fi.
Beneath us, Dexter rumbles in either agreement or indigestion. To my mild delight, he burps up three more dahlias.
“Want to make it a flower crown?” I ask. “Seems like that would fit with the venue’s, uh… vibe.”
“You can’t argue with the earth, Mom,” says Fi. “Not your beloved earth.”
Apparently, nature is the Hell-Mother’s singular weakness.
Capitalizing on this moment, I say, “Agreed, Fi! We better move fast and do what Dexter wants. How about we use this tablecloth to dry off? Amazing. Now let’s come this way to get your hair finished and your meditation on.
We can make sure you’re out of sight when the guests arrive.
Bec, how about you stay here to greet the guests?
Mandy, keep a lookout for the bridal party. ”
“I’ll send them your way!” Mandy says. “Becuille, oh my trees, your calf muscles are so BIG.”
With the Hell-Mother distracted by Mandy’s pixie-dusted ego-stroking, I rustle Fi to the safety of the ceremony site.
As I get her situated on her meditation platform—aka pillow fort—I mentally run through a final, harried checklist. Bridal party, check.
Bride and bride’s family, check. But bride’s future family and her fiancé, Asher? Nowhere in sight.
Oh no. This couldn’t be more sabotage—could it?
“I was really hoping to look beautiful today,” says Fi, her voice dejected.
My thought-spiral slams to a halt. Bending down, I look her in the eye.
“You are beautiful,” I tell Fi earnestly. “That dress clings to you where it’s wet, and it’s hugging your curves, like, wow. Your skin is so well-hydrated, it’s glistening. And your hair is taking on a dark, moody glow as it dries. You look incredible.”
“I wanted to look like—like I did during my makeup and hair trial.”
Of course she would. Wouldn’t anyone?
“Didn’t you come into my shop right after doing bridal portrait photos?
” I ask, the memory returning to me. “The way I see it is, it’s up to you to choose how you want to remember your dress.
You can frame the photos you took while dressed up on Tuesday.
As for this morning, I’ll ask the photographer to take lots of distant shots and silhouettes. That way, you’ll have lots of options.”
“Oh,” says Fi. “What about my makeup? I don’t look awful, do I?”
“Hmm. You’ve got a soulful doe-eye thing going. Here, let me…” Digging a tissue out of my pocket, I wipe the more-raccoony-than-soulful eyeliner away. “There. I think it looks fine. Besides, Asher loves you for you. He’d marry you even if you wore your mom’s dead deer as a tutu.”
“Bet,” says Fi. “You know, Mom would love that.”
“Which is why we’ll let sleeping deer lie. Do you want some time to dry off? Do you think your mom can hold back the sun?”
Though I’m halfway serious, Fi laughs. I’ll take that as a win.
“It’s fine with me if we start late,” she says, tucking hair behind her ear. “Thanks, Sabby.”
Leaving Fi embracing a Stonehenge replica rock, I seek Robert out. It comes as no surprise that in classic Sasquatch fashion, he’s hiding behind an elm.
“Hey! Robert. Any chance you have a stand-up routine ready to go?” I ask, catching his arm before he lopes away. “We’re going to push the wedding out a bit. And while our guests are waiting, I’m sure they could use a laugh.”
“So could I,” says Robert. “Badum-chaaaah. See? That was the sound of a mic drop.”
“Not a drum snare,” I agree.
“Correct! Snares are terrifying,” says Robert as I herd him toward our arriving guests. “I lost a toe to one once. See?”
If Robert weren’t a Sasquatch, I’d go out on a hairy limb to suggest he’d still have trouble finding work on the comedy circuit.
The good news for everyone is that a low line of clouds keeps the sunrise at bay until the moment Fi’s fiancé arrives.
And when she walks down the aisle, the sun catching on her fiery curls, Fi looks beautiful.
Really. Her golden-limned figure glows as warm as candlelight.
Asher can’t keep his eyes off her—to the extent that he trips over his feet, face-planting into Dexter.
This makes for a great photograph, and it also allows everyone relief from forced laughter.
And yet, our drive back to Salem is mostly somber.
Actually, no: I’d like it to be somber, but Mandy and Bulan are working through the leftover wedding cake Fi wasn’t allowed to bring back to her freezer.
They’ve also insisted on tuning in to classic radio.
“I thought it went well,” Mandy says from the back seat, between outsize, crumbly bites and verses from Cyndi Lauper’s “Girls Just Want to Have Fun.” “I mean, besides, you know—”
“Fi falling out of her canoe,” says Bulan.
“And her mother interrupting the ceremony.”
“Multiple times.”
“And Dexter vomiting during the handfasting.”
“I guess it was an allergy.”
“He’s flower-intolerant,” says Mandy. “So sad!”
I clear my throat to get the pair’s attention.
“I think it went okay, too. Did you see how Fi smiled when she and Asher were pronounced husband and wife? It was brilliant.” As I say it, I realize this was the first time I’d seen Fi’s face break free of any tension.
In spite of my exhaustion—maybe because of it—the thought makes me do the same.
“Fi seemed happy, didn’t she? In spite of everything.
She even laughed when Robert tried to dance with her mom. ”
“I think she loved it. And we helped make it happen!” Mandy exclaims. “Yay!”
“Hooray!” Bulan echoes. “We didn’t sink the party!”
And there goes my smile. The whole canoe debacle continues to disturb me. “What do you two think about the weird stuff that kept happening today? During setup?”
“I don’t know. Was it Becuille?” Mandy asks.
Bulan effortfully turns in his seat, fighting to speak around the shoulder strap. “Hmmph. If anything, I suspect the bride was responsible. Fi could’ve been using you to go behind her mother’s back, Sabby. She could’ve sunk her canoe into the lake on purpose.”
“No way,” I say, thinking back to her dejection about her makeup. “What woman doesn’t want to look her best on her wedding day?”
“You’re unusually obsessed with your appearance, you know,” says Bulan.
“That’s not true. I don’t want people to notice me.”
“Yeah, and you work really hard at it,” says Mandy. “It makes you stand out.”
“Indeed,” Bulan pitches in.
Because they’re callously colluding against me, I change the topic. “Fine, then. How do you explain that strange whining during the ceremony? The napkins getting an origami treatment? The food on the buffet tables jostled everywhere, like someone had tried to make scrambled eggs?”
“I thought it was romantic,” says Mandy.
“No!” I interrupt, swerving the van unintentionally. “It wasn’t romantic, and it wasn’t just this wedding. We are the victims of sabotage. Sabotage, I say!”
Unconvinced, Mandy stuffs the remainder of the cake in her mouth.
“You really think so?” asks Bulan.
“I do,” I say. “And I think it’s… ghosts. The saboteurs are ghosts.”
I think on this. Presumably Mandy does too, as she attempts to chew her massive helping of cake. Bulan just laughs at me, because he’s a jerky, pompous know-it-all.
“Now, Sabby. That can’t be it!” Bulan says with a knowing, puntable air. “Certainly, ghosts affected your last wedding. But they would’ve shown themselves, had they been present this morning. Ghosts are uncannily vain.”
Ignoring him, I ask the back of the cabin, “What if it was Grandma Rose? What if it was her unascended spirit?”
Mandy hasn’t successfully swallowed her cake, so she chews furiously instead of answering.
“Rosie?” I hear the frown in Bulan’s voice. “I very much doubt that. She would never sabotage you.”
“But she was weird. And unpredictable,” I say. And hurtful, I nearly add but don’t.
“She loved you,” says Bulan.
I grimace. Yes, I know she did. And I should’ve loved her better, and I couldn’t.
Maybe that’s what this is all about—is this Grandma’s revenge for me ignoring her for years?
It’s hard to imagine. Like Bulan said, she wasn’t the vengeful type.
She did want me to stay in Salem, though, enough to keep me here with her magical will.
Besides, who else would be so invested in my success or failure?
Because I’m not. Not invested in these weddings in the least.
My only goal is to get back to my New York life: my bland and gray-walled apartment with its perfectly acceptable bedsheets and my reasonably enviable but not-interesting-to-talk-about-in-conversation job. When I’m not so busy, I’ll do a better job of remembering that.
I stare grimly out at the road.
“Don’t overthink this, Sabby. Sometimes things go wrong without a reason,” Bulan says to console me. “In spite of it, time marches forward. Always! So we might as well make the best of it.”
I switch off the radio, pivoting to my K-pop playlist. Sure, it’s easy to believe whatever you want when all you have is a head. But I don’t say that aloud, because Bulan acting pouty is no fun on a car trip.