Wedding Tea

by Sheila Horgan

  TEN

  ALL THE WEDDING preparations are going well. I’ve actually been able to hand a lot of it over to my sisters, but not because I’m all pathetic and unstable, but because I’m going to make an honest effort to balance my life. One of the things I’m going to balance is give-and-take. I’ve always been more about give. I’m gonna get used to taking.

  I’ll be honest, it’s driving me a little bit crazy.

  It’s like the time I decided I was using too much sugar in my tea. When you drink as much as I do, even three quarters of a spoon and a smidge can add up. First, I cut out the three quarters of a spoon. That didn’t work at all. Then I decided to give up the smidge. Almost as bad.

  During Lent, Mom suggested I give up all sugar. Mom. My mom. The woman that raised us to believe Lent was not about giving something up. Giving things up is too easy. Lent was about doing something extra. Let me tell you, we had more than one discussion about that at school. The nuns were never amused my mother was changing the rules on them. It didn’t slow Mom down in the least.

  Back to the subject at hand. I’m trying to gracefully accept the help and advice of others.

  I’m trying with the accept part first. I’ll work on the gracefully part later.

  A.J. told me a guy from Roland’s company had asked Suzi out for coffee. He didn’t seem very pleased about it. He claims any person having the personality to work successfully for Roland is probably several degrees off-center. I couldn’t come up with a valid argument instantly, so I led with Suzi being an adult and, it being her decision, we need to stay out of it.

  He didn’t laugh.

  That’s why we’ll have a successful marriage.

  Me. Minding my own business.

  Even I had to laugh.

  My brothers came over a couple of nights ago and put together the frame we’re using to hold up the fabric and lights that will give the backyard some style for the wedding.

  They transplanted some beautiful stuff from my father’s garden. We’ve been working hard to get the backyard in shape, but there’s something about mature plants. They create more of a mood than our little baby ones. Daddy’s certain we aren’t going to lose any plants by taking them out of his backyard and putting them in ours.

  I’ll feel terrible if we destroy his beautiful garden. It’s always stunning.

  This morning, I got up early and made a cup of tea. I walked out in the backyard to sit and enjoy a little time to myself, and my heart almost broke.

  The frame was all torn to bits, and some of the plants were displaced.

  I cried.

  Then I got myself together and called Roland. I told him it wasn’t an emergency situation, but he might want to send someone over to review the tapes and take a look around. The backyard is under video surveillance, and as much as I hate it, it will come in really handy.

  Once A.J. was up and showered, I told him about the yard.

  He was pissed.

  Beyond pissed. His anger seems to be building lately.

  I haven’t seen him that angry. Ever.

  Ever since Suzi shared with me that A.J. has a bit of a dark side, I’ve been wondering what it would look like when he got really angry. Now I know. I’ve seen it twice. More?

  He instantly turned his anger into something more positive.

  As Suzi came downstairs with Evelyn, he grabbed the baby and took her out back. They worked on getting the plants back into place and reestablished. They worked on cleaning up the mess. For part of the time, Evelyn was in her little carrier thing. For part of the time, she was in her bouncy seat. The whole time, A.J. talked to her and explained what he was doing and why. He’s going to be such a good dad.

  Suzi shook her head. “Why would anyone do that?”

  “It’s got to be those kids. Friends of Christophe, Adeline’s grandson. They think it’s my fault Christophe is living in a huge mansion and working with his cousins, running around the world in private jets and being mentored by some of the best minds in history, while they get left out of all of it.”

  “And they think the best way to get invited along is to trash our backyard?”

  “Who knows what they’re thinking? Roland said they come from money, and they’re entitled little brats.”

  “If he knows who they are, why doesn’t he just go to the cops and have them arrested? I thought they were under control and no longer a threat. What happens now? Why not call the cops?”

  “He hasn’t said, but I’m assuming it has something to do with Adeline’s grandson.”

  “He trashed our backyard?”

  “I don’t think so. God, I hope not. I didn’t even think of that.”

  “Well, if he did, then he deserves whatever the other people get. He doesn’t get to break the law just because his grandmother is stupid rich.”

  “And my employer.” I tried not to panic.

  “Does that matter?”

  “Yeah, it kind of does.” I took a breath. It’s not like me to have situational ethics. If Christophe trashed my backyard, he should be held accountable. A thought hit me.

  “Give me a second. I want to check Adeline’s calendar. I’ll be right back.”

  By the time I got back to Suzi, I felt much better. “Christophe couldn’t have done anything in our backyard. He’s in Canada.”

  “Unless he flew home on one of her private jets.”

  “Let’s pray he didn’t. When Roland’s people look at the surveillance video, we’ll know.”

  “Last time, all we saw was it was maybe boy or possibly girl that could be kind of tall but not really and he or she wore a hoodie.”

  “They’ve put in much more sophisticated equipment. I really didn’t understand why, thought it was overkill, but now that I really think about it — the whole thing about Christophe — maybe it was more about protecting Adeline than it was about protecting me.”

  “How does that make any sense?”

  “It would really hurt Adeline to think after all she has done for Christophe, he’d still be pulling stupid stunts like trashing my backyard. Roland was pretty sure the person or persons messing with us were part of Christophe’s old crew. My guess is he put in really good equipment so that if it happened again, they could prove Christophe wasn’t a part of it, even if he were in town.”

  “Maybe it has nothing to do with Adeline and her family, and it’s the baby monitor weirdos.”

  “Roland’s sure that part of our lives is in the past.”

  “Let’s hope he’s right. But then, wasn’t he sure those kids were taken care of? You are still assuming it was them. How often is Roland wrong?”

  Suzi and I made breakfast and brought it out back for A.J. and Evelyn to join us.

  I’m guessing Roland’s guys have a feed straight from our backyard to the office because they didn’t come rushing over when I called. Of course, to be fair, I told them the rest of the family wasn’t up yet, and I’d appreciate it if they took their time. Still, you would think they would be out to prove they weren’t asleep at the wheel.

  I’m pretty sure they’re going to be annoyed we ruined their evidence by fixing up the backyard, but I don’t care. A.J.’s mental health is more important than catching a few screwed-up kids creating a mess but not really hurting anything. One of the reasons that A.J. was okay with the neighbor generously offering the use of their property was our ability to pay them back in advance.

  The neighbors are having a birthday party for a hundred-year-old man, and he doesn’t deserve to have his party messed up because of us. I’m sure that’s one of the reasons A.J. was getting everything back in order so quickly.

  I know the kids are harmless.

  That’s what I keep telling myself.

  No different than a toddler messing up the playroom.

  I keep telling myself that so I don’t freak out thinking they’re going to do something to destroy my wedding. Our wedding.

  Seamus keeps saying we’re stupid to do it in our backya
rd, and we should move to another venue that’s more easily secured.

  I don’t want another venue.

  For me, this isn’t a venue — it’s my home. A home I’m going to share with A.J. for the rest of my life. The home I’m going to raise our kids in. The home that I’m going to die in. Having the memory of getting married in it, telling the kids that story, the grandkids — with luck, the great-grandkids — means a lot to me.

  I’m not going to let some smart-ass kids mess that up for me.

  What if Roland is all about protecting Adeline and not me? That would actually be smart on his part. A little evil, but smart. If he knows Christophe is still running around with the friends that are causing me problems, what are the chances he would choose to keep it to himself instead of telling the woman who writes both our paychecks? How would you go about telling Adeline that she is the grandmother of our little ringleader?

  Which doesn’t make sense because Christophe is in Canada.

  But you don’t have to be physically involved in something to be involved in it.

  I need to think about this.

  And probably call Teagan. And maybe Daddy.

  I don’t want to bother A.J. with it. He’s in protecting mode because it’s all happening at the house. And he’s trying to get all his projects done at work so he can take time off for our honeymoon. I’m not keeping anything from him. Not really.

  Of course, that’s what Teagan did with the gypsy guy and his strangely named wife the pastor-slash-con-artist.

  Maybe it would be smarter to just stay out of it.

  I’ve been accused of lots of things in life, but making the smarter choice is rarely one of them.

  I called Teagan.

  “So explain it to me again, dingleberry.”

  “I just want to see if there’s any reason to think these little butt-warmers are being led by Adeline’s grandson, Christophe.”

  “Butt-warmers?” She laughed at me. “Why not ask Adeline?”

  “She’s my employer. Why would she pick me over family?”

  “You are her family, you dingbat.”

  “Dingbat. Really?”

  “You said I had to pick a new nickname. I’m trying some out.”

  “Where did you get dingbat?”

  “Jessie and I were watching old shows. It was once a common term. I thought I’d find something old. Since, you know, you act like you’re a hundred and ten, and you’re all into tradition and everything.”

  “Here’s a thought. You could just call me Cara.”

  “No, that’s boring, even for you.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Not your fault. Mom and Dad named you. You didn’t choose your boring name.” She didn’t even give me a chance at rebuttal. Mrs. Scubba, my debate teacher, would be most unhappy. She laughed. “You’re the one that chose to live up to your boring lady name.”

  Jerk.

  “Teagan, I need help tracking this. Roland sent one of his guys over. They said it wasn’t the kids they caught before. Not friends of Christophe. Not their problem. They think it has something to do with the neighbors. On the recorder, they saw the kid come over from the neighbor’s yard. Left the same way. Spent more time around their property.”

  “I thought you said your backyard got the majority of damage.”

  “Our backyard has more stuff in it. The neighbor’s backyard is mostly cement. That’s one of the reasons taking down the fence works so well. There really isn’t much you can do to their side.”

  “Great. How nice for them, but what about you?”

  “Once A.J. started putting the backyard back together, he said they really didn’t do much. They didn’t break the frame; they just kind of took it apart. They didn’t even mess up the fabric too bad. I ran it through the washing machine, and we’re good to go. The plants they messed up, they didn’t hurt the root ball or break any branches. They pretty much pushed them out of the holes they were in. Thank God they’d just been transplanted. Daddy said no real damage was done.”

  “So, let me get this straight. They aren’t part of Adeline’s group. They went out of their way to make a mess, but to do it gently and not break anything, and Roland has them recorded but you don’t have a picture of their faces?”

  “We do, but I can’t do much with the picture. They were taken at night, in the dark. It’s kind of like finding fingerprints when the owner isn’t on file. Once we find them, we can confirm them on the recorder, but using that image is going to be kind of difficult. Are you going to help me?”

  “Sure. I only have about a billion other things to do, not the least of which are all the details I’m dealing with for your wedding while you sit back and do next to nothing.”

  “You’re the one that told me to delegate.”

  “As always, you took it to the extreme.”

  “That’s not fair. I told you guys I want simple. Basically a family dinner. You and Sinead decided I needed a bunch of decorations, and she really doesn’t want me in the way. I’m over here thinking this is major growth on my part, but if you don’t want to do what you volunteered to do — make that insisted on doing — I’ll be happy to step back in the middle of it. It was kind of driving me crazy anyway.”

  “Boy, are you touchy. Calm down.”

  “It’s not funny, Teagan. I thought you were serious.”

  “I am. And it is major growth. I’ve always thought the reason you needed so much control over everything is because you didn’t trust yourself to deal with it if something went wrong.”

  I shook my head. “You sound like Mom.”

  “She and I talked about it more than once.”

  “About me having control issues? Why did you guys talk to each other instead of me?”

  “It’s not all about you, Cara. You aren’t the only one in the family that needs to control stuff, but I was wrong.”

  “You? Wrong? I must know the details.” Okay, that was a little bit snotty, but she deserved it.

  “Think about how much has changed since Mom died. Every single member of our family has changed. You for the better. Seamus, not so much.”

  “What’s wrong with Seamus?”

  “He’s just much more Seamus-y. Anyway, I think Mom held us together by sheer force of will, and now that she’s gone, it’s not like we’re falling apart completely; it’s like we aren’t as together.”

  “I need to think about that. Sometimes I feel like I’m fading away. Like my reality was all smoke and mirrors. I hadn’t really attributed it to Mom, and boy, would she be pissed if we did, but I think I get what you’re saying. You think my letting go of control is a bad thing?”

  “No, I think it’s really good.” She took a deep breath and seemed to weigh what she was going to say. That’s never good with Teagan. “Don’t hate me.”

  “Say it.”

  “I think losing Mom has had a positive effect on you.”

  I didn’t kill my sister. I’m proud of that.

  “Cara, before you go nuts, let me explain. I think that somewhere in the back of your mind, somewhere hiding so deep that you didn’t even know it was there, you had a fear of losing the family. Any or all of us. You had this thing in your mind that said without the family, you were nothing.”

  I couldn’t talk.

  “But now that Mom isn’t here with you, you’re okay, Cara. The world didn’t end. I know how much you miss her. I miss her, too. I miss all that was and all that will never be. I’m not saying that losing Mom was a good thing. I’m just saying your personal growth has been a good thing.”

  I started to object. Was she saying that Mom had to die so I could learn a life lesson? I felt like I was pulling apart in pieces.

  Teagan can always read my mind. “I’m not saying that losing Mom had anything to do with you. That’s on the bitch behind the wheel and nobody else. What I’m saying is that you have taken the most negative thing life could hand you. Two major losses in such a short time. You learned from them. You ma
de them count. In a good way. Mom would be so freakin’ proud of you.”

  Okay, so then I cried. But I’m getting better. I cried for a bit, but when I was done, I didn’t feel empty. I felt refreshed.

  “Teagan, are you going to help me find the idiot that trashed my backyard so I can get married without having to worry about it?”

  “I will.”

  Long story short, we found the guy. Well, mostly Teagan found the guy. I thought it was going to get ugly for a minute there. When we approached our neighbors, explaining that there had been an issue, that we have security cameras all over the backyard, and that the security team saw the guys come from their property, they took offense.

  I wanted to just show them a picture, but Roland insisted that there were liability issues because we didn’t really have proof and the picture wasn’t clear enough to stand up on its own.

  Okay, I’ll admit I wanted to scream.

  Why is it when the cops said maybe a spider walked across one of the sensors, they got angry and said they had the world’s best equipment. Then they say they can’t really make out this kid’s face well enough to identify him, but they’re certain that it isn’t Christophe and his friends.

  It doesn’t make sense.

  So we had to just talk to the neighbors like we weren’t sure of anything. Which, unfortunately, is true.

  The neighbors got a little agitated. They explained there had never been a problem until we moved in.

  When we asked if maybe one of their kids could have been part of an innocent hazing thing at school or something, we were given a very cold shoulder.

  All I need is to make them angry before the wedding.

  Pretty much everything has been designed around a double backyard.

  I’m not a bridezilla or anything, but making huge changes this late in the process could be a problem.

  We’ve been working with our neighbors for their party and our wedding, so we do know a little bit about them. Basic facts like the name of their daughter and what school she attends. Teagan took that information and ran with it. To Facebook, I think.