by Dyan Sheldon
Which would be the Bagley-Schreiber reception. Because it had amped up Mr Schonblatt’s fascist tendencies to new levels, I’d heard more about it than anyone except the bridal couple actually needed to know. I said, “Yes. It sounds like it’s really going to be something.”
“It is, it is. It’s a very big deal, let me tell you.” He actually rubbed his hands together. “An event like this could really put the Inn on the map.”
I was tempted to ask what map – the map of twelfth-century Asia? Of the Hapsburg Empire? Of southern Florida? – but I knew that ZiZi had enough troubles with Mr Schonblatt without adding a snarky friend to the list. I said, “Oh, really? That’s great.”
In case ZiZi had omitted sharing any detail of this affair with me, Mr Schonblatt filled me in. It was the wedding of the season – at least in Howards Walk. The bride’s father was a mega-rich developer; from Mr Schonblatt’s description, I guessed the bride’s father was the kind of developer who bulldozes the Garden of Eden to build luxury apartments. The guest list included some very important people – very, very important. He told me what the menu was. He told me all about the flowers and how much they cost. He explained that the colours of the wedding party’s dresses were being coordinated with the serviettes. A person can only retain so much trivial information and I was starting to lose the plot when he asked me if I’d ever done any waitressing.
“Excuse me?”
He needed extra staff for the wedding. People were letting him down – going away, not wanting to put in the extra hours. “You’d be amazed at how lazy some people can be,” Mr Schonblatt confided. He could tell that a girl like me would be perfect for the occasion.
This time I was tempted to ask if, by “girl like me”, he meant breathing. I didn’t, though. I said, “No, I haven’t really done any waitressing.” Meaning none at all.
“Oh, you don’t need a lot of experience.” He dismissed my lack with a wave of his hand. “It’s not like you’d have to take orders, you’d just have to serve,” Mr Schonblatt explained. “This is a very sophisticated do, and, if you don’t mind me being frank, you’re exactly what we need.”
Which meant he didn’t ask me because I can breathe, he asked me because he thought I looked good.
I demurred. “Well…”
His smile made me wish he’d scowl. “What do you say? I’m paying time and a half.”
This was another one of those moments when I was going to say no – when I should have said no – but right then Gabriel Schwartz strode past me without even looking my way. And, in that moment, it occurred to me that if he was working at the reception – which was likely; he was planning to get as many degrees as I was and would want the extra money – and I was working at it, too, I would have the opportunity I needed to confront him. You can’t ignore someone who has you backed against a sink.
And that’s why I said, “Yes.”
Which, for me, was the biggest surprise of the last twenty-four hours; twenty-four hours that had for definite had their share of surprises.
ZiZi
The pre-nup blues
Weddings are supposed to be happy, joyous occasions, but, as far as I could tell, the Bagley-Schreiber wedding (at least the reception part of it) wasn’t bringing any joy or happiness yet.
Not to Mr Schonblatt, that’s for sure. Where he was concerned, all it was doing was bringing out the worst in him, and, trust me, that’s not a pretty sight. It was like all these evil demons had been hiding in a corner of the dungeon of his heart and just the words “sit-down dinner for two hundred and fifty” had called them to the surface, drooling and wailing and flexing their claws. God knows when he found the time, since he was always in such a state, but he came up with dozens of new rules to fit the occasion. How we should walk. How we should serve. What we should do when we weren’t serving. What we should say. What we shouldn’t say. Where to stand and how to do it. “Think of yourselves as ghosts,” he repeated so often I heard it in my sleep. “Always there but never seen.” He was constantly telling us how much stress and pressure he was under (like we couldn’t tell!). Every day something changed in the plans (sometimes something changed on the hour), and Mr Schonblatt made sure “the wedding crew” (as he called us) shared his pain.
I could almost feel sorry for Mr Schonblatt when yet another thing was altered or when another waitress said she couldn’t work the reception after all. But only almost. They were closing the restaurant for two days, one for the decorators to set it all up and one for the reception itself, and the hotel was booked solid for the guests. So even though he was having a hard time, he was making a fortune and couldn’t really gripe. Plus, none of us was sorry to see him get some of the misery and blame he dished out back. (That’s called “karma”, aka “you get what you deserve”!)
But here’s the thing. If the wedding was bringing any happiness and joy to the bride-to-be, she was making sure no one knew that but her. She was the one making all the decisions, but a day (if not less) after she made one, she didn’t like it any more. Change this. Change that. I hate this. I hate that. We can’t possibly serve chicken… (Or beef, or cheese, or potatoes, or lettuce. You can pretty much insert any food you can think of here.) Why can’t you people get anything right? What’s so difficult about following my instructions? She was on the phone at least twice a day (we always knew it was her, her voice really carried!) Sometimes she rang so often that Mr Schonblatt made one of us answer to tell her he wasn’t there, and we actually did it. The days she didn’t call up, she came in (stomped in, really, but very elegantly, and always in designer shoes), her mother in tow. (Two very sophisticated-looking and expensively dressed women who may not have been born with silver spoons in their mouths but absolutely ate with them.) Isn’t that true, Mother? Don’t you think so, Mother? My mother agrees. My mother thinks so, too. Mrs Bagley was the senseless victim here. She may have been wearing enough gold and diamonds to pay a ransom, but if you asked me she was a little downtrodden. All she ever did was smile and agree (kind of like the way a chameleon changes colour to protect itself from predators). All the bride-to-be ever did was shout or burst into tears. But I still had more sympathy for her than for Mr Schonblatt. I figured it was all the pressure and stress and pre-wedding nerves. Even if it was pretty exhausting for everybody else.
“I know Mr Schonblatt’s going to wring every ounce of misery out of it that he can,” I said to Loretta, “but I’m really glad I’m working the reception.” (I was really glad Loretta was working it, too, but that was because I wanted her to have the full Schonblatt experience. Then she’d really know what it’s like to be me!)
Loretta had wads of cotton between her toes and was holding the polish in one hand and the brush in the other. She looked up. “Why’s that?”
“Why’s that? Seriously? Because I’ve only been to one wedding in my life and that was in a yurt. This is a real fairy-tale wedding. It’s going to be awesome.” The flowers alone cost thousands. I couldn’t even imagine what everything else cost…
“A fairy-tale wedding?” Loretta put down the polish like she was stabbing something with a knife. “Is this the fairy-tale where the princess gets locked in the tower?”
“No, Loretta. It’s the fairy tale where everybody lives happily ever after.”
It was a full sixty seconds before she stopped laughing. (I know this because I was looking at her antique alarm clock so I didn’t have to look at her while she was impersonating a gang of hyenas.)
“Oh, give me a break, Zi. You know that isn’t true. Most marriages are just as likely to end in divorce as not.”
“Everybody wants to get married, Loretta.”
“No they don’t. I don’t.”
She’d said this before (she’s said everything before) but I thought she was just being Loretta (you know, difficult for the hell of it). This time, I believed her. She had that you’ll-never-open-this-lock look on her face.
“How come? Because you figure no one will ever a
sk you?” Who would have the nerve?
She put the brush into the polish bottle and set her face for lecture. “Because historically, Giselle, marriage has been used to oppress and control women. To treat them like property. Like they’re a bed or a horse. And that’s all so the man has some guarantee that the children his wife has are actually his.”
I said that was pretty cynical.
“I am or they are?” Loretta said that’s why she believes in matriarchy. “You always know who your mother is. It makes so much more sense.”
“Well, I think you’re wrong. I don’t think marriage is about oppression. I think it’s about love. Love and commitment and making a life together.”
“Love! You don’t need to get married to love someone or to be committed and build a life together.”
“Maybe not, but then you miss out on the wedding. Come on, even you have to admit there’s nothing like a wedding. Queen for a day.”
“Serf for a lifetime,” said Loretta. “Besides which, it’s just a big party that costs a fortune and usually ends in somebody’s tears.”
“Then I don’t know why you took the job if you think weddings are such a joke. Surely you’re demolishing a couple of your precious principles here.”
“Mostly, I took it for the money. The pay’s good, and there’s a solid chance we’ll all get a nice tip if no one sets the bride on fire or knocks over the cake.”
Quel negative attitude, or what?
“That and Gabriel Schwartz. If Gabe is there, I’ll finally have a chance to talk to him.”
“You see?” I said. “Deep down, you are a romantic.”
“It’s not romance,” said Loretta. “It’s biology.”
Like I said, I was glad Loretta was working the Bagley-Schreiber reception with me, even though she was her usual major monsoon trying to wash out my parade about it. (I told her to remind me not to ask her to be my bridesmaid, and she said she would.) But I wasn’t going to let her negativity throw even a tiny cloud over me. I was excited and I was staying excited. Plus, I guess I secretly hoped that once she saw what a real wedding’s like (it’s all civil ceremonies and a takeaway in her family), she’d change her mind about marriage being just another thing invented by some man to enslave women and ruin their lives (and about weddings being just a waste of a lot of money).
I was determined that the Bagley-Schreiber wedding was going to be the wedding you dream about from when you’re little. Maybe the bride wasn’t a princess and the groom wasn’t a prince, but you can’t have everything. And anyway, it was going to be almost as good as. The bride was going to be beautiful. The groom was going to be handsome. The guests were going to be glamorous. And my faith in romance and love would be restored. I was counting the days.
If I’d known what was going to happen, I might have stopped before I started.
Loretta
One girl’s dream-come-true is another’s giant monster crushing everything in its path
By the time the Bagley-Schreiber wedding was looming over the horizon, shadowing everything around it like a berserk, giant monster set on destroying the world, I was already tired of it. And I didn’t even work at the Inn, which meant I wasn’t having it shoved in my face every day. I might have been tempted to back out at the last minute, but ZiZi found out for certain that Gabriel would be working in the kitchen; faint heart never won attractive astronomer.
Everything I heard about the wedding – which was a lot – I heard secondhand. Secondhand and through the deep pink, bubble-filled filter of ZiZi’s enthusiasm. I said I hadn’t realized she was such a fan of antiquated, oppressive institutions. She said what she is a fan of is romance and love; and that if she couldn’t have romance and love for herself because Dillon Blackstock went to live in a tent, then she’d have it through the Bagley-Shreibers. “Just wait,” said ZiZi. “You’ll see. Even you’re going to have to admit it’s like a dream come true.”
File under the heading: Famous last words.
It was an afternoon wedding, and the reception didn’t start until five, but, of course, we had to report for duty hours earlier. Since it was the kind of wedding where nothing was left to chance – if they could have controlled the weather, they would have – professional wedding designers had done the decorations, but there were still tables to lay, two marquees as well as chairs and tables to set up in the garden and Mr Schonblatt’s drill to go over and over again.
It was the hottest day of the Summer so far, thick and muggy; the sun so strong that the air was almost liquid, making everything appear slightly warped – as if you were looking through a bubble.
“What’d I tell you?” ZiZi was ecstatic. “Ohmygod, it’s a totally perfect, gorgeous day!”
I ran a handkerchief over my forehead. “Except for the part where the air is wet.”
The slightest exertion – for instance, breathing or moving one foot after the other – made you sweat and want to sit down.
“People in love don’t care about humidity,” said ZiZi.
I flung myself into the air-conditioned car as if it was a mountain pool. “But people hauling trays of food do.”
The first thing I noticed when we got to the Inn was that if it had been a country it would have been on red alert with soldiers at every airport and train and bus station, and a police presence on every street. Everybody seemed to be running in circles, and Mr Schonblatt was dashing from one place to another, shouting and looking distraught.
Of course, that wasn’t what ZiZi noticed.
“Ohmygod, will you look at it! It’s totally awesome!”
It may have been Summer in the Sahara outside, but inside it was more like a snow palace – and not just because of the air conditioning, which felt as if it was cranked up as high as it would go. Everything was white and silver. Tiny white star and heart lights criss-crossed the ceiling and framed the windows; there were white and silver flowers at every table.
“But this isn’t all,” gushed ZiZi. “There’s going to be this amazing ice sculpture in the shape of a swan in the centre of the room.”
I said I could hardly wait.
Mr Schonblatt had a clipboard with all his notes on it, and he marched around the dining room and the terrace barking orders as if he was a general about to launch an invasion. We had to set the tables three times because there was always something not quite right. We had to hear again the sequence of events – drinks and photographs, dinner and speeches, dancing to live music more or less under the stars. He reminded us several times that we were to think of ourselves as ghosts, neither seen nor heard but always present.
At the point where there was so much tension in the restaurant that if we’d been a bottle of champagne we would have popped our cork, the wedding party and the guests finally began to arrive.
ZiZi and I stood side by side at a window, watching the cars pull into the parking area.
“Look at her,” whispered ZiZi as the bride and groom got out of their limo. He climbing gracefully out of the car; she fighting her dress, which seemed to want to stay where it was. “Tell me she doesn’t look like she stepped out of a fairy tale.”
“She’s lucky if she’s able to step out of the car.”
What the bride looked like mostly was a cream puff – one with mobility issues – and the groom looked like he was either a very upmarket mortician or in a clothing ad, but I had no chance to say anything because Mr Schonblatt clicked into gear right then and sent us all scattering like confetti being thrown at a bride and groom.
Two waitresses who the gods called lucky were sent to cover the garden – Claire and me. The garden was where the pre-dinner drinks and canapés were being served while the bridal party was having their photographs taken. Two marquees had been erected at the far end of the lawn – the larger one for the band and the dancing, the smaller one as an outdoor bar.
Mr Schonblatt might as well have sent us to hell, it was so hot outside. I looked back with longing at the Inn, which shimmered mirag
e-like under the broiling sun. Inside, it was cool and shady; inside, was the kitchen.
“Put a smile on your face and hope for the best,” whispered Claire. “Here they come.”
I turned. Surging towards us was a kaleidoscopic wave – a tsunami, really – of guests. There were so many, I couldn’t believe they were all friends and family – some of them had to be strangers they’d picked up along the way or hired for the occasion. I put a smile on my face, and stepped forward bravely with my tray.
“Here they come” was the last thing Claire said to me for the next two hours – and more or less the last thing I heard besides the voices of the celebrants. After that, it was serve tray, load tray, smile, smile, smile. Besides serving and smiling, we were responsible for the general happiness and well-being of everyone in the garden. If a guest wanted ice, you had to get it. If you were offering a tray of caviar but a guest wanted “another of those cheese things”, you had to scuttle off and get it. If someone wanted a coffee rather than a drink or needed tissues or had a bottle for baby that needed to be warmed, the smiling waitress was given the job. If they’d wanted a cup of water drawn from a distant mountain stream, that would have been our job, as well. We could have used Segways.
As involved as they were with themselves and the happy couple, the guests still found time to ask a lot of questions. Is there anything that’s gluten free? Do you know if this has nuts in it? Is this organic? I don’t really eat dairy, does this contain butter or milk? What is this? What’s in that? What happened to the shrimp? Aren’t there any restrooms outside? Are you bringing some chairs down to the lawn?
Within minutes, every nerve I have was tingling, but I was strong; determined. I channelled ZiZi. Her words ran through my head like a mantra: You have to think of being a cute girl as your lever… You have to think of being a cute girl as your lever… You have to think of being a cute girl as your lever… I was such a cute girl I could’ve moved a mountain. I smiled. I was helpful and eager to please. I was pleasantness with a tray of avocado and salmon on rye. It wasn’t just the men who thanked me and smiled back.
