Page 11 of To Have and to Scold

See? Guardian angels making sure kids aren’t named truly embarrassing names do exist!

So, yes. My totally sane, successful, and brilliant attorney mother loses all common sense in pregnancy and my father (also a top-notch tax attorney) loves her too much in her postnatal, tender state to argue with her.

“Oh! Well, I think it’s a nice name,” the front desk woman says, who, according to the placard on the desk, is named a very lovely “Mary.”

“Thank you.”

“When Mayor Dobbs sent over your info, we assumed you were a man, that’s all.” Her smile falters a little as her gaze dips down to take me in all my petite glory.

My tongue darts out to moisten my lips. “Not the first time that’s happened.”

“It’s not a big deal of course,” Mary says warmly.

“So, you all were talking about me, huh?” I lean in and tilt my head conspiratorially.

“We don’t get many new hires. Especially ones from out of state like this. It’s been kind of exciting.”

“Well, I hope to live up to the hype!”

Mary beams. “You’ll love Mayor Dobbs. She should be coming by later, but she wanted me to get you started. Now that she’s subleasing offices here in our building, I’m working as her receptionist, too.” She tells me where my new office is, pointing down the hall. I heft my laptop bag higher on my shoulder and find it. The door is already open, so I enter and set my stuff down on the desk.

It’s sufficient. Small. There’s not room for very many vendor samples to be stored here, which is a bit of a disappointment. Hopefully the new venue that will house the weddings will have some storage space. I crack the window to clear out some of the stuffiness. I can’t wait to start bringing in things to decorate.

The importance of setting the tone of my services as a wedding planner can’t be overstated. If my clients can see I have good taste in office décor, they’ll hopefully trust me to put together a beautiful wedding.

And I know how to put together a beautiful wedding, let me tell you.

It’s not long before Mary knocks on my open door with an exaggerated “Knock, knock!”

She’s grinning ear to ear, her thick, silvery hair beginning to fall out of her low clip. “How do you like your new space? Walter, who was a foreman on Beck’s crew before he retired, sort of trashed it in all the years he was here. Don’t know what the man even did in here half the time.” She pinches the bridge of her nose.

Mary takes a delighted-sounding breath and continues on. “You’re coming on board at the beginning. Mayor Dobbs purchased Willow Wood Mansion not long ago. In addition to restoring one of our town’s historic treasures and something that had been in her family years ago, the mayor thought she could make some money renting it out. Weddings are a big business.”

“They certainly are.” The entire Amore Wedding Planning Firm in Atlanta, Georgia makes very good revenue off that fact.

“The mayor knows it’s a long-term investment, but I’m confident with your help and Beck’s reno job, we’ll get there,” Mary says.

Beck Billingsley. Shoshana mentioned his name when she talked about the mansion renovation.

I’m not going to be here long term, but if Mayor Dobbs lets Shoshana know that I did a good job, I can get back to Atlanta andThe Plan.

“Thanks, Mary. But I was under the impression that the wedding venue was nearly ready to go.”

She laughs, crinkling up her nose. “Whoever told you that? There have been issues with everything. And Beck had an unfortunate personal experience a few months back, so the mayor’s been understanding about the progress being a little slow.”

“I…” I trail off. Did I assume the mansion would be ready since, according to one of the emails from the mayor, the first wedding of the season is in four weeks?

And who is this Beck and what happened in his personal life?

All that’s of little consequence right now.

“Before Mayor Dobbs bought Willow Wood, the old mansion wasn’t in good condition.” She shakes her head. “Beck and his guys have been working hard on it. They’re busy, though. Lots of big projects going on around town, plus they’ve submitted a bid to build a fabulous new wing of the YMCA. It’s going to be something else! They even want to do the labor for free and donate some of the supplies. Fingers crossed they win the bid.”

She’s saying lots of important sounding things, but I’m still hung up on the mansion not being ready.

“And,” Mary continues, “we’ve got you now. A real, big-city wedding planner with great experience.” The hope in her eyes gets me right in the gut.

I thank her, my mind going a hundred different directions.

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