Page 72 of Just Say Christmas
After she finished the centerpieces, hopefully by four o’clock, it would be the bouquets for the rooms. She’d designed them already, and she’d be tweaking the design more when she prepared them. The bridal bouquet, too, which was going to be gorgeous. Six hours allocated for all that, and tomorrow morning, starting at five o’clock again, she’d do the prep on the flowers for the arbor and the rest of the marquee décor, load everything up, and drive it three hours north to the venue. She’d be there by one and move fast, so the flowers were in the rooms and any final tweaking done by the time the guests arrived. Rhys was going to put the trailer on the van for her. He’d fill the van with gas, too, and he’d help load it up and then take the kids to her parents’ before he followed her up there.
All of that worked. All of it was awesome. She’d be working until ten again on Saturday night, and be up early again on Sunday morning, too, but that was all right. Arbors could be tricky and time-intensive, and Nyree’s bouquet was a challenging one, but that was why she’d chosen palm leaves for some of the arbor greenery. You got a spectacular result without endless fiddling.
She had music on, the peppy kind that helped you work, but Casey’s words from the night before resonated in her head all the same.
She’s going to help me plan for my wedding someday when I get married, too, because she’s very good at making things pretty, like Auntie Zora, but she has time, and Auntie Zora doesn’t have time.
What did it say that your own child—because Caseywasher child now—couldn’t count on you to help with her wedding?
She’d been a single mum too long, maybe, and a might-as-well-be-single mum for too long before that. You didn’t get a choice when you were a single mum. You did what you had to do. If you had to be ruthless about separating necessities from luxuries, and if those luxuries included the time to help out on a school trip or visits to the beach? That was how it was, and you changed your definition of “quality time” to include “time spent stripping leaves from flowers” and “time spent folding the washing.”
She wasn’t a single mum now, though, and every time she thought of Casey’s words, she wanted to cry. She’d built her business from absolutely nothing, and it felt good to know that every year, she got better at it. She loved flowers, she loved expressing herself with them, and she loved that she could brighten somebody’s day just by turning up with a bouquet.
On the other hand, she kept getting a pinched nerve in her shoulder that stabbed like a knife, her feet hurt, and she’d done just about nothing to prepare for Christmas, outside of that one outing to shop for decorations, and Christmas happened to be in exactly one week. Her emotions veered between “weepy” and “panic,” and her balance was very nearly gone.
She needed an assistant. Clearly, she needed an assistant, one who had a driving license and wasn’t nine years old, and never mind that you’d have topayan assistant whether you had weddings that week or not.
Her phone rang, and she thought,No. I can’t. No,then looked at the screen anyway, because of course she could.
Brilliant. She put herself intoHelpful-but-firmly-calm-to-bridesmode, pressed the button, and put it the phone on speaker. “Hi, Nyree. What can I do for you?”
“There’s been a hiccup,” Nyree said. “Well, more than a hiccup, but we’ve got an alternative.”
Zora thought,No. No. I can’t.She had a palm against the table and was taking some more breaths. “Right,” she said, forcing her hands to get busy again. “Tell me.”
“We’re not having the wedding at Kauri Cliffs,” Nyree said. “Marko’s grandmother’s ill, so we’re doing a much smaller thing in Tekapo.”
Thud.That was Zora’s heart. “Oh.”
“We’re doing it the same day,” Nyree said, as if it mattered. “Sunday, three o’clock. We’re about to leave for the airport now, in fact.”
Zora started in again arranging purple ranunculus, clematis, and lilac, the sure movement of her fingers bringing her to something like calm, or at least something better. “I’m sorry to hear that,” she said, keeping her voice low. Keeping it steady. “I do have to say, though, that I’ve purchased the flowers and done most of the work already, so a refund’s out, I’m afraid.” Anthurium was incredibly expensive, but Nyree had loved the idea, and ithadbeenWoman’s World,so she’d done it anyway.
Rhys wasMarko’s coach. They wouldn’t stiff her on the final bill, surely.Surely.
Also, she wasn’t going to be delivering this bouquet. Why was she working on it?
“I know that, of course,” Nyree said, and Zora’s heart started beating again. “It’s a thing. Buried cost, or something. That you’ve already spent the money anyway, so it’s dead, and there’s no point letting it influence your decision going forward. Isaiah probably knows all about it. We’re trying to look at it like that. Marko loves his grandmother, and life happens, eh.”
“Yes,” Zora said. “It does.” Now that she wasn’t going to be doing her arbor or decorating her marquee, she got a pang for all of it. No satisfying her, apparently.
“I was wondering, though,” Nyree said, “if you and Rhys would still come, and if you’d still do the flowers. I realize it’s Tekapo, and it’s a much longer journey, and obviously we’d reimburse you for the extra expense. We wouldn’t be doing the centerpieces or the guest room bouquets, as it’s going to have to be a casual thing. I’m not even sure where our few guests are going to be sleeping on Sunday night, which means I’m not sure where we’d put you up, except that it’s not likely to be very flash. Tents have been mentioned. I’m also not sure how you get flowers onto a plane, but . . . if there’s any way? I tried to pare it down to the essentials,” she hurried on, “but having a bouquet to hold, and something beautiful to stand next to while we’re doing the vows, even if it’s just a couple more vases of flowers, feels important, and you do them better than anyone I’ve ever seen. Also, Marko would really like Rhys to be there, and you know . . . Luke is bringing Hayden, and I don’t expect that to go well with my stepfather. At all. I think Luke could use the support, if Rhys could do it. Rhys is one of the few people who might make an impression on Grant. Victoria and Kane are in a bit of their own world just now, Vic never notices anything anyway, and I’ll be getting married. I’m worried I’ll miss something happening, and besides—Luke deserves good things. He doesn’t deserve what he’s going to cop from his dad, and if this is being a Bridezilla, I’m going to be one and say that I don’t want somebody I love going through that kind of pain at my wedding.”
“Rhys would be supportive,” Zora said when Nyree finally ran down as if she’d geared herself up to ask for this. “Heissupportive. He likes Luke.” And then there was the look on Hayden’s face last night. He’d come out to their parents all the way back in high school, and it had been awful. She still remembered the sick feeling in her stomach from that night. Their dad had been furious, and their mum had been despairing. Since then, he’d been the same Hayden, quick with a joke, laughing it off, keeping it quiet. If something hurt, you never knew it. What would it be like, though, to come alone to every family event? To feel like you’d always have to?
All of that was why she needed to do it. Three more days, that was all. And sorting out what to do with all these hundreds of gorgeous flowers that she didn’t need.
Three more days. And then Christmas.
“I can help you,” she decided. “With the flowers.Someof the flowers. I can make it work. Chilly bins, that’s all. I’ll ring the airline and ask. And I know Rhys will want to come, too.”
“Oh, good,” Nyree said on a breath. “I just had to sit down, I’m so relieved.Thankyou. Now all I have to do is find a wedding celebrant. In Tekapo. In two days. Who’s not too fussy. Easy-peasy.”
36
Promise of a Day
Sunday,December 20
