“Sure thing, boss,” Jolene agreed, and she reached over to squeeze my hand. “I can’t believe you’re getting married!”
“Me neither.” I shook my head. “All of this, it’s so much.”
“Yeah, but on the day, you won’t have to worry about a thing, and it’s all going to be perfect,” she reminded me. “Better a little stress now than a lot of stress on the day, right?”
“Right.” I nodded. “You’re right. I just don’t think I’ve ever had to consider the color of napkins before in my life.”
“All right, so that’s the flowers booked in.” Nonna reappeared next to us, placing the phone she’d been using on the table. She ran her hands through her hair, and for a moment, she looked as human as the rest of us all sitting around that table, working our butts off as though our lives depended on it.
“If you want to take a break—” I suggested to her gently, but she shook her head at once, not buying it for a second.
“I don’t want to,” she replied firmly. “I want to make sure this thing is finished once and for all by the time I walk out of here.”
“All right.” I grinned to myself. She reminded me of myself in some ways. Even if I would never have been so blunt and straightforward about what I wanted and how I was going to get it, both of us locked onto a goal and stuck with it no matter what. Maybe that’s why we’d always gotten on so well.
Kristo drifted in and out, bringing us coffee and food where he could. I was still feeling a little under the weather, but I had been chugging a bunch of that apparently magical tea, and it was more or less keeping me on my feet. Besides, with the buzz of having everyone around, everyone focused on helping me get this damn wedding off the ground, I couldn’t let any of them down. As though realizing this, the baby seemed to decide to give me some respite, for the time being, a break from the nausea that had been plaguing me, and before I knew it, we had put together the most spectacular wedding I had ever heard of in my life.
“Okay, so let me run through it from the top.” I clapped my hands together once I had everyone in front of me. Like me, they all looked a little ragged around the edges but kind of energized, too, like they could have spent another hour on the phone talking about the color of the flowers we were going to have at the ceremony versus those we were going to have at the reception.
“The wedding takes place in Nonna’s back garden.” I pointed to Kristo’s grandmother, who smiled sweetly.
“And I’m going to get the gardeners through next week to make sure the place looks perfect,” she assured me as though it wasn’t already the most gorgeous garden I’d ever seen one person own in my life.
“Right.” I smiled. “And we perform the ceremony with a nondenominational priest—thank you, Darla—in front of a small seated crowd and under an arch surrounded by lilies.”
“White and pink,” Jolene piped in as though the difference was vital to the success of the day. I winked at her in acknowledgment.
“Of course,” I agreed. “And then, when the ceremony’s done, we’ll cater the reception in the pavilion area.”
“I still think you should have let me cook the food,” Nonna muttered, and I shot her a look. We had been having this conversation on and off all day, and there was no way in hell I was lumping a woman of her age with the catering for an entire wedding, no matter how much I enjoyed what she had to make.
“Maybe another time, huh?” I soothed her. “And from there, the classic swing band plays for the first hour, and then we just go to regular music for the rest of the night?”
“That sounds right to me.” Cleo nodded, and I noticed that she and Darla were holding hands beneath the table. It was so cute, it made my heart ache a little. They had spent the whole day running off together, just the two of them, like they couldn’t wait to be all by themselves. But they had been the ones who had pulled enough strings to get me this amazing swing band to play the reception, Cleo’s socialite connections coming in handy, and I was so grateful to them for all their hard work.
“And the napkins will be eggshell-colored,” Darla finished up for me. “Which I feel is the most important thing.”
“And what about the dress fittings?” Jolene asked excitedly. She had pulled out a selection of a dozen dresses from various magazines, and I had made phone calls to salons across the city to see which ones they all had in. I had narrowed it down to three favorites, and I was going to try them on at some point in the next week.
“You’ll be right there with me,” I promised her. “And I’m going to need your brutally honest opinion so I don’t look like a meringue on the wedding day, all right?”
“Anything you need.” She flashed me a grin, and I knew she was looking forward to playing arbiter of my fashion sense.
“I think that’s it. We’re done,” I sighed deeply, and I felt this swell of relief rush over me. And gratitude too. I couldn’t have gotten a job of this magnitude finished without all of them surrounding me, and I was more grateful to them than I could possibly express.
“Thank you so much for all your help,” I told everyone, covering my mouth as I yawned. “And I’ll be sure to thank you properly once I’ve actually had some sleep.”
We bid goodbye to everyone, and Kristo emerged from the kitchen with some light nibbles and some water. I ate happily, and Jolene made her way off to bed.
“So, our wedding is actually happening, then?” Kristo remarked, sitting opposite me at the dining table and glancing around the near-bombsite of fabric swatches and dress pictures. I nodded.
“Too late to back out now,” I teased him. “No time for cold feet, all right?”
“As if.” He shook his head, and he planted a kiss on my temple. “Come on, let’s get you to bed. You’ve had a hell of a day, and you could probably use some sleep.”
“Whatever you say, boss.” I yawned, and he guided me to my feet and then through to bed. And as I lay there, eyes already drifting shut, I couldn’t keep the smile off my face as I realized that my wedding was really, truly happening. Soon enough, I would be bonded to this man, to this family, for life.