The Bastard Takes a Wife (4 page)

Adele nodded. She appeared a little relieved.
“Of course. You know, you should think about moving back in until
the wedding. I know you love Sam but that flat is far too small for
a couple. Besides, if you’re here, consulting on the wedding
planning will be so much easier.”

I tried not to wince. Apart from the fact
that I was no longer their nanny, the wedding was the exact reason
I’d decided to move in with Sam. I didn’t want to be consulted
every minute of the day.

“Who are those people?” I asked, evading the
question.

A band of fire-eaters, jugglers and men on
stilts had appeared on the lawn and seemed to be getting ready to
perform.

“The entertainment. Angus suggested them.
They’re going to serve the canapés and then do tricks by the pool
for an hour or so until everyone is here. I’ve never seen it done
at a party before.”

There could be good reason for that.

“Why didn’t you ask me if I wanted them?”

“You were busy with the bridesmaids
dresses.”

I could feel my body tensing. “This is
getting out of hand. I mean, I’m not being ungrateful but Sam and I
wanted a small celebration, not …” I waved my hand around the lawn,
“….not this. Look, if I move back in will you promise not to make
any more decisions without me?”

“Well,
erm
, yes, of course.” Adele’s
face broke into a nervous smile.

“You haven’t ordered any other entertainment
I should know about, have you?”

“I wouldn’t count that
Australia’s Got
Talent
child singing the theme song from ‘
Romeo and
Juliet’
entertainment. More of surprise Engagement gift.”

Oh God. Sam was going to freak.

“Right,” I said. “I’d best go and start
getting ready.” And warn Sam to smile and play nice. He loathed
Australia’s Got Talent
only slightly less than he did the
remake of
Romeo and Juliet
which he’d deemed ‘bloody
ridiculous’ declaring it was ‘two hours of his life he’d never get
back’ after I made him watch it with me. There was no way he’d be
able to keep his mouth shut about it if I didn’t prep him
first.

“Millie! Woohoo!” Paige came flying into the
room, curls springing free of her pigtails, her new Justin Bieber
t-shirt displayed proudly on her chest.

“So you went to the concert?” I asked,
bending down to give her a huge hug.

“Mrs Brayshaw-Jones took us for Jennifer’s
birthday. And instead of party bags we got these.” She pulled at
the bottom of her t-shirt to allow me to admire it. “He’s so hot,”
she sighed.

“Paige. Language,” Adele admonished.

Paige ignored her mother’s stony glare. “Did
you bring your party dress, Millie? Mine’s upstairs. It’s very
pretty.”

“Yes,” I said as I swung her around in
circles.

“Great. Can we get ready together?” she
puffed.

“Sure. I might need a little longer than you
though. I have to put my makeup on.”

“Well, don’t wear too much. You don’t want to
look Mrs. Jennings over the way. Mummy said Mrs. Jennings wears so
much makeup she’d need a shovel to put it on. I think needs it to
hide her wrinkles but it doesn’t work.”

I ignored the statement and swung her harder.
At last, she begged me to stop and so, coming to a halt, I put her
down. She wobbled, attempting to right herself. Her cherub face
looked up at me with a wide smile. “That was fun.”

“
Mmm
. Would you like a drink? I’m
getting one.”

I took Paige’s hand and we strolled to the
bar, where one of the catering crew was busy unpacking supplies for
the evening ahead. I took a small bottle of water from the fridge
and poured a glass each for Paige and myself.

“Your hair is getting very long,” I remarked,
as Paige and I walked to a sofa. I sat and Paige perched herself on
the arm next to me, leaning into my shoulder. “Do you want me to
take you to Paolo’s for a trim next week? I’m going to have
one.”

Paige shook her head. “No. I’m growing it for
the wedding. Jennifer had long hair when she was a flower girl and
I want mine to be longer.”

“What if you wear it up? People won’t know
how long it is if you have it up.”

“Will the other girls have their hair up,
too?”

“We haven’t decided yet, but possibly. And
tiaras look nice when you have your hair up.”

Paige shrugged. “Guess I’ll go with the flow,
then. Don’t want to upset the apple cart.” She jumped down from her
position, handed me her empty glass and ran out of the room.

“Honestly, that child,” Adele muttered, as
she walked past. “’Go with the flow.’ Does she think we’re hippies?
What are they teaching her at that school?”

“I think they’re doing a unit on
colloquialisms,” I replied.

“Ridiculous rubbish. She’d be far better
learning the times tables.”

“At least she’s not saying ‘skanky’ any
more.”

“That’s one small blessing, ” Adele replied.
She stopped at the bar where the caterer had left a pile of
unopened cartons, filled with every nameable alcoholic beverage.
“Now, where did that boy put the Moet? If that’s not chilled to
perfection, it tastes like cat’s piss.”

I laughed, thinking that sometimes Adele
could do with some language lessons. She and Paige were more alike
than she cared to admit.

*****

By seven-thirty that evening the outdoor area
was teeming with people. The carefully placed fairy lights twinkled
around the garden and the pool was lit up with floating candles.
Strings of white ball shaped lanterns marked the perimetre of the
garden. In the marquee down on the lawn, the circus performers were
serving hors d'oeuvres of smoked salmon, caviar and oysters along
with bite sized sausage rolls and party pies. Adele had almost
given birth to kittens when I asked to have them included on the
menu. Apparently, things wrapped in pastry were only for people who
didn’t care about their reputation. I knew twenty or so boys who
were attending the party that didn’t give a fig for reputation and
as I watched them from the window in Paige’s room, they were
emptying those particular trays faster than they could appear from
the kitchen.

“Time to meet and greet,” I said, taking
Paige’s hand.

“Where’s Sam? We can’t go without him.”

“He’s getting changed. He should be ready in
a minute.”

“Will he be wearing his clown suit? Clowns
are fun at parties.”

I smiled down at her and we headed for the
door. “Let’s hope not. There’s enough clowns at this party already.
Let’s go see, shall we?”

We headed out the door and along the corridor
to the guest room. Sam was coming towards us, looking very handsome
in a pair of charcoal trousers and a crisp white open neck shirt.
His dark hair was gleaming under the hall light and I was reminded
of the first time I went out with him ~ the day at the rugby club
when he told me he wanted to kiss me. A surge of warmth enveloped
me and I greeted him with a huge smile.

“You scrub up okay.”

“You don’t look too bad either,” he replied,
as he stepped forward and put his lips to mine. Then his head
tilted to the small person beside me. “And Miss Paige, you can’t
possibly get any prettier. I think I’ll have to keep an eye on you.
The boys are going to be chasing you down the street before
long.”

“I don’t care what they do. I have ‘Bieber
Fever’.”

“Oh?”

“Paige went to see Justin Bieber last night,”
I explained.

“And he was good I take it?”

Paige’s face was filled with the type of
unrequited adoration I used to feel for houses by the beach.
“Freakin’ awesome. But don’t tell Mummy. She hates it when I say
that.”

Sam locked my arm through his and took
Paige’s hand in his other. “Right. Well let’s get this party
started. I’ve got my two best girls… Time for action.”

*****

Outside by the pool, Sam and I wandered hand
in hand through the crowd greeting our guests and thanking them for
coming. We stopped to talk to Johnny and Mel, who had arrived
together, much to our surprise.

“Don’t go reading anything into this,” Johnny
warned us. “We were at a Law Society lunch and thought it’d be
easier than getting two taxis.”

“Besides, I had to save the degenerate
bastard from making a fool of himself,” Mel added. “He was about to
invite the Hon. Maria Jankovich to be his bloody date. God help me,
I’d rather slit my fucking wrists than have to listen to her spew
her ‘green’ policies at us all night.”

“She’s a very intelligent woman, Mel.”

“She’s a fucking idiot and we both know it.
And she looks like a horse. You were only after a shag. ”

Sam and I grinned at each other and left them
to it. Nothing had changed.

We skirted the edges of the paved area and
stopped to receive last minute instructions from Angus. He was
wearing a pastel pink checked bow tie that matched the colour of
the floral arrangements and a pair of casual pants in cream with a
shirt of the same colour. His neutral pink lipgloss glowed in the
early evening light. His hair was immaculate, as usual, and from
his left ear, he sported a headset into which he stopped every
thirty seconds and barked a soft but firm orders using code names
such as Mother Goose and Georgie Porgie. It was easy to see why he
was regarded as the best in his field. He had this party running
like clockwork.

“Good. You’re here,” he said with a glance at
his watch that signified we were ten seconds late. “Now. You have
ten minutes to do the introductions with Sam’s parents and then
we’ll go to other important guests. At eight we’ll have official
photos and then at eight thirty, cake cutting followed by speeches
and gift opening.”

“Isn’t it a little rude to be opening gifts
in front of the guests?”

“Oh, you’re not doing that, I have you and
Sam scheduled for a spotlight dance then.”

“A what!!!?” Sam looked appalled. Every one
knew he didn’t dance unless he’d had at least two bottles of red
wine beforehand.

“You and Millie will be treading the boards
followed by the family members while the bridesmaids and Paige are
opening gifts and making notes on the cards as to who sent what.
Sasha will be supervising. Seeing as she’s been a bridesmaid eight
times, I thought it prudent to let her guide the other girls.”

Sam held up a hand. “Just back it up there,
Angus. There won’t be any spotlight dances. I don’t dance.”

“It’s true,” I acknowledged. “In fact, I
can’t remember the last time Sam danced. He hates dancing.”

Angus’s face collapsed. “I suppose I should
have checked. I assumed that like all couples, you’d be doing the
dance.”

Sam seemed to relax. “I think it’d be safer
if you don’t assume in the future. But it’s okay. All’s not lost.
I’ve got a few backups here. They love to dance.”

Now Angus looked bewildered.

“My mates from the Reserves team. I pay them
to dance with Millie so I don’t have to.”

“You what?” It was my turn to look
appalled.

“I thought you knew.”

I’d always harboured the assumption the boys
danced with me because they liked me, or dancing, or both. “I
didn’t. And you can’t ask Woody to stand in at our Engagement
party. People will wonder what’s going on.”

“It would be inappropriate,” Angus
confirmed.

“What about Johnny, then? He’s Best Man?”

Oh God.

“NO!”

“So I have to dance?”

“Yes.” Sam may have paid people in the past
but now he was going to pay. I rubbed his forearm in a
pseudo-sympathetic manner. “Just think of it as Strippers Night at
the club. You danced with a pole then.”

Angus coughed. “I think, in this scenario, if
that’s what gets you through Sam, do it. Either that, or I can give
you a Xanax.”

Sam was stony. “I think I can cope. Thank
you.”

Crisis averted, Angus consulted his
clipboard. “So, after the dance, you have half an hour scheduled to
do another round of social chitchat with the VIP guests. We need to
get a few informal shots for the social pages of
The West
at
some stage. Then your evening is yours.”

The evening was ours? It’d be over by then.
All I’d wanted was a nice, simple informal party with some friends
and family. Instead I’d ended up with a re-enactment of every
horrendous wedding movie ever made. A couple of wedding crashers
and an ice sculpture would complete the picture. Desperate, I
looked around for a waiter-slash-circus person.

“Someone get me a champagne please. I think I
need a drink.”

“Just bring the bottle,” Sam called.

Angus seemed happy. “Good idea. Calm the
nerves. Then we’ll go and meet the parents.”

God help me, lets hope that wasn’t going to
be like the movie.

*****

Sam’s parents, Kent and Patricia, and his
twin sister, Amanda, were standing on the lower terrace between the
pool and the gardenia hedging. Angus had placed them there in order
to catch the light from the setting sun. He wanted the staged
photos to look as informal as to be real, so he’d given them
specific instructions not to move.

Patricia didn’t look to me like the type of
woman who took instruction well. She had rather a hard face and
blonde hair that was twisted into a Margret Thatcher-esque chignon
at the back of her head, possibly to keep her wrinkles from
re-forming, though I had no doubt she employed a truckload of botox
for that very purpose. As we walked over to them, I wished I’d had
more than one glass of champagne or at least brought one with me.
Not that it would have made the short journey. My knees were
knocking so hard, I could barely walk a straight line.

Kent Brockton, though a little shorter than
Sam, was still tall, and while he appeared serious there was a hint
of the rogue hidden behind his eyes that I would have laid odds had
caused more than Patricia’s fair share of grief in their younger
days. Sam looked like an exact, albeit younger, clone. Kent’s hair
was smattered with flecks of silver. His skin was tanned and
weathered but it didn’t make him look old as it did with some,
rather it provided a perfect backdrop for his dazzling green eyes.
He would have been very handsome in his day.