Christmas Wedding (3 page)

“
OK, you and Melanie have convinced me. I am not Lifestyle material. Now come on, I’ll show you the rest of the downstairs.”

“
Ashley, I appreciate it that you permitted us bridesmaids to select our own dresses. The dress I chose suits me fine,” she said as we moved back into the reception hall. “None of that frou frou little girl stuff for me.”

We had given each bridesmaid a swatch of the color they were to wear – a bright Christmassy red – but let them choose the style that suited their figure type. Subject to Melanie’s approval, of course. She had to have the last word.

“
Remember those big tulle dresses your mother made you wear to her mock wedding to my grandfather?” Kiki reminisced.

“
How could I forget? Melanie’s was green and she said she looked like Kermit the frog. But then the wedding was cancelled because of that poor lady’s sudden death.”

“
And they never rescheduled. Granddad was heartbroken.”

“
Oh, poor man. But you mean Rhett, don’t you?” I asked, referring to the name Mama had given to Kiki’s grandfather when she met him at the Magnolia Manor Nursing Home. Mama had been besotted with Gone With the Wind.

“
He loved it that she called him Rhett. Made him feel young and dashing, he said, like Clark Gable. He adored your mother,” Kiki said with a wistful smile. “He died about six months after she did.”

I gave her a hug but my arm didn’t quite make it around her formidable girth. “I know you miss him, Kiki.”

4

Kiki brushed away a tear. “What’s back here?” she asked with false bravado.

“
This is the garden room. We modeled it after the one at Biltmore, but on a smaller scale. It’s octagonal, like theirs, but the waterway side is all glass.”

And the domed roof was made of glass too, supported by I-beam steel trusses that were then covered with oak, just as the garden room roof at the Biltmore House had been constructed.

The garden room extended out from the rear of the lodge, and through the windows there were breathtaking views of the Intracoastal Waterway, and beyond that, of Wrightsville Beach. A sleek white yacht went sailing past, bound for the Wrightsville Marina.

The waterway doesn’t change much in appearance from season to season. The live oak trees are always green, as are the magnolia trees. The sky and the water look summer-time blue even in January. And with the golden sea grasses and the colorful cottages, it could be June, not December.

“
This room is lovely, Ashley. I love the palm trees, and all those orchids. And look at this beautiful antique rattan furniture. Oh, and the three-tiered water fountain. And that darling cupid on top. Does it work?”

“
Oh, it works. We’ll have it flowing during the reception.”

“
You know, Ashley, I just might borrow this concept for the house I’m decorating for the mayor of Charlotte on Queen’s Road. Would you mind?”

Kiki’s trip to North Carolina was half-work, half-play. She’d be driving back and forth to her decorating job in Charlotte. Ray was here to play, she’d said, and he had already chartered a yacht and planned a cruise.

“
Mind?” I asked. “Why would I mind? Didn’t I borrow the idea from Richard Morris Hunt?”

“
Fair’s fair,” she said.

“
We’re going to hold the Kindness Ceremony out here during the reception,” I said.

“
What’s a Kindness Ceremony?” Kiki asked.

“
Something Melanie dreamed up. You’ll see. You’ll like it.”

Kiki rolled her big beautiful eyes. “Like I always said: That sister of yours is not just another pretty face. You know, Ray has been carrying the torch for her for the past two years. He tried dating, but he couldn’t get Melanie out of his heart. He is totally crushed that she is marrying someone else.”

Oh no, I thought to myself.

Kiki went on, “Just between you and me, I think he intends to bare his soul and ask her if she’s sure she wants to go through with her marriage to Cam. He’s just waiting for the right time to get her alone.”

“
Please don’t say that. We’re all as twitchy as cats on a porch full of rocking chairs. Are you sure?”

Kiki rolled her eyes again. “That’s what he confided on the plane ride down. Maybe he’ll see her with Cam and decide it’s hopeless for him. Maybe this is what he needs to get unstuck. I sure know why they call it being ‘stuck’ on someone. You can’t move forward, you can’t move back. You are totally stuck. But he’s my brother and I love him so I hate to see him hurting.”

“
Of course you do,” I agreed. “But, Kiki, Ray’s no ordinary man. He’s rich and successful and so handsome. He could have anyone.”

“
He don’t want ‘anyone’, kiddo. He wants what he can’t have,” Kiki said, her love for her brother shinning through. “Ain’t that always the way?”

Then she said, “Let’s change the subject. I’m looking forward to all the festivities. Who knows? I may take the plunge myself one day.”

“
Oh, is there someone special?” I asked, and hoped there was. Kiki was a great girl.

“
Not right now, but you never know. Love is just around the corner. Or staring you right in the face. You’re living proof of that, aren’t you?”

“
I am,” I said, and felt myself smile broadly.

“
Uhmmm, Kiki . . . before I drive you back to town, I was wondering . . .”

“
Spit it out, girlfriend! You can say anything to me. You oughta know that by now.”

“
Well, do you have your cards with you, by any chance?”

Kiki reared back and let out a roar of laughter. “Have you ever known me to be without my cards? ‘Course I got my cards. In my bag. You need a reading?”

“
I do, Kiki. There is something strange going on. Aunt Ruby is acting peculiar; she’s unavailable which is so unlike her. Melanie is as jumpy as a grasshopper. Cam’s mother, the incomparable Nelda Cameron, is arriving on Wednesday.”

“
I know Nelda. That’s right, she is Cam’s mother.”

“
You know Nelda?”

“
Yep. Decorated her Park Avenue apartment. Only why she wanted it redecorated beats me. The lady lives ten months out of the year in Rome.”

“
Well, Melanie is a wreck worrying about meeting her,” I said.

“
Melanie hasn’t met her yet?”

“
No,” I answered, “somehow that never happened. All pretty strange to me. Jon drove me to Lumberton and insisted I meet Granny Campbell just as soon as we became engaged. She is all he has.”

“
Oh wow, Melanie hasn’t met Nelda, huh?” For an instant she looked worried. “Well, hey, Nelda is all right. You’ve just got to know how to handle her. You know, she has spent her whole life with people kowtowing to her, so she thinks she can walk all over everyone. You’ve just got to stand up to her, that’s all. That way she’ll respect you.”

“
I’ll be sure to tell Melanie,” I said.

“
OK, babe, let me get my bag. We’ll sit out here among these gorgeous orchids and I’ll do a reading for you and see if we can’t put your mind at ease.”

“
Thanks,” I said, relieved. Kiki was the mistress of the Tarot cards. And as she was fond of saying: The cards never lie.

“
OK, you remember how we do this?” she asked after she had returned from the car with her tote bag.

“
I draw the cards,” I responded.

“
You draw ten cards from the seventy-eight. Those ten cards will represent your journey at this particular moment. The immediate situation, as well as its probable outcome, will be revealed.”

Kiki unwrapped the deck from its traditional black cloth wrapping. She spread out the cloth, shuffled the cards, then laid them face down on the table in a fan shape. “So OK now Ashley, draw ten cards.”

I selected ten cards at random, then handed them in order to Kiki who spread them in the Celtic Cross pattern on the black cloth.

Turning over the first card, Kiki said, “This first card is called the Significator. This card reflects your current situation. Aha! Now you know why I say the cards never lie. Here we have The Empress. Look at her, a beautiful earthy woman, and very pregnant.”

“
Oh, Kiki, you know how much I want children.”

“
Let’s not go jumping the gun here, kiddo. The Empress represents the Great Mother, the maternal instinct. Her appearance in the cards means that you are beginning an earthier phase of life. She portends marriage. How appropriate with your wedding just days away. Now, let’s see what is crossing the Significator, that which will be generating conflict and obstructing your destiny.”

“
Maybe it will be a blank card,” I joked.

Kiki turned over the crossing card and we both peered at the picture of yet another woman seated on a golden throne, the arms of which were engraved with golden snakes. In one hand she held a golden apple; in the other she held a golden cup.

“
The Queen of Cups,” Kiki said. “Helen of Troy. Wife of King Menelaus, whose love affair with Paris was the excuse for starting the Trojan War. I personally think she got a bum rap. Men are always blaming women when their testosterone-induced misadventures fail to pan out.”

“
But what does this mean? A war? Feuding in my family? Or between Jon and me? Please say no.”

Kiki looked me straight in the eye. “Well, you will have to tell me who she is.”

“
But I don’t know. Someone representing a feud?” I shrugged my shoulders. “I simply don’t know. We’ve all been getting along rather well, considering the pressure we are under.”

Kiki offered, “Melanie is a beauty, just like Helen. But there’s no getting around it, the Queen of Cups signifies the coming of crisis and conflict. Maybe you’d better find out who this mysterious woman is before it’s too late.”

“
I will. I’ll be on the look-out for her.”

“
Good for you.”

One by one Kiki flipped the cards, each suggesting that the wedding would not go smoothly. When we came to the tenth card, I held my breath, for it is called the Final Outcome, the predictor of what is to come.

“
The Chariot!” we shouted together at the image of a warrior driving a chariot, pulled by two sturdy horses.

“
Here we have aggression, conflict, stubborn wills, and a struggle which you must overcome.”

Kiki gave me a shrewd look. “Honey, whatever is coming, you’ve got a fight on your hands. But it’ll be worth it. You can’t argue with the cards. And their message is loud and clear: you can’t run from this fight, you’re gonna have to slug it out.”

5

“
I swear, Jon, I would not believe it if I hadn’t seen her with my own eyes. Melanie is having a fling with Kiki’s brother, Ray. And the wedding is only three days away!” I moaned, and dropped my face into my palms.

Jon, my sweetie and husband-to-be, reached over from the driver’s side and patted my knee. “Take a deep breath, Ashley, and then slowly tell me exactly what you saw. When and where. Don’t leave anything out.”

I lowered my hands to my lap and lifted my gaze to my wonderful fiancé. He had been my respected business partner first, then my trusted best friend, now he is my lover. Jon Campbell, architect, romantic guy and incredible lover.

And he is mine. All mine. Lucky me. Jon and I met for the second time three years ago when we worked together on our first house restoration. The first time we met I was fourteen and he was twenty-two and studying architecture at NC State.

“
Melanie has been consumed with planning this lavish double wedding for the past year, and now she’s about to ruin everything and risk her chance at happiness with Cam by getting involved with Ray,” I complained to Jon.

Ray is known as “The Wizard of Wall Street”, the youngest futures trader on the street with his very own seat on the New York Stock Exchange. I remember when he’d met Melanie two years ago and how smitten he’d been with her. And as I remember, she’d been pretty gaga over him too. He’d invited us both to New York to be his guests, and we did go, but by then Melanie, true to form, had gotten involved with someone else. She’d always been romantically involved with someone, usually a sleazy guy who was unworthy of her. Isn’t that the way it goes? You have a woman who is a winner attracted to men who are losers.

I glanced out of the window of Jon’s Escalade at Smith’s Creek and the swampy landscape that flew by as we drove out to the airport. We were meeting Melanie and Cam there, all of us come to fetch Cam’s famous mother and whisk her off to The Verandas Bed and Breakfast where the spoiler Ray was bedding down as well. But was he bedding down with my sister? That was the question on my mind.

“
You know, she always used that ‘grass is greener’ expression. Then she’d go off with the most dangerous man in the crowd. At least Ray is not dangerous. He’s a sweetheart, actually. But poor Cam. He’s the best thing that ever happened to her. If she messes this up, I’ll disown her,” I vowed to Jon.

“
You still haven’t told me what you saw that has got you so upset.” He turned briefly to give me a heart-stopping smile. Jon has mastered the art of remaining calm and cool when I get worked up into a tizzy.