Lavender Haze

Prologue - 2 Years Ago

My eyes are sore. I'm not sure what I find more offending, if the monstrosities the bridesmaids were forced to wear (no doubt threatened at gunpoint), making them look like they wrapped gold-coloured tin foil around their bodies, the ruffles of their dresses mimicking a sash, their open-toe shoes revealing a gold-speckled pedicure that reminds of the time Rafael puked cornflakes and tequila in my bathroom sink after my house warming party, or the abominable gold-and-black-spraypainted flowers draped over the altar - what were once white lilies and green palm fronds now coated in sickly-smelling dye. In the list of atrocities currently crowding my sight is probably also worth mentioning there's an Elvis impersonator queuing at the open bar. He was also made to wear a gold and black suit. I'm starting to think this is a joke wedding and that my ex high school nemesis is playing a practical joke on me, but then I remember Cassandra Miller was never funny. Not once in her twenty-seven years on this not-so-green-anymore earth. I mean, she did say something hilarious once, but it was a total mistake and nobody but me laughed, so it's opinionable whether she said something actually funny or I was only half-listening to her speak and I filled the void with my own funny thought.

Anyway - back to the offensive festivities all around me.

Honestly, I could have done a much better job adorning this nineteenth century villa than the tiny man shouting into his earpiece did, even if I had been, let's say, blindfolded, on MDMA and after being tackled by Tom Brady and hospitalized with a concussion. Everything is simply... tacky. And tacky doesn't even fully encompass the extent of what's surrounding me. Everything is dripping gold, and if that's Cassie's attempt at being ostentatious, then she crashed and burned. Badly.

Now, had Cassie asked me to plan her wedding, things might have looked a little different. Sophisticated.

Refined.

Beautiful.

Not that I would have taken the gig had Cassandra Miller begged me on her knees - or, okay, maybe if she had begged and cajoled and pleaded, in that case I might have said yes, but the level of imploring should have been such to put to shame prisoners in the Death Row who plead for a second chance at life. Yet, I would have not agreed to put my name on anything that looked like one of those over-the top, strobe-lights-equipped Russian weddings you gawk at online while pretending to do research for your next event and link to your best friend's inbox to have a laugh together in the future. The ones where the bride and groom have on their table full roasted pigs with glinting apples in their mouths and whose wedding photoshoots seem recovered from photobooks discovered in Chernobyl post nuclear devastation.

I would have swallowed a bar of plutonium before associating my brand to this disaster.

As I wait for the bartender to pour me a scotch, I grab my phone from my clutch and take the millionth photo of the day to show my clients exactly what not to expect from me when they hire me to plan their weddings. I snap a photo of the groomsmen (black tuxes and golden vests) as they walk down the altar with the bridesmaids and - surprise! They all break out in spasmic, badly coordinated dance moves that would warrant the immediate intervention of paramedics. Or at least a psychological evaluation. I take a covert video and send it straight to my best friend, Rafael, to savour on a rainy day as we eat ice cream straight out of the tub with oversized spoons and scavenge the internet for funny memes to soothe his heart after a fight with his husband.

"Here, miss."

"Thank you." I leave a tip in the jar on the counter and ignore - at the best of my abilities - the jerky motions coming from the wedding party.

In this July day, the sun is scorching, and I regret ignoring my brother's advice to pack sunscreen, though in my defence, the reason I didn't was because I couldn't fit the bottle in my clutch. I'm thankful I've remembered to apply SPF underneath my foundation, though, or my freckles game would have made me resemble a too-grown, milk-chocolate-brown-haired Annie. I swipe at a drop of sweat slowly inching down my forehead and fan myself with a hand.