Lecretia's Choice

by Matt Vickers

  And Lecretia had her own questions too.

  ‘When would you like to get married?’

  ‘I don’t see a rush—we just got engaged. Why don’t we enjoy that for a while?’

  ‘Oh no,’ she said. ‘The whole point of getting engaged is to get married. I’m not waiting.’

  ‘So when were you thinking?’

  ‘Early next year.’

  ‘That’s only a few months away! I’m still getting used to the idea of being engaged!’

  ‘Well, get used to the idea you’re getting married!’

  I had unleashed a hurricane of activity. Within two weeks of my proposal my inbox was filled with quotes and estimates from venues and caterers and wedding photographers and florists and cake decorators and more.

  I was being asked for my opinion on everything. I had to choose between two shades of green for the invitations. I had to come up with my guest list. I had to choose what flowers I liked. What kind of cake did I want? Which photography package?

  I tried to delegate all decisions to Lecretia, but it didn’t work. I made the fatal mistake of disagreeing with one of her choices.

  ‘You say you don’t want to be bothered with the decision-making,’ she declared, ‘but then when I choose something you do have an opinion. I need you to participate! This is our day!’

  We flew up to Tauranga and spent a weekend inspecting churches and venues. We looked at a garden at an architect’s house. Two country estates. Two chapels. A winery. Lecretia’s dad suggested the Tauranga football club. Lecretia took one look at the place and walked out again.

  We finally decided we would be married at St Joseph’s Church in Te Puna, a small chapel outside Tauranga. It was a modest wooden church that barely seated 120 people. Behind the altar the words of Christ and God swirled in English and Māori. The church was on a hill a short drive from the coast, and on a sunny day it stood stark against the sky as an unambiguous block of colour, with the clear and confident lines of a Rita Angus painting.

  Securing the church was my responsibility. It was a Catholic church, and I was the closest thing to a Catholic out of the two of us. I had the guilt and I had the sin, but I had neither the faith nor the appetite to acquire it. But at least my grandmother, a committed and humble Catholic, would be happy.

  For the reception we chose Mills Reef Winery, one of Tauranga’s few wineries and likely the best. We set a date of 8 April 2006.

  Now everything began to fall into place: the chef, the photographer, the florist, the band. There was no going back.

  While we were preparing for the wedding, and after two months of kitten photos, our Abyssinian arrived from the breeder in Christchurch. We decided to call him Ferdinand. He was a tiny bundle of flecked ginger and chocolate fur and he had big green eyes. His tail stood up erect, but the last inch or so was kinked forward at a right angle. After settling in to our home he took to chasing balled-up and discarded drafts of wedding invitations around the room.

  Getting married in a Catholic church isn’t something you can just do, it turned out. There are rules. Our first appointment was with a priest in Wellington. For our application to be married at the church to be approved, he said, we had to make a promise to do three things.

  ‘What are they?’ I asked.

  ‘You need to do a counselling session with a married couple in the community to look at your compatibility.’

  ‘Sure,’ I said.

  ‘You need to do a group counselling session with other couples, to learn some tools to be effective in your relationship.’

  ‘Sure,’ I said.

  ‘And finally, you need to promise to do your best to bring your children up to know the Catholic faith.’

  I was uncomfortable with that promise then, and I am still uncomfortable with it now. My intent was to raise children who could make their own minds up about the world. But I thought about the wording. I would tell our children what Catholics believe. I would take them to the church to show them. I would even have them baptised as I had been baptised. But I would let them make up their own minds.

  ‘I promise that any children I have with Lecretia will know the Catholic faith.’

  And, with that, we had a wedding venue.

  Before our first counselling session we were given a questionnaire to answer about our attitudes on everything including domestic duties, sex, children, religion, finances, priorities and work. Our answers were reviewed by a couple who lived close to us, in a beautiful house that oozed tasteful wealth and privilege. The evening we were to see them, we knocked on the door and were invited in to sit down in their living room.

  Our counsellors were in their forties. He was a successful senior manager, the sort of clean-living, sober and serious person who rises to become a top public servant or banker. She was a homemaker. And together I supposed they represented the sort of archetypal couple the Catholic Church would hold up as exemplary.

  Is this what we were expected to be like? I was terrified.

  ‘We’ve compared your questionnaires, and tonight we’ll go through the results and point out where there are clear differences in your expectations—the purpose being for you to look at those differences and discuss, acknowledge and if possible resolve them.’

  And we sat, one couple facing another couple, as they unpicked our relationship and explained how different we were.

  Lecretia wanted four kids. I wanted two. She valued having children more than anything else. I valued travel and fun. She felt I didn’t do enough around the house. I felt like we were about equal. She saw sex as extremely important; I saw it as moderately important. (That was a surprise.) She equated family with freedom. I equated money with freedom. And on it went.

  It was a really useful exercise. There were things that we had never discussed: how we’d share our finances, how we’d school our kids and so on.

  The couple showed us to the door and we shook their hands. Walking home, we discussed our evening and the bigger issues. We had a new understanding of each other.

  Our next session was a group session over a weekend. We heard from couples who’d been married for decades about the challenges they’d experienced. We learned about the difference between sex and love and the purpose of each. We were given handouts and diagrams. At one point we were asked to hold hands, and to recite the Blessing of the Hands, a meditation about how we would support each other. We both burst into tears.

  As we moved steadily towards our wedding, our working lives seemed to take on more urgency. My job at the public relations agency was becoming more demanding. I worked on books and speeches and articles. But I was becoming uncomfortable with the demands of the job. PR is about spin and rhetoric, and convincing people to believe things are important when they aren’t, or that they aren’t important when they are. It wasn’t for me. I lasted less than ten months, and I resigned a few weeks before the wedding.

  When I met Lecretia, Chen Palmer & Partners was at the height of its powers. Mai and Geoffrey had turned their firm into a public law machine. All of this meant exciting work, and Lecretia loved it. She often accompanied Geoffrey on visits to parliament or to clients, and he regarded her as an extraordinarily dependable and diligent associate. Lecretia was the soul of discretion, and kept most of the details of her work completely confidential, even from me.

  I didn’t often see Lecretia on a Wednesday night, as she would regularly accompany Geoffrey to his public law lectures for third year students at Victoria University. Many younger lawyers Lecretia encountered later in her career would remember her quiet presence there as Sir Geoffrey sallied forth from the lectern.

  Lecretia had always enjoyed working for Geoffrey. She found him demanding but fair, and able to communicate clearly what he expected from her. But eventually Geoffrey had decided to move on from the firm and pursue other opportunities. As he prepared to go, more of the rainmaking fell on the shoulders of Mai, and she began taking on more and more of his team to backfill the work.

/>   After Geoffrey left, so did the rest of the partners, leaving Mai as the sole partner in charge of the firm. The firm’s name was shortened from Chen Palmer & Partners to just Chen Palmer. Mai quickly came to rely on Lecretia just as Geoffrey had. Mai could be extraordinarily kind and very generous, but like a lot of brilliant businesspeople, she worked hard and expected her employees to work just as hard.

  Lecretia had always been a hard worker. She worked like she had a personal stake in the company. If she was behind, she would work all hours to catch up, and if she let her employer down she took it as a personal failure. Knowing Mai needed her, she started working harder than she ever had before.

  Lecretia worked right up until a day before the wedding.

  On the day of the wedding, my three groomsmen and I got up early and met the photographer, who accompanied us into town for breakfast. I had spent the night in a motel, while Lecretia slept at her parents’ home. It was a beautiful Tauranga day and we enjoyed French toast with bacon and champagne by the waterfront. I took the chance to practise my wedding speech.

  We were the first to climb the steps to the church. The sun was bright in the sky and the church was resplendent. We stopped to put in our lapel pins.

  ‘Are you nervous?’ asked Damian, my best man.

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘Excited, actually. You’ve got the ring, right?’

  He tapped his pocket. ‘Of course. Let’s just hope she turns up.’

  As guests started arriving I stood at the door of the church welcoming them in. I’d chosen Sigur Rós as the accompaniment to people being seated.

  After everyone had taken their seats I resumed my position in front of the chancel. There was still no sign of Lecretia. We stood waiting while Sigur Rós crooned away in inscrutable Icelandic. The attendees were smiling at me and glancing at the door. I saw Lecretia’s family and mine, old school friends, work colleagues and others. The church had stained-glass windows which cast rainbow hues over everyone’s faces.

  At last, one of Lecretia’s bridesmaids appeared in the doorway, and began walking down the aisle to a bridal march. Others followed behind her in their maroon dresses, paused, and stepped ceremoniously towards the front, beaming.

  And then Lecretia appeared with her father. She was wearing a simple, elegant white dress, no train, her head covered by a veil. My heart leapt when I saw her familiar figure. Her eyes were on me as she walked through the church. When she was almost at the front, I shook Larry’s hand and then took Lecretia’s, guiding her to stand across from me. I pushed back her veil and she was revealed, her glorious eyes and sweet smile and tender gaze.

  Any last lingering doubts or fears melted away in that moment. She looked at me with such trust and acceptance, such love, that I knew I had found someone with whom I could share my life.

  We exchanged vows and rings. The priest declared us man and wife. And in that instant, I sensed an infinite number of possibilities winking out of existence, leaving only this woman to whom I had said yes. Lecretia never shone more brightly than that day. I had never been more certain of anything or anyone in my life. We were made for each other. When I kissed her in front of everyone I couldn’t have been prouder. She held me tightly and kissed me back.

  We walked out of the church into the sunshine. We descended the steps and turned to look up at the narrow doorway of the church as our guests emerged to greet us. In twos and threes they came and shook our hands and kissed our cheeks.

  We stood by a green hedgerow while guests were configured and arranged to be photographed with us. Lecretia’s family, my family, siblings, cousins—they all had their turn. There was one final shot of us from the doorway of the church, with all our wedding guests behind us, all supporting our union.

  Lecretia never sought the spotlight, never wanted to be the centre of attention. But on this day, she embraced it. There was no modesty, no bashfulness. She sparkled like a diamond and smiled and laughed and it was glorious.

  Later, after the speeches and the dancing, we were driven into town to the hotel where we would spend the night. We checked in and went to our room. We undressed and made love and lay tangled in each other’s arms.

  ‘I know it was our wedding,’ said Lecretia, resting her head on my chest. ‘But objectively speaking, I think that was the best wedding I’ve ever been to.’

  ‘I agree,’ I said.

  I tilted Lecretia’s head up and kissed her. And then, in every sense, we were husband and wife.

  Chapter 6

  OUR MARRIAGE BEGAN with a trip to Cuba. I was curious about the place—the beautiful old American cars, Havana, Hemingway, cigars, mojitos and the mob. Lecretia’s reasons for visiting were more personal. Somewhere in her Fijian grandfather’s ancestry was a Spanish sailor who came to Fiji via Cuba. She wasn’t planning to look up relatives, but she wanted a sense of where she came from.

  We flew to Havana via Santiago, and stayed in the city a few days before taking a private tour around the island. Cubans were a fun and friendly people but any appearance of wealth or prosperity was a facade. Behind the gorgeous Spanish edifices in Havana were unfurnished rooms and slums. Under the bonnets of classic cars were Russian parts, the American engines having long since expired. Even the money was an illusion: we used convertible pesos which could only be spent in certain stores, while the Cubans had their own peso.

  In the first restaurant we visited, the waiter handed us a menu. We studied it. Five minutes later, he returned.

  ‘I’m sorry, but we’re not able to serve anything on the menu today. We have grilled pork, grilled chicken, or grilled fish, with a salad.’

  Lecretia and I looked at each other.

  ‘Grilled pork,’ I said.

  ‘Grilled fish.’

  In a few minutes the waiter returned with two plates, one bearing a single piece of seared fish, with no seasoning. The pork was served the same way. And the salad was slices of raw carrot and slivers of beans.

  The meal cost us US$50.

  The food didn’t improve for the entire trip, but once we understood why—the loss of ties to the Soviet Union, the trade embargoes, the government rationing of food and the high cost of some of the things we took for granted, particularly spices—it made sense. But mojitos—rum, sugar, mint and lime, all of which are plentiful in Cuba—were cheap and delicious.

  We headed west to Parque Nacional Viñales, speeding down motorways past hitchhikers and tobacco plantations. We travelled back east to Trinidad, a town in the centre of the island, where the streets were lined with brightly painted doors. We headed to the resorts of Varadero, stopping for ice cream and passing oil pumps at work on their pivots in brown fields. We spent three days lazing on loungers and drinking cocktails and swimming in the pale blue sea.

  It wasn’t an easy trip, but it brought Lecretia and me closer together as we relied on each other’s limited Spanish. When we returned to Havana, we sat on the Malecón, the esplanade along the coast where desperate Cubans launch their dangerous rafts in search of Florida, and we watched convertible Cadillacs pass by with white-dressed brides sitting up on the trunk with their legs in the back seat.

  When we got home it was approaching winter. It was difficult to reacclimatise to the chilly Wellington weather after the tropical temperatures of the Caribbean. And after three weeks in Cuba, where there was no outdoor advertising, the sight of a billboard was jarring. Ferdinand was glad we were back, but he sulked for a while before he forgave us.

  We began our lives as a married couple, and it was bliss. We’d ironed out most of the kinks in our domestic arrangements. We went to parties and shows and held dinner parties. I dreamt for her that she would have everything she wanted, and she dreamt the same for me. I have seen marriages where one partner’s desires subsume the other’s—the more compromising partner gets bound up in the identity of the more dominant partner and loses something of themselves. That didn’t happen with us. On the contrary, I think we made each other stronger.

  Th
is was reflected in our working lives. I became more ambitious. I was married to someone I respected and admired and I wanted to deserve her love. Lecretia was a high achiever and I felt like I was just starting out. At work, I shifted gears and moved from coding software into business analysis. It taught me to develop new skills: working with clients, solving problems, making presentations and winning new business.

  Meanwhile, Lecretia was under extraordinary pressure. She was now effectively the second most senior lawyer in the business. While Mai held the firm together, Lecretia played a key role in advising and supporting her and her staff. Eventually Mai introduced several more senior hires into the team, including a woman named Catherine Marks with whom Lecretia formed a firm friendship. Catherine was a brilliant lawyer, and she and Lecretia worked well together.

  I asked Lecretia sometimes whether she believed she should be made partner. She certainly deserved it—she was a first-rate lawyer, liked and respected by her clients, and she worked very hard—but despite her ambition I sensed she was conflicted about it, perhaps because we had recently begun thinking about children. Lecretia wanted children more than anything else, and she was worried that the demands of being a partner might interfere with being a good mother, or being a mother at all.

  I’ve always been good with kids. Play comes naturally to me—I can switch on my imagination and communicate with children at their level. They like me for it. Lecretia wasn’t as easy-going around them as I was—she wasn’t much for play—but her love, and care, and adoration shone out of her. She loved holding babies, she loved how they smelled and how they would nestle into her for warmth and comfort. I could see that she would be the same sort of mother as her own mother: someone who would show her love through sacrifice, putting her child ahead of herself in all things.

  We began trying to conceive naturally. Lecretia was thirty-four and I was thirty-one, so we figured that a few months of trying should be fun and get us results. But within a short period of time the lack of success became stressful. I cut back on alcohol and took care of my diet, and Lecretia plied me with a variety of pharmacological and herbal supplements to supercharge my potency—despite my tests all indicating I had no fertility issues. She too took a cocktail of supplements to boost her own fertility. But the new routines became a burden.