A Ballad of Confetti, Cake and Catastrophes

by Helen Juliet

  Kinny spluttered, but Bas let out an “Oooh!” noise. “You don’t know – how fabulous.”

  “It’s really not that big a deal,” Kinny said. “And mum said she is going to help, so there’s really no point in discussing it, right?”

  Ash arched an eyebrow, then looked pointedly at Bas. Nicholas was torn between wanting to be nice, and finding out the story behind the argument. As it transpired, his vote didn’t matter anyway.

  “Alright, look,” said Kinny before Bas had a chance to speak, and held up her hands. “My grandmother gave us all some money in her will.” She glanced towards the kitchen door, then to her smirking sister, then leant in towards Ash and Nicholas. “She told us to spend it however we liked,” she continued in hushed tones.

  Bas let out a whoop. “Yeah, right.”

  “Just coz you have no imagination,” Kinny said. Bas shook her head, and carried on squeezing teabags. “Long story short, mum got it in her head that I should use it to pay off some student loans, or put it towards a house deposit. But it wasn’t enough to even come close to covering either of those things – if I did that, it would have been like she never gave me anything at all. Babaanne wouldn’t have wanted that.”

  “Oh, but it’s okay for me to do it?” Bas scowled as she plonked tea in front of Ash and Nicholas. Kinny, Nicholas noticed, had not been made a mug.

  Kinny shrugged, unfazed, and got up to make her own brew with what was left of the water in the kettle. “It’s up to you – it’s still up to you. You should do something memorable.”

  Bas snorted. “I still have to live with Mum and Dad,” she said. “Unlike some people, I can’t escape their wrath.”

  Kinny rolled her eyes. “I wanted to use it for an experience – and that’s what I did. And,” she added, waving a teaspoon around. “I shared it with Clara – so I don’t know why she’s the golden child right now and I’m the devil’s spawn!”

  Something clicked in Nicholas’s mind. Eighteen months ago would have been November.

  “No I get that, I get that,” Ash said, nodding her head. “So what did you do? Travel round India? Do some yoga and find yourselves?”

  “Erm,” said Kinny. She cradled her mug and returned to her seat. Bas giggled from behind, leaning against the counter with her own tea.

  “I’d take a course and learn a language,” Ash said to Nicholas. There was a twitch of a grin on her lips that told him that maybe she knew she was barking up the wrong tree. “Or sponsor building a well in Kenya. They have droughts, right?”

  Nicholas raised his eyebrows at Kinny. He was pretty sure she and his sister hadn’t helped an African village. “Uhh…” she said.

  Bas was obviously enjoying Ash’s little show. “She could have given it to Battersea Dog’s Home,” she said with an innocent bat of her eyelids.

  Ash clicked her fingers in agreement. “Or one of those donkey sanctuaries.”

  “Guys,” Nicholas said warily. He felt like maybe the teasing had gone on long enough now.

  “Ooh, I love those places,” said Bas. She nodded and gulped down some tea. “They have those Greyhound homes too, for when they stop racing. I bet they would have loved a couple of grand.”

  Ash frowned. “That’s not really an experience though, is it?” She raised her eyebrows at Kinny, whose face had drawn back into a grimace. “Did you go teach English to orphans in a hut somewhere.”

  “That would have been cool,” said Bas. She ran her tongue over her braces with practiced ease. “Proper charitable.”

  Ash drummed her fingers on the kitchen table. “Or—”

  “We went to Vegas!” Kinny shouted. She dropped her head into her hands.

  Yep, Nicholas had been right.

  Bas snorted into her tea, and Ash blinked. “I’m sorry, but, beg your pardon?”

  Kinny let out a high-pitched whine from behind her palms. “We went to Las Vegas,” she continued in muffled tones. “And spent it all on strippers and slot machines.”

  Ash drew back in her seat. “Shut the front door.” A delighted smirk crept across her face. “You wild child.”

  Nicholas couldn’t help but laugh too, now that he remembered. He’d wondered at the time how Clara had been able to book a last-minute jaunt to the City of Sin. “That wasn’t all you did,” he said, trying to keep a straight face. “If I recall, you also got yourselves backstage at Ricky Martin.”

  “No!” Ash slapped her hands to her cheeks. “Not even Britney – Ricky Martin?”

  Bas started to sing a rendition of ‘Livin’ la Vida Loca’, sashaying her hips as she shimmied across the kitchen. “That’s definitively what Babaanne would have wanted,” she said, patting Kinny on her head as she passed.

  “And I believe there were tattoos?” said Nicholas.

  Kinny snatched her hands away from her face and gave him and imploring look. “No, okay – she doesn’t know about the tattoos, I’ll definitely never be forgiven if she—”

  A noise from the hall made her clamp her mouth shut. Bas looked triumphant though, and leant over her shoulder to whisper in her sister’s ear. “I think you’re going to owe me. For, like, ever.”

  Kinny just gulped.

  Nicholas immediately felt bad. He hadn’t intended to get Kinny in any more trouble, and he definitely didn’t want to piss off Mrs Sadik any more than she already was, not if there was any chance she could still help them.

  “Hey, look,” he said hurriedly, grabbing Kinny’s hand. “Let’s just forget about it, okay?” He looked over at Bas and raised his eyebrows. “Okay?” She sighed, but, with a glance out to the hallway and the voices drifting down from upstairs, she nodded. “I’ll talk with your mum. She doesn’t need to know about the tattoo.”

  Kinny sniffed and scrubbed at her face. “What if she doesn’t help? She still seems so mad.”

  Bas landed in a chair with a huff, and glanced between them and Ash. “She’s not actually spiteful. Come on, don’t cry. It’s no fun if you cry.” She leant over and wiped one of the tears from Kinny’s face, eliciting a weak laugh. “I’ll smooth things over.”

  The voices grew louder, and the four of them looked towards the doorway in anticipation.

  “Kinny!” A boy of maybe ten or eleven years came charging into the kitchen and threw his arms around his sister. Nicholas thought he was probably the youngest of the Sadik brood; he certainly displayed the exuberance he recognised from being the baby in his own family. “You’re here! You’re here! Mum said I can help with sewing. Did you really ruin your bridesmaid dress?”

  “Enver!” Kinny said tiredly, ruffling his hair. It was as liquorice black as hers and Bas’s. “No, Clara’s cat did the damage.” Her voice died as her mum came back into the room, struggling with a sewing machine spotted with age.

  Ash jumped to her feet. “Let me help with that,” she offered. She reached over and helped Mrs Sadik rest the old machine onto the kitchen table.

  Kinny’s brother Enver took a step back, his mouth falling comically open. Nicholas couldn’t help but watch as the poor boy’s eyes travelled up the length of Ash’s athletic figure, only clad in leggings and a t-shirt, which didn’t leave much of her body shape to the imagination. Now, wasn’t that the sort of reaction he was supposed to have?

  “I can help too,” Enver spluttered, quickly coming to their assistance and beaming dreamily up at Ash. It was pretty cute, Nicholas had to admit.

  Bas also leapt up. “I’ll make you tea, Mum,” she announced, not waiting for an answer before filling the kettle once more from the tap. “You want a Ribena, Squirt?”

  Enver shook his head. Now the sewing machine was secure, his focus was entirely on spreading out the bridesmaid dress they had previously removed from the garment bag. Nicholas could tell it was Danielle’s, as she had extra bling on the ribbon bit under her boobs. Apparently, that would let people know that she was the maid of honour.

  “Oh dear,” said Enver, and Nicholas’s heart dropped like a stone.

/>   “Is there no hope?” he asked, seeing as the boy apparently had an idea of what he was doing.

  Enver shared a look with his mum, who was rummaging through a box of cotton reels, searching for a shade that matched the dresses. “What do you think?” she asked him. Nicholas held his breath.

  Enver bit his lip and moved the slices of chiffon this way and that. After another few moment’s inspection, he nodded once. “There’s hope,” he announced.

  Nicholas couldn’t help but cry out, and Ash punched the air. “You can put them back together?” he asked.

  “Oh, no,” said Kinny’s mum. She put down the pale pink cotton she had found, and patted him pityingly on the arm. “But we can modify it – they are all looking as bad as this, yes?”

  Ash leant over and flipped the shredded bits of dress back and forth, making Enver’s eyes glaze over as her leggings stretched favourably across her bum. “I think this one is the worst, actually.”

  Mrs Sadik clapped her hands together. “Then we have no problem.”

  Kinny didn’t risk looking at her mum, but she did give a watery smile from behind, catching her sister’s eye as she gave her a thumbs-up. Nicholas agreed. This was excellent news. “Brilliant.” He reached up and clasped Mrs Sadik’s hand where it still rested on his arm. “Honestly, thank you so much. Whatever it costs, I can pay—”

  Mrs Sadik cut him off with another of her raspberry sounds, and began threading her needle. Enver eased out the next dress from underneath Danielle’s, and Bas clinked a teaspoon against the inside of another mug as she made her next lot of tea.

  Right, then. He guessed that was that sorted. He glanced awkwardly at Ash, who shrugged, and Kinny, who offered him a small smile. There wasn’t much else for him to do, other than sip at his now lukewarm tea.

  Surely, after this and the harp, the universe had to be done with them. There couldn’t be any more disasters between now and Saturday.

  Right?

  Chapter Five

  Once Kinny’s mum and brother began to work in earnest on the three dresses, conversation stilted awkwardly. Kinny seemed keen not to draw any additional attention to herself, lest she get into another argument with her mum, and Bas left them all to go back to her biology coursework. The fact that this was the better option was not lost on Nicholas, as he tapped his finger nervously against the side of his now empty mug. He opened his mouth several times to try and say something to Ash to lift the tension in the room, but each time he decided against it. Knowing him, he’d try and crack a joke, and that would just make things worse for Kinny, he was sure.

  Rescue came however, in the form of a Jack Russell terrier called Lauda. He trotted into the kitchen like nothing at all was amiss, almost in fact like there should be a group of strangers there, just waiting to give him a belly rub.

  Nicholas wasted no time in plonking himself on the tiles and fussing over the small dog. Tickling his tummy and telling him he was not only a good boy, but a handsome one, got more than a few smiles out of Mrs Sadik, and Kinny visibly relaxed as her mum’s attention was guided elsewhere.

  However, once it seemed Kinny’s mum and brother were confident they could do something to make the dresses wearable again, Nicholas and the girls were keen to make their excuses and escape the strained atmosphere in the house. Ash genuinely had to get ready for work anyway, so soon enough, the three of them let themselves out the front door and back into the rain once more.

  Nicholas was on a schedule too, he couldn’t forget. Luckily, he’d had the forethought to put the receipt for collecting the ties in his wallet yesterday evening. Therefore, he asked Kinny to drop him in the town centre so he could pick them up from the suit shop. He waved them away from under one of the umbrellas, then began trudging down the street to his destination.

  He let out a long breath as he walked. It may have been an uncomfortable experience, but it seemed like Kinny’s mum had a design in mind that she and Enver could implement to save the dresses. Obviously, it would have been much better if they had never been shredded at all, but if they were wearable come Saturday, Nicholas would count his blessings.

  He half thought about popping in to say hi to Peter at work, as his shop was more or less on the way to the suit place. But Nicholas didn’t think he’d be able to refrain from letting something slip about the dresses. Or the harp. So he just carried on to Moss Bros, wishing his trainers were a little bit more waterproof.

  After the couple of days he’d had, he half expected the shop to have lost the tie order, or at least misplaced it. He felt light with relief when it only took them a couple of minutes to locate the right parcel from out the back. They even double wrapped the bag for him to help protect the silky ties from the weather.

  That left him with a couple of hours to kill before meeting up with Fynn, so he took himself off to get lunch at a pizza place. He managed to successfully distract himself for a while by messaging Trev and catching up on Facebook. It seemed his school mates were thinking about going to Havana, one of the local night clubs, the next night. But he wasn’t sure he fancied that, so kept his answers deliberately vague, blaming the wedding for his lack of commitment. It was true to a certain extent; he might just listen to Danielle, and not meet up with anyone until Saturday was all over.

  Eventually he had to think about Fynn, and making his way over to see him. Surely, he tried to argue with himself, all he had to do was sit and listen to the guy play for a little while? Wasn’t that the point of them meeting up, to check out some songs that he could perform at the breakfast? That didn’t have to be all that difficult, not unless he made it so. He just needed to take a breath before he said anything, and try and play it cool.

  He still felt nervous as he paid his bill and gathered up his things, carefully making sure to double check he had the ties safely packed away. His jitters only got worse as he awkwardly followed the navigation from the map on his phone and held the umbrella over his head. He winced every time the wind changed direction and made the rain swerve against him despite his best efforts, and he hugged his package tighter to his chest.

  Saying something stupid was probably inevitable. The more he thought about trying to talk to Fynn, the more nervous he got. And the more nervous he got, the more he was going to blabber. He was probably going to have to clamp his tongue between his teeth and bite it to stop him from embarrassing himself, and that didn’t sound like a very pleasant prospect.

  He sighed as he crossed the road. Maybe he just needed to accept the fact that he was going to come across as a bit of a prat, no matter what. That way, he could try and relax, even just a little. So what Fynn was cool and talented and really good looking? Nicholas wasn’t trying to be his friend, he just wanted him to play at the wedding.

  So why did it seem so important for Fynn to like him?

  With a start, Nicholas realised he had reached the position on the map with the pulsing dot. He stopped walking, and looked up. He had been expecting a house, but he was now stood in front of a very nice block of flats, flanked either side by three-story town houses. The flats were gated, and he stood feeling a little foolish for a minute as he looked around for an intercom panel.

  Eventually, he realised it was located in a metal box on the other side of the gate. He hoped no one had been watching him look about gormlessly for the last minute or two, and darted over to the box. He carefully extracted Fynn’s business card from his pocket, and without dropping the ties or his umbrella, attempted to keep the rain from spattering it while he scanned the handwriting. When he was reasonably confident he’d deciphered the numbers correctly, he pushed his thumb against the ‘twenty-three’ button, then held his breath and hoped for the best.

  Just as he was starting to fret that his ring had gone unheard, the intercom clicked alive.

  “Hello?” a woman’s voice buzzed through the speaker.

  “Hi! Hi,” Nicholas spluttered, slipping the business card back into his jeans pocket. “Um, I – is this where Fynn Dum
ashie lives? I’m, uh, Fynn, that is – I’m here to see him. This was the address he gave me. I’m Nicholas.” Nice. Very smooth.

  There was a pause, and he anxiously chewed on his lower lip. “Of course,” came the woman’s voice again. It was faint as it competed against the sound of the downpour. “Come on in. Second floor.”

  The line went dead, but Nicholas didn’t mind. It seemed like he was in the right place, so he’d got over his first hurdle. He heard the tell-tale click of the gate, and hurried to push it inwards before the lock reactivated itself.

  Once inside the courtyard, he felt another flutter of nerves. Which out of the two doors was he supposed to go through? Would he need buzzing in a second time? Out of the pair, he randomly chose the door on the right, only to realise that that was the side for flats thirty and above. Cursing, he splashed back through the rain to the other side, and yanked at the door. Locked.

  “Urgh!” he growled. There was another metal panel to right though, and at least now he was under a slim awning which gave him a small amount of protection from the rain. He ran his gaze down the numbers, and jabbed at twenty-three. “Hello!” he squeaked as a buzz of static told him the line was open. “Sorry, it’s Nicholas again. I went to the wrong door, if you could let me in—”

  The door clicked. The woman didn’t speak again though, and the line went dead just like it had on the outer gate.

  Brilliant. He wasn’t even in the building yet, and he’d announced himself to be nothing better than the village idiot. There wasn’t much he could do though aside from grit his teeth and lean into the glass door.

  Inside was awfully modern compared to the red-brick exterior, suggesting it had been remodelled in the past decade or so. Everything was glass and chrome, and Nicholas felt the cool touch of climate control on his damp skin as he slid the umbrella shut and shook off the excess rain onto the bristly welcome mat that stretched across the first several feet of the corridor.