Iced Tea

by Sheila Horgan

  Teagan was talking fast. “We don’t have to talk about it at all. Just forget I said anything. I promise. I’ll get it under control. It really is Cara that has the problem with blurting things out. She’s the family blurter. I swear. I’ve just been spending too much time around her. I’ll be good. I promise.”

  She smacked me. Teagan smacked me. Like it’s my fault she made Morgan cry.

  Actually, it was good she smacked me because it made Morgan laugh.

  “I’m not unhappy with you Teagan. I know we haven’t had time to get to know each other yet. Liam and I know every detail about each other, and yes, I know about the whole fart thing when he was a kid, believe me, but I haven’t had time to get to know you guys. There are some things about me I want to share with you, but we can’t do it right now, Jovana is waiting. Can we maybe go over to the diner when we’re done? Do you guys have time?”

  I nodded, “All the time in the world.”

  “Do you have to get back to work, Teagan?”

  “Don’t worry about work. They love me. I rarely make anyone there cry.”

  At that moment, Jovana came out the door and rushed to give hugs all around.

  Jovana stood at arms length and admired Morgan, “My God child, you will make the most beautiful bride this place has ever had the pleasure of sheltering.”

  “Thank you. I can’t believe you’re even considering this. I’d love to see the space, but I have to tell you, our budget is pretty slim. I don’t think that we are going to be able to afford this place, but I’d love to see it.”

  “Don’t you worry about that. Come. Follow me.”

  I thought we would walk into the bar, but instead, Jovana led us to a separate entrance at the other end of the building.

  “Now, if y’all decide this is where you want to have your celebration, we would use this entrance. We can put a sandwich board out on the street, to get your guests attention, but sometimes that backfires and people come in off the street that are not supposed to be a part of your party. Sugar, how many people are you thinkin’ will attend?”

  “About 100.”

  Teagan’s eyes got wide. “Really? Have you made a list, cause our family is going to take up most of 100.”

  Jovana smiled and said, “Sugar, we can do 100 standing on our heads. We’ve done huge and we’ve done intimate. Just depends on what y’all want.”

  We followed Jovana into a wide hallway, “We can go up the stairs, or there is a nice sized elevator to the back. I gotta tell y’all, the stairs are just gorgeous for wedding pictures. You can stand on the landing and take pictures from above or below and they will all turn out beautiful. You can also put an attendant on each stair and it looks just as beautiful. Are you having many attendants?”

  “My son Jordan is my best man, and Liam hasn’t asked anyone yet. I think we’ll probably just stick to the two.”

  “I love the idea of your son being your best man.”

  “He’s excited. Liam and I made a pretty big scene fighting over which one of us will get the privilege of him standing up for us. I wish I’d had a camera going. Liam is so good to Jordan. They’re like soul mates. I couldn’t ask for a better father for my son.”

  Teagan smiled, “Yeah, well, we have a slight competition to see who can be the best aunt. The kids in the family will never want for attention. Or cookies.”

  We meandered up the wide staircase and ended up in a huge entryway, with several outrageously beautiful wooden doors, oversized and doublewide. Jovana pulled open the first set, and smiled with pride.

  “I still get a little tickle when I walk into this room.”

  I could see why. It was absolutely beautiful. The floors were some kind of stone, the walls were painted a beautiful vanilla, there were thick wood moldings everywhere, and the widows were one full wall, half the ceiling, and nothing like anything I’d ever seen before.

  Jovana was watching Morgan carefully, “Before you say anything, let me just tell you. I know it’s bright in here, and if you have a daytime wedding, it might seem a little overwhelming, but I know about light, I’m a photographer, and I have a few tricks to tone it down a bit. Besides, with your lovely dark skin, you need the light for the pictures, Sugar, you’ll just shimmer.”

  Morgan just stared.

  “And I know it looks huge, since you’re having an intimate celebration, but we have a few tricks for that too. If you want the wedding and the reception here, we can make it two very distinct areas. If you’re getting married in a church, we can still make the room feel smaller and fill it up with a few things.”

  Teagan was the first to get her feet under her, “This is the most beautiful room I have ever seen. I had no idea this was here. I’ve lived here all my life and I had no idea. How did I miss this place?”

  “It hasn’t been like this all that long. When we bought the building, this was just a storage space, like an overgrown attic. Some of my son’s high school friends decided it would be a good place to get together, so one weekend they came up here and they cleared out all the stuff, cleaned it all up, and they put a big TV and a bunch of LoveSacs all over the place. There was a fridge for drinks, and a bookcase they shoved all their snacks in. They could hang out and watch TV, or throw a football around, and nobody cared. They could stay here late, cause we were always here at the bar, and it was something cool to tell the kids at school, they were all hanging out at the bar all night. Then the girlfriends started showing up to hang out with the guys. The guys decided real quick they needed to upgrade.”

  “This is quite an upgrade.”

  Jovana laughed. “Well, it was a process. First they just started using a garbage can instead of leaving their stuff thrown around. Then they actually started to sweep up. Then it was a new bookcase.” She smiled at the memory. “Not long after they graduated from college, one of the guys asked his girl to marry him, right here in this room. She said yes and they decided that they wanted to get married, right here, where they’d fallen in love.”

  Jovana just shook her head in wonder, even after all this time, “The parents decided that their kids were not going to get married in a college dorm environment, no matter what the size. Turns out his parents have quite a bit of money. Her parents have more money than sense. They asked if they could spruce the place up, and in return for the inconvenience of us putting up with their crew, we would have a nice space. To be honest, we thought they were going to do a little something, clean the windows, do some cosmetic changes, a couple of weeks, tops. Wouldn’t be that big of a deal, the bar was only open at night then, and the crew was only going to work during the day. There’s a separate entrance, as you know, the crew would get all the permits and such, all we had to do was say yes. It took a whole lot longer than we expected. I really don’t know how much it cost to do this, I really don’t want to know, but I know our insurance rates took a hit and don’t even mention the tax thing in front of my husband.”

  “They certainly did a beautiful job.”

  “Let me show you something else.” Jovana led us back to the far end of the room. There was a smaller room, the size of a large bedroom, with full makeup table, a small round platform to one side, the windows, just like the ballroom, and a huge ornate old-fashioned standing mirror.

  “Now picture this, Sugar. It’s your wedding day, you come on up here, we can play some music for you, serve you a drink, your makeup artist can do your makeup right here, and look, look at this.”

  She pulled Morgan over to the mirror, positioned her at an angle.

  “Sugar, we take your picture right here. Then we can Photoshop it any way you want. We can have you looking in the mirror as a beautiful bride, and have a picture of you as a child looking back. I did one last year of the bride looking back wearing her first communion outfit, it was stunning. But you know what I think I would do with you Sugar, I’d take a picture of you in your wedding dress, standing next to your best man, and if you have a picture of the two of you together when he
was just a pup, I’d superimpose that picture looking back at you.”

  “That sounds lovely Jovana, it really does, but I’m on a budget. There won’t be any makeup artist, no photographer. I was hoping that the family could get some casual pictures, and that AJ might be willing to take a couple of formal ones.”

  “Oh, Sugar, we can do better than that! Honey, AJ will take some pictures, cause that is what we photographers do, but I was hoping you would allow me to be your photographer.”

  Morgan looked slightly trapped. I could see that she was adding the price of a ballroom, together with the price of a first rate photographer, and the number was much bigger than she could deal with.

  “Sugar, get that look out of your eye. It doesn’t cost nothin’ for me to take a picture, and I’m not gonna charge you a dime. It’s all digital. I’ll take the pictures, I’ll put them on a disk for you, and you can choose which ones you want to print out. AJ can help you figure all that out.”

  “I could never impose on you like that.”

  “Sugar, I wanted daughters all my life. It just didn’t work that way for me. I’m never going to get the chance to be the mother of the bride and my son married a lovely girl with a lovely mother, so I didn’t even get to abscond with the mother of the bride duties for her. If I can do a little bit here and there, for a few young ladies, it brings me joy. It isn’t an imposition Sugar, it’s an honor.”

  That got all three of us. We teared up, but I’m proud to say, we kept it together. Mostly.

  “So, Sugar, do you like what you see?”

  “It’s beautiful.”

  “Would you like to get married here?”

  “I’d love to, but I’m not sure we can swing it.”

  “Well, let’s get down to brass tacks. This is what it will cost you. You need to take out an insurance policy for the day. My insurance guy does it all the time; the charge is reasonable, since we’ve never had a problem. You need a couple of security people. I know your group won’t be a problem, but because we’re in Old Town, it’s best to have someone at the door, making sure that your guests are the only ones coming into the place. If you have your own people, that’s fine, but I have got a few guys that are willing to do security, they’re bouncers at the bar, they charge $50 each, and food, whatever you are serving is fine.” Jovana lowered her voice, “They mostly do it to meet your young female guests.”

  “Let’s see, what else? Oh, if you want to serve your guests food, we have a full kitchen available, we can do the cooking, we charge the price of the food, plus the hourly salary of the staff preparing it. You can always have friends or family do the food, but Sugar, we can get the food cheaper than you can, we can do it more efficiently than you can, and you don’t want that problem on your wedding day. For a wedding celebration the size of yours, as long as you decide buffet, I think three staff will be adequate, and if you don’t mind a bad joke or two, I know my husband would love to be one of those three. He charges a dance with the bride.”

  Morgan didn’t know how to respond. “I don’t know what to say. I never imagined all of this. I didn’t even know it was possible. I can’t ask you to do all of this. This is the first time we’ve met. This is too much. I really appreciate the offer, but I just can’t let you do this.” She started to tear up again.

  “Sugar, if you don’t want to have your wedding here, I understand. If the reason you don’t want to have your wedding here is a case of budget, or me, or some silly sense of propriety, you just need to stop, besides, I’m not done with you yet. Listen to it all, then make your decision.”

  Jovana walked back out to the ballroom and shared her vision. She outlined every cost, every option, and every alternative. When she was done, Teagan, who had been taking notes, handed Morgan the results.

  “Oh Dear Lord. For less money than we were going to spend to have our wedding at a little tiny church and our reception in a broken down meeting hall, we could have it here. This just doesn’t make sense. This can’t be right.”

  “Well, there is one more thing Sugar.”

  “What?”

  “AJ tells me that you are a website designer. A graphic artist. The numbers I called out are my cost on everything and the reason it’s such a great deal is that I didn’t add in any profit at all. Instead of charging you for the regular profit I make, I’d like to propose that you help us with our website, and you design 12 flyers for us to use in the bar over the next 12 months. I’ll supply you with whatever you need, but you do the work.”

  “Barter? Your beautiful ballroom and wedding coordination, for my web design and a few flyers? Hardly seems fair.”

  “Sugar, things only have the value that is assigned them in this life.

  When I was younger, some guy decided that a rock was worth some money, gave it a name, put it in a box, even made accessories for it, and the Pet Rock was born. I have the facilities and the knowledge to help you with a beautiful wedding. You have the knowledge and the tools to help me with my website and flyers. You let me know if this is something you want to do.”

  “I should talk to Liam.”

  “Just give me a call when you make a decision Sugar.”

  Morgan’s phone rang. “Speak of the devil.” She smiled.

  As Morgan excused herself and walked to the other end of the building, I thanked Jovana, gave her a hug, and told her she is forever a part of the family.

  Morgan came back, a smile lighting up her face. “He said yes. Anything I want.”

  “So we’re going to do it?”

  “I can’t believe it, but yes, I would love to get married here.”

  “Well then Sugar, I got a bunch of stuff down in the office, from the people to call for your insurance, to check lists to make sure we got everything covered. The only thing better than a wedding is the birth of a child. Thank you for letting me be a part of it.”

  It started out very quietly, then the music got a bit louder, then louder still. A beautiful waltz. Jovana’s husband walked into the ballroom, a smile on his face. With great aplomb he took Morgan’s hand, bowed, and said, “May I have this dance?”

  She smiled.

  He escorted to her to dance floor, where they began a beautiful waltz, spinning and posing.

  “Wow, she’s introducing the grace gene into our gene pool. None of us are going to look that good, probably not ever, but definitely not dancing.”

  The music grew with intensity as they glided around, Morgan looking more beautiful than I could have imagined.

  When the song was over, we wandered downstairs, got the paperwork, thanked Jovana profusely, and headed across the street to the diner.

  “You sure you won’t get in trouble at work, Teagan? We’ve been here a while, I’m not sure how long you get for lunch, but between the drive over and the dancing, you’ve probably already overshot it.”

  “The nice thing about my job, I’m the Grand Poobah of the office. It might not pay better, but I do pretty much anything I want, any time I want.”

  “How about you Cara, have you got some time?”

  “I do.”

  “Good. I have a couple of things I think you should know about me. Maybe you won’t be as excited to help your brother and me get married once you hear them.”

  Teagan and I exchanged a look.

  Teagan ordered a huge plate of hash browns, scattered, a side of ham, and a cup of tea. I ordered the ma-tuni special, which has nothing to do with tuna, I just want to make that clear. I ordered Pepsi, as you can never be sure that the tea they serve in a diner is made the proper way, with a Lipton tea bag, and a preheated cup. Morgan ordered a fried hot dog and french fries, with a diet Pepsi. If you’re going to eat a fried hot dog, a diet Pepsi seems a little weird, but I kept my mouth shut, for once.

  “First, I just want to say that I love your brother. He knows everything I am about to tell you, and he says it doesn’t matter, and that he loves me anyway.”

  “Morgan, you don’t have to do this. Your p
ast, whatever it is, doesn’t matter. You make Liam happy. Jordan is a happy kid. Whatever is in your past might want to stay there.”

  “Teagan, I appreciate it, I really do, but you can’t hide from the past these days. Between the Internet and no one having any sense of discretion, everything is up for grabs, and I’d rather that I tell you this stuff myself.”

  “I’m just saying that you don’t owe us an explanation of anything.”

  “But I do, and some things are going to seem pretty strange without some background information. Like the fact that none of my family will be at the wedding.”

  “What? Why not?”

  “They don’t approve.”

  “But they don’t even know us yet. We aren’t that bad! Maybe we should plan a dinner or something. Let them get to know us before they decide.”

  “It isn’t you they don’t approve of, it’s me.”

  Teagan leaned in, “I don’t understand.”

  “Not very many people know all the facts, most people just have assumptions and guesses, but if you have any questions, I’ll answer them when I’m done. Please, just let me tell it from the start.”

  Teagan and I exchanged a look. This couldn’t be good. Visions of Turkish prisons danced in my head. Not that I know what a Turkish prison looks like, but the thought crossed my mind.

  Morgan took a deep breath and started in, “I wanted to be a doctor. I wanted to be a doctor more than anything else in the world. It was all I thought about from the time I was a little girl. I worked hard in school. I took accelerated classes in high school. I got to school every morning before 7 and I was still there studying after dinner. I took classes on the weekend, got my first aid courses done, my CPR classes, everything. By the time I was old enough, I was working weekends on an ambulance crew, just to find out what it was really like. I volunteered at the hospital. I was one hundred percent involved with everything to do with medical training, and I worked hard at it 18 hours a day, every day.”