Confetti & Confusion

by Confetti

  ‘Would you believe that Mum bumped into an old flame in the hotel bar last night? Apparently, she and this guy called Brad Maxwell went to art school together – they even dated for a couple of months before they graduated. I remember Mum telling me about him the Christmas after Dad died when we were going through a box of old photographs. Brad left to take up an internship at a New York art gallery and asked Mum to go with him but she’d just been offered a job as a trainee interior designer at Liberty and their relationship sort of fizzled out because of the distance. Then she met Dad and, as the saying goes, the rest is history.’

  ‘He is kind of dreamy though, don’t you think?’ said Imogen, her chin cupped in her hand. ‘Sort of an older George Clooney. Mum’s definitely got excellent taste.’

  ‘Well, looking at their body language last night, they could have melted a chocolate bar at ten paces!’ grinned Harriet, as she gathered her copper-coloured hair up from her shoulders and tied it into a high ponytail.

  ‘Yes, well, she should be here instead of lolling around the pool nursing her headache,’ tutted Karen, clearly upset about her mother rekindling the friendship.

  ‘Well, she did promise to chase up the flowers with the wedding planner, didn’t she? And the personalised confetti. You know, Kaz, I’m started to think Mum’s right about her. She’s definitely been conspicuous by her absence since we arrived. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not as obsessed as Mum is about all the arrangements, but I would like to have a wedding bouquet and a couple of posies for my lovely bridesmaids and flower girl!’

  ‘Heaven help the woman if Julia finds out she’s forgotten to organise the butterflies!’ laughed Carla. ‘Maybe we’ll be able to round up a flotilla of turtle doves for you instead, Immie.’

  ‘I’m pleased Mum has reconnected with an old friend. She deserves a bit of romance after everything she’s been through. Dad’s been gone for three years now and she’s refused to even think about having dinner with anyone. She’s only forty-eight. I don’t want to think of her being alone for the rest of her life. I wonder if she’ll invite him as her plus one to the wedding?’

  ‘Immie! It was a drink, that’s all.’

  ‘And a walk round the grounds in the moonlight.’

  ‘Ah, she didn’t tell me that bit.’

  ‘Well, that’s probably because—’

  ‘Okay!’ interrupted Ella before the sisters embarked on a sibling squabble. ‘A very warm welcome to the second day of your Chocolate and Confetti course here at the Paradise Cookery School. Today we’re going to be showing you how to create a new twist on a Mississippi mud pie, experiment with a chocolate shortbread recipe my grandmother invented, and prepare a pina colada trifle made with chocolate custard and laced with Caribbean rum. So ladies, aprons on, let’s get started.’

  All the women, apart from Gracie, who wore her pink glittery sandshoes with pride, had clearly learned a lesson from the previous day and had swapped their designer heels for embellished flip-flops or, in the case of Carla, neon-coloured Skechers. They watched in fascinated silence as Ella talked them through her family recipe, liberally interspersed with anecdotes about her childhood in St Lucia. Then it was over to them and, like the previous day, the burble of contented conversation accompanied the occasional burst of laughter as the students crafted their own, individual versions of the recipes.

  Before they knew it, lunchtime arrived. Ella lit the barbeque on the veranda and set about grilling red snapper marinated in lime juice and diced chillies, tuna and chicken skewers coated in fresh mango salsa, and for dessert, bananas with their skins sliced open and stuffed with cubes of pineapple drizzled with honey. The aroma of chargrilled meat and fish wafted through the air as the party tucked in with gusto.

  ‘I love your earrings, Imogen. I’ve never seen anything like them.’

  Ella was something of an aficionado of eclectic jewellery items and always sported a vast array of bold pieces, most of which had been hand-crafted by her friend Anisha, who had a shop in Soufrière. However, Millie had to agree with her. Imogen’s earrings-and-necklace combo was exquisite. The twisted silver links caught the midday sun, streaming through the French windows into the Paradise Cookery School’s kitchen, beautifully.

  ‘Thank you! I’m so pleased you said that,’ Imogen beamed. ‘These are from a brand-new range I designed myself especially for the bridal party, but after the wedding, I plan to roll them out to my clients.’

  ‘Ah, so you’re a jewellery designer?’

  ‘Yes, I trained as a silversmith. I mainly do commissions, but I’ve always wanted to move into the wider bridal jewellery market. Everything went manic when Pippa Middleton was photographed wearing one of my pieces at Wimbledon in July and now I can’t keep up with demand. It’s amazing and I’m so excited about the future. I’ve made our wedding rings, too.’

  Millie’s heart softened at the excitement written across Imogen’s face when she spoke of her impending nuptials. She really did look like the happiest girl on the island, with a smattering of freckles on her upturned nose, and her hair smoothed down into an elegant chignon to combat the attack of frizz that was inevitable in the humidity of the Caribbean. Despite the fact that her mother had turned her wedding into a royal occasion, Imogen seemed to have taken it in good spirits. And why shouldn’t she? Millie had taken a quick peek at the website of the wedding venue. How could anyone complain about getting married in a magnificent white gazebo amid the lush manicured gardens of an upmarket St Lucian hotel?

  ‘Shall we get back to the kitchen?’ asked Ella, replenishing everyone’s glasses with home-made iced lemonade for them to take back to their benches.

  ‘What’s on the itinerary for this afternoon?’ asked Harriet, dabbing her lips with a napkin after her second helping of chocolate trifle and snatching up a white chocolate chip cookie to take back to her workstation with her.

  ‘Millie’s going to showcase her fabulous chocolate and orange lava fondants and then I’ll guide you through the most delectable chocolate tiramisu bombe – and you’ve guessed it – it’ll be soaked in Caribbean rum.’

  The women set to work. The all-encompassing fragrance of warm cocoa and melted orange caramel was so intoxicating Millie wished someone would bottle it so she could feast her senses on it whenever she wanted. It would be instant happiness in a jar!

  ‘What did you say the guys were up to today?’ asked Karen.

  ‘I think Alex said it was scuba diving this morning and then a quad bike safari this afternoon.’

  ‘No offence, Millie, because I’ve had an absolute ball learning about all these chocolate-based goodies, not to mention the tasting sessions,’ said Carla, tucking the sides of her short bob behind her ears before reaching for her beloved camera to take a few snaps of her creations to post on Instagram. ‘But I would have loved to join in with the guys this afternoon for a race around the plantation on quad bikes.’

  ‘What? Even in the rain?’ laughed Millie, glancing through the window as the heavens opened to deliver the daily deluge of liquid sunshine. She didn’t think it was wise to go on to say that she couldn’t think of anything she would rather not do than spent the afternoon on one of the over-grown mechanical bluebottles Zach loved.

  ‘When do you think the boys will get here?’ asked Imogen, clearly keen to be reunited with Alex as soon as possible.

  Millie checked the little silver watch that had belonged to her French grandmother. ‘It’s three-thirty, so probably in about half an hour or so. Zach said to expect them around four o’clock.’

  ‘Well, if my super-organised boyfriend has anything to do with it they’ll be here on the dot – and with him in the lead of course!’ muttered Carla, taking her camera over to the patio doors and pointing the lens at the palm trees surrounding the swimming pool, their trunks leaning almost horizontally to the weather’s torment. ‘It was Greg’s idea to put up the ribbon across the courtyard as a finishing line, and he’s even asked me to take a picture of everyone as
they arrive just in case there’s a photo-finish.’

  ‘Well, if you don’t mind, I’ll give that delightful experience a miss. I’d like to get Gracie back to the hotel for a nap before we go out for dinner tonight,’ said Karen. ‘I’ve never been a fan of watching grown men compete for the Testosterone Trophy.’

  ‘You really just want to subject Mum to an intensive interrogation about the suitability of Brad as an escort, don’t you?’ laughed Imogen, coiling her arm around her sister’s waist and ruffling her niece’s blonde ringlets that had morphed into a halo of candyfloss.

  ‘Too right! One of us has to look out for her. We don’t want strange men taking advantage of her good nature, do we?’

  ‘She’s a grown woman, Karen, and she deserves a bit of fun. Leave her be and let her enjoy her sojourn in the sun.’

  Karen leaned in to kiss her sister on the cheek before dashing with Gracie to their hire car and disappearing through the curtain of rain down the steep incline towards the town at the bottom of the hill.

  Imogen and her two bridesmaids took their time preparing extra-strength cocktails from the recipe cards designed by Lottie and when the rain stopped, they took them out to the veranda so that Millie and Ella could make a start on the tidying up. Millie had to confess that Tuesday’s culinary clutter was even worse than the day before. Every counter top and cupboard door had a generous splodge of melted chocolate smeared across its surface and the whole kitchen looked like a chocolate firework had exploded.

  ‘Hey! Is that them?’ cried Imogen, unfolding her long legs and leading the race to the courtyard at the front of the villa.

  It was exactly the excuse Millie needed to ditch the cleaning and welcome the men back from their afternoon’s exploits. As they waited on the steps, the unmistakable buzz of a quad bike’s engine pierced through the air from deep within the thick, jungle-like vegetation on the eastern border of the Croft cocoa plantation. Millie shielded her eyes with her hand and concentrated on the spot at the far end of the driveway where a row of palm trees stood to attention like a battalion of sentries.

  ‘I reckon it’ll be Alex out in front!’

  ‘Not if Greg has anything to do with it,’ said Carla, coiling the strap of her Pentax around her index finger. ‘You know how competitive he is. He’d even try to out-race Lewis Hamilton!’

  ‘Well, it definitely won’t be Owen,’ murmured Harriet, her face flooded with concern for her husband. ‘He was horrified when Alex suggested this trek as part of his stag week itinerary – I don’t know how Greg managed to talk him into it. He had fun on the rainforest treasure hunt yesterday, though, and he’s excited about the fishing trip that Dylan from the Dive Shack has organised for tomorrow, but anything to do with four wheels makes him really apprehensive, especially on these roads. Have you seen the potholes! I’ve seen smaller swimming pools!’

  Millie cast a covert glance in Imogen’s direction. Earlier on that afternoon the bride-to-be had confided the reason Harriet was constantly glancing at her mobile phone, her expression wreathed in anxiety, and why Owen shied away from getting behind a wheel more than was absolutely necessary. If she were in Harriet’s position, she would be exactly the same and her heart gave a nip of sympathy.

  ‘Yay! It’s Alex!’ squealed Imogen, bouncing up and down on the spot, clapping her hands in jubilation as the frontrunner emerged from the arboreal sanctuary and shot up the driveway towards the official finishing line.

  Imogen was right, her fiancé was in the lead, but only by a few seconds as Greg appeared from a different gap in the trees fifty metres to their left, his head bent low over the handlebars, revving the engine and expelling a cloud of exhaust fumes as he tried to coax the last ounce of speed from the rusty mechanical beast.

  A blast of excitement erupted in Millie’s chest when she saw that Zach was in third place. It was all she could do to prevent herself from coming over all Eliza Doolittle-esque as she joined the chorus to encourage her preferred winner.

  ‘Alex!’ yelled Imogen, cupping her hands around her lips and screaming ‘Go Alex!’ in a very unladylike fashion before linking her arms through Millie’s and Harriet’s. ‘Come on, ladies. Let’s get over to the finishing line. Come on, Carla. It looks like we might need that photo-finish after all!’

  The high-pitched squeal of the engines was getting louder and the waft of diesel fumes invaded Millie’s nostrils as she watched the string of quad bikes buck and bounce along the road like a procession of kangaroos on steroids. She wasn’t a fan of the quad bikes Zach loved so much. She glanced around the gathering in the courtyard then longingly towards the kitchen where she knew Ella was busy tidying up from their Chocolate & Confetti session. She knew where she would rather be, even if it meant doing the washing up.

  She intended to offer the guys a cool beer before they were whisked off by Greg for the next part of their itinerary – an evening of bar-based activities in Soufrière. However, she knew that no delay in his meticulous scheduling would be tolerated for the whimsy of food preparation and consumption. Someone perhaps needed to remind Greg, a former sergeant in the Royal Marines, that the pre-wedding celebrations were not one of his military field manoeuvres. And she’d thought Zach was obsessive!

  ‘Oh, thank God! There’s Owen – bringing up the rear as usual!’ Harriet sighed and Millie saw the relief flood the young girl’s attractive features. ‘I thought he might have fallen off or something…’

  Millie, Imogen and Harriet loitered at the red ribbon Greg had insisted they rigged up for the victor to drive through, whilst Carla crouched down onto her haunches next to the wooden post and levelled her camera lens, poised to snap a picture of the winner’s triumph.

  ‘Yay! Alex! You won!’ screeched Imogen, her chignon bouncing around her cheeks, as she rushed forward to hug her bridegroom-to-be before raising herself up onto her tiptoes to kiss him tenderly on the lips, her adoration lighting up her face. ‘Well done, Greg! You were awesome, too!’

  Only a couple of seconds had separated Alex from his best man, but that was all that was needed. A wide grin split his face as he yanked off his safety helmet and strode over to offer Greg his palm in commiseration.

  ‘Great ride, Greg! That was a truly exhilarating experience. I might even be forced to reconsider my earlier criticism of the over-the-top schedule for my stag week. You’ve definitely delivered a fantastic programme of activities so far!’

  ‘Hey, Zach, well done to you, too – third place in this troop of ex-military competitors is a fantastic achievement!’ laughed Imogen, striding forward to give him a quick congratulatory peck on the cheek, sending a mischievous glance in Millie’s direction, clearly aware of the spark of electricity that flowed between them. ‘Ooops, sorry, Millie!’

  Millie smiled at Imogen’s teasing, enjoying the sensation of being an integral part of the welcoming committee, not to mention the way Zach had raised his perfectly sculpted eyebrows and smirked at Imogen’s blatant assumption they were a couple.

  Her thoughts spun back to the day she had met Zach Barker. Initially, they had irritated the skin off each other due to the fact they possessed character traits at opposite ends of the organisational spectrum. However, over the subsequent two weeks their tolerance of each other’s foibles had ballooned while they worked to achieve the impossible – getting a group of laid-back Caribbean workmen to pull out all the stops and complete the villa’s kitchen renovations in time for Imogen and her friends’ arrival.

  Due to their constant squabbling, their friendship had surprised her, but her blossoming relationship with him had been responsible for papering over the cracks in her heart after her unceremonious abandonment only six months ago. With Zach’s help, she had succeeded in grappling with her sorrow, and had discarded the mantle of gloom she had habitually draped around her shoulders as some sort of protective battle armour after her break-up with Luke. Zach had called her out and she had risen to the challenge of putting the past behind her. She now woke each morni
ng with a smile on her face, confident that she had a better-than-average chance that the struggle to bedtime would be devoid of melancholy.

  ‘Come on, Owen! Put some welly into it!’ called Greg, waving his arms in encouragement.

  The whole crowd turned in unison to watch Owen, his face a curious shade of overworked putty, as he covered the final hundred yards to the finishing line. Harriet rushed forward to pick up the ribbon so he could drive through it like a conquering hero. With only fifty yards to go, Owen raised his hand in a triumphant fist pump to acknowledge the group, but mainly to indicate to the First Assistant Director in charge of his personal horror show that he had succeeded. However, in that split second of distraction, he lost control of his quad bike. The handlebars swung to his left and he headed at speed towards Millie.

  ‘Agh! Millie, look out!’ screamed Imogen.

  Millie found she was frozen to the spot as she watched on in terror whilst Owen and his rampaging quad bike bore down on her at speed. She screwed her eyes shut and prepared herself for the inevitable impact and the ensuing pain. Before she knew what was happening, she was flying through the air and landing with a thump in an adjacent ditch.

  The shock of the collision hit her like a sledgehammer to the solar plexus. A dry retch escaped from her throat, yet there was none of the expected agony because she had experienced a surprisingly soft landing. She slowly explored each one of her senses in turn and found she was no worse for her unexpected brush with serious injury. Then she glanced down to see a pair of arms secured around her chest.

  ‘Maddening Millie strikes again!’ Zach groaned in her ear as a waft of his familiar citrusy cologne invaded her nostrils. ‘Do you think you could climb off me so I can breathe again? I swear you’ve put on weight since the last time I rescued you from certain death. If you’re going to make a habit of this, the least you can do is cut down on the chocolate brownies!’