‘What a family gathering!’ declared Paddy O’Connor, relishing it as everyone began to gather for the wedding. Amy had moved back home to stay with her family in Linden Crescent for the three days and Dan had decided to stay with his folks, too!
The house looked great. Helen and Ciara had the place sparkling: the couch covers and chair covers had all been cleaned, and the wooden floor re-waxed. The garden was in great shape, and Helen had huge pots of pink hydrangeas in full bloom at the front door. Amy had never seen her home look so well, and knew just how much effort everyone had put in. Even Barney had been cut and washed, and his smelly foam bed and blanket laundered. Amy couldn’t believe all the neighbours and friends of the family calling to wish her well. She smiled when she saw the new mugs and cups her mum produced when she served the visitors with coffee and biscuits.
The massive table plan was spread out on their dining table and it had been all hands on deck for the past few days as they’d worked out the final seating arrangements for the reception.
People were on and off tables.
‘Aunt Bonnie’s deaf, so make sure to put someone beside her good ear!’ warned Helen.
‘Aisling went out with him, so don’t put her on that table,’ insisted Jess.
Dan’s elderly uncle Frank needed to be near a door to get to the bathroom.
Carmel Quinn’s brother, James, didn’t get on with Eddie’s family.
The single people didn’t want to be on tables full of couples.
‘For heaven’s sake, put friends together and family together,’ advised Helen. ‘There is nothing worse than finding yourself at a wedding, sitting for a few hours at a table with a load of people you don’t know, or with relations from the other side. Mixing people at a wedding table doesn’t work!’
‘When you put a group of friends or family together on a table everyone’s happy, and well able to sort themselves out and find their own seat,’ said Paddy.
Honestly, it was like doing a big puzzle, trying to work it all out. Amy checked that Carmel was happy with the tables before finally emailing the whole plan down to Eve at Glebe House.
‘Thank heaven that bloody thing is gone!’ Helen said, worn out with the complexities of it.
Amy was taking three and half weeks off from the office for her honeymoon and wedding, and was looking forward to such a long break away from work. Norah and the gang in the office had brought her for a celebration lunch in Peploes on Tuesday, and presented her with a generous gift voucher for Arnotts.
Uncle David and Aunt Anna and four wild kids had arrived from Tipperary and had taken over Sheila’s for a few days. Her mother was in her element, having them around. Helen’s Cousin Fiona and her husband Will had come from Amsterdam and were staying with Uncle Tim in Howth. Mary and Sinead, Paddy’s two sisters, along with their husbands, had come up from Cork and were staying in the Radisson Hotel, along with a few more of his cousins. It looked like it was going to be a great family hooley!
Faye, one of Amy’s oldest friends, who had grown up in the road with her, had come over from New York with her American boyfriend, Nick.
‘I’m just dying to show him off to the girls at the wedding.’
The place was like a madhouse, with so many people visiting and calling, the phone constantly ringing, everyone wanting to talk to the bride!
‘I think we need to chill out a bit!’ Helen said, trying to ignore the mounting panic. ‘So I’ve booked for you, me, Ciara and Jess to go to Dalkey to have a massage, manicure and pedicure, and then we’ll have lunch afterwards in Harvey’s.’
‘But we’ve so much still to do,’ worried Amy.
‘Amy, it will all get done,’ promised her mum. ‘A bit of pampering and an hour or two with our feet up will do us all good. Weddings are stressful enough, God knows!’
Amy was like a lunatic, checking and rechecking the weather forecast on every station, in every newspaper and online. August had been rather unsettled, with lots of clouds and showers, and she kept telling herself that it wasn’t the end of the world if it rained tomorrow – after all, they were in Ireland.
Tomorrow’s weather forecast was for sunshine, with rain predicted by late afternoon on the east coast of Ireland. Helen had buried an Infant of Prague statue under a shrub in the back garden in the hope of a sunny day for Amy’s wedding. Barney, however, usually prowled the garden, and in a frenzy of barking had found the statue and dug it up. Helen, running to stop him, had reburied the plaster saint in the front garden, instructing everyone not to let the dog near it.
Jess arrived at eleven and they all set out for Dalkey. Nina and the girls in Santé made a great fuss of them, asking Amy all about the wedding as the pampering began.
Amy let herself sink into the warm towels as Nina took charge of her.
‘I will get all that tension and stress out of your muscles,’ she promised, as she began the massage.
Jess was in ecstasy in the other room as one of the girls gave her a salt scrub plus a massage, followed by a spray tan and a manicure and pedicure.
‘I think that I have died and gone to heaven,’ she moaned, giving in to the transformation.
‘I feel great,’ declared Ciara, who had opted for the Indian head massage. She watched, fascinated, as her bitten nails were magically returned to a perfect state and her feet were scrubbed until her heels and toes looked and felt amazing.
Helen O’Connor fell asleep on the bed as all the tension and stress were kneaded from her tired, tense shoulders and back. Having her fingers and wrists massaged felt good, too, and she had a manicure afterwards.
Amy lapped it all up, the full bridal package: nails, feet, relaxing oils rubbed into her skin and finally a light golden spray tan applied.
‘Lots of luck tomorrow,’ wished Nina and the girls in the salon as Helen paid and they headed off for lunch.
Harvey’s was busy as usual, and Amy could feel her excitement mounting as they ordered lunch. She was determined to have only a glass or two of wine, as she didn’t want to be muzzy-headed or sleepy when she had so much to do. Her mum was in sentimental form and told stories about when they were kids and the silly things she and Ciara and Ronan used to do.
‘Imagine! By this time tomorrow, you’ll be a married woman.’ Helen laughed.
Amy was nervous about the wedding, but she couldn’t wait to be Daniel’s wife, and for the two of them to build a life and home together.
They all tucked into the fish of the day. The plaice was served with a tangy lemon butter sauce, on a bed of greens, with Harvey’s renowned sauté potatoes.
Amy and Ciara ordered the luscious-sounding chocolate dessert.
‘I have to fit into that purple dress tomorrow,’ bemoaned Jess, begging Amy to keep the bowl away from her. Jess was so proud of the fact that she’d had to have the dress taken in because she’d lost so much weight.
Back at home, Amy had a host of things to do, and taking out her Filofax checked that she hadn’t forgotten any of them. Daniel had collected their wedding rings from the jewellers earlier on. She had packed all her clothes for the honeymoon, and printed out three copies of their flight itinerary and hotel bookings. She rattled her brain to see if there was anything else she needed to do.
Her aunts Sinead and Mary arrived at the house with their presents, dying to see how everyone was doing, just as Fran and Katie from next door called, too. Amy was embarrassed by all the wonderful gifts she was receiving, and opened a file on the computer to make sure that she remembered exactly who had given what! She thanked everyone, and Helen whooshed them all outside to the garden, to sit in the sun. Amy took Saoirse, Katie’s little girl, up on her knee, wondering how long it would be till she and Dan had a baby. Tara and Sarah and Aisling called quickly to wish her well, too. Ciara and Helen made pot after pot of coffee and tea as the visitors kept coming.
Helen had made a big chicken casserole for dinner, and when all the friends and relations had left, they finally got a chance to sit down and relax. Paddy opened some wine, and Ronan had a load of Coronas on ice in the fridge, Krista slicing up limes to put in their glasses. They sat in the kitchen laughing and chatting as Ronan got out his guitar and played some of their favourite songs. Everyone sang along.
It was long after midnight when they finally got to bed. Amy fell asleep in her old room with her pink quilt, school photos, and posters of all her favourite bands and rock stars around her.
Dan had phoned her to say goodnight. He’d gone out to dinner with his parents and then down to Mackey’s, their local, to have a few beers with his brothers and his dad. They laughed, comparing each other’s time-warp bedrooms.
‘I swear that there is a poster of Zig and Zag still on my wall,’ he confessed.
‘I have Riverdance!’
It seemed strange to be apart, and Amy cherished the sound of his voice and breathing as they both finally said goodnight.
‘I’ll see you tomorrow,’ he promised.
Amy closed her eyes, thinking of Dan as she fell asleep.