Elly in Love. Colleen Oakes

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СКАЧАТЬ off her khaki pants. Smiling, she pushed the damp hair off her face and hummed quietly to herself. She stopped when she realized that Snarky Teenager was staring at her. This alarmed Elly. “What are you staring at? Aren’t you supposed to be misting the plants?”

      “Nothing.” A sly grin crawled across the teenager’s face.

      “No really, do I have soil on my face?” Elly looked around for a mirror. There was a reflective statue across the park that she could walk to….

      “No, really. It’s just …,” Snarky Teenager smiled. “You’re sweaty and you’re smiling. What I mean is, you’re never happy when you’re sweating. You’re always a snappy, miserable beast.”

      “This is getting better and better,” Elly mumbled as she quickly fashioned a decorative wreath out of curly willow.

      “Elly.”

      Elly looked up, surprised. Snarky Teenager actually sounded quite sincere.

      “I just wanted to say I’m glad to see that Keith is making you so happy. If you’re smiling when you are covered in sweat, then he must be doing something right.”

      Elly couldn’t hide the blush bubbling up from below her cheeks. Yes, he was definitely doing something right.

      Snarky Teenager began jumping from foot to foot. “Okay, enough of that—is it groomsmen time yet? Is it?”

      Elly laughed. “Okay, okay, we’re going. Try to keep the hormones in check. I don’t want to be responsible for any sexual harassment suits. You know, against you.”

      Snarky Teenager nodded. “Gotcha.”

      Once they were in the sculpture museum, Snarky Teenager bolted for the groomsmen, boutonnieres in hand, while Elly followed a winding cement hallway to a room washed in natural light. It reeked of patchouli and incense. Three women stood clustered around a dilapidated easel mirror, all staring at themselves. Elly crept in silently and placed the bridal bouquet—an asymmetrical masterpiece, filled with olives and olive leaves, tiny oranges, succulents, plum grapes, and dripping moss—on the desk. She turned to leave, coughing awkwardly in the thick air.

      “Elly?” The bride turned around, her pretty brown eyes wide with concern.

      Elly smiled at her. “Oh, Jonna. You look beautiful.” Elly repeated the speech she had said to so many: “I don’t know that I have ever seen such a stunning bride, and I see a lot of brides.” Elly bit the inside of her cheek. She meant every word, each time she said it. Each bride was beautiful. In the back of her mind, however, she knew which bride had been the most beautiful. Lucia, the woman who had married her ex-husband. Thinking her name didn’t cause her spasms of pain like it used to. Now Lucia’s name elicited nothing more than annoying twinge in her heart. It was liberating. Jonna walked toward her, a gorgeous muslin dress shifting loosely around her body. Elly smiled and placed a crown of rust-orange waxflower on her honey curls. Jonna was a true hippie, ripe and earthy. She had been so laid-back throughout the process, and Elly had loved working with her. The mother, not so much. But Jonna had been simply lovely.

      The bride wrapped Elly up in a quick hug. “Thank you so much for everything you did for us. My bouquet is … oh …,” she clapped her hand to her mouth, “oh my goddess. Are those oranges?”

      Elly looked at up at her, concealing her mild annoyance. “Yes, remember that we talked about having fruit accents to make it a truly organic bouquet? And those are organic oranges, the perfect color to accent your crown and your bouquet. I bought them straight from a farmer’s market as you suggested….”

      Moving so fast she made Elly jump, the bride flung herself away from the bouquet and pressed up against the cement wall. “I’m allergic to oranges! I can’t even touch them! Oh my goddess, get them away from me!” The mother of the bride ran to her daughter and scowled at Elly. “I should have known the help would be useless! Jonna can’t have a physical breakdown on her wedding day! How could you possibly dream of putting oranges in the bouquet? What is wrong with you?” She gently rested her hand against Jonna, who was hyperventilating.

      “Can’t believe oranges …,” gulp, gasp, “oranges on my wedding day….”

      Elly took a step back and put her hands up. “Everyone calm down. I can remove the oranges with no problem.” She tried to look sympathetic even though inside she was fuming, “Jonna, why didn’t you tell me that you were allergic to oranges?”

      Jonna shrugged, her flower crown pushed up against her face. “I thought you would just know. I’m sorry.” With a smile that was as real as her tan, Elly reached for the bouquet and tenderly withdrew the oranges, one by one, their fat heads bouncing on tiny wooden sticks. Then she removed all the flowers that the oranges had touched. She looked up at her bride, who was literally clinging to her mother with terror. Elly’s stomach clenched uncomfortably and she felt guilty for causing Jonna panic on her wedding day. But really, didn’t you think it might be important to tell me that you are deathly allergic to a certain fruit when you requested fruit in your bridal bouquet? Elly’s hip bumped the table and one of the removed oranges rolled off it, bouncing in the bride’s direction.

      Jonna screamed and climbed on the table. “Don’t let it touch me! Mom!”

      The mother pressed her body over her daughter’s as if shielding her from a bullet. It would have been admirable if it hadn’t been an orange.

      Elly picked it up and put it back on the table. “Everyone is going to be okay,” she said, more to herself than to them. She took a deep breath and centered herself, staring at the bouquet that now had some large, gaping holes in it. She pulled floral wire out of her apron and stretched one of the strands of plum grapes down its length. She wrapped the wire around it, securing the grapes to the stick, cut it into a few small pieces and then began arranging them over the hole where the oranges had been. In a stray bucket, she found some extra olive leaves and tucked them around the looser stems. Taking her spray bottle, she misted down the entire bouquet and then wiped down the areas around where the oranges had been.

      Jonna, her mother, and an exhausted-looking maid of honor watched her with wide, panicky eyes. Elly gently set the bouquet back onto the table. “There. That should be perfect. You can’t even tell something is missing, and the grapes still give it that organic, harvest feeling.”

      Jonna climbed down from the table and crept forward hesitantly. “This might be a lot to ask, but is there any way that we could still have some orange in this? I mean, I know we took out the oranges but I would still like that orange color….”

      Elly silenced her with a raised eyebrow.

      Jonna gave an apologetic shrug. “Actually, you know what? I think this will be fine.”

      Her mother looked at her with disbelief. “But honey … if you want orange….”

      Jonna waved her hand. “I think that the goddess inside is telling me that orange is not in the plan today. Let’s trust her kind spirit. The oranges can return their energy to the Earth now.”

      The goddess would not be the only one telling her that there would be no orange today. Jonna looked down at the bouquet, and the smile Elly was waiting for finally crept across her face. “Actually, it’s perfect. More perfect that I could have ever imagined.” She reached out and pulled Elly into a tight hug while Elly held her orange-tainted hands out in front of her, not wanting to touch the bride. СКАЧАТЬ