Page 4 of Hot Tea & Bird Calls
“So you caught it.” Celene had to be in the Twilight Zone. She lamented the final sip of her drink. “You squabbled over a bundle of flowers. In public. And won.”
“I think one of my friends recorded it.” Ramona unlocked her phone with her thumb.
More unwanted pictures and photos. Celene gave them what she’d given Brenda. “I have the gist of what happened. That won’t be necessary.”
“Do you want another?” Ramona pointed, sliding the rest of her water across the table to Quinn. “All the work you’ve done, I’m sure you want to catch up.”
Celene could’ve turned her down. Rather, she folded her hands in her lap, nodding. “A Manhattan, thanks.”
“I believe they’re called ‘Big J’s the Man-hattans.’” Ramona snorted as she hopped up from her seat. “Glad I finally got to meet you.”
“Likewise.” She meant it. It demystified who Quinn ultimately chose. And once Ramona stepped into a long line to the bar, Celene eased her face into what she hoped was an unoffensive smirk. “Ramona’s quirky. And talkative.”
“She is,” Quinn affirmed, sighing like those had been her top two love requirements. “You look nice. Elise chose a beautiful palette.”
Celene examined her own dress, her painted nails, appreciating how the dusty rose complemented her brown skin instead of washing her out as she’d feared. “Thank you. You do, too.”
“Are we making you uncomfortable?”
That‘we’thing again. “No. I admit it’s hard to reconcile who you were before you left me and the person sitting here now.”
“Have I changed that much?” Quinn swished her dark hair over her shoulder like she’d always done. Her voice remained familiar, her fingers drifted over the faint texture of the tablecloth per her habit. And yet. Everything felt alien, virtually sterile between them. They’d been reset to acquaintances.
Celene let a minute or two tick by, noticing her sister and Ajay off in a corner, stealing a kiss behind the DJ booth. A barely-concealed second to themselves. “It’s not bad that you’ve changed, Quinn. Everyone should evolve incrementally.”
Quinn grinned. Probably because she sounded like classic Celene there. “You’re right.”
Metaphorically, if one cut Quinn in half, the cross-section would resemble an angular, sweeping labyrinth. Fascinating yet frustratingly complex. Even on their best days together, Quinn asked her obviously planned questions in what were supposed to be casual, no-pressure settings. Celene remembered contemplating, ‘Could I live with these stilted conversations forever?’
Right on time, Quinn recited, “How much input did your parents and in-laws have for the wedding?” with the energy of interview prep.
Celene responded, relieved to spot her brother Donovan and his wife Briana approach their table, each wrangling a whining daughter. Sweet escape, distractions.
Not long after Ramona returned with the ridiculously-named-but-proficiently-mixed cocktail, Celene’s nieces, Fiona and Isolde, regaled them with tales of their hotel hijinks and described every dressy item they wore. They’d raided the lavish dessert table, tiny teeth sinking into sweets after every sentence.
Meanwhile, Donovan and Briana checked their phones and rubbed their temples. Waiting for the girls’ inevitable sugar crash. Celene smiled. Her people.
Though after Quinn and Ramona moved on to dance, Celene couldn’t concentrate on any conversation or her text messages to Nadine.
She’d never fully understood the woman she once wanted to marry. In her pettier days, Celene wrote it off as a flaw in her ex.
But now, seeing Ramona effortlessly in-tune, navigating the maze that is Quinn without GPS, Celene wondered about her own next steps. How could she evolve if she had no idea what lay ahead?
Celene picked at a favor bag her nieces ransacked—missing bangles, empty dried fruit sachets, autographed headshots of the newlyweds still intact—and paused on a piece of parchment paper. It once held a bem-casado, considering the crumbs and remnants of caramel spread. The ‘Well-Married’ sweet.
She leaned to view the now-empty DJ corner. Elise and Ajay had sneaked off. And it scared her to think it’d be nice to do that with someone, too.
2
By 2 a.m., the Vales wrapped up what they could have of the festivities. Instead of retiring to their respective quarters, they grouped themselves in the vacated bridal suite. With Elise and Ajay in the lovebird suite six floors above, it left the more spacious room free for the family to claim.
Unsatisfied with the hotel lobby’s selection, Edna Vale brewed a dark roast she brought from home, splitting the pot equally into white paper cups. It scented the air in a fruity richness that reminded Celene of childhood, under her mother’s roof.
Briana, Donovan’s wife, tucked their six- and four-year-olds in the king-size bed, leaving them as two lumps beneath the thick duvet. Donovan lay passed out atop the covers, too spent from fatherhood and bottomless cocktails for the bride and groom’s families.
“I haven’t danced like that in years,” Byron Vale said, his voice like worn sandpaper, conscious of the sleeping children. He’d had his eye on the recliner ever since Elise gave them the grand tour, and now he’d sunk deeply enough to leave an imprint.
“At Don’s wedding.” Celene’s mother jogged his memory, tapping his hand with a cup of black coffee. “You were seven years younger. I think your age is finally hitting you.”
