Page 48 of Fathers of the Bride

“A hundred.”

“Can we make it a hundred and twenty-five?”

My throat clenched. I wanted to say no, but really, I couldn’t. It was Kelly’s wedding. She deserved, we deserved—

“Yes, I think we can do that.”

“Were you always this agreeable? Or has age mellowed you?”

“Dial down the bitchy. I’m fairly certain Barry is straight.”

“Barry? Our accountant is named Garth. Barry was two years ago.”

We walked through double doors into a nicely appointed reception area. I asked the receptionist for Garth—Miles’ reminder had been timely. She buzzed him and a few moments later we were making ourselves comfortable in two leather and metal chairs—well, as comfortable as we could in the ultramod furniture.

Garth was very young and far too pretty to be an accountant. He would have been better employed as a lifeguard, masseur, escort, porn star.

“I thought the two of you—has there been a reconciliation?”

“What?”

“Oh my God!”

“No.”

“Absolutely not.”

“Ridiculous!”

“Impossible.”

“Not. Going. To. Happen.”

“My mistake,” he said. “So, I have all the paperwork laid out. And all you have to do—”

He was opening a folder, ready to spread the paperwork out in front of us, and I said, “We’d like a hundred and twenty-five, if that’s possible.”

Looking up at me, he smiled. Taking a second folder out of a drawer he said, “The bank qualified you to nearly two hundred. I took the liberty of having docs prepared at one twenty-five. Unless you’d like one-fifty?”

“One twenty-five is fine,” I said.

He laid the new documents out and we took turns signing. To fill the empty air, he said, “So, your daughter’s getting married. That’s exciting.”

We all agreed that it was because it was.

“Church wedding?” he asked.

“Backyard.”

“That sounds nice,” he said, though he’d obviously never seen our backyard.

Finally, the documents were finished and we signed. He asked us to wait a moment, called in the receptionist, and she notarized them. As she did, he said, “The bank will deposit the money into your account here. Would you prefer a separate account so that you can keep a tab on the wedding expenses?”

Miles and I looked at each other. We hadn’t talked about this. My guess was, “Yes, that would very nice.” And since Miles didn’t object it was set in motion.

We thanked Garth and said good-bye. Stopping at the receptionist’s desk we had our parking validated. Then, as we waited for the elevator, Miles began catching me up on the wedding details.

“I picked out this amazing paper for the invitations. It has seeds woven into the paper and you plant the invitation in your yard and wildflowers grow. Isn’t that amazing?”