The Wedding Planner, page 4
They were excited talking about it, and Faith promised to work on the estimate that weekend, and email it to them at the beginning of the week.
They were planning to charter a yacht in the South of France for two weeks for their honeymoon, and then Morgan had to be back in New York for Fashion Week, and Alex would be back to work on his show by then. They had already put a great deal of thought into it. Of all three weddings for the clients she had met with that week, theirs sounded like the most beautiful and the most fun, and the closest to what her own dream would have been. The Albert wedding was going to be over the top, no matter how much she tried to put the brakes on. She just hoped it wouldn’t be too extreme. And the plastic surgeon’s wedding sounded a little too traditional and unimaginative to her, but it was what they wanted and she tried to stay within her clients’ guidelines. But between the elegant townhouse with the ballroom and the garden and the topflight resources they wanted to use, and their whole attitude about it, Morgan and Alex’s wedding sounded perfect to her. She could hardly wait to get started on it, if they approved her estimate. They already knew that a quality wedding like the one they wanted would be expensive and didn’t mind. They both had high-paying jobs.
They mentioned wanting the ceremony to be very traditional, and to use classic, traditional vows that were the most meaningful to them.
“I have a whole binder of them. I collect them,” she said, and promised to show it to them.
They hugged Faith before they left, and thanked her for her time and great ideas, and promised to be in touch as soon as they got her estimate.
It was not going to be the most expensive wedding she would do that summer, but she was sure it would be the most beautiful, and they seemed like the happiest, most well-balanced couple. Their relationship was solid, they had lived together for a long time and knew each other well. They had managed to survive the disapproval of Alex’s family and had made their peace with it. They were getting married to celebrate a relationship which worked well, and not to fix one that didn’t work, which she saw all too often, or to jump into something prematurely that wasn’t fully cooked yet, which was the feeling she had with both Annabelle Albert and Doug and Phoebe. Alex and Morgan were equals and well suited to each other. You couldn’t ask for more in a couple, whatever their sexual orientation was. It was totally irrelevant.
They wanted to send out Save the Dates as soon as possible, and she promised to send books of them as soon as the contract was signed.
All in all, it had been a good week, and Faith was pleased when Violet left on Friday night. She had done all the research Faith needed to finish the estimate for the Albert wedding over the weekend, and the one for Jack and Phoebe.
“Have a great weekend!” Violet called out as she left, and Faith wished her the same. It had been a very good week. And two more calls had come in from older couples who wanted to get married with small weddings in June. She had room in her schedule for them. Planning Doug and Phoebe’s wedding wouldn’t take up too much of her time, and she had plenty of time to work on the Albert extravaganza. She had busy months ahead, which was just how she liked it.
Chapter 3
As she promised she would, Faith drove out to Connecticut to see Hope and her family for the day on Saturday. They made lunch together, she played with the children, and had some quiet time with Hope when Angus disappeared to his studio over the garage to do some writing, while Seamus played quietly and Hope put Henry and the baby down for their naps.
Angus knew Faith and Hope liked to have time to chat alone sometimes, although they enjoyed his company. He had made delicious pasta carbonara for them for lunch. It always made Faith happy to see Hope. When she didn’t, she felt as though a part of her was missing, and Hope felt that way too. There was definitely something different about being a twin. It was like being sisters with a special bond added. When they had been children, they had their own language, which no one else understood. They were closer to each other than they’d been to any friend they’d ever had.
Faith told Hope about the clients she’d seen that week, and how much she had liked Alex and Morgan, and how beautiful she thought their wedding would be.
“The one on Long Island is going to be the biggest challenge, the one with the fireworks, so it doesn’t turn into a circus.” Annabelle wasn’t wrong about that, and Faith could see why their oldest daughter had eloped, to avoid a wedding that size, where the bride and groom could get lost in the shuffle.
Faith felt happy and at peace when she left her twin and her family in the late afternoon and drove back to the city. She had had her fix for the week, and Hope promised to come to town and have lunch with her soon.
“Yeah, don’t be so lazy,” Faith said as she hugged her.
“Are you sure you don’t want to spend the night?” Hope offered again before she left.
“I can’t. I have work to do. I want to get those three estimates finished, so I can send them on Monday.”
She worked on them that night when she got home, and all day Sunday, and at midnight on Sunday night, she finished the last one, for Alex and Morgan.
Doug and Phoebe’s was the least expensive. His club had given him a good deal on the price. You could only do so much with flowers there. It wasn’t cheap, but it wasn’t extravagant either. She thought he’d be pleased with the price. They weren’t having a rehearsal dinner, since he had said there were no out-of-town guests coming. Phoebe had no family who would be attending, so they had decided to skip the traditional rehearsal dinner.
Alex and Morgan’s was going to be fairly costly, with a canopy that had to be custom-made for the garden, and the quantity and type of flowers they wanted. They were very specific and wanted to go all out with the floral decorations, and the caterer they wanted to use was expensive. They wanted to serve good wines and champagne. They weren’t skimping on anything, and Faith knew they expected to pay for it. Given her experience and reputation, her fee didn’t come as a surprise to her clients, with the flawless weddings she provided, each one designed especially according to their wishes. She made magic happen.
The big-ticket wedding, as expected, was the Alberts’. The estimate came in at just over a million dollars, with the caveat that there were still several unknown elements about the fireworks show. The tent was going to be shockingly expensive, with everything they wanted in it. They needed lights and electricity, air-conditioning on Long Island in July, the chandeliers that Miriam wanted to light it, a fabric liner for the tent, a specially built floor, and a generator to run it all. Faith had taken everything into account, and guessed that the add-ons could easily come to another two hundred thousand dollars. She fully expected Jack Albert to call her and try to negotiate. It seemed like an enormous amount to spend on a wedding, although she had other clients who had spent that before. The only way she could cut down the price if he complained was to eliminate some of the things they’d said they wanted. She had given them a break on her commission, because the cost of the wedding was so high. For everything they wanted and the number of guests, it was actually a fair price, which still sounded shocking, even to her.
She sent all three estimates by email late Sunday night, read for a while, and then went to sleep, after she set her alarm for five-thirty as she always did, in order to do her ballet class by Skype at six a.m.
She felt fresh and rested when she woke up the next morning, got to her computer on time in her leotard, and called Hope when she was finished.
“Did you get your work done?” Hope asked her.
“Yes, I did.”
“How much is the wedding on Long Island?”
“I estimated just over a million, with a warning that it could go up as high as a million two, because of the fireworks. I’m sure the father of the bride will complain. I don’t blame him. But a wedding like that is insanely expensive. They want everything but dancing bears and ballerinas on zebras. The kind of tent they want will cost a fortune.”
“I can’t imagine spending that for a wedding,” Hope said, in awe of the numbers Faith had quoted. “But people do, I guess.”
“Lucky for me,” Faith said, and giggled. “I’d much rather do what I do than work for an insurance company. And I’d be starving if I still worked as a magazine editor. I don’t know what I’d do if I didn’t do weddings.”
“You could marry for money,” Hope suggested, and Faith laughed.
“In the long run, that comes at too high a price,” she said. “Besides, I like my life as a spinster. I can do whatever I want, whenever I want. No one tells me what to do. When I see guys like the plastic surgeon, it makes me shudder. I could have been married to that, if I hadn’t broken it off. I’d have killed him by now and I’d be in prison.” Hope had to admit, and had said to Angus recently, that Faith was so independent and used to being on her own by now, that Hope wasn’t sure that her twin could still adjust to living with a man. She liked her freedom and she never seemed to have regrets about being alone. She went on a date now and then when she met a man she liked, but after one or two dates, he got on her nerves and she moved on. Hope couldn’t see that changing, and neither could Faith, and as long as she didn’t mind being alone, maybe it didn’t matter.
“Well, have a good day. I’ll talk to you later,” Hope said, and went to play with the baby before he took his first nap of the day. She liked her life too. It suited her perfectly, and Angus had turned out to be the perfect man for her. After seven years, she had no complaints about him. It warmed Faith’s heart to know that her twin was happy.
* * *
—
Alex and Morgan’s estimate was the first one to come back to her signed and scanned, with their thanks. She was sure they would be just as prompt with the deposit.
She got Doug’s a few hours later, and Annabelle Albert called to make an appointment with her for the next morning, to go over some details without her mother interfering. Faith didn’t have their signed estimate yet, but she was happy to meet with Annabelle anyway. She was surprised that she hadn’t heard from Jack Albert, one way or another. She fully expected him to complain about the price.
She worked on the two small weddings she had accepted for June for the rest of the day. That night, she cruised the Internet, looking for small venues for Violet’s wedding. She still hadn’t come up with alternatives to the neighborhood pizza restaurant, which she just couldn’t allow to happen. Violet deserved so much better than that, and she wanted her to have it.
* * *
—
On Tuesday morning, Annabelle Albert arrived promptly at nine-thirty, and Faith was surprised to see her father with her. She had made a point of saying she would come alone. Instead, Jack walked in right behind her.
“I won’t stay long,” he said as he sat down, and took an envelope out of his pocket. “I thought I’d deliver this to you in person,” he said, handing her the envelope. “It’s the signed contract, and check for the deposit.” He was smiling, without a word about the amount of the check he had written. Faith was too startled to speak for an instant. She had expected some resistance.
“Thank you very much. I tried very hard to reduce some of the amounts. I’ll continue to work on it, as we refine some of the elements of the wedding,” she reassured him.
“If it’s that expensive, it’s bound to be fabulous,” he said, looking pleased. “I give my girls whatever they want,” he said proudly about Annabelle and her mother. “I want this to be the wedding of the century.” She could tell he meant it. He might have had rough edges, but his heart was in the right place for his daughter. Violet came to offer them coffee then, and he declined, as Faith made a suggestion to Annabelle to keep her busy while she wrapped things up with her father. She wanted to thank him for his prompt payment.
“Why don’t you look at the binder of tents I wanted to suggest?” she said to Annabelle. “Violet can show it to you.” Annabelle looked relieved to leave the room, and followed Violet back to her office, while Faith took the opportunity to thank Jack again. “Thank you very much for bringing the check so quickly. It’s wonderful to do business with you. And I promise you an extraordinary wedding for your daughter.”
He smiled, leaned forward in his chair, and lowered his voice. “Why don’t we have dinner to talk about it?” he said, with a look in his eye she didn’t like. “Just a quiet, intimate evening, the two of us. Annabelle doesn’t need to know, or her mother.”
Faith leaned back in her own chair instinctively. He was unattractive, and what he was proposing to her was repulsive. His intentions were clear.
“I don’t think that’s a good idea, but thank you for the invitation.” She stood up with a chilly look.
“Maybe another time,” he said hopefully. Maybe never, Faith thought.
She stood formally, as he picked up his coat to leave, and she kept her distance as she followed him to the front door. She wondered how many women he tried that with, and how often it worked. He was spending a fortune on his daughter’s wedding, and making a pass at her. She thought he was disgusting, even more than she had thought at first. That was why he had brought the check himself, so he could ask her out to dinner. Even if he had been attractive, she wouldn’t have done it, but the combination of inappropriate and repugnant was too much, no matter how big the check was. The door closed quietly behind him, and she went to find Annabelle in Violet’s office. They were poring over the enormous binder of tents, and Annabelle had chosen the most expensive one, which didn’t surprise Faith. She realized now that Annabelle was very spoiled, and to what degree. She was twenty-nine years old, and didn’t work. She’d never had a job, and had made the comment herself at their last meeting, to which her father had responded that she didn’t need one. Faith couldn’t imagine a life of such indolence and self-indulgence. She wondered what Annabelle did all day. It had always been understood in their family that she and Hope were expected to work when they finished college, and they both had. She at Vogue, and Hope as a model. And Faith had started her own business six years later. Aside from the money she earned, she couldn’t imagine life without it. She would have died of boredom without a job. It gave her life meaning and substance.
She had fully understood that everything in the Alberts’ life was about money. The most expensive wedding, the most expensive tent. Jack Albert wanted to show everyone he knew how successful he was, and his daughter’s million-dollar wedding was the perfect way for him to do it. It was more about him than about her.
Douglas Kirk had the same theory, on a smaller scale. He wanted to show off to the people he thought were important, professionally and personally. Faith hated to see people use weddings in that way. She was a purist and thought that they should be a sacred moment in a couple’s life, to be cherished forever, and only shared with people who were important in a deeply personal way. Only Morgan and Alex seemed to be respecting that, and considered it a highly private occasion to be protected and safeguarded. Alex and Morgan wanted a chic, stylish, fun wedding, with high quality providers, to share with their closest friends, which was why they’d come to Faith. They paid their deposit the day after Jack Albert. She had Doug Kirk’s deposit in hand by the end of the week. She never had trouble collecting from her clients. They were desperate for the most beautiful wedding, and were willing to pay for it to ensure that they were a priority to her, so most people paid promptly. It was a great way to do business.
As she’d been scheduled to do, Faith drove to the Albert estate at the end of the week, which was a fascinating experience, but not a surprise.
Everything in their enormous forty-thousand-square-foot home was expensive, and all of it was flashy. It was easy to see that they had been willing prey for decorators and art and antique dealers. Some of the pieces were beautiful. There was an incredible Picasso from his Blue Period, a Degas, and a Monet. But none of it was related. There was no “story.” It was just an amazing collection of fabulously expensive pieces that had no relationship to one another. Each was simply there because of its monetary value.
There was nothing you could fall in love with, no corner that was warm and cozy. The house looked like a chateau, but the periods and styles were eclectic, Italian with French with Danish with English, from different periods. Jack had bought it all as investments, and not from the heart. She realized she’d have to be careful he didn’t do the same with the wedding. She wanted the wedding to have meaning, and to represent Annabelle and Jeremy, not just her father’s bank account.
* * *
—
With all three estimates signed and deposits in hand, Faith started working in earnest on all three weddings, researching the best suppliers for whatever services she needed. Alex and Morgan wanted to rent the finest crystal, china, silver, and table linens. In the quantities they needed them, Miriam Albert wasn’t as particular. And the club was providing what Doug and Phoebe needed, so they didn’t have to deal with rentals.
Faith wanted to be particularly careful with the fireworks show, so they didn’t get some risky group to do it and set their house on fire, or injure someone. Faith took out large insurance policies for every wedding and charged the clients.
