xx
I clicked on the first attachment and a landscape photo opened onto the screen. It was of Beau and me at the end of the night. The photographer had zoomed in. Beau was bent at the waist, his lips on the top of my hand, and I was smiling.
It looked like a movie still.
Dragging it to the left, I saved the image to my desktop.
I closed down the photo and clicked on the second attachment. This picture was portrait and looked like it had been taken from the stage looking over the dance floor. The couple in the center eclipsed the shot. It was intimate in a way that made you unable to look away. The woman’s head was tucked into the man’s neck, the angle covering most of his face, and his hands splayed across the open back of her dress. That’s when I realized the woman was me. I was dancing in the arms of the masked man.
My mouse hovered over the delete key as I stared at it.
Then I dragged the image to the left and saved it to my desktop.
I shut the laptop, pushing it down the couch, and pulled a blanket from the floor.
Spending time with my parents was always a highlight for me. Except on this day, with visiting Henry and the gala the night prior, I was feeling more emotions than I could manage, which meant there was only one emotion that would require the surrender of others.
Fear.
It took a minute to find the remote, and when I did, it took another five to scroll through the horror selection on Netflix until I settled on an old favourite, Scream.
The year that movie was released, I spent a month sleeping with a knife beside my bed and, of course, that Halloween, Henry went as the Scream killer.
Gore was my failsafe.
When I felt scared, I didn’t have to feel anything else. Fear was an all-consuming emotion.
“What’s your favourite scary movie?”
I pulled the quilt up to my chin and let fear devour me whole.
A Few Weeks Later…
“I’m thinking Grecian with new age flare,” Emma announced, her short black hair falling into her face as she dropped concept boards onto my desk.
Tina was right behind her. “We would do all white flower arrangements with spray-painted gold roses as the pop.”
My desk was now joined by a small arrangement that showcased her point.
The gold did pop.
Tina’s arrangements always required the pop.
“White lights in every tree.” Kevin made twinkly motions with his hands as he leaned a graceful hip against my desk.
Tom hovered in the doorway liked they’d no doubt dragged him there, but he offered his two cents anyway. “We’d do a floating stage just inside the lake with land access and spotlight it from all sides. I could rig the speakers in a semi-circle arrangement, which would allow the sound to carry throughout the garden.”
To say the team was enthusiastic about our venue for the 2017 Halo Foundation Gala would have been putting it mildly. With a last minute cancellation at the VanDusen Botanical Gardens, it would be the first ever year the event would be held in the full swing of summer, on August fourth of next year.
“And these…” Emma tapped one of the concept boards demandingly despite her tiny frame. I followed her eyesight and raised my eyebrows.
“Chinese lanterns for a Grecian theme?” I looked at my team, unsure.
Emma shook her head wildly. “No, no.”
“Picture this,” Kevin chimed in. “You give your speech, and as you finish, every guest in attendance releases one of the white lanterns.”
“The sky would be dazzling.” Emma sighed, her eyes dreamy.
Looking over their heads, I eyed Tom. “Is that safe? Are we going to have a problem with a fire hazard?”
He shook his head. “Shouldn’t be a problem. I can run specs with the city inspector when I see him next week regarding the Rickshaw wedding.”
I nodded.
The sponsorship from the campaign of mayoral candidate Beau Callaway had included a contract to sponsor the 2017 Gala, and a subsequent follow up donation of an impressive sum was made.
Needless to say, my team was eagerly willing to put that money to good use.
“Have we done anything on the Weizmann fundraiser today?” I asked, and immediately their eyes moved to anywhere but mine. “The Weizmann fundraiser is in four weeks!”
“But—” Tina pouted.
“No buts.” I shook my head and laughed. “Leave this all with me. Kevin and I will run costing and see what we come up with, but I’m serious. Get to work on the Weizmann contract.”
There was a collective growl of frustration before they filed out one after another, a few curse words in slew.
Obsessively passionate, each and every one of them, it’s why I hired them.
Picking up my cellphone from my desk, I pulled open the text messages thread and typed an iMessage out to Beau.
Me: You have made my team a bunch of botanical event hungry monsters.
Delivered.