add a few tables?” she asked one Sunday.
“Because the room has a maximum capacity,” I said.
“Maximum according to whom?”
“The fire department.”
That was where everything got worse.
Mavis stared at me.
“People always use that excuse.”
Ryan nearly choked on his coffee.
Then came the guest list.
That was where everything got worse.
One night, she arrived at our apartment carrying a handwritten list.
Ryan and I had agreed early that we wanted fewer than one hundred guests. We were paying for most of the wedding ourselves, and neither of us wanted to spend the evening shaking hands with people we barely knew.
One night, she arrived at our apartment carrying a handwritten list.
“Eighteen people,” she announced.
Ryan looked at the paper.
“I have a second cousin named Dennis?”
“Who are these people?”
“Family.”
He pointed at one name.
“Who’s Dennis?”
“Your second cousin.”
“I have
