Cupid's Queue

Chapter 16

Today was the day! Mikayla and Damien were getting married!

The staff from the wedding decorations company that they hired had been running about earlier that morning setting up the Pigeon beach area near the hotel.

Heather, the head coordinator, was an absolute pleasure to work with. The short, brown-skinned woman had an infectious laugh and she had been Hannah's right hand woman where all event planning was concerned. She would take over in overseeing everything once Hannah had to leave to go get ready for the wedding.

The weather was absolutely perfect and the blue waters looked simply magnificent. Due to the Caribbean heat, Mikayla and Damien had decided that the wedding ceremony would take place late in the afternoon.

It would be timed in such a manner that once they had shared their first kiss, the sun would be just starting to set. This would create a perfect backdrop to end the evening, seeing as they would be getting married next to the ocean itself. That, and their guests as well as themselves would not be melting under the rays of the hot sun.

For the wedding menu, Mikayla and Damien decided that they wanted to mix their cultural cuisines. Since the bride and groom loved curry so much, they decided to have an authentic Trinidad curry-que as their main wedding food, while serving French style hors d'oeuvres.

Hannah walked to the hotel's restaurant and entered the kitchen, where she was kept up to date on the preparation of the hors d'oeuvres. Damien's mother and father had made frequent trips to the kitchen during the week. They had been helping out the head chef and his team, taste-testing to ensure that the flavours were as authentically French as possible.

The hors d'oeuvres would include pork rillettes, cheddar, gougères, mini tartes flambées, reblochon tarts with bacon and fingerling potatoes.

Sophie sampled the provençal vegetable tarts and nodded, "These are perfect!"

Daniel had nodded in agreement before he eagerly tried the smoked salmon croque-monsieur, which were faultless, "Oh oui, parfait en effet!"

"Of course, we must have a classic cheese fondue," Sophie had added in excitement.

As Hannah continued to look at the hors d'oeuvres being prepared, she was satisfied that everything was going well. She then walked just outside of the restaurant on to the large back terrace where there were huge pots of curry, all lined off in a row, being cooked. Her mouth watered at the aromas that were filling the air.

The caterer, Jenny, saw Hannah and smiled. The Indian lady was a caterer friend of Cynthia's and was known to make some of the best curry on the island. Her team would ensure that all the food would be finished in time for dinner, everything would be hot and fresh.

"Hi Hannah!" Jenny greeted her.

Smiling, she replied, "Hi Jenny, how's everything coming along?"

"Just great, the roti skins are being prepared off site as discussed. And I know how much Cynthia and them love their amchar mango, so there's going to be a very large pot of that so we don't run out!" she answered with a big smile.

"Perfect! I love amchar mango too! Mikayla makes it for me sometimes," Hannah replied.

"Yea? It's so nice to see little Mikayla all grown up!" Jenny commented.

They went over the menu making sure that nothing was missing. The meats consisted of ginger curry shrimp, king fish in curry tomato sauce as well as curry chicken, duck, and goat. There would also be curry body and pumpkin as well as rice and dhal.

"What about the baigan and aloo curry? There are so many pots here I can't really tell what is what. But I just know that Mikayla will kill me if she doesn't have it, she really loves her eggplant and potatoes," Hannah chuckled.