The reservation.
The wedding had gone off without a hitch. Seamus and Colleen were now married and embarking on the rest of their lives. The church had been decorated with beautiful flowers, the colour of her choice. Burgundy red roses mixed with cream coloured chrysanthemums. The service flowed, and even the congregation had joined in with her chosen hymns with gusto. Even the sun joined in and shone down on the happy occasion. Her dress had arrived on time and fitted perfectly.
The groom looked immaculate in his tux and tripped over his vows, where his nerves mangled his tongue in a mouth that was drier than the Sahara Desert.
The lavish reception had been no less a success. Seamus’s best man made a speech, which, although bawdy in places, had delighted and entertained all of those invited. Uncle Mick did his usual party trick of dancing like a puppet with tangled strings and landed flat on his back, sliding under one of the tables that ringed the dance floor. His legs stuck out from under the tablecloth cloth and there he stayed.
The five-tiered cake stood up, and bets had been taken on at what point it would topple. Anyone betting it would stand would have cleaned up, but it did look precarious, balanced as it was on slim pedestals, tier upon tier, with a bride and groom perched on the smallest cake at the top.
Auntie Maud got drunk on the punch and fell off the seat that had been placed under her as she tottered off the dance floor. She had lain on the floor, giggling and showing off her drawers where her legs were draped across the chair seat. No one noticed. It was her usual condition at functions such as this.
The Maid of Honour was going to have a hard time convincing her husband that there was such a thing as an immaculate conception, some months later, especially as his vasectomy had been performed several years ago with no adverse effects or further accidents. The child bore an uncanny resemblance to the Best Man, including red hair.
The page boy got his first glimpse of certain parts of the female anatomy. I’ll show you mine if you show me yours. So, that was good too.
All in all, it had been a great wedding with no fighting. Perhaps that would come later, after Seamus and Colleen had left in their hired limousine to begin their married life at a five-star hotel in Limerick, booked and paid for by his dad as a wedding present.
Tin cans rattled and clanked, tied to the rear bumper of the limousine with a huge sign “Just Married” on a large card held on by some ribbon hooked into the trunk lid. Once they were out of sight, the liveried driver stopped to remove the bits so they didn’t cause a problem on the motorway.
Eventually, and after much giggling and cuddling in the back seat, the hotel swung into view at the end of a long, sweeping gravel drive. It was one of those huge gothic gothic-looking manses, set in acres of neatly kept parkland. The hotel was secluded and as private as it was possible to be.
The chauffeur got out and managed to avert his eyes as Colleen stepped from the car in an undignified manner. She still had her garter on, he noted; it was blue. He wasn’t sure, but she might have been, sans knickers.
Alice was just starting her shift at the front desk. Her black dress was freshly laundered and pressed. Her white blouse with a starched collar was pristine. Her makeup and hair were the product of many minutes sitting at her dressing table in preparation for being the face of the hotel.
She looked critically at the oak panelling that formed the reception walls, with its oil paintings of some dubious-looking characters from decades past. She could smell the aroma of polish that had been liberally sprayed and wiped over the wood surfaces. The flowers, in a huge fan-shaped vase, were fresh, which was nice, and she noted that one of the lamps in the swan-necked wall lights was on the blink. A minor irritation and one she would be having a word about, very shortly. One had standards to keep up to, and defective lamps did not present the hotel in the best light, so to speak.
She rearranged the leather-bound guest book, pen stand and inkwell. Adjusted the faux-Faberge angle poise lamps at either end of the reception desk and flicked at some minuscule fleck of dust that looked completely out of place. Alice was ready for whatever the world had to throw at the hotel. She could never have been prepared for the next few minutes. There was nothing in the training manual that covered it.
Suddenly, the doors banged open and the newly married Mr and Mrs O’Flannery fell headlong into the vestibule, landing on the plush carpeted floor, giggling and laughing fit to bust. Eventually, they untangled themselves and stood sheepishly in front of Alice with the reception desk between them while their bags were being dumped without ceremony by the chauffeur behind them. He was now certain that the new Misses O’Flannery was indeed, sans knickers.
“Good evening. How can I help you?” Alice asked in her very best posh accent.
“We would like the bridal suite, please?” Seamus stated, noticing the haughty look the Receptionist was offering by way of welcome and trying desperately to smooth over their somewhat unorthodox entrance, even add a level of decorum.
“Do you have a reservation?”
And Colleen, in one of those moments that are forever etched into the memory, answered…
“Well, I am a bit worried about taking it up the arse…”
Three jaws dropped as the receptionist, the chauffeur and more importantly, Seamus looked at Colleen, with varying degrees of shock.
“… well, I’ve never done that before, and I have some reservations about it.”
