So I Married a Groomzilla (eBook)

Chrystalle Anstett (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2023 | 1. Auflage
224 Seiten
Bookbaby (Verlag)
979-8-3509-0013-2 (ISBN)

Infos

'So I Married a Groomzilla' is a laugh-out-loud romantic comedy about what happens when a corporate go-getter bride-to-be leaves the wedding planning to her fiancé and his grandiose 'vision.'

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Bride-to-be Chrystalle Hannon is a twentysomething go-getter in New York City. She loves her job at the legendary investment bank Belden Pratt and is rapidly scaling the corporate ladder in five-inch heels. Sure, she's excited to get married but she dreams of promotions. Her fianc Michael, is a metrosexual with a passion for color palettes. When Chrystalle becomes consumed with pleasing her new boss, Michael takes over the wedding planning and his "e;vision"e; takes on a life of its own. As their budget goes up in flames, Chrystalle must grapple with her heart and her head, learning how planning a wedding and planning a life can intersect.

Textauszug

“I Can’t Stand Lidded Banquet Dishes”

It is a common misperception that the ’zilla afflicts only women, and only high maintenance diva-type women at that. This is not the case. What makes the ’zilla so deadly is its ability to victimize any person who plays a lead role in a wedding. Usually it’s the bride, but in some cases it can extend to the mother of the bride or the mother of the groom. And in exceedingly rare cases it can even afflict the groom himself.

To be sure, the poor souls who get consumed by the ’zilla are most certainly victims. They don’t mean to be crazy, and they definitely don’t mean to hurt anyone. All these dear sweet people ever wanted was the perfect wedding.

Which is exactly what fuels the ’zilla.

All they ever wanted was the perfect wedding.

The perfect dress. The perfect venue. The perfect flowers. The perfect whatever it is they have been dreaming about for their entire lives. The ’zilla taps into those dreams and drives its prey into full-fledged Prenuptial Perfectionism Disorder—a special kind of crazy where suddenly nothing is ever good enough and the most minor of details take on monumental importance.

The good news is that if, like me, you never gave much thought to what your wedding might be like, you are immune to PPD. But if you are like Mike, my darling fiancé and now husband, who dreamt about his special day since he was a little boy, you are in for a world of trouble. Brace yourself for the ’zilla.

There were signs. Make that a lot of signs. From subtle hints to neon flashing lights, there were definitely clues that I would have competition for the traditional role of “Bride” in our wedding.

For starters, I probably should have known that any man who openly admits to being a metrosexual has a high probability of being a groomzilla. But none of his metro habits ever rang any alarm bells for me, so I wasn’t concerned. In fact, I kind of liked his metroality. Who doesn’t love a man who can cook? Sure, he bases his side dishes more on which color combinations would look best on the plate than on any taste/texture pairing concerns, but when someone has dinner waiting for you every night when you get home, you don’t criticize.

And is it really so bad if he’s... what’s the word I’m looking for here... particular about which cleaning products should be used in the apartment? My sister-in-law has long accused me of being “dumb like a fox” because about a week into my and Michael’s cohabitation, I was abruptly relieved of all cleaning responsibilities.

“What are you doing?”

It’s never good when people ask you what you are doing when you are in the midst of doing something completely self-explanatory.

“What does it look like? I’m cleaning the bathroom.”

“With Windex?”

I had no idea where he was going with this.

“Well... yeah....”

“Oh, because the Tilex and Scrubbing Bubbles are right under the sink. Here let me-”

Ah. He’s just trying to help. That’s so sweet.

“No, that’s okay. I’m fine with the Windex.” 

“But you can’t use Windex to clean a bathtub.”

Huh?

“Why not?”

“What do you mean ‘why not’? What are you, a 20-year-old boy?”

Woah! Where did that come from?

“But Mike, there’s a picture right here on the label of a bathroom. See?”

Mike was nonplussed.

“Chrystalle, this is not a dorm room! Stop. Just stop. Give me the Windex-I’ll take it from here.”

And that is how Mike became Chief Cleaning Officer of our apartment.

His other metro tendencies seemed equal parts beneficial (like his excellent taste in home décor) and harmless (really, do I care if he has more shoes than me?). But when Mike casually mentioned one day, long before he ever proposed, that he “can’t stand lidded banquet dishes” I should have suspected we had a problem. I mean, what the heck is a lidded banquet dish? I didn’t even know what the dreaded object was, let alone have a fully formed opinion about it.

In case you were wondering, Mike was referring to American-style banquet service. American style means guests are served plates of food that the chef artfully prepares and arranges in the kitchen. At most catering halls that serve this way, the plates are brought out with dome-shaped covers, which the waiter then removes with fanfare as the entrée is placed on the table.

Mike finds this highly offensive. He prefers that dinner be served in the French style, where platters of food are prepared in the kitchen. Each waiter carries a different platter out of the kitchen and serves guests directly from the tray. For example, if lamb were on the menu, the chef would issue a waiter forth with the entire rack of lamb resting on a cart. If you would care for lamb, you indicate as such to the waiter who will then place some lamb on your plate. Why this is desirable, I have no idea. However, Mike’s eyes lit up when he explained it to me, so I know it’s important.

But getting back to the lids, if for whatever reason French style service is not an option and dinner must be served by the plate, Mike believes that under no circumstances should a guest ever see the lid that once kept his or her food warm. Personally, as long as my food is warm, I really don’t care if it has a lid, but my husband regards the lids as exceedingly poor form.

That particular revelation occurred when we were newly dating, maybe about a month into our relationship, while Mike was still trying to “woo” me (his word, not mine). Back then, he would plan big elaborate dates the way some people plan vacations. Sights to see, things to do, restaurants to try—each one better than the last. Now, I’ve since come to learn that all of the places we went during our first three months together were actually stops on the Ladies Love Cool Mike tour, his deftly scheduled itinerary guaranteed to separate any girl from her pants at regular intervals. When Mike met a woman he wanted to impress, he did not deviate from his gameplan. Date #1 was dinner at a hip Manhattan restaurant, Date #2 was a Broadway show, followed by a late dinner at another hip Manhattan restaurant; Date #3 was a marathon event that started with a hike through the state park near his apartment and concluded conveniently with dinner at his apartment, cooked by him of course; and Date #4 was a visit to Boscobel. That’s when things started to get interesting.

Boscobel is a New York landmark. Fifty miles north of the City, perched on a bluff overlooking the Hudson River and West Point Academy, the eponymous house attracts tens of thousands of visitors annually. Part of the draw may be the two-hundred-year-old mansion itself, but the real lure—and the reason why Boscobel is on the LL Cool M tour—is the view. In a word: WOW. Standing on the front lawn, the Hudson Highlands rise up to your right and left, the wetlands of the Constitution Marsh Sanctuary lie immediately below you and Bear Mountain Bridge stands off in the distance. Taking in all that beauty is nothing less than intoxicating. And Mike knows this. Which is why he brought me there in October, when the fall foliage show was in full swing. The plan, I’m sure, was to get me completely drunk off Boscobel, but Mike ended up feeling a bit tipsy himself.

“Wouldn’t it be great to have a wedding here?”

Ha! That’s funny, I thought. I must really be in La La Land. I thought he just said something about getting married.

“What?”

“I was just saying that this would be a great location for a wedding.”

Crap! He DID just say what I thought he said. I had no idea what I was supposed to say here. No objective bystander could argue with the observation that Boscobel is a great spot for weddings. They host weddings there all the time. But mention of the “W” word on Date #4 is a major violation of The Rules! No girl in her right mind would ever start talking about weddings, even in a generic sense, one month into a relationship. It’s practically on par with premature dropping of the L-bomb. Unless you want to see a man run like his hair’s on fire, you just don’t say those things. And men don’t say those things period! So was this a test? Maybe this is some sort of weird reverse psychology to see if I’m desperate to get hitched. Having ruled out the possibility that Mike was simply stating a fact, I concluded that I was being evaluated for signs of psycho. I decided to play stupid.

“Oh, ha ha! Uh yeah, I guess so... I hadn’t thought about that.”

“Really?” Mike sounded genuinely surprised. “I think so. It would be awesome! Can you imagine a Christmas Eve wedding here? With strings of white lights twinkling off the snow? And red poinsettia centerpieces?”

What the...?

“Er, maybe not poinsettia centerpieces.” Mike cocked his head to the side, deep in thought. “Maybe just white pillar candles and some silvery ornaments strewn on the table.”

Oh boy. He was off to the races.

Giddy now, he exclaimed, “And it could be catered by Abigail Kirsch! You know, they do some amazing stuff. Her food is out of this world, and the presentation—wow. They don’t use those stupid lids you see everywhere. It’s...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 24.5.2023
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Comic / Humor / Manga
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Romane / Erzählungen
• ISBN-13: 979-8-3509-0013-2 / 9798350900132