7.
It was very difficult to rein my mother in with the wedding plans. Both families agreed to have the ceremony and reception in our garden, which was big enough and rather exquisite. My cousin Moira was to be my bridesmaid as she had always been closest to me and Callum’s best man was his best friend, Millar.
While shopping for dresses, I found a beautiful soft mint green dress for Moira. It was not a colour I would normally have gone for but the minute I laid eyes on it I got sold. Moira not too keen on the colour but willingly went along with my choice. My dress was a different story; there was nothing in the bridal shops or the material shops that interested me in the least. Styles and designs had my mother and me at loggerheads constantly, so much so that at one stage I felt eloping was a better option. Veronica, Callum’s mother, came to the rescue with a design and a dressmaker she knew who lived in Cape Town – much to my delight and relief. My mother, on the other hand, was not very impressed that her ideas had not made an impact. Her dress was going to be elaborate, stylish and celebrity-like and, as expected, she would most probably outshine me, the bride.
It was difficult enough trying to find the time to deal with all the arrangements, dress fittings and my mother when the filming schedule was taking up almost 24 hours a day. On most days I was too exhausted to care what happened. If the cake came out purple, well, that would be okay too.
With a week to go all I wanted was for the wedding to be over so that I didn’t have to endure an endless battle with my mother over my lack of grandeur and just finally be Callum’s wife. On a glorious day for winter, I relaxed outside in the sun while Callum and Millar behaved like little boys in the pool. The water was freezing and yet they deterred not. Millar, being a great athlete, was doing back flips from the pool edge into the water, Callum clumsily trying to copy him.
Several times I heard Millar say, ‘Wow bru that was close to the edge,’ and Callum would just laugh as they both climbed out of the pool to repeat their antics.
For a while all was quiet. Millar had to answer a call, and Callum wallowed in the pool like a seal. It was so peaceful that even the clinking of dishes from the kitchen was pleasant. Disturbing the peace was a crack, the oddest sound of something breaking.
I sat up and looked around, squinting from the sun’s rays and then heard Millar shouting, ‘Callum, Callum!’ as he jumped into the water.
It was then that I noticed Callum floating face down in the pool. By the time I had stood up and rushed over, Millar was pulling him out of the water carefully holding his neck in one position as best he could.
‘Callum, Callum!’ I screamed, ‘What happened Millar? Callum, Callum!’
I was almost hysterical as I continued to scream while trying to help Millar at the same time. My parents were by this time alerted to my screams and had rushed outside to find out what was all the commotion. Millar was checking Callum’s breathing and calling out to him as I continued to scream his name desperately. My father, with one glance at the scene before him, yelled at my mother for her to call the paramedics, but she just stared at Callum, numb.
‘Faye! Call them now!’ he said firmly shaking her out of her frozen state, and she turned and ran.
I had never seen her run so fast in my life. My father took over from Millar, trying with all his might to resuscitate Callum. Millar breathed air into Callum’s lungs on every count of five, and my father thrust pressure onto Callum’s chest. They worked as a team, vigorously, pleading Callum to come back to us.
‘Callum, Callum!’ I continued to call him, begging him to make a movement, take a breath, to call out my name.
Nothing. Millar and my father kept their pace until the paramedics arrived. It must have been a very few short minutes, perhaps even seconds from when my mother ran off to phone them to when they arrived. My mother pulled me up from my frozen position on the ground as close to Callum as possible. I resisted with all my strength not wanting to be away from him.
‘You must let the paramedics have the space to work with Callum,’ she insisted as she wrapped her arms around me as we stood a foot away from my motionless husband-to-be.
They worked with speed, checking vital signs and taking over the CPR efficiently, all the while asking questions. Millar was quite breathless from pumping all his oxygen into Callum and slowly gave them the details of what had happened. I was cold as I stared at Callum lying like a washed-up jellyfish on the ground, and as much as I told myself it was not true, the blue shade to his lips could not go unnoticed. My father, also exhausted from pushing Callum’s chest for those few minutes stood aside aiding the paramedics whenever they requested him to do so. For a brief moment, he simply stood silently with his eyes closed. I could see he was praying. After what felt like hours, one of the paramedics stood up and looked at the four of us staring at him hopefully.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said with compassion etched into his face, and my heart shattered into a million pieces.
‘What? NO NO NO!’ I screamed until I had no more voice and flung myself onto Callum, hugging him, holding him, shaking him, begging him to come back to me.
‘Oh no! Oh no!’ I cried as I sobbed on top of the lifeless body of my only true love.
I faintly heard Millar sobbing behind me as he put his hand on my shoulder encouraging me to let go.
‘NO!’ I shrugged his hand away and held on tighter to Callum’s body.
My father held my mother in his arms as they consoled each other. The paramedic somehow got me off Callum, kicking and screaming. How had this happened? In a week’s time, I was to marry him, and we were going to spend the rest of our lives together in peaceful bliss.
‘How? Oh, why has this happened?’ I asked Millar whose only reply was to engulf me in a hug and sob as hard as I was sobbing.
Our chests beat thunderously. Who was going to phone his parents?