“Finally, you’re here! In my day, a maid of honour would have been here before the sun came up,” Jomo’s mother said as I arrived at the house. She was tip-top – obviously the food last night had not made a dent in her stainless-steel constitution. “You must straight away talk to that white woman of yours. She seems to think pieces of bark on the tables are suitable decorations. I have some plastic roses back at home I can bring if we can’t find anything better.”

“Yes, of course, MmagoJomo, I will get right on it,” I said and headed to Bonang’s room to see how she was doing.

I found her still in bed. “Bonang, don’t you have an appointment at the hair salon?”

She poked her head out from under the blankets. “What’s the use? How can we fight the curse? It’s been with my family for generations. We might as well just accept it. Maybe we should skip the wedding all together. Who needs a wedding?”

Her eyes were red and I could see she’d been crying for some time. “How’s your stomach?”

“Better. But I suppose the curse will poison the food today too, so what’s the difference?”

“The food was not poisoned. Someone must have put laxative in it. Amogelang tested it and that’s what she found.”

“Laxative? Why?”

“I’m sure it was a mistake of some sort. An accident.” There was no need to let her in on my theory about Kukie. If I could keep away from any dangerous subjects such as wedding curses and ex-girlfriends, I might have a chance of getting her out of bed and to the hair salon.

“Well, that’s good, I guess.”

“Yes, no curse. Now let’s get you up.”

I got her out of bed and ready. As we walked to the car, Jomo’s mother stopped us. “Off to the salon then?”

“Yes, a bit late, sorry,” I said attempting to push past.

“You’ve spoken to the white woman about the table decorations?”

“Her name is Mrs Wang.” I was beginning to lose my patience.

“I can’t say all of those foreign words. Did you speak to her?”

“Yes, I did.” I hadn’t.

“And you have the photo from the magazine I gave you? They will have no problem following that hairstyle. Bonang will look perfect in my wedding dress and the same hairstyle I had at my wedding.”

I tapped my purse. “Yep, got it right here.” I had long threw it in the bin. “Okay, we’ll see you later. I’m sure you’ll manage to keep everything under control while I’m gone.”

“Well, of course I will. What do you take me for?”

The hair salon was a welcome relief. Even Bonang relaxed there. “So, what do you think? Any progress with Gideon?” Bonang asked me.

“I’m very busy with everything. I can’t worry about such things.”

“Yes, but you like him, right?”

“He seems a competent young man.”

“He’s cute and you know it,” Bonang said.

“Maybe.” The hairstylist was pulling out my hair. I generally left it natural, usually plaited. It had grown a lot though. She pulled it straight and it nearly went to the middle of my back. It felt odd hanging back there.

“That’s beautiful,” Bonang said. Her hair was a mass of ringlets piled on her head and around her face. She looked more beautiful than I’d ever seen her before – and that was saying something for someone as beautiful as Bonang.

“Jomo is going to drop dead when he sees you,” I said.

“From the rumours I’ve heard, Gideon might not do too well when he spots you either,” Bonang said. I didn’t dig any further. I couldn’t think about all of that now. I needed to find a lost wedding ring and try to capture a woman bent on destroying my best friend’s wedding. And I’d have to do all that in a dress that wrapped me up like a mummy.

*****

We arrived at the house just as the bakery was delivering the wedding cake. It was a three-tiered cake, each with a forest scene. On the top tier was the smallest cake, held up by little plastic columns, on which stood Bonang and Jomo – or plastic people meant to be them –holding hands. I left the bakery staff to sort the cake in the tent and rushed with Bonang to her room before Jomo’s mother saw the missing bouffant. Already she’d likely not be very keen to see that her huge marshmallow of a dress had been shrunk to more suitable proportions thanks to Amogelang’s magic spray. If all went well, Bonang would look nothing like Jomo’s mother on her wedding day.

I got into my skin-tight blade-of-grass dress, and then left the other bridesmaids to help Bonang get ready. I needed to find that ring. It had to be somewhere around the house. Before leaving to the florist, Jomo had been at the back with the traditional doctor. I decided there would be the first place I looked.

I searched in the grass and around the place where the doctor had been sitting. There was nothing. I brought a ring I got from Mr Wang’s some years ago just in case. It was made of aluminium and had a big, red, plastic stone with a little black spider on it.

I decided to check the tent. It took me forever to walk there in my dress, but I was beginning to the get the hang of it. If I hopped a bit I could move a little faster. Inside, the cake was on the cake table to the side – it looked gorgeous even if it wasn’t the normal pastel wedding colours.

The tent was empty, except for a shuffling sound behind the top table. And when I looked, there was Kukie! Then, just as I caught sight of Kukie, I heard something behind me. As I turned to see what the noise was, everything seemed to shift to slow motion.

There was a cracking sound. The top tier of the cake – where Jomo and Bonang stood – had begun to tilt and then collapsed completely to the side. The entire top tier fell and slid down the other two tiers, shaving off a path of cake along its way. I hadn’t realised I screamed until people came running. Gideon was at the front, behind him the bakers who had just been leaving.

“What happened?” the baker asked.

“It fell.”

They rushed to the cake and tried to repair what they could. I, meanwhile, knew who’d done it. It must have been Kukie! I set off after her, as fast as I could – which, of course, was pretty slow.

“Where are you going?” Gideon asked.

“To catch the perpetrator.”

“So you’re at work even now when you look so gorgeous?”

I ignored the last bit. “Someone is trying to destroy Jomo and Bonang’s wedding and I plan to catch her.”

I set off running, which was really just an odd mixture of hopping and shuffling.

“Wait, I can help you!” Gideon said.

He pulled a camping knife from his back pocket and flicked it open, pulling out a tiny pair of scissors. Then he bent down and slowly cut a slit up the left side of my grass dress.

“Oh! That’s much better! Thanks,” I said. A man with a plan during a crisis was a useful sort of fellow indeed.

I ran to the back of the tent, but I couldn’t see Kukie anywhere.

“Who are we looking for?” Gideon asked. We were apparently a team now.

“Jomo’s old girlfriend, Kukie. Do you know her?”

“Sure.” He scanned the crowd and out to where the cars were parked. Then he caught sight of her. “There she is, hidden between those two cars. Let’s go!”

***

Tell us what you think: Do you think someone can be so mean to put laxatives in the wedding food and knock down the wedding cake?