“It’s for gender-reveal parties, and it functions as an art piece,” Bettina said in excitement. “This is a wood veneer, and once you shove an ax into it…” She demonstrated with a hatchet. “And knock enough of the wood veneer off, and you can see the pink or blue underlayer.”
“We figure you all might have enough wedding merch, so this is a head start on the baby shower,” Dottie said, patting Meg on the arm.
“Ax throwing!” Annie Svensson said in excitement as she and her sisters raced onto the roof terrace.
“Are there prizes?” another little blond girl asked me.
“Absolutely!” Though my planned party games were more along the lines of ring hunt, how well do you know the bride, model the apron, and princess match, the prizes I had bought would work for ax throwing too.
“Are we playing now?” Enola asked me. Then her eyes lit up as Dottie took the top off another box. “Ooh, knives!”
The rest of the partygoers who were arriving seemed equally impressed with Ida’s targets.
“I can totally throw an ax!” Susie said.
“You have to teach me!” Meg’s friend Kate begged.
“We have knives and axes for everyone!” Ida declared, handing out sharp objects. “And this is official wedding merch, right?”
“Sure. Why not?” I said, throwing up my hands.
I filled a plate with sausage rolls, parmesan-crusted fingerling potatoes, and pretzel bites. Then I settled in to watch the ax-throwing competition.
“Did you place your bets?” Dottie asked, handing me a card. “Odds are on Susie on account of how she used to be a police officer.”
The deputy mayor was up first to throw. She kicked off her high heels and took off her suit jacket. Then she hefted the ax, hauled back, andthunk. It went into the board to cheers from the crowd.
“Up next,” Ida said into the loudspeaker, “we have Enola Svensson.”
I wasn’t sure how the little girl was going to throw the ax into the board. Ida had set the target at the other end of the rooftop. Enola stepped up to the line, hefted her ax, and threw.
“Dang!” I said as the ax buried itself into the wood.
Meg smirked. “And for some reason, Hunter is concerned about when Enola gets older and the boys start coming after her. All they need to do is watch that ax display, and they’ll be too busy grabbing their balls to ask her out.”
We laughed as Enola’s younger sister Annie picked up her ax and threw it. It whistled across the terrace to hit the board.
After the other Svensson sisters had a go, and I had had several more drinks, I was feeling super confident.
“Poor decision-making abounds,” Brea said.
“What?” I asked. “No way. Shoot, a three-year-old girl just demolished this. I guarantee I can totally hit the target.”
“Ma’am?” Enola said in concern as I picked up an ax and almost cut myself on it. “We have all grown up on a compound with no electricity. Ax throwing was our only source of amusement, and we are quite good.”
“I totally have this,” I said, patting her on the head. “I’m a country girl too.” I closed one eye and tried to sight the target. I took a step, wobbled drunkenly, hefted the ax, and threw.
“Ooh,” the ladies in the crowd said, then winced as the ax went over the wall, fell four stories, and hit something with aclang. A man down below on the street cursed.
“In my defense,” I said, backing away to the stairway and hoping that I hadn’t just maimed someone, “it went pretty far.” Then I turned and ran downstairs.
42
Sebastian
Ihad a very nice bachelor party planned. Of course, I had been assuming that Hunter was going to have the teenagers babysit the younger kids while we went out for the evening.
Except when I arrived at the Svensson house, they were all in matching T-shirts, queuing up to load into the school bus that had been painted bright blue with black lettering that read Hunter Is Finally Getting Married!
