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We come to a standstill. “Angus, thank you.”
“What for?”
“For being you.” Then I add something that even surprises me, “Don’t give up on Teagan.”
“Now don’t ye go meddling where there is nothing to meddle,” he murmurs by my cheek, “that ship sailed.”
The mere mention of Teagan’s name has him searching the small crowd until he locks onto her walking the miniatures over from the corral with Alice. They are on leads, and the Mini-Ms are following on behind with Coco and Oscar, their ever-playful friends. All the animals have blue bandanas with little Australian flags printed on them around their necks.
We’re fully fenced off now, so they can’t get around to the front of the house to escape. I’ll get the sisters to let them off their leads for a little bit so the guests can spend time with them for half an hour taking pictures. The animals adore the attention.
Teagan locks eyes with Angus, and then she looks away quickly.
“Why don’t you go talk to Teagan and tell her how you feel,” I say softly.
“Been there done that, still got the aches and pains.” He absentmindedly rubs at his chest. “Ye go talk with yer guests, and I’ll go speak with the MacDougall clan.”
He leaves me and jogs over to where his brothers and Paisley are talking.
I locate the group of Fainting Goat guests, who have all joined us for the afternoon, mingling on the grassed area or around the firepit with a glass of MacDougall wine or an Aussie beer I had shipped over.
I spot Gwendoline, and my hands automatically fly up to cup my mouth, hiding the massive grin and smothering the laugh that bubbles up.Awww… she is such a good sport dressing up in the Vegemite jar costume.
What can I say? She drew the short straw.
My mood instantly lifts seeing her like this.
I raise the camera hanging around my neck and prepare to take some fun candids for my social media.
As though she senses me, my BFF looks over her shoulder and shakes her head, grinning down at her outfit.
I wave to the Vegemite jar. She holds a thumb up in the universal sign of “it’s all good” then I click away, taking photos of my gorgeous friend before she turns back to chat with the guests.
I catch Shamus pointing Gwen out to Angus and laughing as they head over to her.
My friend’s doing the job, which comes with the honor of wearing the costume by walking a tray with Vegemite on Jatz biscuits with cheese cubes stuck with Australian and Aboriginal paper flags in them around to our guests.
She is a crowd-pleaser as selfies get taken with her as they pull faces at the unusual salty flavor hitting their taste buds.
Not exactly a food you would pair with wine, but hey, this is a fun afternoon, so it is what it is.
I start making my way over to Gwen and her group of guests.
“Hey, Aussie.” Jensen is by my side, halting me with a soft grip on my elbow. “We good?”
“You bet, Peterson.” And I hope we are. “Where were you? I didn’t see you out here.”
“I just stepped out to your driveway to call Dad and see where he was at. He should be here in the next fifteen minutes, something about having to help one of his lady friends with her cat, and it took a lot longer than he anticipated.”
“You and Hank up for Vegemite and cheese on a biscuit” Or as you say here, ‘crackers.’”
“Dad will try anything you set in front of him.” And I don’t doubt Hank will rise to the occasion. He screws his face up then waves me forward. “Bring on the tar.”
“Peterson, sometimes you just gotta live dangerously, and it’s not that bad.”
“Says the facial expressions on your guests.” He laughs, wiggling his forefinger in circles in the air toward them.
“It takes practice, my friend. Vegemite will be your buddy if you ease into the relationship. It will become a friend for life.”
