Chapter 6: The Groom

Bon-Hwa Rohan Fernando was nicknamed ‘Gravity’ by his friends and mates. He was nicknamed ‘Acada’ by his family.  He was like the wind; impossible to trap, dangerous to offend, difficult to predict. He was very arrogant and full of himself.

He was tall, handsome, cold and dashing. The domineering aura round him made people breathless when they came close. He was the grandson of the great Bon-Hwa Fernando.

The Fernando family has ruled the business sector in Country Z for many generations.

The Bon-Hwa Fernando Group was the number one in the country when it comes to money. And also ranked top in the world business ranking, courtesy of Rohan Fernando.

The group touched all sectors of the economy; banking, entertainment, health, electronics, hospitality management such as hotels, etc.

Rohan was a shrewd businessman, a dare-devil investor, very calculative and intelligent.

He was not only powerful because of his money, wealth, family but he also works with the government which gave him advantage over so many of his contemporaries. He works as a volunteer ghost FBI officer.

If you prove too stubborn from the overt world, he will deal with you from the covert world. When he was a little younger, he often paints the city of ‘k’ red with his friends. The police and other law enforcement officers knew him very well and were all his friends.

He was a philanthropist, generous to a fault. Bring one hundred persons for an interview, seventy persons would profess to love him, while thirty persons would profess to hate him.

But he was not perfect, just like no man is perfect, every man has his own weakness.  He had a glaring weakness ‘women.’

Today was the day of his marriage ceremony; the wedding was taking place at the largest cathedra in K city.

He was not a faithful member of the church, but his mother was. When his mother died in a ghastly motor accident two years ago alongside his father, after the burial, he had gone back to rebuild the cathedra into a modern style as an appreciation to the church.

After rebuilding the church, he became a celebrated non dedicated member of the church.

That he came to hold his wedding in the church was not only because the members of the congregation had come to love him, but because he had promised his mother to get married in her church.

Otherwise, he would have held the wedding in his own seven- star hotel; ‘Hotel De Tycoon.’ But the wedding reception would be taking place in the said hotel.

All his friends, acquaintances, well-wishers, Club members, business partners, both within and without the country and workers in his company would have all love to congregate at Hotel De Tycoon for the continuation of the ceremony.

But only few of them were invited, basically, members of his club.

Three months ago, something happened that made him decided to keep the wedding as low key as possible.  Thereby restricting attendance to the wedding as much as possible.

The wedding ceremony was announced just four days ago, he had purposely delayed the announcement because of the controversial nature of his life.

He was the most eligible bachelor in K city, but he was very controversial; especially in his relationship with women. And he had stepped on many feet because of this.

When he delayed the announcement, he had hoped that only few persons would be aware and come.

He was still embarrassed because of the what happened to him three months ago. It was too embarrassing. If not that he had made a promise to his dead mother, about having a wedding, he would not have had the wedding in the first place. He would simply get a marriage certificate.

If not because the Club he belonged to ‘Big Brothers Club’ (BBC) has a policy, which made it mandatory ‘that every member of the club who wants to get married must conducted a wedding ceremony otherwise, the member loses his entitlements as a newly married member of the club.’

If not, he would have avoided the whole ceremony stuff and obtain a marriage certificate and take his bride home.

But these reasons, and more, made him decided to do the ceremony; fulfilling his promise to his late mother and collecting his entitlements from his club.

If only he knew that the wedding ceremony would have brought him another car load of embarrassment and disaster, he would not have held the ceremony.

But he had no idea.

He had an intuition that something was going to go wrong, and had delayed the announcement of the wedding, and had also refused his club’s offer to organize a bachelor’s night for him.

He had even dreamt and saw himself crying during the wedding, but his dreams have never come true, so he was not perturbed because of the dream, but the feelings of impending ignominy were there. He therefore, wanted to avoid as much publicity as possible.

He had even gone to the extent of placing restrictions on the attendance to the reception.

Only those who are invited would be allowed into the ‘hotel reception during the ceremony.’

But for the church, he had no control. The church was the largest church in the whole city, and his mother was very faithful, and a great financier of the church during her life time, having been the wife of a billionaire.

And when the members of the congregation heard of the wedding ceremony of Mrs. Julia Bon-Hwa Fernando’ son, they all were willing to attend the wedding ceremony despite the short notice.

They came to the wedding not because of the young man who hardly come to church, but because of his mother, also maybe because he had rebuilt their church to the latest style.