Zoha and Moe booked a private condo party space in Maple, just north of Toronto, for their twentieth anniversary. I got there while the room was still quiet, tables going up, the bartender lining bottles along the counter. Then the doors opened and it stayed loud for the rest of the day. Family had flown in from around the world for this one afternoon. The tables filled fast, fruit carved into a pineapple boat, grape leaves dusted with pistachio, pomegranate and cauliflower in small glass cups, trays of pastries somebody kept refilling, tea poured from a glass pot into little glasses beside the candles. As a Toronto event photographer I shoot a lot of rooms that take an hour to warm up. This one skipped that part. People came through the door and went straight into a hug.
Out on the terrace the light was wide open, grasses moving in the planters, condo towers standing on every side. Zoha and Moe dropped onto one of the grey couches with her bouquet beside them, put their foreheads together, and for a few seconds nobody called their names. Later, in front of the burgundy drape and the sunflower arch, Zoha stood beside one of the family elders and wiped her eyes, and neither of them tried to hide it. Then the music started and the floor did not empty again. Grandparents dancing. Kids running past with balloon swords. Moe spinning Zoha under the flowers while the circle around them clapped. The frame I keep going back to is the two of them on that terrace couch, twenty years in, still leaning toward each other like nobody else is up there.
