by Bloom, Tracy
‘Perhaps Logan could help me,’ said Gabriel at one point. ‘To make it fair.’
But Braindead and Ben had agreed that Gabriel would probably trounce them anyway and so he truly deserved to sleep in the honeymoon suite. Gabriel then suggested that they all take it in turns to have the room like the true gentlemen he was, which Ben and Braindead had agreed to happily.
‘Did you see that goal he got in against you? It was outstanding,’ observed Braindead.
‘He confessed later on that he used to play every day when he was growing up in his dad’s bar.’
‘Seriously!’ exclaimed Braindead. ‘Well, that explains it then. At least we all get a go. Looking forward to taking Logan for his first hot tub.’
‘Right,’ said Ben. ‘Not Abby then?’
‘What?’ replied Braindead. ‘Oh yeah. I guess she’ll like it too,’ he said with a shrug.
‘You never know,’ added Ben. ‘We might all get to use the honeymoon suite for the reason it was intended.’
‘No chance of that with the kids around,’ sighed Braindead.
‘Perhaps we could babysit for each other a bit,’ said Ben. ‘Give us all a chance to have some couple time away from the kids.’
‘I suppose,’ said Braindead. ‘Not that bothered, to be honest. I came here to have time with Logan and I’m sure if you asked Abby, she’d agree.’
Ben couldn’t help thinking that by the look of Abby tonight, spending time with her son was the last thing she wanted to be doing on holiday.
Chapter Fourteen
‘What are we going to do?’ asked Katy, looking up at the podium where Abby was currently engaged in dancing around a pole.
‘She’s good,’ said Daniel, ‘really good. She should really think about doing that for a living.’
Katy turned to stare at him. ‘Seriously!’ she said. ‘She is married, you know!’
‘That’s not looking like a woman with a husband up there at the moment,’ he pointed out.
Katy looked back up and was horrified to see a man had joined her and was about to start writhing behind her.
‘Oh God, Daniel, do something,’ she said.
‘Like what?’
‘Go and stop him. He’s such a letch and she’s married. And she’s so drunk, she doesn’t know what she’s doing.’
‘Why have I got to step in?’
‘Because, because you’re a man. Can you imagine the fuss if I get up there? All the blokes will think it’s lesbian hour or something, we could have a riot on our hands.’
Daniel looked at her disdainfully. ‘You are not a convincing lesbian,’ he said, looking at her sensible cotton dress. ‘There is no-one here who would ever think that you were being brought on as entertainment in a lesbian show.’
‘Thanks, Daniel. I shall consider later whether or not I should be offended by that statement but in the meantime will you get up there and help Abby?’
‘She doesn’t look like she needs help,’ he said as Abby began to sway to the music with the topless man behind her.
‘Well, if you won’t do it for Abby, do it for Braindead,’ she shouted in his ear.
‘But he might hit me!’ pleaded Daniel.
‘So be subtle about it,’ she said, giving him a push forward. He looked back at her pleadingly before stumbling towards the podium. She held her breath as he climbed up and then inched up behind the man. A massive cheer went up from the writhing crowd. Daniel looked around and a smile broke out on his face. He then caught sight of the pert buttocks of the man twisting and writhing behind Abby and so sidled up to him and mimicked his actions. Daniel looked like he was starting to enjoy his mission.
The crowd were now roaring their approval and Daniel was waving cheerily to his supporters whilst the man was still unaware that he was having the mickey taken out of him from behind.
Daniel carried on and the cheers grew and grew until the man looked up and noticed the entire throbbing dance floor was gazing up at him and laughing and cheering. He smiled for a moment and then became aware of something behind him. He looked over his shoulder to see a grinning Daniel pulling a face and aping his moves. The crowd’s laughter increased and the man leapt off the stage and disappeared, a wave of back-patting following him.
Of course Daniel took the opportunity to take a bow to his appreciative audience. Then he tapped the oblivious Abby on the shoulder and indulged her in a brief dance before taking her hand and gently leading her off the stage back down to where Katy was standing.
My hero, Katy mouthed at her friend.
‘For Braindead,’ nodded Daniel.
‘And for the adulation of about a thousand clubbers?’ she asked.
He smiled. ‘Not bad for an old-timer like me, hey. Now I think I’ve had way too much excitement for one evening,’ he declared. ‘Would it be acceptable to go home now? I’ve no idea where everyone else is so I reckon we could get away with a disappearing act right now, don’t you think?’
‘Absolutely,’ agreed Katy. ‘Come on, Abby,’ she said. ‘We’re going home. Come on, let’s go.’
‘No!’ said Abby. ‘No way. It’s early. I’ll… I’ll go and find Fi and Rachel. You go. I’ll be back later.’
‘But Abby, I really don’t think it’s a good idea to come back to the hotel on your own, do you? Why don’t you come back with us now? We said we’d do the early shift with the kids in the morning as well, didn’t we? Let the boys have a lie-in.’
Abby stared back at her blinking, processing her thoughts in a drunken stupor.
‘No,’ she said, shaking her head. ‘I’m having fun. I won’t go home yet.’
‘Where have you been?’ came a sudden screech from behind them as Fi and Rachel staggered up. ‘We’ve been looking all over.’
‘I had a dance on the podium,’ said Abby proudly.
‘Was that when everyone was cheering?’ said Fi aghast. ‘We couldn’t see who it was.’
‘Think so,’ nodded Abby, grabbing hold of a stool to keep herself steady.
‘So I think we’re all going to go to the Calipo next,’ announced Fi. ‘They have a two-for-one from midnight.’
‘Brilliant,’ Abby said. ‘I’ll see you two later,’ she added, turning to Katy and Daniel.
‘You not coming?’ asked Fi.
‘They want to go home,’ said Abby sulkily.
‘Oh that’s fine,’ said Fi. ‘We’ll take care of Abby, won’t we?’
‘Will you?’ said Katy, trying desperately hard not to sound like a disapproving mother.
‘Of course,’ said Fi.
‘Will you bring her back to the hotel?’ she asked. ‘You won’t let her walk back on her own, will you?’ she urged, knowing any chance of trying to sound relaxed was gone.
‘Yes, we’ll bring her back,’ nodded Fi, although Katy doubted whether she would remember anything about this conversation in five minutes’ time.
‘Or she can come back to ours and kip on our sofa if we can’t find your hotel. No worries. It will be fine,’ said Rachel. ‘Now come on, we could miss the strippers if we’re not careful. See you soon, guys,’ she said, shouting over her shoulder and dragging Abby with her.
Katy was left open-mouthed, fighting the urge to go after her.
‘Sometimes you’ve just got to let them go,’ said Daniel. ‘And just hope they come back.’
Katy stood shaking her head. ‘What’s Braindead going to say?’ she said. ‘What’s he going to say if he wakes up tomorrow and she’s not there? He’s going to kill me.’
‘It’s not you he should be angry with,’ said Daniel. ‘It’s Abby surely. She’s a grown-up. What are you supposed to do? Demand she come home? You did what you could and now we can look forward to a day on the beach tomorrow with at least two people miserable and not talking to each other. Happy days, eh?’
‘We should at least go and say goodbye to Cassie,’ said Katy. ‘Would be polite. And I want to see if she’s okay.’
‘Polite,’ mused D
aniel. ‘An interesting word to use in association with a hen party.’
‘Have I just shown my age?’
‘Yet again,’ sighed Daniel. ‘Come on then, let’s do the polite thing and then get out of here.’
‘Can I just go to the loo first?’ asked Katy.
‘You’ve only just been!’ he said, throwing his hands in the air.
‘It’s my age!’ she said, smiling.
* * *
As nightclub toilets went, it wasn’t too bad. Actually they were pretty impressive. The paint finish appeared to be a black matt emulsion embedded with glitter and giggling girls crowded round the enormous gilt-framed mirrors with backstage-dressing-room-level lighting.
Of course there was no lack of drama. A very blonde girl with the most impressive hair extensions stood at one end with mascara running rivers all down her face. She was surrounded by well-wishers saying things like, ‘He always was a bastard,’ and ‘He’ll do the same to her,’ but nothing seemed to be abating the tear flow.
Katy slipped into a vacant toilet and was happy for a moment’s peace. She took out her phone to see if there were any urgent messages coming through, which was of course extremely unlikely given the time of night, and then got distracted by the words #MassiveElephant trending on Twitter. On discovering it was not of that much interest at all, she realised she had been sitting there far too long and Daniel would be wondering where on earth she had got to.
She opened the door of the cubicle and nearly tripped over a pair of legs. Someone was sitting on the floor, leaning against the wall, staring at their phone.
‘You might need to move before you trip someone up,’ said Katy, looking down and realising it was Cassie. ‘What are you doing down there, Cassie?’ she asked.
Cassie looked up, startled.
‘Are you FaceTiming your fiancé?’ Katy asked her. ‘You know Ruth will be very cross if she finds out you’ve been in touch. Isn’t that one of the rules? You’re not allowed to contact men at home in any shape or form. Especially not fiancés!’
Ruth had given the three of them a run-down of her hen party rules in the first bar. All of them seemed to be designed to make sure poor Cassie would have the worst time possible.
‘I… I… I’m watching cat videos,’ she said, turning the screen to show Katy.
Katy gasped. She didn’t know what was more appalling. Cassie breaking Ruth’s hen do rules by speaking to her fiancé or her sitting on the toilet floor on her hen do watching cat videos.
‘Don’t tell Ruth, will you?’ she said looking desperate. ‘She’ll make me do some terrible forfeit or something. Please don’t tell her.’
Katy shook her head. ‘Of course I won’t but I have to ask you, Cassie, why are you sat on the toilet floor in a nightclub watching cat videos?’
Cassie blinked back up at her and then to Katy’s horror she watched as Cassie’s eyes filled with tears.
What should she do now? Cassie showed no sign of getting up so she had no choice but to join her on the floor and put her arm around her.
‘There’s no need to cry,’ said Katy. ‘Really! The floor isn’t even sticky.’
Cassie managed to raise a smile, then it disappeared and then she just looked really sad.
‘So why are you here?’ Katy asked again gently. ‘Are you not enjoying your hen do?’
Cassie shook her head. ‘Not really.’
‘They’re not everyone’s cup of tea, are they?’ continued Katy. ‘Enforced drinking and dancing to Olivia Newton-John isn’t for everyone.’
Cassie nodded.
Katy thought she sounded like a boring old woman. When had that happened? When had she stopped being the type of woman who enjoys a hen do? There was a time when she would have dropped everything for alcohol and dancing to Olivia Newton-John.
‘I feel so bad,’ said Cassie.
‘It’s not your fault,’ said Katy. ‘Do you know what? I reckon hen parties now are planned more for the guests than the bride-to-be. No-one really cares what she wants, they just want an excuse to go crazy.’
‘But… but… I shouldn’t even be on this hen night,’ whimpered Cassie.
‘What do you mean?’
Cassie looked up at her, stricken.
‘Because,’ she said, ‘because I’m not sure…’ She stopped and swallowed.
‘Not sure about what?’
‘Not sure if I want to get married.’ Cassie looked up at her, searching Katy’s face for reaction. Or perhaps she was searching for judgement.
Oh shit, thought Katy, trying very hard not to let her face react. Oh shit, what should she say now? Why was Cassie telling her this? She hardly knew the poor girl. But then she thought about how Ruth or someone like Fi would react and it made perfect sense that Cassie was telling her.
‘It’s perfectly normal to have doubts,’ said Katy, trying desperately to string some sensible words together. ‘Especially now when it’s all about to happen. It’s just cold feet,’ she said. ‘That’s all.’
Cassie nodded as if Katy was getting it right. As if somehow she had managed to say the right thing.
‘I wake up in the middle of the night in cold sweats,’ said Cassie. ‘I keep having this reoccurring nightmare that I hate being married to Jules so much that I strangle him with my bare hands.’
‘You dream of strangling him?’ said Katy, trying to keep the astonishment out of her voice.
‘Yes,’ she nodded. ‘Apart from the time I drowned him. In the bath in our flat.’
Katy nodded as she gave careful consideration to these violent manifestations of Cassie’s wedding cold feet.
‘Did you ever have doubts?’ asked Cassie.
‘Yes,’ said Katy. ‘It’s such a huge decision that it’s hard not to.’
‘Did you ever dream of killing your future husband and burying him in the back garden?’
‘You also buried him?’ said Katy, unable this time to cover her shock.
‘Yes,’ said Cassie. ‘In my dad’s garden using his spade. My dad’s not very keen on Jules so I wondered if that was why I chose his spade to dig the hole.’
‘Mmmm,’ said Katy nodding her head. ‘Makes sense.’
Cassie sighed and fiddled with the trim on her top.
‘Have you told Jules you dream about killing him?’ asked Katy.
Cassie shook her head. ‘He’d be devastated,’ she said.
Katy found herself longing for that boring family holiday she had been half dreading. God, she was tired. She needed to go to bed.
‘Do you love him?’ she said, turning to look at Cassie.
‘What?’ asked Cassie, looking startled.
‘Do you love him? Simple question.’
Cassie didn’t answer straight away. She looked away first and didn’t even make eye contact when she gave her reply.
‘I think so,’ she mumbled.
Shit! thought Katy. This marriage is doomed.
‘Not a great answer,’ she ventured.
‘I’m not even sure I know what love is,’ said Cassie, looking up at her this time.
Katy took a deep breath.
‘May I suggest,’ said Katy softly. ‘That if you are not sure what love is then you are probably not in love with Jules and actually that might indicate that you should perhaps take these nightmares seriously.’
Katy’s heartbeat was going very fast now. She was on such dangerous territory. She was suggesting that someone call off their wedding. Someone she barely knew.
‘What are you saying?’ asked Cassie.
Oh no, thought Katy. Cassie wanted her to spell it out. How was this happening? She should be tucked up in bed now next to two snoring kids, not sitting on the floor of a nightclub trying to prevent someone from possibly ruining their own life, and definitely ruining someone else’s.
Katy opened her mouth to speak but shut it at the last minute. She didn’t know Cassie well enough to be blunt. What if this was just drunken ramblings that she was in danger of
taking too seriously?
‘What are you afraid of?’ she eventually asked. Answer a hard question with another question, she thought. She’d watched Daniel squirm out of many an awkward patch using that strategy.
Cassie stared back at her.
‘Letting everyone down,’ she replied. ‘There’s a non-refundable deposit on the venue and the wedding car.’
‘It’s just money,’ said Katy.
‘It will destroy Jules,’ she added.
‘Will it?’ asked Katy.
Cassie nodded.
‘Would it destroy him more to have you marry him and then divorce him in a few years’ time because you are unhappy? Oh, I forgot you’re going to drown him first, aren’t you?’
Cassie managed to raise a small smile.
‘Thank you,’ she said.
‘What for?’ asked Katy.
‘For listening and not shouting at me.’
‘Look,’ said Katy. ‘Daniel and I are going to head back. We’re old, you know. Why don’t we walk you back to your hotel? I think you’ve got some thinking to do.’
‘Would you?’ said Cassie, looking hopeful for the first time. ‘I’m really not enjoying myself.’
‘Sure,’ said Katy. ‘Let’s go and tell the rest we are going so they don’t send out a search party and then I think we all need to sleep on it.’
* * *
‘We’re going to go, Ruth,’ said Katy as they approached her at the bar. Katy had told Daniel that she’d found Cassie in the toilets and they’d lost track of time talking. Cassie had made her swear not to tell anyone about her doubts. ‘Too old for all this,’ Katy said to Ruth, casting her hand around the mayhem. ‘Thanks so much for inviting us though. Really, it’s been a blast.’
‘Right, let’s go,’ said Cassie, pulling on her hand behind her. ‘Let’s go now.’
But it was not to be. She got her timing completely wrong as just at that moment Ruth got her trusty whistle out and the dulcet tones of Olivia Newton-John could be heard over Ariana Grande as the remaining members of the hen party quickly gathered.