The Woman Who Met Her Match

by Fiona Gibson

  ‘Everything’s fine,’ he says. ‘We’ve had a lovely evening – we’ve been out to dinner and she’s had just enough wine to take the edge off things.’

  ‘Smart move,’ I say, smiling. ‘So, we’ll be at the hall first thing, decorating the place, and then I’ll be at your place to do Mum’s make-up …’

  ‘I don’t know what we’d have done without you …’

  ‘Really,’ I say, ‘it’s nothing, Hamish. I’d just like both of you to enjoy your day.’

  On Friday morning we set off, Stu having shown up looking extremely dapper in a dark grey suit and crisp white shirt. ‘It’s Bob’s,’ he admits, and I resist the temptation to quip, ‘So you’re sharing clothes now?’ Because I am delighted he’s coming with us, sitting beside me in my scrappy car, kids in the back, the boot stuffed with our overnight bags and boxes of neatly folded table linen and bunting.

  As arranged, we first stop at Little Cambersham village hall, where Walter Fadgett lets us in to festoon the room with bunting. The stripes, the checks and bleached-out cottons look incredibly pretty when strung up about the place. Trying not to think of them as shirts at all, I busy myself with the help of the kids as we spread out the tablecloths. The florist arrives with numerous hand-tied bunches of flowers, plus the requested jam jars; the hall looks quite lovely when we’ve finished.

  From here, we drive onwards to the pub where we are staying tonight after the wedding. The Laughing Duck is a delightful, low-slung whitewashed building, its hanging baskets a blaze of blue lobelia and pale pink geraniums. While the kids and I will be packed into the family room in the eaves, Stu is relegated to the ‘staff room’, no more than a bleak cubbyhole really, which was all that was available when I requested a last-minute addition.

  ‘It’s fine,’ he asserts, when we confer on the landing. ‘Anyway, you know what your mum’s like. After a few wines she’ll probably have me tucked up with her and Hamish.’

  ‘Now there’s an image I’ll never be able to un-see,’ I retort.

  Bags deposited, we drive on to Hamish’s family seat. It’s the first time I’ve seen the place for real, and I’m taken aback by how neglected and faded it looks, not nearly as impressive as in those photos Mum’s always wafting around. Window frames are peeling, the roof sags in several places, and precarious-looking scaffolding clings to one of the gable ends. Several dismal outhouses are dotted around the grounds. I suspect now that Hamish’s parents were just being difficult in refusing to have a marquee, as from what I can see as we follow the curving driveway, the lawn is in a pretty awful condition. A sign reading ‘closed until further notice’ hangs on the tea room door.

  We park alongside a row of vehicles – ranging from a dented silver Bentley to a scuffed red Mini – on a weed-smattered gravelled area and make our way to the huge studded front door, where I rap the large brass knocker. We wait, and Stu squeezes my arm reassuringly. The door is opened, finally, by a middle-aged woman in a stark black dress and orthopaedic-looking shoes, her sandy hair in a tight ponytail.

  ‘Hi, I’m Lorrie,’ I start.

  ‘Ah, yes.’ She glances at Stu. ‘This is your husband?’

  ‘Er, no, this is Stu, my friend, and Cameron and Amy …’

  ‘Do come in,’ she says briskly. ‘Everyone’s getting ready …’ She ushers us through to the drawing room. ‘I’m Christine, the housekeeper,’ she adds. ‘Can I get you all some tea or coffee?’

  ‘Don’t go to any trouble,’ Stu says quickly. ‘I’m sure everyone’s very busy.’ He turns to the kids. ‘We’re happy waiting here, aren’t we, while your mum does Grandma’s make-up?’ Cam and Amy insist they’re fine, and arrange themselves rather stiffly on brocade armchairs under the gaze of gloomy oil paintings and deer heads hazed with dust.

  While I am expecting to meet Hamish’s parents, it’s the groom himself who greets us warmly in a cream linen suit, his hair oddly flattened, his cheeks flushed pink. ‘Ah, Lorrie, I’m glad to see you. Marion’s a little …’

  ‘Nervous?’ I suggest.

  ‘Just a bit. She seems out of sorts. I do hope she isn’t having a change of heart …’

  ‘Oh, Hamish, of course she’s not! What makes you say that?’

  He shakes his head. ‘Just her mood today. You know, I wish we’d done it my way, just a small ceremony without fuss …’ He tails off, his hands shaking slightly, and I’m overcome by a wave of affection for him.

  ‘You’re doing this for Mum,’ I suggest gently.

  He nods. ‘I’ll do anything to make her happy, you know. Come on, I’ll take you upstairs where she’s waiting for you.’

  I throw Stu and the kids a worried look as we head towards the hallway.

  We climb the sweeping stairs in silence. Various voices float down as Hamish accompanies me to a bedroom entirely done out in pale peach, where Mum is perched on a dressing table stool in satin pyjamas with her hair freshly set.

  ‘Good luck,’ he whispers, then scuttles away as I embrace her. She sits rigidly, as if waiting for me to stop all my cuddly nonsense.

  ‘Feeling okay, Mum?’

  ‘Er, yes, I think so,’ she says, sounding uncharacte‌ristically timid. Her mouth is set in a straight line.

  I pull up a chair and sit beside her. ‘You look really worried. You know everything’s going to be okay, don’t you? It’s all sorted—’

  ‘It’s not that.’ She turns to the dressing table mirror and pulls a face. ‘It’s this.’

  I frown. ‘What d’you mean?’

  ‘This old face,’ she exclaims, leaning closer towards the glass. ‘You know the thing about marrying a younger man? You just feel so old!’

  For a moment, I’m stuck for words. I have never heard her speak this way before. ‘Oh, Mum, Hamish loves you,’ I say, touching her shoulder. ‘Your age doesn’t matter to him, and anyway, you don’t look anything like your real age. I doubt if he even considers it.’

  Her eyes sparkle with sudden tears as I squeeze her hand. From the whiff on her breath, I assume alcohol has already been taken. Not too much, I hope. I know how tricky she can be after that third glass. ’I just wonder what the point is,’ she adds crossly. ‘Having my hair done, my make-up, trying to look nice …’

  I start to unpack my make-up on the dressing table. ‘Of course there’s a point. It gives you, I don’t know – a boost, a feeling of being all pulled together and ready for anything …’

  ‘Is this the kind thing you say to your customers?’

  ‘Yes, it is,’ I say as I smooth moisturiser into her face, ‘but I do mean it, you know – otherwise I wouldn’t be able to do my job. Okay, shall we get started now? Go with those colours we talked about?’

  She nods and I set to work, aware of gravelly voices drifting from faraway rooms. We don’t talk as I stroke taupe eyeshadow onto her lids, then enhance her pale blue eyes with a soft brown liner. Cheeks, lips, brows groomed and defined: she looks wonderful.

  ‘Well, what d’you think?’

  She blinks at the mirror. ‘It’s not finished.’

  ‘Mum, you don’t want to look too made up. We said a fresh, natural look, didn’t we? That’s what we decided, when we practised—’

  ‘Yes, fresh and natural, Lorrie, with bronzer.’

  I wince. ‘D’you really need bronzer? I honestly think blusher’s enough. It’s more modern, you know …’ I catch her stony expression in the mirror.

  ‘Bronzer please, if you don’t mind. You think I want to get married looking like a corpse?’

  ‘Mum, trust me. You won’t look …’

  ‘Come on, Lorrie. Just a little!’ She stares into the mirror as, with a sinking heart, I take the lid off the pot of shimmery pearls that’s sitting, ready and waiting, on the dressing table. Whatever makes the customer happy, I muse as I dip my biggest blusher brush into the pot.

  Leaving Mum to get dressed in the un-Jacobean frock, Stu, Cam, Amy and I have coffee and cakes at a tea room in the village, before joining the gu
ests all congregating outside the small and astoundingly pretty church. In fact, there aren’t as many as I’d expected. While I recognise and greet several of Mum’s friends, there are few relatives present from our side; over the years, various inexplicable squabbles have driven Mum to sever ties with most of them. I recognise Nancy, a cousin of hers, and there are introductions and polite small-talk. ‘This is my friend Stu,’ I say, feeling obliged to make it clear that he’s not my husband.

  Meanwhile, on Hamish’s side guests range from excitable children, who are already charging around the church grounds, to elegant ladies in pastel-hued hats who could possibly be well into their nineties. Still no sign of his parents. I sense of a stab of sympathy for Mum, realising now how uncomfortable she must feel when they clearly object to her being part of the family.

  ‘You must be Hamish’s new stepdaughter,’ remarks an older lady, her hair set in immaculate silvery curls.

  I smile, feeling far too old to be anyone’s stepdaughter but agreeing that they make a lovely couple, and isn’t it wonderful that they’re so happy together?

  ‘It really is,’ the woman says, extending her hand. ‘I’m Nanny Bridget.’

  ‘Oh, Hamish’s nanny?’ I shake her hand warmly.

  ‘That’s right, dear. A big grown-up man now, but he’ll always be my little boy, scuffing his knees and stuffing his face with too many redcurrants in the garden.’ She chuckles as the silver Bentley I spotted at Lovington Hall purrs to a halt at the end of the lane. ‘I assume you’ve met Hamish’s parents?’ she whispers.

  ‘No, I haven’t actually.’

  ‘Ah, well, they’re not quite so delighted but they’ll come round, don’t you worry.’ She glances at Cameron and Amy. ‘You’ll know how hard it is to let one’s children go.’

  ‘Oh yes, I do.’

  ‘But he’s, like, fifty-eight,’ Amy sniggers as we all start to filter into the church, where low-key organ music creates a sense of calm.

  As we take our places on pews, I realise my hands are sweating. Stu leans across Amy to whisper, ‘Are you okay?’

  ‘Just about,’ I reply as the music grows louder, our cue to stand and turn as Mum and Hamish appear at the church door.

  My heart seems to clench. They are gazing at each other, and now I realise that Mum’s mutterings about his failings are just an act, when in fact she clearly adores him. Clasping her arm, Hamish is beaming at her as if she were the most beautiful woman he’s ever laid eyes on. They start to walk up the aisle, Mum shimmering metallically but still radiant in her blue dress. She is all smiles now as she greets her public with a regal flutter of her hand.

  The ceremony commences, and I spend the whole time fighting back tears. It really is beautiful, seeing a couple formalise things in such a gorgeous setting surrounded by the people they love. With a stab of regret, I find myself wishing – for the first time – that David and I had done it, not to prove anything or because we weren’t fully committed, but just for the actual day, to have something special to remember. God, what’s happening to me? I glance past Amy and Cam to where Stu is standing. He raises a brow and sends me a stoical smile, as if understanding exactly what’s going on inside my head.

  It’s all over so quickly, in a torrent of confetti as Mum and Hamish leave the church.

  The reception is everything Mum didn’t want it to be, and it’s wonderful. There’s no stately home, no quarry reopened: just a hall in a pretty Hertfordshire village, decked out in bunting, with everyone sipping champagne and nibbling on canapés and bestowing Mum with the attention she craves. Even Hamish’s relatives look impressed. I catch Nanny Bridget straightening his bow tie, and almost expect her to spit on a napkin and wipe his face with it.

  At the buffet, Stu and I sit with Mum’s friend Dolores, who has just about managed to forgive her for rejecting the Jacobean dress she made with such care. The mood is incredibly jolly, and I am showered with compliments on the bunting, and even the buffet, despite having had nothing to do with it. Yet Nanny Bridget insists on praising me as if I had lovingly fashioned every prawn and caviar canapé myself.

  The band arrives in the early evening, a motley collection of middle-aged men in ill-fitting suits who, I believe, are friends of Hamish’s from his bridge club. The music starts up – a mixture of big band show tunes and wonky cover versions of seventies hits – and Mum dances with Hamish, then with Walter Fadgett who has lingered on to check that all’s going to plan, and then Stu, clutching him to her heaving bosom while Hamish merely gazes in adoration at his bride. Cam and Amy sip their champagne and watch, grinning, as though being treated to a live version of a wedding-themed reality TV show. Noticing Cam sneaking off outside, I wonder whether he’s tippled a little too much champagne, and keep glancing at the door, itching to slip out and check on him. Hamish bowls up to our table, and introduces us all to his parents who, thankfully, seem to be doing a sterling job of masking their disapproval. In fact, they are quite charming, with Hamish’s father declaring, ‘This is the kind of thing I like. Being with regular people in simple surroundings like this. Salt of the earth …’

  ‘He’s enjoying mixing with the peasants,’ Stu whispers with a grin.

  I smile and make my excuses as I step outside to find my son. He is leaning against the rough stone wall, and I can tell immediately that he is a little drunk. He is also smoking a cigarette.

  ‘I wish you wouldn’t do that,’ I remark.

  ‘Yeah, well.’ He shrugs and looks down at the moss-speckled gravel.

  I study his face. He looks pale and worried, and I wonder now whether he came out here fearing he might be sick. ‘Are you all right, darling? You don’t look too well.’

  ‘I’m fine, I’ve only had two glasses …’ It’s not true, not that I’ve been counting; it’s my inbuilt teen-booze barometer and it’s pretty accurate as a rule. ‘Mum …’

  Oh God, he is going to be sick. ‘Hang on, let me get you some water or something, or a bucket—’

  ‘I don’t need a bucket!’

  ‘But you look—’

  ‘Mum, it’s not that. I’m not drunk, okay?’ He manages to raise a wonky smile. ‘It’s, it’s Mo and me …’

  ‘Mo and you?’

  ‘Yeah, you know …’

  ‘Oh, are you going to that festival?’ I smile and wrap an arm around him. ‘You want a loan, don’t you? For tickets before they sell out?’

  He is laughing now, shaking his head at my idiocy. ‘Oh God, Mum. D’you really not know? Haven’t you realised at all?’

  A rather raggedy version of ‘Livin La Vida Loca’ filters out of the hall. ‘Realised what?’

  ‘That we’re, y’know. Together.’

  I peer at him and then I understand, and we’re hugging, even though he’s still clutching his cigarette, and I’m apologising for being such an idiot and not knowing, and he’s saying it’s fine, he knew I’d be okay. I want to stay out here for a while, just Cam and me, so I can ask about Mo, about whether he makes him happy. But Stu is at the door of the hall, beckoning us in. ‘Come on, they’re cutting the cake!’

  I grab Cam’s hand and squeeze it as we hurry back inside. As everyone else gathers around, Stu and I find ourselves loitering at the back of the hall, sipping our drinks, enjoying a few moments’ respite from the music. I want to tell him about Cam, and I will, as long as Cam says it’s okay. I want to tell Stu everything, I decide, glancing at him. Well, almost everything. Perhaps I’ll miss out the bit about being ticked off for being too shouty in bed.

  ‘So,’ he ventures with a teasing smile, ‘how was your boring fart in a suit?’

  ‘That’s a bit judgemental, isn’t it?’ I smirk. ‘Pretty awful actually. I mean, not all of it. But I won’t be visiting him again.’

  ‘Oh, right.’ In terms of masking his delight, Stu fails spectacularly.

  ‘But some people do have to wear suits,’ I add, skimming his wedding outfit with my gaze. ‘They have corporate jobs that don’t involve bomb
ing around on a motorbike with bunches of coriander …’ He chuckles, as I continue. ‘You look great, by the way. Terribly dapper. You should wear one more often.’

  He pulls a bashful face. ‘You reckon?’

  ‘Yes, you could even buy your own.’

  ‘Okay, if you say so.’ He glances at me, and something about his expression makes me look away.

  ‘So how are things with Ginny Benson?’ I venture.

  He shrugs. ‘There’s no thing with Ginny Benson.’

  ‘Not even deliveries?’ I ask, raising a brow. ‘No raw organic vinegar required at 2 a.m.?’

  ‘No,’ he says, laughing now. ‘It was a bit of a sort-of-nothing-thing.’

  ‘Oh, is that what you call it?’

  He grins at me and my heart seems to quicken. He’s standing so close, I sense him breathing. I’m just missing him, that’s all. I’m missing his lovely lemon cake and his encyclopedic knowledge of the entire ranges stocked by virtually every North London supermarket and speciality store. I miss seeing my best friend every day; the man I love, really, when all’s said and done. Because we really are best friends, and always have been. We leave personal correspondence lying about, we answer each other’s phones, and his pants often whirr around in the washing machine with mine. He has seen me splayed on the sofa, first with Cam and then Amy clamped to a veiny breast. He’s wiped the tears and snot – copious snot, like a face full of glue – off my face at David’s funeral. He helped me to box up his things and carry them up that shaky ladder to the attic, saying, ‘So, okay, you know everything’s still here but you don’t have to see it all the time. I think it’s better that way. We can deal with it at some point – together – when you feel ready.’

  Further back – way, way back, to the eighties – he helped to pull me together after Antoine stopped writing and I was a heartbroken mess. There was that kiss, of course, our one little romantic slip-up in the thirty-odd years we’ve been friends.

  I turn, realising he’s saying something. ‘Sorry? I was miles away there—’