The Wedding Diary (Choc Lit)

by James, Margaret

  She went on to explain that Cat and Adam’s schtick would be two lovely, smart but ordinary people – I’m so sorry, darlings, but you’re very ordinary, you know – getting married on a shoestring in these very difficult, recession-burdened times.

  ‘Amor vincit omnia and all that jazz,’ she added, tapping like a woodpecker with OCD, already busy roughing out their schedule.

  ‘God, more stuff from sundials,’ muttered Cat.

  ‘I beg your pardon, angel?’

  ‘I dare say that was Latin, wasn’t it? You and Adam here, you’re such a pair of intellectuals. He’s always quoting Latin at me, too. What does that bit mean?’

  ‘Love conquers everything,’ said Fanny airily. ‘Didn’t you go to school at all, my princess?’

  ‘Yes, but I didn’t learn any Latin. I did Business Studies and IT, which are very much more useful in the modern world.’

  ‘On the contrary, my love, you can’t get anywhere in life without A-level Latin. I’m living proof of it.’

  ‘You might have a point,’ conceded Cat.

  ‘Of course I do. So – are you going to help me out, my angels? Listen, I’m going to get you on the telly. You’ll be famous, you’ll be huge on YouTube, a thousand hits a minute, and I’ll share the advertising revenue with you.’

  ‘What percentage?’ Adam asked.

  ‘Eighty–twenty, in my favour, obviously,’ Fanny told him, as she twinkled at him merrily.

  ‘Come on, Cat, we’re leaving.’

  ‘Just hang on a moment, sweetheart. Let me have a little think. Shall we say sixty–forty?’

  ‘Fifty–fifty.’

  ‘Fifty-five to forty-five,’ said Fanny.

  ‘Yes, all right,’ said Cat.

  ‘Adam, darling?’ wheedled Fanny.

  ‘I suppose so.’

  ‘Excellent,’ said Fanny, and once again she smiled her vixen’s smile.

  ‘But there’ll be no formal contracts tying us to Supadoop,’ said Adam. ‘We’re not signing anything that isn’t in our favour.’

  ‘Of course you’re not,’ said Fanny. ‘This will be an equal partnership, and anyway I trust you absolutely. Cat, will you be able to get some time off work at Microsoft?’

  ‘Barry will probably let me work part time while this is going on.’ Cat crossed her fingers, hoping Barry might.

  She’d have to tell him that she would be leaving to go and work with Adam, anyway. So if he got another office manager fairly soon, perhaps the two of them could work in tandem, Cat training up the newbie and the newbie taking over while Cat was busy doing stuff for Fanny?

  Yes, it should all work out.

  July–November

  Fanny milked every cash cow dry, exploited every opportunity. She made them keep a video diary which she flogged to cable. She had them blogging, Facebooking and Tweeting dawn to dusk.

  Although she had accepted they ought to keep their day jobs – it makes you seem more real, my angels, shows that you’re a-man-and-woman-of-the-people, it’s the Susan Boyle effect – she still sent them travelling miles and miles around the country to be interviewed by local radio stations, local newspapers and to pose for photographs for regional and national magazines.

  People came to stare at them because they were that couple off the telly. Phones and cameras clicked, and cyber-images of Cat and Adam sprang up everywhere, like cyber-mushrooms, overnight.

  Who would design Cat’s wedding dress? Fanny ran a competition in a magazine. Of course, it had an entry fee. She wasn’t doing this for nothing, darlings. She had overheads.

  Much to Cat’s astonishment, eight thousand people entered, sending in a sketch or jpeg of the perfect gown. ‘When you were a little girl, didn’t you love drawing brides?’ asked Fanny as she and Cat and Rosie sat sorting through the entries, many of which looked like they were the work of five-year-olds.

  Fanny had been schmoozing with a host of possible designers, mostly young and hungry ones, but Lulu Minto loved one sketch enough to make the gown. Cat found she loved it too, and agreed the sketcher must be invited to the wedding. ‘So everybody wins,’ said Fanny smugly, sweeping a great pile of cheques into a dark green Harrods carrier bag.

  ‘Especially you,’ said Rosie as she picked up the bag.

  ‘Well, of course,’ said Fanny. ‘Especially lovely me. Get those to the bank today, my darling. Cat, you’re the sort of person who mixes with the common herd, so tell me, why do people still use cheques when God has given us Paypal?’

  She got them an audition for a television commercial advertising laxatives, which meant they would be dressing up as constipated monkeys, man and wife, and which she said would be a lot of fun, and tremendous tie-in for their wedding, if they could square it with those spoilsports from the actors’ union who wanted real performers to play any speaking parts.

  But Adam put his foot down. ‘I’m not having anything to do with it,’ he said. ‘I’m not a chimpanzee or a baboon.’

  Fanny darlinged him and angeled him, but even she had realised when he meant it, when his dark eyes narrowed, flashing warning fire.

  Cat was both astonished and amazed to find that anybody could refuse to do what Fanny wanted and not be blasted by a thunderbolt.

  The only dampers on her happiness were Adam’s absences on projects up and down the country. She couldn’t shake the feeling that each time he went he might decide he wasn’t coming back.

  ‘Of course I’m coming back,’ he said, when he finally got her to admit she was afraid the pressure would begin to get to him, that he’d do a Jack and disappear.

  ‘Where are you going this week?’

  ‘Wolverhampton, Middlesex and Dorset.’

  ‘Melbury Court, you mean?’ she asked. ‘You’re still working on the stables, are you?’

  ‘Yes, that’s right.’ Adam found some photographs and got them up on screen. ‘Look, here’s the sauna and the plunge pool and a couple of the treatment rooms.’

  ‘Scroll back a bit,’ said Cat. ‘Oh – isn’t that the fountain? Why is everything wrapped up in sacking and blue plastic?’

  ‘That’s to protect its pipe work from the elements while we’re trying to get its rubbish plumbing sorted out.’

  So Cat relaxed a bit, because when Adam went away at least he kept his phone on all the time, and he called home often.

  Their reunions were wonderful – and partly filmed, of course. Carrying their camcorders around became an automatic reflex, and Fanny was delighted with the footage they produced.

  She said they’d have some lovely moments they could show their children. That sequence where they had a fight with shaving foam, when they’d squirted it all round the bathroom – darlings, so hilarious, Fanny told them. ‘I laughed until I cried,’ she said. ‘It’s already had a couple of thousand hits on YouTube, and the advertising revenue is pouring in. You’re a pair of naturals, Cat and Adam. You’ve missed your vocations as a double act of circus clowns.’

  ‘When all this is over, that bloody camera’s going in the landfill,’ muttered Adam, who hadn’t even known the bloody camera was recording. Cat had put it on the bathroom windowsill, and she’d accidentally left it running. She’d handed in the footage without checking.

  So Adam saw himself on television streaked from head to foot with shaving foam, and his friends went on and on about it, having a laugh at his expense for weeks and weeks and weeks.

  Adam’s friends – Cat found she liked them all, almost as much as she liked him. Jules and Gwennie turned out to be lovely. A heavy but attractive man of Adam’s age and a dark-haired girl, when they met Cat they gave her a big hug and said they were delighted that Adam had at last found somebody to take him off their hands.

  ‘We’re so looking forward to the wedding,’ Gwennie told them when they met up f
or dinner at a restaurant in town.

  ‘I’d love to be a bridesmaid,’ added Jules, and then he glared at Adam, mock-offended. ‘Lawley, don’t you look at me like that! I’ll get my hair done, and I promise to shave my legs.’

  ‘Sorry, all the bridesmaids must be girls,’ said Adam firmly.

  ‘I play the piano,’ Gwennie told Cat later in the evening, when they’d had a lot to drink and were feeling like they’d known each other all their lives. ‘I’ve been taking some refresher lessons recently. I’d love to play for you. As you’re coming in, I mean, and going out again.’

  ‘Thank you, Gwennie,’ Cat replied. ‘That would be really kind.’

  Cat had never known a man could be so good at presents.

  Lovely things and silly things, unusual things, all tiny but desirable, found their way into her washbag, handbag, got underneath her pillow, were slipped into the pockets of her coats.

  A Japanese ivory netsuke of a little bride and bridegroom, a Victorian silver locket to go on her silver chain, and of course a ring, a band of gold with amethysts, carnelians, tourmalines – she didn’t know where he’d got it, and of course he wouldn’t say, but she was sure it had to be unique.

  Adam often had to go to Melbury Court to check up on the progress of the work for which he’d been commissioned, the rebuilding and conversion of the Georgian stables.

  Cat always asked about the fountain in the forecourt – was he doing any work on it right now, and did he think she’d ever see it play?

  ‘It’s a major project,’ Adam said. ‘We’re gradually sorting out the plumbing, but it will take months – or maybe even years – of restoration before we can try it out again. It’ll also be quite difficult to find exactly the right shade of marble to replace the bits that have been lost.’

  ‘One day, maybe, Adam?’ Cat asked him wistfully.

  ‘Maybe,’ Adam said. ‘On our golden wedding anniversary, perhaps, when you and I have lost our marbles, too.’

  Saturday, 12 November

  It could not have been a lovelier day.

  The last few golden, russet, purple leaves were falling softly from the trees. The sky was a deep, fathomless cerulean. The sun was almost hot. Melbury Court itself looked glorious, an enchanted castle in a children’s fairy tale.

  After an early morning frost, the air was crisp and energising, and the ground was steaming as the autumn sun beat down.

  At noon, thought Adam, it should be more than warm enough for photographs outside. The wedding was being filmed, of course, for the final episode of the television series. But he wanted all the aunts and uncles to get their snaps as well.

  Gwennie’s phone was working overtime. She was frantically tweeting all her movie star-struck mates.

  I’m in Daisy Denham’s lovely house!

  I’ve had a tinkle in her bathroom!

  I’m in her garden and I’m walking in her honeysuckle bower!

  I’ve seen the studio pix of her and Ewan Fraser – wow – totally last word in gorge and glam!

  I’ve died and gone to heaven!

  Adam hoped she wouldn’t try to steal a souvenir, but was afraid she might, if she could prise a little something small and inconspicuous loose and slip it in her clutch.

  He got quite anxious when he saw her sidle slowly up the Grinling Gibbons staircase. He was terrified she’d try to break a bit of carving off and get them all arrested or at least thrown out.

  ‘Damn, forgot the cuffs,’ said Jules, grinning like a gargoyle as he read Adam’s mind.

  ‘She’s late,’ said Gwennie, fussing with Adam’s tie again and clucking like an anxious mother hen who’s lost one of her chicks.

  ‘No, she’s not,’ said Jules, whose hired trousers were that bit too tight and who was tugging crossly at his crotch. In the course of helping Adam celebrate his last weekend of freedom – a weekend which spilled over into the following week and made for perfect daytime television – he’d put on lots of weight. ‘Anyway, she can’t be late, you muppet, not when she’s already here. Omigod, look out, here’s Grendel’s mother, and she’s bearing down on you.’

  Adam turned and there were Fanny and her greyhound stalking through the crowd of wedding guests, Fanny being charming as she parted wives from husbands, being beyond gracious as she waited for a couple in her way to realise this and stand aside.

  She smiled and nodded, her antennae picking up a mass of fascinating signals, sharp ears listening hard, blue eyes darting here and there – looking for her next exciting project, probably.

  One thing was certain – she wouldn’t miss a thing.

  ‘Hello, Fanny.’ Adam bent to kiss her on the cheek. ‘You and Caspar look – what can I say – astonishing.’

  ‘Thank you, darling, so we should. It’s all Balenciaga, even Caspar’s collar. You don’t look too bad yourself, considering your clothes are hired.’ She flicked a piece of non-existent lint off Adam’s shoulder. ‘Your lovely little bride’s a lucky girl.’

  ‘When did you last see Cat?’

  ‘Only a minute or two ago, so don’t you fret, my angel, she hasn’t run away. Rosie’s lacing her into her gown – I must say Lulu has excelled herself – and Tex and Bess are busy doing something with her veil. She would insist on having real white roses in her hair, instead of a tiara, but the roses haven’t been wired, and so we had to ask the hotel housekeeper for pins.’

  ‘It’s Bex and Tess,’ said Adam.

  ‘Whatever.’ Fanny waved one white, bejewelled hand. ‘The bridesmaids are in green, you know. I wouldn’t have chosen green for bridesmaids. I think green’s unlucky. But in a way it suits them, I suppose. They look like fairies in a forest glade.’

  Bex shook out the wedding veil and Tess fixed it on Cat’s head.

  ‘I can’t believe we’re here at last,’ said Cat, as she gazed into the huge gilt mirror which adorned the bridal suite.

  ‘Yeah, it’s been a long, hard slog,’ said Tess.

  ‘She certainly made sure that you and Adam earned your money,’ added Rosie.

  ‘You two must feel like you’ve run a marathon,’ said Bex.

  ‘More like half a dozen of them,’ said Cat, because the past few months had been a nightmare of fatigue, confusion and bewilderment while they’d done promotion stuff for Fanny, earning the deposit on a house and trying to do their real jobs as well. It had been exhausting, and Cat knew she would never criticise a hunted, harassed, put-upon celebrity again.

  She couldn’t wait to have her real life back.

  It had taken Bex and Tess a while to come to terms with all the luxury and splendour of the Melbury Court Hotel.

  On the night they’d first arrived, they’d both run round it squealing like a couple of excited piglets, exploring and exclaiming and experimenting, anxious to leave nothing out.

  They were both delighted by the hotel’s harem-style health club, which came complete with houris in white tunics, ready to do their bidding, and grant their every health and beauty wish.

  But there were no eunuchs. It was health and safety, Cat supposed – no one was prepared to risk the dangerous operation just to get an industry award.

  They booked themselves a range of treatments, and by the actual wedding day all three of them had been so waxed and groomed, so peeled and buffed, so tanned and glossed that they looked like goddesses, my loves, as Fanny Gregory put it when she saw them, but with a sarcastic little twinkle in her eyes.

  When she had arrived at Melbury Court, Cat had been sad to see the marble fountain in the forecourt was still swathed in sacking and blue plastic and girded with a mile or two of tape.

  But the house itself was perfect and the health club was fantastic.

  The housekeeper and staff were warm and welcoming and couldn’t do enough for them.

  T
he food was wonderful.

  She was content.

  ‘She’s coming,’ someone whispered.

  ‘God, she looks ace – fantastic,’ murmured Jules, who’d sneaked a glance behind him. ‘Mate, you’re a lucky man.’

  ‘I know,’ said Adam, thinking with a little shudder how he’d nearly blown it, how his male ineptitude had almost lost him Cat, who he knew he loved more than his life – who made his life complete.

  It was very strange how fate and destiny worked out, how people you’d have crossed a continent – or at least a country – to avoid were the ones who made your dreams come true.

  If it hadn’t been for Fanny Gregory, who he admitted to himself he’d sometimes – no, come on, be honest, make that often – like to strangle, this would not be happening.

  As he stood there waiting for his bride, he heard a little chuckle on his right. He knew it must be Fanny. He wondered what she’d planned today, if she was going to conjure up a pumpkin, wave her magic wand and turn the pumpkin into a golden carriage, in which they could go off on honeymoon.

  The cable people would love that.

  As Cat arrived at Adam’s side, he smiled. She saw the pride and happiness in his eyes and almost started crying.

  ‘No, don’t you dare, you numpty,’ muttered Tess, when she saw Cat’s shoulders start to shake. ‘You’re on television and you’ll ruin your mascara.’

  The music died away. Amy Winehouse, Lady Gaga, Coldplay wouldn’t have been right, thought Cat, as Gwennie finished playing something lovely and romantic on the grand piano and everybody sighed contentedly.

  The registrar picked up her book and welcomed everybody to the wedding. The mothers started sniffing and the ceremony began.

  Then everything went sort of blurred. Adam and Cat got married. Or Cat was almost sure they did. She couldn’t remember making any vows. Rick the boy photographer took a hundred thousand snaps. Tess caught the bride’s bouquet, neatly fouling Bex, who lunged for it and missed.