The Vintage Summer Wedding

by Jenny Oliver

  ‘We’re all here, Miss,’ Billy shouted.

  Anna glanced across the faces that she didn’t really recognise, the wary expressions, the hair pulled high on top of heads, the T-shirts with a faded Razzmatazz written across them, the trainers banging against the wood, the Twixes and packets of Hairbo, the acne, the fat fingers, the thin fingers, the greasy skin, the powdery foundation, the streaky fake tan, the faces engrossed in iPhones, the headphones, the tipped-over school bags, the mess, the scowls and the half-smiles. And she found her own mouth stretch into an involuntary grin.

  ‘Except Lucy.’ Mary added, quietly, ‘She doesn’t want to do it any more.’

  ‘Why not?’ Anna asked, realising then that she’d actually been searching for the Farah Fawcett fringe.

  ‘Because you gave Mary her part,’ Billy said, while curling himself over into a bridge from where he stood at the foot of the stage stairs then, as he kicked up into a handstand, got stuck halfway so Matt kicked him and he fell in a heap on the floor.

  ‘But I didn’t give Mary her part, she just stood in for her in that section.’

  Matt jumped down off the stage and gave Billy a hand up, while muttering, ‘We think it’s better this way round.’

  ‘That’s because Lucy has a new boyfriend.’ Cut in a pale-faced, fat boy who was sitting at the end of the line.

  ‘Fuck off it is, Peter. It’s because it’s better.’ Matt glared at him and Peter snorted a laugh.

  ‘Ok, ok fine, look don’t worry about it.’ Anna waved her hands to settle them down. ‘We’ll talk about Lucy later, let’s just get warmed up.’

  ‘I’m pretty hot already, Miss,’ one of the guys called out and the others laughed.

  ‘I’m sure you are,’ Anna raised a brow in his direction and then turned to Billy. ‘Do you want to lead the warm-up?’

  ‘No way I’m following him,’ muttered Peter as the ten year old bounded to the front of the hall.

  At the same time as he said it, Anna was distracted by a movement of the doors to the side of the room. ‘Well—’ she said, her attention caught by who she thought it was. ‘Go home then.’ She shrugged and felt Peter glare at her as she jogged towards the doorway. She might be trying to be a little nicer to them all, but that didn’t mean she had to put up with their every whim and sulk. ‘You need to all work together. It shouldn’t matter who leads the warm-up,’ she called as she went.

  Just before pushing the doors open, she glanced back to see Peter slope into the middle of the group and start a shuffling, half-hearted attempt at the warm-up. She also saw Matt pause to take a sip of Evian before turning the tune up loud and that made her smile.

  Out in the corridor, she glanced both ways and just caught the swish of a blonde ponytail ahead of her. The girl was walking fast, but perhaps not fast enough to want to go unnoticed.

  ‘Lucy?’ Anna called, and the girl paused but then carried on.

  ‘Lucy!’ she shouted again and started to jog after her. It crossed Anna’s mind that she could just leave her, that it would probably make her life easier if she let her go. But when she finally caught up with her, just in front of the fire exit that led out the back to the bins, and put her hand on her shoulder which Lucy, spinning round, shrugged off quick as a flash, it wasn’t the Farah Fawcett flick that Anna saw. Instead her mind seemed to see brown hair, centre-parted with a long fringe, a cropped New Kids on the Block T-shirt over a black leotard and leggings, eyes narrowed like a cat’s, perma-frown of aloofness and an almost rigid poise in her body. When the girl turned, Anna almost had to take a step back at the accusation, temper and annoyance on the pursed lips. She wasn’t face to face with Farah Fawcett Lucy but with mini-Anna.

  Anna swallowed and said, ‘Do you want to come inside?’

  ‘No.’ Mini-Anna scowled and went to walk away.

  ‘Wait, hang on.’ Big Anna pressed her hand against the bar on the fire exit door to stop her from opening it. ‘Wait.’ Why was she suddenly finding it so hard to breathe? She’d only jogged down the corridor. ‘Wait. It’s OK. Come back,’ she said. ‘Please don’t throw this away, you enjoy it.’

  ‘How would you know?’

  Anna frowned, ‘I just think you do. I think that’s why you’re here, watching. Because you enjoy it. Because you’re good at it.’ She paused, saw mini-Anna’s jaw lock, saw the fury on her face. ‘It doesn’t matter about being the lead part or anything like that, you do it for you.’ She tried to will her to listen to her. ‘It’s about you being good at something and letting your—’ When she saw the trembling of mini-Anna’s chin, she tried keep her own steady. ‘Letting your talent shine whatever position you’re in. About doing it for you,’ she said again, more quietly.

  Anna kept her hand firm on the fire exit bar, unwilling to let this girl escape now that she had her, thinking of how much more she had to say, when suddenly mini-Anna fizzled away and Farah Fawcett Lucy’s voice snarled, ‘But you think I’m shit.’

  Anna sighed, turning to rest both her hands on the doorframe behind her to steady herself. ‘I don’t think you’re shit at all,’ she said, trying to hide her disappointment, her bewilderment at seeing her former self so clearly. ‘To me, Lucy‒’ she coughed, buying herself some time to get her thoughts in some kind of order.

  ‘To you, what?’ Lucy muttered.

  ‘To me you were one of the leaders of this group,’ Anna said, drawing on her PR experience and trying to compensate for the rambling emotion she’d just succumbed to. ‘And, as a leader, that doesn’t mean you always go up front, Lucy. It can mean that you lead by showing others, all those who look up to you and think you’re good, can then see that it’s OK to be anywhere. You lead by being part of the group‒’ Anna paused, reminded suddenly of the talk her boss had had with her when she’d demanded a promotion and had a massive sulk when her annoying colleague Beatrix had got it instead. She hadn’t listened at the time, just fumed at the idea of being kept down. It was only as she was repeating it that it now seemed like reasonable advice. It sounded like something her dad might say... No, something that her granny would have said and her dad would have repeated, passing the wisdom off as his own. That thought made her laugh, completely inappropriately given the circumstances, so she stifled it into a sort of horse-like snort which made Lucy raise a brow, like Anna was gross and old and couldn’t manage her bodily noises.

  ‘Lucy, you are a leader, and you need to acknowledge that every one of you in this group is a star.’

  Were they stars? If Anna hadn’t been a star, could she allow this rag-tag bunch to think they were stars? As she considered it, felt ridiculous and childish for making such a petty comparison, she suddenly questioned what this word was that she had clung to and placed so much emphasis on? What would she have had to do to finally take a bow and say, I am a star?

  ‘You’re stars,’ she said again, ‘For trying. And what would make you personally stand out would be by doing what’s best for the whole group, because you want your whole team to succeed.’ Anna added a small smile of encouragement at the end.

  Lucy kicked the floor. ‘You should have told me about Mary.’

  ‘How could I have told you? You didn’t come to rehearsal.’ Anna shook her head.

  ‘It’s a small village. You’ve seen me about. I see you about.’

  ‘You do?’ Anna couldn’t imagine even showing up on Lucy’s radar.

  ‘I had to find out from Billy, little shit.’ She pushed her big fringe back and sighed.

  Anna realised that she had probably seen her, hanging outside Rachel’s bakery, or sitting on the bench in the square with her friends, that she could have walked over and maybe mentioned what had happened in the rehearsal. If she’d put herself in Lucy’s position, she would have realised that that was what she should have done. If she’d remembered that that narrow-eyed swagger wasn’t something to be daunted by but something to just push through, a wave to duck under. She of all people should know. ‘Yes, I should have told you.�
�� Anna nodded.

  Lucy licked her lips and looked away down the corridor.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Anna said.

  Lucy glanced back, eyes glinting. ‘What was that, Miss?’

  Anna rolled her eyes, ‘I’m sorry,’ she forced out a second time.

  There was a pause between them, and then Lucy grinned and said, ‘That works for me.’ Then she laughed. ‘Jesus Christ, Miss, never thought I’d hear you apologising.’ She laughed and then strutted away in the direction of the hall, leaving Anna trailing behind thinking exactly the same thing.

  Back in the hall, Billy and Matt were attempting to show the others a couple of the steps Anna had run through with them at the previous rehearsal. The rest of the group were lined up behind them watching and awkwardly attempting to follow. It wasn’t very pretty. Peter stumbled over his Nikes while Mary retreated back into herself on the back row and Billy’s sister Clara, her luminous dyed-orange hair curled in neat fifties-style rolls on top of her head, just stood at the side with her hand on her hip saying, ‘That’s fucking stupid. It’s impossible.’

  Anna crossed her arms in front of her chest and tried not to wince. Lucy looked from the group back to Anna and made a face, ‘I don’t want to be in the bad bits on the TV, Miss.’

  ‘No.’ Anna shook her head. Shit. OK. She was out of her league. Anyone she’d worked with at least had a semblance of rhythm. How did one teach non-dancers how to dance? She tried to picture Seb at the dance lessons they’d gone to before their wedding. His grimacing face as he’d stood in the bright studio and Pepe, their Brazilian instructor, had tried to get some sway into his rigid hips. He’d got him to visualise a hula hoop round his waist like he was a kid in the playground and in the end had Seb snorting the odd laugh as he awkwardly pretended to hula hoop. At the time she hadn’t found it funny at all, just rolled her eyes at his inability. When secretly she’d been consumed by her own panic ‒ the rigidness of her body when she thought about having to dance, wondering if she would be able to put one foot in front of the other, the sickness it caused in her stomach as she lay in bed the night before the session. But tradition had forced her to push on through, the idea of people questioning what type of wedding didn’t have a first dance, especially one of an ex-ballerina. She hadn’t wanted the reason to shine on her. To her relief it had never got to her turn, but it hadn’t stopped her hiding her own fears at Seb’s expense.

  She was brought back to the scene in front of her when Peter stumbled and knocked a skinny kid with freckles who, in turn, pushed Mary who tripped and fell on her bum while Clara patted her hair and blew a bubble and Billy sighed loudly before throwing himself into a double back-flip just for something to do and everyone started swearing and shouting.

  ‘OK, OK, let’s stop for a minute.’ Anna held her hands up.

  ‘Lucy!’ Matt said surprised when he saw her standing next to Anna and then blushed luminous red.

  ‘I’m back, yeah.’ Lucy strutted over and took a place between Peter and the skinny freckly boy. ‘I’m leading from back here, with my crew.’ She smirked.

  ‘We’re like Step Up 2.’ Clara laughed.

  ‘In your dreams.’ Billy raised a brow and Clara gave him the finger.

  ‘Or Dirty Dancing?’ Anna added and they all looked at her like they had no idea what she was talking about. ‘You haven’t seen Dirty Dancing?’

  ‘No!’ Clara looked horrified. ‘It’s from like the fifties.’

  ‘The eighties.’ Anna said. ‘It’s not that long ago.’

  ‘For you maybe, Miss,’ smirked Billy. ‘I was born in 2004.’

  ‘Jesus!’ Anna shook her head.

  ‘Yeah, you’re old.’

  ‘OK, that’s enough, thank you. For your homework you should all watch it.’

  ‘You can’t give us homework.’

  Anna rolled her eyes. ‘Just watch the film. It’s probably on Netflix. OK, listen, I just wanted to say that I was wrong the other day when I said you didn’t have any steps. You do have steps, it’s just that some of them get a little lost and some of them could be…’ She searched for a word. ‘More refined.’

  ‘It’s not ballet, Miss,’ Lucy shouted.

  ‘No, I know it’s not but, look, I’ll call it and we’ll go through really slowly and it doesn’t matter if anyone treads on anyone else’s toes.’

  ‘OK, Peter?’ Matt laughed.

  ‘Piss off.’

  ‘OK, so from the beginning,’ Anna shouted and they all shuffled into place. ‘You’re clap left, clap right, and the hips, left arm is in front of the body, Mary, yep, and hips forward. That’s nice. You’re looking for simplicity. Let the music do the work.’ Anna walked along in front of them as Lucy, Billy, Matt and Mary came forward and the group split into its front and back row. ‘Very nice. Look at your arms, Peter, like a wing. Like wings, everyone. That’s better. And now you’re on the spot, leg up and OK, pause. Hang on a minute. This bit is where the back row, you’re getting lost.’ She leant against the piano and they all stared at her, waiting.

  For a second she thought about going to stand with them and doing it herself to show them what they were doing wrong, to run through it quickly and they could watch, but her body froze at the very idea. Instead she said, ‘Maybe you need to think about it differently, maybe imagine you’re pulling your boots on, so it would go...knee up, body over, welly boots pulled up.’

  ‘We don’t wear welly boots, Miss.’

  ‘Well imagine watching someone who does.’

  ‘My mum has a pair,’ the freckly skinny boy shouted.

  ‘Great,’ said Anna, ‘Imagine, sorry, I don’t know what your name is.’

  ‘You’re so forgettable, Scotty,’ Matt laughed.

  ‘We’re all thinking about your mum, Scotty,’ Peter chimed in.

  ‘Yeah? Well no one wants to think about your mum, Peter,’ Scott snarled.

  ‘OK, no one’s thinking about anyone’s mum. We’re thinking about wellington boots.’

  ‘Can we think about another type of boot? Like I could think about my Uggs?’ Clara offered.

  ‘Yes.’ Anna clapped her hands. ‘Think about whatever boot you like. Or even think about socks. Right, let’s go from there. So your left boot—’

  ‘Sock!’ someone yelled.

  ‘Shut up.’

  ‘Right boot, lovely. Now you’re going to jump, feet apart, left arm reaching up, it’s a punch in the air, less violent, Peter, think about maybe picking an apple, that’s better, and then clap either side, yes, clap up…no, up! Like, I don’t know, like you’re squashing midges. Yes. Very nice. Good. And we’ll go from the top.’ Anna stopped clapping. All the kids stopped and waited with their hands on their hips. ‘OK, so when we go again I’m just going to shout wings, boots, apples, midges. Yes?’

  And they all did it again, and then again, and then they wanted to stop for a break but she made them do it again, and Peter swore and Lucy glared at him, and then they did it again and this time no one stepped on anyone’s toes and the sun streamed in through the little windows, and while there were still some dubious looks they did it in perfect time, with perfect posture and perfect movements.

  ‘Brilliant. Brilliant.’ Anna clapped, quite taking herself by surprise by the euphoria she felt from seeing them move as one giant unit.

  ‘Miss,’ Lucy said as they peeled apart and had a drink. ‘Can we add some twerking?’

  ‘I don’t know what twerking is,’ Anna narrowed her eyes, ‘but I’m not sure I like the sound of it.’

  Forty minutes later, they were all sweating, red-faced and aching but the looks of desperate concentration had turned into smiles, and Anna’s niggle of a guilty conscience for axing her from the main role had led to Lucy managing to get her own twerking solo just after the Matt and Mary Hustle. It was just as she was in full twerk, gleeful that she’d managed to get her own way, that the back door opened and slammed shut loudly. Lucy stopped, straightened up, and Anna turned to see Hermione st
rutting towards them, kitten heels clipping on the parquet floor, sunglasses pushing caramel hair back like velvet, dressed in minuscule green shorts and a black-and-white print vest that billowed out behind her.

  The boys stopped staring at Lucy’s bottom and instead watched, paralysed, as Hermione sashayed over.

  ‘Hello, darlings,’ she drawled. ‘Anna, I’ve brought you some refreshments.’ She held up a can of gin and tonic and, setting down her Fortnum’s cool bag, pulled out two little glasses with ice and a slice. ‘Is that outfit meant to be ironic?’ she asked as she straightened up, taking in Anna’s old leggings and sweatshirt.

  Anna crossed her arms self-consciously over her baggy jumper and then said, her voice clipped, ‘I can’t drink while I’m teaching.’ She didn’t really want Hermione there. They hadn’t talked properly since Hermione had started shagging her father and Anna couldn’t help but one hundred percent disapprove.

  ‘Sure you can. I don’t think one can be a teacher and not sneak a snifter on the sly. What’s this I hear about Seb sleeping in the shed?’ Hermione asked as she cracked open the can.

  ‘Mr Davenport’s sleeping in the shed?’ Peter asked, incredulous.

  ‘Of course he’s not sleeping in the shed,’ Anna rolled her eyes.

  ‘Did no one ever teach you not to eavesdrop, you little shit?’ Hermione sneered at Peter. ‘Go on, go back to your Backstreet Boys.’

  ‘It’s not bloody Backstreet Boys.’ Peter curled his lip but Hermione just raised one perfectly arched brow and he seemed to shrink back into the gang.

  ‘Thanks for bringing that up about Seb. I’m sure he’ll be thrilled when they ask him about it at school,’ Anna hissed.

  Hermione just made a face and sipped her gin as Anna clapped her hands and shouted, ‘OK, let’s go through it one more time, I’m not going to call unless you get stuck and we’ll try it with the music this time.’