by Lovett, Jo
‘Okay, well, I’m not sure there’s much else to say now, but I’ll be in touch. Obviously you’re welcome to call me if you’d like to talk when you’ve had a chance to digest things.’
‘Great.’ Dan moved again to avoid yet another group of people out for the evening. ‘Yes, I’ll probably be in touch again soon. I’d like to join you at your anomaly scan, if that’s alright.’
‘Of course.’
When they’d ended the call, Dan carried on staring at the pavement for a while before he decided that right now he just wanted to go home and be by himself this evening and, as Hannah had said, digest the news.
* * *
Forty-eight hours later, Dan was in his car on the way to the Cotswolds for Sasha and Angus’s engagement party and nowhere near having digested the baby news. He’d texted Hannah to congratulate her again and reiterate how keen he was to be involved in the baby’s life but beyond that he hadn’t got his head round it at all.
When he finally arrived at his mother’s house, she opened the front door wide and said, ‘Dan. I’m so pleased to see you. Darling, you look tired. Are you alright?’
Dan opened his mouth to reply, wondering if he was going to tell her right now that she was going to be a grandmother again (his older sister Lucie already had two little boys). And then she looked at her watch and said, ‘Goodness, we’re quite late.’ Yep, now wasn’t the time. In fact, what had he been thinking? Of course he shouldn’t tell anyone the weekend of Sasha’s engagement party. No-one appreciated their thunder being stolen.
‘Why don’t you go ahead and I’ll follow you?’ he said. ‘I need to get changed and I might grab a quick shower first if that’s okay.’ Sasha was torturing them all with a fancy-dress party.
Half an hour later, he stuck his Henry VIII hat on his head and pushed open the door to the pub function room where Sasha and Angus were holding the party. The room was boiling. He was going to fry in this synthetic-fur-lined cloak. Bloody fancy dress. Probably good, though, for taking his mind off everything else.
‘Dan.’ Sasha flung her arms round him. ‘Hello. You make a great Henry the Eighth.’
Dan bowed his head gravely. ‘Thank you. And you make an even better Cleopatra. Huge congratulations to both of you.’
‘Thank you so much. Good to see you.’ Angus pumped Dan’s hand up and down a few times, grinning. ‘And before you ask, the costume was Sasha’s idea.’ Angus was dressed as an Egyptian pharaoh, complete with headpiece, bare chest, snake armband and a staff. Dan had never seen him in anything other than jeans and a checked shirt before. He was so conservative in his dress taste that he practically made Dan look like a boy band member.
Dan battled laughter for a few seconds before he managed to say, ‘You look great, Angus.’
‘Thanks.’ Angus nodded and his headpiece wobbled. He set it straight. ‘God. The things you do for the woman you love.’
‘Yeah.’ Dan caught sight of Evie chatting to friends on the other side of the room and suddenly felt less mirthful. They hadn’t spoken much since Vegas and he wasn’t totally sure they were back on track friendship-wise even though they’d kind of laughed it off the next day. He wondered what she’d think about his baby news. ‘Congratulations again. I’ll let you greet the rest of your guests. Catch up with you later.’
Twenty minutes later, he was managing not to worry about the baby and was enjoying the party, if he ignored the fact that he practically had a crick in his neck from spending the entire time surreptitiously keeping an eye on where Evie was. He wasn’t even sure whether it was because he wanted to talk to her or avoid her. Also, was she with that tall, blond man? He glanced over again to where she was talking in a group in the opposite corner of the room. The blond man wasn’t there now.
She was looking sideways at him at exactly that moment. He smiled a little and looked away.
‘Stop looking at her but avoiding her,’ Sasha hissed in his ear. Dan jumped slightly. ‘It’s really obvious. There’ll be a lot more gossip if you don’t speak to her than if you do.’
‘I’m not avoiding her,’ he said. He kind of was.
‘So go and speak to her.’
Dan closed his eyes for a second. He really didn’t need this from his sister. He’d like to snap at her, but it was her engagement party, and also they were now adults, not bickering children.
‘Please?’ She gestured with her sceptre, narrowly missing his eye. ‘Not for my sake, or your sake, but for Evie’s.’ Her voice was very piercing and several people turned to look. Fantastic. ‘Once you’ve had a chat in public, that will be that. It will all have blown over.’
Dan nodded. ‘Good plan,’ he said. It probably wasn’t, but it didn’t feel like he had a lot of choice now.
He started walking across the room towards Evie, aiming for a saunter, which didn’t work well, it turned out, when you were dressed as a Tudor king.
‘Hey, Evie.’
‘Hello.’ She gave him a small smile.
‘Great costume.’ Always a failsafe conversation starter at a fancy-dress party. Evie was dressed in an incredible all-in-one flared trouser and top thing, in bright-blue satiny stuff, and high platform boots. ‘ABBA?’
Evie gave him a slightly bigger smile. ‘Yes. Liking yours, actually. I’m a little bit surprised by it if I’m honest.’
‘Yeah, my initial instinct was to wear my one and only ten-year-old dinner suit, and get myself a toy gun.’
‘James Bond?’
‘Yup. And that was the plan I was going with until I realised that Sasha would be loudly disappointed in me, and, more importantly, that she might find a costume for me herself.’
‘Definitely safer to choose your own.’
‘Indeed. Although I’d like to make it clear right now that this wouldn’t have been my number one choice. There were only three options in my size and the other two were Superman and Harry Potter.’
Evie sniggered. ‘I’d have liked to have seen you in a Superman costume.’
‘Yeah. I decided to embrace my inner wife-murderer instead.’ Oh, for God’s sake. Why had he mentioned the word wife? This was the effect Evie had on him. She made him lose his mind slightly. ‘Can I get you another drink?’ He gestured at her nearly full glass.
‘Hi.’ The blond man had reappeared and put his left arm round Evie’s waist as she was opening her mouth to reply to Dan’s question. He held his right hand out to Dan. ‘I’m Matthew.’
‘Dan,’ said Dan, shaking Matthew’s hand. He looked between the two of them. ‘So you’re…?’ How long had they been together? And did he have any right to be angry however long it was? No, he didn’t, so he should try to act like he didn’t want to punch Matthew or shout at Evie right now. What a ridiculous reaction, actually. And, now he thought about it, of course she hadn’t already been with Matthew at Christmas. He was sure she wouldn’t do that, and also Matthew would have found out about their Vegas trip on social media.
‘Yeah,’ said Matthew, apparently impervious to what Dan felt simmering between himself and Evie. ‘Been seeing each other for about three weeks now, haven’t we?’ He smiled down at Evie. ‘Although we’ve known each other for a few months. She finally consented to go out with me after she’d hit me in the eye.’
‘With a shuttlecock.’ Evie smiled at Matthew and didn’t completely meet Dan’s eye. ‘By mistake.’
‘Aw,’ said Dan. ‘That’s sweet. Well, great to meet you, Matthew.’ He was pretty sure his voice was almost shaking with insincerity. ‘Good to see you, Evie.’
Evie murmured, ‘Lovely to see you too,’ while Matthew shook Dan’s hand enthusiastically again.
Dan turned round and walked away, tempted to shake his head.
He made himself busy chatting to old friends and relatives and he had a perfectly pleasant evening. Except for the fact that he actually had a physical pain now in his neck from surreptitiously eyeing Evie and Matthew the whole time. He really hadn’t been expecting her to be with anyone
tonight. No reason she shouldn’t be, of course, but it still felt off.
Matthew seemed like a nice enough guy. Much better than the man she’d been with at Lucie’s wedding a few years ago. Not a great guy, though. Not good enough for Evie. Not someone she’d necessarily have a lot of fun with.
God. The way he was thinking, it was like he was jealous.
Twelve
Then – October 2016
Evie
The beauty of having to wear a large (purple velvet) penis-and-accompanying-balls deely bopper (‘Double meat and two veg all round,’ Sasha’s sister Lucie’s very posh friend Tara had yelled when she’d distributed them) was that when you leaned forwards it obscured most of what you did.
Evie waited for Lucie’s friend Nags to finish sloshing tequila into everyone’s shot glasses.
‘Right,’ Nags said, sitting down. Oops, she’d missed her chair. Up she got. ‘Chair moved,’ she said. ‘Okay. On the count of three. One. Two. Three.’
While everyone else tipped their heads back and downed their shots, Evie poured hers into the pot of the large yucca plant behind her. She’d spotted the yucca when they’d arrived at the restaurant and had manoeuvred herself into the closest seat to it. She’d now tipped three out of five shots in there and was a lot more sober than everyone else. It was lovely that Sasha and Tara had invited her – along with thirty-seven other women – to Lucie’s hen night, but she was helping out with a school Duke of Edinburgh training day tomorrow, and it would be torture with a hangover. Plus she wasn’t that keen generally on getting over-pissed.
Nags stood up again and banged the table with a fork. Oh, God. If there was one thing the last hour had taught Evie, it was that Nags had a lot of ideas that Evie didn’t like.
‘It’s time for Truth or Dare,’ Nags announced. Exactly. Evie didn’t like that idea.
Fifteen minutes later, it was Evie’s turn.
‘Truth,’ she said. There was no choice. The first three victims had gone Dare. Nags had a big list that she was ticking off. The first three had been: ask a man at the bar for his number (that had been Lucie and she’d gone for someone with a wedding ring and he’d still given her his number and tucked it into her bra top – Lucie had been free with the champagne before the tequila and she’d found that hilarious, where Evie wouldn’t have been quite so pleased); let the rest of the group sign you up to Tinder with your real details (the woman who’d got that one had just got engaged and wasn’t happy); and go braless for the rest of the evening (and the woman who’d got that one was wearing quite a see-through top and also wasn’t happy). Truth had to be safer. And what did she have to hide? Absolutely nothing.
‘Oooh, I have a big question for you,’ Sasha screech-slurred before anyone else could speak. Everyone went quiet and leaned in. ‘I always want to ask you this and I never do.’ Really? Evie and Sasha didn’t have secrets from each other, surely? ‘Do you fancy Dan? Like really fancy him? Because I love you both and I think you’d be perfect together. And I’ve thought for the past few years that maybe you like each other. Do you?’
Okay. The whole Dan thing was the one big secret Evie did have from Sasha. The kiss the night before her twenty-second birthday. The very full-on, amazing kiss, since when she’d hardly seen Dan. And the fact that for a long time Dan had been her secret crush. She thought about him much less now, because she hardly ever saw him, so it shouldn’t be too difficult to lie, especially since she was a lot soberer than everyone else.
‘I mean, he’s lovely,’ she said. Good start. ‘Really nice. Of course he is. And good-looking. Of course. But he’s your brother. I’ve known him forever. I mean, he’s almost like a cousin to me or something.’ He really wasn’t. ‘I don’t think there’d ever be any kind of spark.’ She was going on too much. She needed to stop talking. Pretty good lying, though, if she said so herself.
‘Hmm. I’m not sure.’ Lucie waved a dildo wand in Evie’s direction. She was slurring even more than her sister. ‘People always fancy their friends’ siblings.’
‘That’s what I think. And you looked all dreamy when he kissed you under the mistletoe that time,’ Sasha said. ‘I didn’t mention it because I didn’t want to embarrass you.’
Very restrained of Sasha. Unfortunate that her restraint had gone out the window now, though.
‘Ha,’ Evie said. ‘Dreamy. I was probably a bit pissed.’ She remembered it well and, yes, she had had a bit too much mulled wine, but it had been more than that. She’d definitely felt a bit dreamy. ‘Also, if you remember, I have a boyfriend?’ So silly. She should have mentioned Euan immediately rather than wittering on about why she could never fancy Dan. That would have been the end of the conversation. And probably a lot more convincing.
‘Is he the one for you, though?’ Sasha said. ‘I know you think you want boring, but do you actually want boring? Oh.’ She clapped her hands over her mouth. ‘Oops. Did I say that out loud? Evie, I’m really sorry. I love you and I’m so sorry.’
‘It’s fine.’ Evie shook her head and smiled. It wasn’t that fine. This was one of the downsides of being the sober one. Drunk people said brutally honest things and you remembered all of them. At least her mum didn’t say stuff while drunk that she wouldn’t say while sober. Other people really did, though.
Maybe Evie should just abandon caution and get plastered herself.
‘Isabel. Truth or Dare.’ Nags had turned her attention to the woman on Evie’s left, hooray.
Was Euan boring?
No, he wasn’t. He was just sensible. And sensible was great. Sensible didn’t force you to wear huge penis deely boppers, drink too much and play Truth or Dare.
Evie looked around the table. Everyone else was having a lot of fun, screaming in delight at Isabel’s dare (twerking her way round the restaurant – the best one so far – Isabel was having fun too).
Arguably, Evie would have more fun if she binned all the sensibleness.
Maybe she wouldn’t chuck her next drink in the yucca pot.
‘So this is nice. BFF,’ Sasha said three hours later.
It really wasn’t.
They were sitting on the floor together in a loo cubicle in a not-very-nice nightclub in Cheltenham. Evie had been vomiting into the toilet basin and Sasha had been holding her hair out of her face.
‘I feel guilty,’ Sasha said. ‘I was drinking a lot faster than you but you’re the one vomiting. I’m kind of thinking you should practise drinking a bit more.’
‘Or never ever touch alcohol again,’ Evie croaked. Her mouth tasted beyond disgusting, her head was killing her and things were spinning around her. This hadn’t been boringly sensible but it wasn’t fun either. ‘I have to be at D of E practice at school at eight thirty tomorrow morning.’
‘That’s bad.’ Sasha hugged Evie’s shoulders. ‘Sorry you feel rough.’
Evie closed her eyes while the tiles of the loo cubicle spun round and round her and her stomach heaved. The tiles were cream, she knew that, but when they were spinning they got a lot darker. Weird.
‘You okay?’ Sasha rubbed her back and Evie’s stomach heaved again and she threw up some more. Sasha looked into the loo. ‘Bile. I think that’s good news. I think your stomach’s pretty much empty now. I think you might be okay to sip some water soon.’
Evie turned her head, slowly, because fast movement wasn’t good, and did her best to smile at Sasha. ‘Thank you so much for being with me here. This would be a lot worse without you. Sorry you aren’t out there with everyone else.’ Oh no. Sasha should be out there with everyone else. ‘You should go and dance again. I’m ruining your evening.’
‘You aren’t ruining my evening. This is nice.’
‘This is not nice.’ The underneath of the toilet bowl definitely hadn’t seen any form of cleaning product recently. ‘I want to get some Marigolds on and chuck some bleach around.’
Sasha sniggered. ‘I love you, Evie Green. I love all your tidiness and the way you like everything to be so perfec
t. Sorry about what I said about Euan and sorry for asking you about Dan. Obviously Euan’s great and obviously you don’t have a thing for Dan. And you’re bringing Euan to Lucie’s wedding and Dan’s bringing his latest girlfriend. Another new one. Ignore what I said. It was just the drink talking.’
Evie shook her head, slowly, waited for her stomach to settle, and said, ‘You were kind of right.’ It felt mean to be lying to Sasha, who really was an amazing friend. ‘Euan is a bit boring.’
‘Oh, Evie, I’m even more sorry now.’ Sasha took some loo paper and folded it round some of Evie’s hair and pulled gently. ‘Vomit in your hair. I wasn’t holding it properly. Sorry. Anyway. I don’t think we should talk about this now. But I would say that I don’t believe you need boring and I don’t believe you should settle for boring. Maybe you need sensible, or steady or dependable, but you do not need boring. You’re under-selling yourself. Anyway. When you’re ready, let’s get a taxi and go home. You should maybe wash your hair before you go to bed. Or wash your pillowcase in the morning. Maybe both.’
* * *
Sitting in the Melting Bishop village church a fortnight later, Evie looked over her shoulder with everyone else to see Lucie as she walked sedately down the aisle on her father Robert’s arm, her bridesmaids Sasha, Tara and Nags behind her. Lucie looked stunning, and a completely different woman from the penis-accessory-holding, boobs-spilling-out-of-tiny-top, cackling hen she’d been two weeks ago. The bridesmaids also looked beautiful, particularly Sasha. Evie beamed at her best friend as they all glided past the end of her pew.
Euan reached for Evie’s hand with his own as the wedding party took up their position at the front of the church. Evie tried not to frown. Lucie had gone for a big wedding, with a lot of family and local friends present. There were a lot of people here that Evie knew very well and liked a lot. She loved the village. She loved the village church, beautifully decorated today with autumn foliage. And, if she was honest, she wanted to enjoy it all without being distracted by Euan’s presence. He was doing some – slightly annoying – finger rubbing. She was pretty sure that he thought it was erotic, because he usually finger-rubbed at the end of an evening when she was going back to his and it looked like sex was on the cards. Right now, it was a struggle not to slap his fingers away.