‘Ok, so while you’re dishing out free therapy Mum, I got fired on Monday.’
‘Oh, Eve.’
She didn’t need to tell her mum that actually she got fired twice on the same day. Once, twice, who’s counting? After standing solitary on the street, her sad little carrier bag in her hand, Eve had answered a call from Belinda at Venus who’d been on a hiking weekend in Snowdonia. When she’d got back to civilisation and reliable mobile service she’d received a never-ending stream of garbled messages from Eve begging her not to run a column that she’d never even received.
‘I’m not sure what’s going on with you Eve,’ Belinda had said. ‘But I’m giving you once last chance to redeem yourself with a column about the gay destination wedding you’re going to. And I want you to camp it up. Big time.’
Eve told her that she wasn’t going to write about that anymore, that she wanted to write about something other than weddings. When she’d said she couldn’t write about the gay wedding of her brother, Belinda had told her that it was that or nothing. So Eve chose nothing.
‘So what are you going to do for money?’ Faye asked, entirely reasonably. Principles were great but they didn’t pay the rent.
‘I’m not entirely sure,’ Eve replied. ‘But I have enough saved up to buy us another round of coffees before we hit the road again if you fancy it?’
Chapter 37
The ‘lets get married abroad so all our loved ones have to use up their annual leave allocation and get a bank loan to attend’ wedding
‘Are you serious?’ Adam shrieked as soon as Faye and Eve walked into the grand hallway of the chateau where the wedding was to be held in two days’ time.
Eve plonked her suitcase down on the chequerboard floor. ‘I think what you meant to say was, “Hi Mum, sis, how was the thirteen-hour journey, you must be shattered, it’s this way to a glass of wine.”’
‘Where are your partners?’
‘Our what?’
‘You told me, no, you promised me, that you’d both be bringing plus ones to the wedding. Please tell me they’re arriving separately.’
‘They’re arriving separately.’
‘Are they really?’
‘No. You just told me to say that.’
‘Eve, look at me, do I look as though I’m in the mood for your sarcasm?’
Eve studied her brother for a minute. His cheeks were flushed, his hair a little disheveled from his hand constantly running through it, his shirt was uncharacteristically creased. ‘No, you don’t. You look like a groom that’s lost all perspective on life. Come on Adam, lighten up, you’re getting married!’
‘The table plans are ruined.’
‘Look, if it’s that important, Mum and I will go out in Avignon tonight on the pull and find a couple of nice local men we can bring along.’
‘Would you really do that, for me?’ Adam asked, his hand on his chest.
A horrified Faye swivelled to her daughter, who just laughed, shaking her head. ‘Of course not! Get a grip Adam, then open a bottle of wine, give me a list of things that need doing and we’ll all get on with our lives.’
‘I thought I heard voices, hello, hello,’ George came bounding down the stairs into the hallway and engulfed his soon to be mother- and sister-in-law in big bear hugs. ‘You must be shattered, do you want tea or wine?’
Eve grinned, and pointed at George. ‘See Adam, that’s the welcome we wanted.’
‘Bugger off.’ Adam replied sulkily.
‘He’s annoyed because Eve and I are both single.’
George gave Faye a wink. ‘That’s not what I heard. How is the gorgeous Latin American?’
Faye blushed. ‘Gorgeous. And slightly out of my league.’
‘Oh hush. He looked completely smitten last weekend,’ George teased. ‘And what about Ben? He rushed after you after you left early, didn’t he Eve? Something to tell us there?’
‘Something and nothing,’ Eve shrugged. ‘As usual.’
She wasn’t quite telling the truth to them all. Ben had phoned her countless times over the last week, and each time Eve saw his name come up on her screen she’d muted the call. If it was possible to be in eerily familiar and yet entirely unfamiliar territory at the same time, then she was in it. She wasn’t sure now whether she’d imagined the look that passed between them when Ben had suggested it was time for him to leave her flat. Whether, if she had asked him to stay, he would have done. And if she had, would it have been because he really wanted to stay, with her, or just his loneliness talking. She guessed she’d never know now.
***
With all her clothes upended in the chest of drawers in her round turret bedroom, and her empty suitcase stowed under the bed, Eve splashed some water on her face and peered into the tiny square mirror over the basin. She looked exhausted. After a snatched dinner of bread, cheese and ham with her mum, Adam and George, she had tumbled into her room and was willing herself to fall into a dreamless sleep. She’d spent the day turning the ancient chateau into the vision of loveliness that jumped out from the pages of the scrapbook that Adam had reverently presented her with at breakfast that morning announcing, ‘This is the blueprint for how we want it to look.’
‘No pressure there then,’ Eve had replied. Extravagant displays of white flowers burst from every page, and there was even one picture depicting a tower of pastel-pretty macaroons. Eve wasn’t entirely sure whether these were just inspirational or whether her brother actually expected her to source, pay for and construct said tower of sugary splendour. After his meltdown the evening before about the lack of plus-ones, Eve couldn’t be sure. It was just as well she had turn up solo because the gargantuan size of her job-list meant that the hypothetical plus-one wouldn’t have seen her. Between helping the florist loop greenery through the bannisters, popping thousands of tea lights into little glass jars, carrying bay trees out to the terrace, tying ribbons onto chairs, and putting a copy of the wedding newsletter she’d written into every one of the chateau’s bedrooms, by the time the antique grandfather clock in the salon struck five in the afternoon, Eve was absolutely knackered and the wedding part of the weekend hadn’t even started yet.
She was woken the next morning by an incessant hammering on the door and a jubilant ‘I’m getting married today!’ being shouted through the keyhole. Eve lay back on her pillow and smiled at her brother’s wake up call. Shards of sunlight poked through the warped wood of the old shutters on her window, giving her room a soft morning glow. Obviously expecting Eve to turn up with a man, Adam had given her a double room, and as Eve stretched her limbs awake, she made a snow angel in the middle of the big bed, moving her legs and arms up and down and side to side, laughing as she did so. Today was a new day. A good day.
A few of Adam and George’s friends were starting to filter up the driveway and according to the itinerary Eve had written and propped up on the easel, they all had an hour ‘at leisure’ before pre-ceremony drinks on the terrace. Eve slipped into the ankle-length jade-green wrap dress that Adam had picked out for her. She clipped on her feather earrings, fluffing her hair out as she ran down the corridor to Adam’s room to continue her Best Woman duties.
The terrace was heaving with glamorous people wearing what the fashion team on her old magazine could only describe as ‘Riviera chic’. The women sported swirling kaftans or clinging minidresses, the men wore a uniform of linen shorts with open-necked shirts and designer sunglasses. A steel drum band were playing at one end of the pool and a few women were already sashaying in front of them. Eve weaved her way through the laughter, chatter and clinking glasses, to the familiar sight of Faye. Her mum looked gorgeous in an ever so slightly see-through silk evening dress in a riot of blues and greens, her short blonde hair was slicked back and a brown muscly forearm was draped across her shoulder. It was nice when a plan came together.
Eve smiled as she approached them. ‘Hi Juan, fancy seeing you here.’
‘Juan told me you called him yesterday a
nd told him to come, you naughty girl,’ Faye laughed.
Seeing her mum so happy proved to Eve that she’d done the right thing. An unlikely couple they may well be, but you couldn’t argue with the width of their grins and obvious chemistry.
‘Sorry to drag you away from each other,’ Eve said, ‘but Adam’s ready for us now Mum.’
Everyone had taken their seats on the terrace, the tealights had been lit, the flowers were giving off a heady scent in the sun, and the steel band started playing Bob Marley’s One Love as Eve and Faye walked a beaming Adam up the wide aisle alongside George flanked by his parents. The joy surrounding them was completely contagious and everyone started clapping along to the jubilant beat of the drums and by the time they’d reached the registrar all their friends were out of their seats dancing and cheering.
It was Eve’s sixth wedding of the summer. The sixth trading of vows and rings, the sixth couple who stared into each other’s eyes and made promises of lifelong love, fidelity and truth. Watching Adam and George tearfully work their way through their pledges, seeing the way George’s thumb kept reassuringly stroking Adam’s, witnessing their intense happiness as the registrar proclaimed them married, Eve couldn’t help but share in their joy. It would be a pretty sad world if love like this didn’t exist.
‘Thank you again,’ Faye whispered to Eve as the ceremony ended. ‘For calling Juan and making him come here.’
‘You’re welcome. I know he’s not Dad, but I thought about what you said, and life’s too short to keep grieving for the past. Anyway, we couldn’t have Adam hyperventilating over two empty spaces at the dinner table, could we?’
‘No, we couldn’t,’ Faye agreed. ‘Which is why I found you a plus one too.’ Faye glanced over Eve’s shoulder as she said this.
‘Hello Red.’
Eve spun round, her eyes wide. ‘Oh my God, Ben, what are you doing here?’
‘Apparently making up numbers.’
There was suddenly and conveniently someone very important Faye wanted to introduce Juan to, and she slipped away, leaving the two of them alone.
‘Say something.’
Eve opened her mouth but nothing came out. For a woman who worked with words, she literally couldn’t find any.
‘Ok, I’ll go first then, shall I?’ Ben said, taking a deep breath before all his words gushed out at once. ‘You and me Eve, we’re meant to be together. I know it. You know it. We’ve wasted too much time pretending otherwise and so here’s the plan. You jack in your job, I quit mine, we take three months off, hire a camper van, travel the length and breadth of Canada and fall in love with each other all over again.’
Eve was still open-mouthed. The noise from the band, the laughter of everyone around her, the smell from the flowers, it was all so real, and yet this conversation wasn’t.
‘Ben, I—’
‘Don’t overthink it Eve. You plan everything to the nth degree, but just let go. Forget about all the baggage, the past. Just say yes, and let us start again. Let’s do it, let’s go away from here and everything and spend some real time together and see what happens.’
It was everything Eve wanted to hear – but it wasn’t realistic, too much had happened. ‘It sounds lovely Ben, but I’ve changed, we’ve both changed, and we’re not the same people that we were.’
‘I know that. So why don’t we pretend we’re strangers meeting for the first time?’
‘What?’
‘Just that. Imagine that we’ve never seen each before, and we’ve spotted each other across a crowded party, and we quite like the look of each other. I’ve come up to you, you’re a bit irritated at the interruption, but intrigued, so I say, “Hi, nice to meet you.”’
Eve shook her head. ‘This is silly.’
‘Humour me Red. What have you got to lose?’
He was right. She had less to lose than even he knew about. Ben pounced on her pause as a sign of her willingness to play along, so he followed it up with, ‘Hello, I don’t think we’ve met before, do you come here often?’
Eve sighed, and couldn’t help a hint of a smile playing on her lips. ‘Not that often no, you?’
‘It’s my first time.’
‘I’m Eve.’ She held out her hand for him to shake.
‘Ben.’ He took her hand and held it in his, then broke into a big grin. ‘With a B.’
Acknowledgements
This novel was conceived during a phone call with my fabulous editor Charlotte Ledger who asked what I loved writing about, and I replied ‘funny women and weddings’ and she told me that sounded like a good place to start. I’ve said it before, but I think it needs repeating: the whole team at Harper Impulse is, quite frankly, extraordinary. Thanks especially to Charlotte Ledger, Kim Young, Kate Bradley, Dushi Horti and Sahina Bibi. To my fellow HI authors, it’s fantastic being part of such a supportive community – lots of love particularly to Eve Devon and Christie Barlow for their pep talks and offers of metaphorical gin.
I am ever grateful to my wonderful agent Luigi Bonomi and the beautiful team at LBA – Alison and Dani – thank you for your words of wisdom and inspiration.
I wrote this novel during our first year living in Rome, and we had a steady stream of visitors that summer, each of whom contributed in some way to this novel being written – Alex and Jasmine Collin thank you for your plot tips and for keeping the kids amused for 47 hours straight, Lisa and Joe Stratford for pouring Chianti into my mouth every evening, Rachel and Jodie Hamilton for reading bits of the first draft and for being well housetrained, Anya White, Dan and Matt Lomax, thank you for bringing your Antipodean humour with you, some of which may have found its way into this book. Big love and huge amounts of grateful thanks to Anna, Claire, Kate, Kerry and Rachel, my new gang in Italy, for telling me all your stories and for making the transition of being a Roman expat much more fun.
To my family, the Butterfields, the Coopers, the Harpers, the Poulains, the Harveys, the Poultneys, you’re all magnificent human beings. And to my own little tribe, Ed, Amélie, Rafe and Theo, J’taime, Ti amo, I love you.
Also by Charlotte Butterfield
Crazy Little Thing Called Love
Me, You and Tiramisu
About the Author
Former magazine editor Charlotte Butterfield was born in Bristol in 1977. She studied English at Royal Holloway University and an MPhil in Gender and Women’s Studies at Birmingham University before becoming a journalist and copywriter. She moved to Dubai in 2005, but now lives in Rome with her husband and three children.
@charliejayneb
@charlottebutterfieldauthor
About HarperImpulse
HarperImpulse is an innovative, award-winning digital imprint. In the four years since launch, we have continually hit digital bestseller lists, hosted the UK’s first online romance festival, published into over ten countries and grown an exciting stable of commercial women’s fiction authors.
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Writers, our vision is to publish the very best in digital-first commercial women’s fiction and we are simply looking for good stories! So, what are you waiting for? To submit, e-mail us at [email protected].
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A Beautiful Day for a Wedding Page 28