Wedding Season

by Katie Fforde

  But could she be reliable when her freelance work caused such trouble at home? She sighed, and thought back to a little incident that had happened just as she was leaving. She had put her last box into her car and was about to close the boot and go home when a large, yellow Labrador bounded up to her.

  ‘Major!' a male voice had said. 'Here!’

  The voice appeared from behind the side of the house. It belonged to a tall man wearing a suit that didn't really fit him. There was a thinner, longer dog of indefinable breed close to the man's heel. The yellow dog bounced away from Bron like a ball ricocheting off a wall and landed by the man.

  ‘He didn't frighten you, did he?' he asked as he came within earshot.

  ‘Oh no,' said Bron, glad of the diversion. She didn't want to go home; any little delay was welcome. 'He's lovely. Hello, Major.' As the dog was by her side again and she was rubbing his chest, it seemed only polite to use his name.

  'Ashlyn wanted him to come to the wedding and wear a blue bow round his neck,' the man explained. 'But everyone agreed it would be hopeless unless he was well and truly worn out first. I've been walking him since dawn, more or less. I'm the gardener,' he explained. 'I'm now going to find the blue bow and be ready to greet the wedding party when they come out of church so he can be in the photos.'

  ‘Lovely!' said Bron.

  ‘Aren't you going to the wedding?' the man went on. `No, I'm just the hairdresser.'

  ‘I can't believe Vanessa – Mrs Lennox-Featherstone – didn't invite you.'

  ‘Yes she did, but, sadly, I can't come. I must get home.' The man had smiled. 'Shame.’

  Bron had thought it was a shame too.

  *

  Roger came home at about ten, when his favourite shepherd's pie looked less golden-brown and more dried-up. Bron had made it as a peace offering although her tired bones would have much preferred to slump in front of the television with a glass of wine and a bowl of pasta. She'd had to get up incredibly early to be with Ashlyn on time. 'Hi, darling! How did it go?' she asked, trying to show some enthusiasm.

  ‘Great! We won. You should have been there.' He looked at her under his eyebrows, the double meaning clear. 'Don't bother to dirty a plate, I'll eat it out of the dish. I'm starving. Mm. This is great!’

  No kiss for her then, but he'd stopped greeting her affectionately a long time ago.

  Pleased, though, that she'd got this right at least, Bron pulled out a chair and sat down to watch him eat. He didn't seem to want to talk and, as she was tired too, neither did she. When he'd finally finished, he threw his fork down and said, 'We're going to Mum and Dad's for lunch tomorrow, did I tell you? I think Mum wants her hair doing.’

  As Sunday lunch with his parents was an almost weekly ritual she hadn't unpacked her car. She didn't mind doing Roger's mother's hair, but she did wonder if Roger, an accountant, would have spent every weekend doing someone's books for free.

  She had a bath and went to bed. Why was it that Roger was so free with her services as a hairdresser, but when she wanted to work for herself, to actually get paid, he didn't like it? Somehow along the way the balance of their relationship had gone wrong. They were no longer equal partners.

  Lying as near to the edge of the bed as she could get without actually falling off, she realised that they never had been, really. She and Roger had moved in together too early in their relationship; mostly, she realised, because her parents had been moving to Spain and she had nowhere else to live. She'd never lived on her own or with girlfriends – getting together with Roger seemed a natural progression.

  Now she was a bit stuck. It was Roger's house and although she had some savings, she would find it hard financially to live on her own. Hairdressers' wages were not good unless you worked at a top city salon. She couldn't even apply for jobs in somewhere like London or Birmingham without a lot of lying, and then supposing they didn't want her?

  No, it was probably better to hope this was just a phase they were going through and to try to work on the relationship – at least until she had a chunk of money behind her. Running-away money, people called it.

  To her huge relief, Roger didn't reach for her when he finally came to bed. She wouldn't have refused him, she didn't hate him, but his lovemaking didn't do for her what it had in the beginning. He still pressed the same buttons, went through the same routine, but for her it had stopped working. Once he had turned her insides to melted chocolate just by looking at her, now his kneecaps tended to bang into her shins in a way that not even the most dedicated masochist would appreciate. She sighed and eventually went to sleep herself.

  *

  The following morning, when she had put stain remover on all the patches of grass on Roger's whites before putting them to soak, and was checking that she had Roger's mother's favourite semi-permanent hair dye in her kit, her mobile rang. It was Elsa.

  After the 'Hi! How are yours Elsa said, 'They were thrilled with how it all went, and I totally love my hair! I can't stop running my fingers through it. Ashlyn's mother told me what a sweet girl you were and what a shame you couldn't come to the wedding. It was good you managed to fit in a quick comb-out for her, when she wasn't on the list.'

  ‘I'm so glad it was all a success.'

  ‘But I must give you back your clips that you used to keep the headdress on with.'

  ‘Oh, you don't need to worry about that!’

  `No, I want to.'

  ‘Well, if you'd like to pop over this evening, I'd love to hear all the details.' Bron didn't often invite her friends over – she could never quite forget it was Roger's house -but she felt it was OK to do so sometimes. Roger surely wouldn't object to Elsa – she was young and pretty and didn't laugh too loudly or anything likely to make him wince. And she did want to hear about the wedding. She gave Elsa the details and then told Roger.

  ‘A friend of mine is coming over for a drink this evening.'

  ‘Oh? One of your hairdresser friends? You want to discuss the latest edition of Frizz, or whatever? Well, that's OK as long as I can watch that film.’

  `We'll go in the conservatory, or the kitchen,' said Bron, hoping Roger wouldn't be rude to Elsa. He could be quite sarcastic.

  She waited on the doorstep for him, so she could lock up. 'Are you wearing that?' Roger asked when he came out to the car.

  ‘Apparently not,' said Bron and went back into the house to change out of her clean jeans and into a skirt that had a mark on it, but would be more in keeping with Roger's idea of Sunday clothes.

  *

  At least doing Roger's mother's hair took them both away from the tedium of what passed for entertainment in that house. Roger and his father liked to watch sport on Sunday afternoons. This was punctuated by Roger's father commenting on items in the paper. Bron almost always disagreed with his opinions, which weren't so much right wing as fascist, but had learnt to say nothing after the time she had suggested politely that England would really suffer if every immigrant who had arrived since the War was repatriated. The discussion turned into an argument and only just stopped short of a row.

  Early on, Pat, Roger's mother, had retired to the kitchen to do the washing up. At the time, all fired up with the injustices of the world, Bron had longed to demand that the men of the family cleared up. A couple of months later she discovered that Roger's father's contribution to Sunday lunch was opening and pouring a bottle of wine.

  She liked Pat and felt a loyalty to her. Pat did whatever her husband Vince wanted without argument, probably because argument was futile. In spite of this doormat imitation, when she was on her own Pat was fun in a gentle way and the two women got on well.

  Really, Bron should have realised Roger wasn't a long term prospect the moment she met his dad, but she had still been blinded by love and thought the similarity between father and son was only superficial. Now, she and his mother had got into a routine. After the men had gone off to the sitting room, they cleared the table, stacked the dishwasher and put the tins into soak. Then
they went up to the bedroom for the hair appointment.

  ‘Tell me about the wedding,' said Pat when Bron had finished pouring jugs of water over her head at the en-suite sink and was gently towel-drying her hair. 'I love hearing about all the clothes and things.'

  ‘It was lovely. A bit of a panic at the last minute though, because the chief bridesmaid backed out.' Bron squeezed a dollop of serum into the palm of her hand and then pulled it through Pat's wet curls.

  ‘Really? How rude!'

  ‘I know! And the bride and her mother insisted that Elsa, the girl who made the dresses, stand in for her. I had to do her hair. I cut it and gave her a fringe. It looked wonderful! I did the bride's mother's too, only that was just a quick comb-through and make-up, really.' She looked at her client and friend in the mirror, wondering if it was time for a restyle. She took out her scissors. Their familiarity in her hand was comforting and restorative.

  Pat wasn't so interested in her hair as in the wedding. 'So tell me what everyone wore. And was the bridegroom handsome?'

  ‘I didn't see the bridegroom, but the dresses were heaven!’

  There was a short pause and then Pat said, 'Don't worry, dear, I'm sure Roger will get round to asking you to marry him eventually. Took his dad five years.’

  Bron exhaled quietly and snipped a little bit off the back of Pat's hair. Was that what she wanted, really? If she and Roger were married, would she feel more secure, confident, and less put upon? It was hard to say. She might do, but she wasn't in love with him any more, she knew that. But did it matter? Wasn't being 'in love' only a matter of hormones anyway? Wasn't it some chemical that wore off after a while? Maybe it would be OK to be married to someone familiar but not exciting. Excitement was probably very over-rated.

  Chapter Six

  Early that evening Elsa had walked out of the town to where a small estate of new houses had been built near the river. A couple of rungs up from starter homes, they seemed mostly to be lived in by young families. She could hear someone mowing a lawn out of sight; a car was being washed by an enthusiastic father with his two small sons, all getting very wet and soapy; and two young mothers watched their toddlers play in a paddling pool while they chatted. It was very domestic and happy, very Sunday afternoon, and she wondered if Bron was thinking of starting a family. It would be the perfect place to live if she was because there would be a ready-made network of friends. Elsa sighed, thinking of the group of friends she'd known at college – none of them lived within easy reach and because of the nature of her work and her shy personality, she hadn't built another one.

  She heard the ding-dong of the bell and saw a shape appear behind the glass of the front door. When Bron opened it, Elsa thought she looked a little fraught.

  ‘Hello, come in,' Bron said, smiling slightly. 'I've got a bottle of wine on the go. Would you like some?'

  ‘Oh yes, why not,' said Elsa, 'I walked here.’

  A tall, good-looking man appeared in the hallway. 'Elsa, this is Roger,' said Bron.

  The man regarded Elsa with speculative eyes. 'Hello, Elsa, are you one of Bron's crimper pals?’

  Elsa had to think what he meant for a minute. 'No, I'm a dressmaker. I did the wedding dress for Ashlyn's wedding. You know? The one Bron did all the hair for? Yesterday?'

  ‘Oh yes. So you drive some poor bugger mad by spending every weekend doing some wedding or other too, do you?' He smiled, to take the sting out of this statement, but Elsa sensed he actually meant what he'd said.

  Elsa blinked. 'No, only sometimes.' She didn't bother to add that there was no 'poor bugger' in her life to be driven mad.

  ‘Bron's always off, leaving me to fend for myself on a Saturday. Missed your tea duty yesterday, didn't you, Muffin?’

  Bron raised her eyebrows apologetically. 'I'm afraid I did. I should have remembered to swap. You don't really want to miss paid work to make a mountain of sandwiches and jam sponges.'

  ‘But you're actually quite good at cakes,' went on Roger, ignoring the reference to paid work. 'She made a really excellent one for my parents' anniversary. No one believed it wasn't made by a professional.'

  ‘Really? You're multi-talented then,' said Elsa.

  Bron shrugged, apparently not wanting to admit to anything.

  Roger didn't give her time to speak anyway. 'Are you going to offer Elsa a glass of wine? There's a nice bottle in the cupboard she might like. There's something I want to watch before supper so you've got half an hour.'

  ‘I really just came to give Bron her hairclips-'

  ‘Do stay,' said Bron. 'Just for a minute.'

  ‘OK then, but I won't be long. I'm on my way to my parents.’

  Elsa followed Bron into the house. 'Come with me to the kitchen while I pour us some wine,' she said. 'I've got some Pinot Grigio in the fridge. I don't know why Roger always assumes I like sweet wine. I think it goes back to one of the first times we visited his parents and his father had opened some Liebfraumilch. I said it was lovely. It wasn't.’

  Elsa felt glad she lived alone, with her work, and not with a difficult man. How awful to come back from a hard day on your feet and have to tend to someone who wanted looking after all the time. The odd twinge of loneliness must be better than that. She hoped her relief didn't show on her face.

  Bron poured the wine and then led the way to the tiny conservatory at the back of the house.

  ‘This is nice,' said Elsa.

  ‘I expect you're wondering why there are no plants here,' said Bron. 'Roger doesn't like plants, they make a mess.'

  ‘Oh. I hadn't wondered actually,' she said. 'I'm hopeless with plants myself. My mother gardens.' Elsa settled herself on a cane chair. 'So you make cakes as well as work miracles with scissors?’

  Bron made the same self-deprecating gesture she had before. 'Only as a hobby, really, but I've done quite a few wedding cakes for friends of friends, people like that. I don't charge for them, then they can't sue me if they're ill after eating them.' She smiled apologetically.

  Elsa, struggling to make Bron feel better, laughed. 'I'm sure there's never been a case of someone being ill after eating a fruit cake.’

  Bron sipped her wine and seemed to relax a little. 'Well, maybe not. Now, more importantly, tell me about the wedding.’

  Elsa adjusted the cushion behind her and searched her mind for details. 'Well, the service went OK although I thought I'd die of embarrassment. I just had to keep reminding myself that they were all looking at Ashlyn, not me. And her dress looked fantastic! I thought it would be too much when she wanted beading, embroidery and lace, but it wasn't. It was rich, but not over the top. Everyone looked fab. It was a very stylish wedding, I must say.'

  ‘I'd love to see the photos, but I don't often get to, sadly. It's OK if the bride is a client of mine, but if we've only met once or twice, for the practice session and then the wedding, they don't usually remember.'

  ‘Well, we can ask Sarah. She's bound to get a look at them. Anyway, it all went really well except there was a bit of an incident with a dog in the churchyard – it was lovely but completely mad. It knocked over one of the little bridesmaids. Just as well she didn't cry, and then someone nearly tripped on the ribbon that had been round its neck.'

  ‘Oh, was the dog called Major by any chance?' asked Bron.

  ‘I have no idea. Why do you ask? He was a yellow Labrador.'

  ‘That must be him. I was just packing up to go when he arrived with this man. Apparently he had had to walk him all morning so he wouldn't be too hyper for the wedding.’

  Elsa laughed. 'He obviously didn't walk him for long enough then!'

  ‘Tell me more about the wedding,' said Bron. 'I did an amazing makeover on you, I want to know all the details.’

  Elsa sighed. 'OK, I suppose that's only fair.'

  ‘And don't miss anything out!' said Bron.

  ‘OK, after the service we got to the reception and Ashlyn needed the loo.' Elsa sipped her wine. 'I tell you, Bron, I had no idea how difficu
lt those dresses were to pee in.'

  ‘But you do now?’

  Elsa rolled her eyes. 'Oh yes! Still, we managed. I had to go too.' Elsa suddenly realised she'd got into territory she really didn't want to.

  ‘Go on then.'

  ‘I had to sit at the top table which was so embarrassing. But the best man was really nice to me, very polite.’

  ‘And did you dance?'

  ‘Sort of.' Just for a second Elsa allowed herself to remember the tall, kind man who had let her dance on his feet but she pushed away the image. It had developed a dreamlike quality since and she'd probably imagined half of it. She snapped herself back to the present. 'Oh, by the way, I think Sarah and the photographer had a bit of a thing.' Sliding over her own experiences, Elsa rather guiltily changed the subject by dumping her friend right in it.

  ‘No!' Bron said, instantly distracted. 'How amazing! Why do you think that?'

  ‘Well, they didn't seem to speak much when the photos were being taken, and the only time I caught them together she seemed quite – how should I put it – brisk.'

  ‘Go on,' said Bron eagerly.

  ‘Did you know she was staying over in the hotel?' Elsa asked.

  ‘Oh yes, she did say.' Bron nodded encouragingly. 'Well, as I left, I was sure I saw them slow dancing together!'

  ‘Really? But she always seems so… well, not frigid exactly, but sort of – buttoned up.'

  ‘Well, I dare say she'd had the odd glass of champagne by that time – it would have been perfectly understandable, the reception had gone like a breeze – and they were sort of locked in each other's arms.'

  ‘You can't know for sure,' said Bron.'Of course not.'

  ‘But it would be good! I don't know Sarah all that well but she never seems to go out for fun. It's always just work with her. And she and Hugo seem to get on well.' Bron fiddled with her glass. 'She muttered something about a wedding next Saturday, so maybe I'll ask her.’