by Claire Allan
And then I threw the phone down again and dressed in jogging bottoms and a T-shirt, hauling my wet hair back into a ponytail and pulling on slipper socks, and went downstairs where I poured a long, cool glass of Diet Coke even though it wasn’t even seven o’clock yet and I reached for the biscuit tin and mainlined some KitKats. Then I put on trainers and went for a jog – ostensibly because I figured moving about would ease the anxiety flooding through me but also because I hoped being out and about would give me some sort of a sign – a sign that this was a blip in the road. Sure all good relationships had them – even Dad and Rose who had been together since I was fourteen had the occasional row. There was that mid-life crisis episode of course when Rose had stormed out for three whole days. She came to stay with me at my university digs and insisted on going to the Student Union every night and drinking pints even though she didn’t even like beer. “I never had the chance to be a student myself,” she’d said, as she sidled up beside me at the back of a design and marketing lecture. She took brilliant notes, as it happened, and it had been nice if a little weird to have her there as a study buddy. The memory made me smile and then I remembered everything that was happening in my life there and then and I frowned and ran on, faster and harder until my legs hurt almost as much as my heart.
Cara was happy to see me when I got home. When I say happy, I do of course mean a strange mixture of absolutely fuming and relieved. “Where the hell were you? You left. You didn’t tell me where you were going. You didn’t even take your phone. You didn’t even leave shagging note. I didn’t know where you had gone. For all I knew, you could be swinging from a big, tall tree around now.”
“If I was going to top myself,” I said, “I would have left a note. Just so you know.” I knew it wasn’t the right thing to say and that I should have apologised for being a feckless bitch but part of me wanted to scream that she couldn’t really expect me to act rationally, could she? Which, I suppose, was kind of the point she was making. I then felt like a whole new level of shit, which was impressive given how shit I had been feeling in the first place. “I’m sorry,” I stuttered. “I didn’t think. I just needed to run.”
She shrugged. “Just don’t do it again, okay?”
I nodded and poured myself a glass of water. “Did it ring at all?”
“What?”
“My phone. Did it ring at all?”
“No – sorry,” she said, sipping from a cup of tea.
“Oh,” I said, sinking onto the chair and putting my glass of water on the table. I didn’t even have the stomach for water this morning.
“I’ll take the day off work so I’m here for you,” Cara said softly. “You don’t have to do this alone.”
“But I’ll be at work myself,” I said.
Her expression was as shocked as if I had said I would be running buck-naked round the city walls singing the score from The Sound of Music.
“Really? I mean, do you think it’s best?”
“It’s my business,” I said, holding on to whatever constants I had in my life for dear life.
“It’s a wedding-dress shop,” she said as if she was telling me something I didn’t know.
“I have customers who have appointments.”
“Who maybe don’t need to be seeing a broken-hearted woman selling them their big dream?”
“I’m not a broken-hearted woman. I don’t know what I am. I don’t know what is going on – where he is or what he is doing – so for now I’m confused and scared maybe but I can still sell dresses.” I was surprised by how determined I sounded because I’m not sure I actually felt it. Cara clearly wasn’t convinced so I took a deep breath. “Look, Cara. I have to do this because I can’t sit here, waiting and not knowing. I have to do something and, since I happen to own a lovely bridal shop which has customers waiting to be served, then I might as well do that.”
She chewed on a nail and sipped from her cup again. “Then I’m coming with you.”
Chapter four
Erin
Two glasses of wine had relaxed me. The nerves were easing even though my category was up next. I slipped my feet back into my very high shoes just in case they called my name – not that I really expected them to call my name. But, if they did, I didn’t want to walk up to the front of the function room in my bare feet or be caught fumbling for my shoes by the photographers. I did not want a place on the ‘Wall of Shame’ in the office – that place where embarrassing photos of Northern People staff in compromising positions were posted in the name of a bit of office banter. Me with my head under a table at the Northern Media Awards would not be a good look – no, best to be prepared.
Locating my shoes, I slipped my tired feet into them. It had been a long day – a hair appointment, a make-up appointment, picking up my dress from the dry cleaner’s and driving Paddy home from chemo.
“I don’t have to go if you don’t want me to,” I had said, tucking him in bed with a cup of tea, full use of the Sky remote and his laptop.
Snuggling down under the covers, he had sighed. “Erin, you are going. You are going because you are great and you will win.”
“We don’t know that I will win.”
“It will be a dirty big fix if you don’t,” he said, his eyes drooping – his need for sleep etched on his eyelids.
“I can stay and look after you – sure Grace can accept it for me if I win – which is a big ‘if’.”
“It’s a wee ‘if’. Now go, woman. Get ready. I’m only going to sleep anyway. You’ll be back before I wake up.”
I had kissed him on the top of his head, reluctant to go but kind of excited too. I didn’t often get a night out – and I never got a night out where there was a possibility I might just scoop an award at the end of it all. Grace, my editor at Northern People, had said I was in with a chance. “Your work has been outstanding this year,” she’d told me, while I grinned like a five-year-old who had just been sent to the top of the class. “The feature on childhood obesity really got people talking. Your campaign to save the cityside playpark had great support and your opinion pieces have a great following. You’ve really come into your own this year.”
I smiled and blushed furiously. It had been nice to hear and I had worked hard, but I didn’t take compliments well.
So, when Paddy told me I looked gorgeous, as I stood in my little black dress, my sky-high heels and my auburn hair tamed by a very talented hairdresser and piled on top of my head, I had snorted. “Aye right . . . a pig in a dress is still a pig!”
“Erin Brannigan. You look gorgeous. You do not look at all pig-like, and if I was in a fit state I would show you just how gorgeous you look. Don’t put yourself down. Now clear out and bring me back your award – and a doggy bag, for when I don’t feel like I want to throw up.”
“Really,” I said again, “I don’t have to go.” Though by this stage I really, really wanted to go.
“Get out,” he said, using what little strength he had left to throw a cushion at my head.
So there I was, beside Grace, slipping my feet back into my shoes and waiting for the MC to announce the award for Feature Writer of the Year. I looked at Grace, who winked at me and then I tried to plaster an ‘I don’t really mind who wins’ face on. Okay, so there were no TV cameras – just a few photographers, mostly hoping for their Wall of Shame moment – but, still, it would be no good to be seen pouting.
I had worked hard for this. I had thrown myself into work – which was a welcome distraction from Paddy and from the wedding planning. Jeez, don’t pout. Smile. Listen. Grace nodded in my direction and it was clear I had won. And I hadn’t even heard my name being called out.
“You should make the most of it,” Grace said, ordering two more Cosmopolitans from a waiter with impossibly tight trousers and an even tighter smile. “This is your big night.”
“I should tell you something,” I said, sidling into her as if we were best friends and not boss and lowly employee. “I can’t really get too w
asted. I’m going wedding-dress shopping in the morning.”
I swear her face lit up, the way women’s faces tend to light up when you mention wedding dresses, and as the light beamed from her she took on an almost soft and dreamy look.
“Oh, how exciting! God, I remember when I shopped for my dress. It was such a brilliant day. Oh where are you going? Are you going to The Dressing Room? You so should go to The Dressing Room.”
I nodded and gulped. Yes, I was going to The Dressing Room and I felt kind of nauseated at the thought. What I really wanted to do was stay and drink at least three more Cosmopolitans and revel in the glory of my big win and enjoy my boss looking at me with admiration.Much as I loved the very bones of Paddy, wedding-dress shopping was not something I looked forward to one bit.
Some people are allergic to penicillin. Some are allergic to peanuts. I knew a girl once who was allergic to salt and vinegar crisps and her lips would swell up in an exaggerated pout if she so much as sniffed a bag of them. Me? I was allergic to weddings – and all things wedding-related.
So there was no one more surprised than me to find myself with an 11a.m. appointment at The Dressing Room on a Friday morning where I would be on a mission to buy one of those big white frocks I had mocked for years. I ordered another Cosmo and tried to focus on the award and my night and not on the following morning.
The glossy purple door of The Dressing Room taunted me. The stark white walls and sash windows looked very inviting – pretty, even – but I wasn’t fooled. If I had my way I would never even contemplate crossing the doorstep but, as I had learned very quickly, once you get a ring on your finger you become the plaything of a horde of female family members who love nothing more than a good wedding.
I didn’t want a good wedding, I had told my mother in an ill-judged move which almost had her reaching for the smelling salts – I wanted a good marriage. And I knewthat I would have that. Paddy was a good man and he wanted to marry me. His actual words were “I need to marry you” and he had a look of urgency about him which melted my resolve.
He had first asked me when we had been together four months. I had said no and he knew my reasons and he accepted that – even if he had adopted a look on his face as if I had kicked him square in the testicles, with steel-toe-capped boots on. He hadn’t asked again for another seven months, until Christmas rolled about and he’d had one too many Drambuies after his festive dinner. He had kissed me under the mistletoe and I had allowed him to. Paddy was a good kisser – the best kisser I had ever encountered – and dizzy with lust, a little part of me had wavered and I’d had to walk away in case I said yes, but I wasn’t ready to say yes yet. I wasn’t sure I would ever be ready. That didn’t deter him from asking again and again and, eventually, when he said he needed me to say yes, I finally realised that this was about more than me. You can’t say no to a man with one testicle, can you?
But no, today would be tricky enough – what with all that taffeta, chiffon, silk and wedding-dress-trying-on – without thinking about the C word.
I took a deep breath, pushed my hair back from my face and walked towards the shop door. I would plaster on a smile and play along with the whole wedding-dress/wedding-planning frenzy which my life had become.
My mother would meet me there. As would Paddy’s mother. They were both just about ready to go into orbit with the excitement of it all. My mother was relieved I was finally going to get married. Paddy’s mother was delighted he was finally getting married. They both did an absolutely top-notch job of pretending this was a perfectly normal wedding not foisted upon anyone by possible life-threatening illnesses. We didn’t talk about that. We just talked about garters (yes, I would definitely have one), doves (no way, I was terrified of birds), champagne (the best stuff for the top table, the cheaper variety for everyone else) and dresses (my mother was holding out hope I would wear a meringue which would make Katie Price’s dresses look tame).
What I wanted was to nip down to the Guildhall with a couple of witnesses and sure we would still be married. But I realised I was now a mere pawn in a very big game of chess and I had to go where I was moved – and really, it didn’t really bloody matter, did it? As long as I had Paddy.
I had never been in The Dressing Room before, but I had been reliably informed it was the best damned little wedding-dress shop in town. The staff, I was told, were friendly and welcoming and didn’t laugh at your stretch-marks or sniff at you snootily if you asked for a dress in anything above a Size 12. The advertising girls at Northern People had said they loved to work with Kitty, the owner, and that she would be extra nice to me. I could do with a little friendliness if the truth be told, so hopefully this wouldn’t be too awful.
Walking into the reception I saw a young woman, withblonde curly hair and an impossibly trim waist, sitting at the counter examining her nails and looking as if this was exactly the very last place on the planet she wanted to be.She looked up at me and offered a smile which didn’t quite stretch to her eyes and asked if she could help.
“I’m Erin Brannigan. I have an appointment?”
She looked down at the book in front of her and traced her finger down the page until she tapped what I can only imagine was my name against the time I was due in. She looked up and smiled again. “Ah, Erin, welcome to The Dressing Room. I’m Cara. I don’t actually work here.” She glanced behind her at two large doors. “I’ll let Kitty know you’re here.” She wandered off rather distractedly through the doors, leaving me standing like a bit of a lemon in a very calm room where headless bridal mannequins stood on guard around me.
I shouted after Cara with the curly hair that it was fine, I was waiting for someone anyway. And then I looked at the headless brides, bedecked in their finery and muttered: “Yes, honestly, I’m okay.”
They didn’t answer.
So I sat down on a very lovely purple-covered chaise longue and flicked through a magazine filled with stark-looking models, all right angles and collarbones, wearing wedding dresses that cost more than I earned in a month. “How much?” I stuttered, looking at one particularly blingy tiara which looked heavy enough to crack my skull if I wore it for more than ten minutes.I put the magazine down, a little bit scared of it if truth be told, and sat back and looked around again. Yes, this place was actually quite calming – headless brides aside. It was bright and airy, which helped any gatheringclaustrophobic feelings. The solid wood floors were pretty. I’d always wanted real wood floors – but we had laminates instead. There were flowers of varying hues in vases around the room and fair smattering of twinkling lights here and there draped over distressed white display cases which screamed vintage glamour.
There was still no sign of Cara and her curly hair or the person who actually did work there, Kitty. There was also no sign of my mother or my future mother-in-law which surprised me. I glanced at my watch. It was five past eleven. I hadn’t expected them to be late. Both had sent me cheery text messages throughout the morning to check, double-check and triple-check the arrangements and both had expressed levels of excitement which, frankly, scared me senseless. I glared at the scary magazine and back to my watch and to the door through which Cara had disappeared.
It was then I heard the clatter of two women clearly hell-bent on making this a morning to remember. My mother and his mother stumbled through the door, arms linked together and laughing like naughty schoolgirls. If it wasn’t eleven in the morning I would have wondered whether or not they were on the drink, but it seemed they were just giddy like two little girls delving into their mother’s dressing-up box.
Mum pulled me into a huge, lung-squeezing hug and whispered, “My baby, getting married!” as if it were news to me.
While Sue, his mum, blinked back tears as she looked at the headless brides. “Oh, these dresses! Oh Erin! You will be beautiful. Paddy will be blown away.”
I was worried, it had to be said. If they could react like this now, what the frig would they be like when they actually saw an actual dres
s?
Their ooh-ing and aah-ing was interrupted by the arrival of a short pale-looking woman with eyes as sad, if not sadder, than Cara’s. She smiled too and I almost wanted to hug her and tell her it would be okay even though I didn’t know anything about her.
“I take it you are the bride-to-be?” she said cheerfully (almost too cheerfully), extending her hand to mine.
I smiled back. “Yes, Erin Brannigan.”
“Ah Erin,” she smiled. “From the magazine? I’ve been told to treat you well. If you want, you and your friends can come through to the dressing room and we will talk about what you might like and what kind of dresses and styles you favour. I’m Kitty, by the way.”
“I’m her mother,” my mum said, extending her hand and speaking in a posher than normal voice. “Anne Brannigan.”
“Nice to meet you,” Kitty responded with a genuine warmth which kind of made the sadness in her eyes seem even sadder.
I knew that sadness. I’d seen it a fair few times in recent weeks.
“And I’m the mother of the very handsome groom,” Sue chimed in. “Sue.”
“Well, Sue and Anne, and Erin of course, let’s go and look at some very pretty dresses indeed.”
I followed her, walking in front of the two grinning mammies. Inside what could only be described as the inner sanctum of the shop there were more dresses than I could ever have imagined in every shade of white, cream, ivory and oyster. There was even a rather extravagant and delicious deep-purple satin number – with a corset which would have made me look absolutely amazing. Like a sexy purple Quality Street. I actually gasped when I saw it and had to fight the urge to reach out and stroke it.
“Oh, I take it that one is just for show,” my mother said haughtily, cutting through my thoughts.