White Wedding

by Milly Johnson

  ‘A little-known fact of history,’ sniffed Dan, faux-imperiously, sweeping his hand out to the scene beyond the window. ‘They don’t call these the windy moors for nothing.’

  Bel laughed then clamped her hand over her mouth. The parsonage had a church-like quiet about it mixed with a little sadness and it felt wrong to be so jocular in it.

  ‘I’d love an office like this,’ said Dan. ‘I might convert a room and buy a quill and some ink.’

  ‘Where do you live now?’ asked Bel, picturing Dan in a swanky converted loft. Something very modern with a lot of chrome and glass.

  ‘Sheffield,’ replied Dan. ‘Large Victorian villa, currently up for sale if you’re on the lookout for something. Bargain-basement price for a quick sale.’

  Bel presumed the house now had unhappy memories for him. There must have been some connection with it being for sale and his ex-fiancée because his next words were: ‘Cathy used to remind me of Catherine Earnshaw.’

  Bel almost said, ‘Was she was a totally selfish bleeder, then?’ before she bit it back. Her Bronte book of choice was Jane Eyre, though Richard had never reminded her of Rochester. He had been more of a St John Rivers type:impossibly handsome, arrogant, serious, intense. Shaden had recently fitted into the story as Blanche Ingram: haughty, beautiful and self-obsessed. Not dissimilar to Catherine Earnshaw – the flighty cow.

  ‘Anyway, that’s a closed chapter, if you’ll excuse the pun,’ smiled Dan, pulling himself away from those thoughts. ‘Where’s the kitchen? And do you think they’ll let us put on the kettle?’

  Bel followed him out of the room and down the hallway. They passed an old couple just entering arm in arm and they exchanged smiles.

  People must suppose we are a couple too, thought Bel. She had a sudden moment of disorientation about being paired with a man she had known for no length of time, and yet strangely, too, she felt as if he had been in her life for much longer than he had. Today they had butted together like a couple of old-standing, joking, totally at ease with each other. As if to demonstrate the point, Dan turned round as they were about to enter the kitchen and said, at Brian Blessed volume, ‘Hurry up, woman. It’s nearly lunchtime.’

  They walked up the staircase where Branwell’s portrait of his three sisters hung. There was a ghost of his own figure between them, washed out. Bel felt a sudden wave of sadness overcome her.

  ‘All that passion inside them, gone to waste,’ she sighed. ‘Do you pour your heart out on to the page, Dan?’

  ‘Oh yes,’ he replied, scratching his head. ‘My writing has taken a very dark turn in the past months.’ They walked into Charlotte’s room, where lots of her work was displayed in cabinets. ‘What do you do to exorcize your demons, Bel?’

  ‘I write poetry,’ she replied, and saw that she had shocked him. He probably expected her to say that she shopped. ‘I’ve never told anyone that. It’s private stuff, not for publication.’

  ‘Recite some to me,’ Dan said.

  ‘Bugger off,’ Bel replied.

  ‘I didn’t have you down as a secret writer,’ he said, grinning a very lopsided grin.

  ‘Yeah, well, the feeling’s mutual,’ Bel smiled back because that grin was contagious. ‘Remember, I thought you were a homicidal maniac. Didn’t have you down as a doctor either, for the record. But I bet you thought I was a rich bitch from the off.’

  ‘Well,’ began Dan, ‘I must confess that our introduction gave me the impression you were a –’ he searched for a diplomatic description – ‘a lady of means.’

  ‘Oh yeah,’ sniffed Bel. ‘I might have a rich daddy and my own Mercedes-Benz but I’m currently living off Pot Noodles in a freezing cupboard and daren’t go home because I dumped the groom who was knobbing my cousin. I’m living the dream, I am.’

  She felt tears rising up inside her and turned away just as another couple came into the room. Bel concentrated on viewing the tiny-waisted dress in a cabinet. It looked more like the dress for a doll than a full-grown woman.

  ‘I can see you in that dress,’ that Dan. ‘You’re as petite as a Bronte.’

  ‘I’m as petite as a Bronte-saurus, you mean,’ tutted Bel, batting away the compliment because she wasn’t sure if he was being serious or not. Richard wasn’t hot on giving out compliments; she’d forgotten the art of accepting them from a man other than her dad.

  The woman behind them smiled at their exchange and glanced wistfully at the serious-faced man she was with.

  ‘I mean it,’ said Dan, looking as if he did too.

  ‘Yeah, right,’ said Bel, still not quite trusting him. ‘Not even before all that cheese we had last night could I fit into that frock.’

  ‘Okay, you’ve said a food word.’ Dan clapped his hands together. ‘I can’t wait any longer. I need lunch. I’m a growing boy.’

  ‘Which part of you is growing, then?’ said Bel, without thinking how that might sound.

  Dan raised his eyebrows and again the woman behind them silently chuckled as Bel playfully slapped him on his arm.

  The woman continued to watch them as they walked out of the room and down the stairs, and wondered why she had settled for a man who never made her smile and had never been playful with her. It had been a huge mistake. She made up her mind at that moment, watching the younger couple together and the warmth that was so evident between them, that she would leave Gerald when they got home that evening and go to her sister’s house. Life could not be colder without him than it was with him. They had given her the final push she had needed for so long.

  ‘What time is it?’ asked Bel.

  ‘Don’t know. I forgot my watch and didn’t bring my mobile phone out with me,’ replied Dan. ‘I know that as soon as I’m in an area where there is any reception, the damned thing won’t stop ringing.’

  ‘Ditto,’ Bel agreed. If the truth be known, she was enjoying this little bubble in which the world she didn’t want to know about was kept at bay.

  ‘It’s time for some nosebag, that’s all we need to know,’ said Dan.

  ‘I hope no one recognizes me as that sad cow in the newspaper,’ said Bel, feeling a sneeze coming on and pulling a tissue out of her pocket. She wished she had brought some sunglasses and a hat.

  ‘That picture looked nothing like you,’ Dan whispered into her ear. ‘You’re much better-looking in real life. I’d put my life savings, all fifty pence of them, on a bet that you are safe from any lurking paparazzi.’

  ‘Excuse me,’ said a woman from behind them, touching Bel’s arm. Bel stiffened. ‘You dropped this.’ The woman handed over a receipt that had fallen from Bel’s pocket when she took out the hankie.

  ‘Thank you,’ said Bel. Then she and Dan looked at each other and laughed, he out of amusement, she out of relief.

  Her kitten-heeled boots weren’t conducive to walking on the streets of Haworth, but they were the most suitable she had brought with her. Another cock-up on the packing front. She stumbled on a cobble and Dan gallantly held out his arm, which she took gratefully. Richard never offered his arm. To Bel, it was a small intimacy that made her feel quite mushy. Men, she thought to herself with a sigh, didn’t really have to perform grand expansive gestures to have a woman melt inside. A simple arm crooked for their use was the equivalent of at least a dozen bouquets. Dan’s arm felt firm and solid and he didn’t seem unduly worried that he was linking arms with a midget.

  At the top of Main Street was a pretty café tucked next to the Apothecary. Cathy’s Café.

  ‘This looks okay,’ said Dan, studying the menu in a glass case outside it. ‘We could explore further down the hill but I might die of hunger if we did. And you might break your neck.’

  ‘Let’s go in here, then,’ said Bel, pushing opening the café door. She didn’t much care for the name of it, but it was marginally better than going arse over tit on the steeply graded cobbles in front of the crowded Shirley’s Cake Shop.

  They both chose Isabella’s Chilli con Carne. They chose this above Ag
nes Lasagne and Branwell Beef and Ale Pie.

  ‘This is a really clever menu,’ whispered Dan with such seriousness that Bel got an extreme fit of the giggles. ‘I think I went to school with Agnes Lasagne.’

  Bel wiped the tears from her eyes with a serviette. ‘Stop it, you’re so mean.’

  ‘Have you seen the desserts?’ Dan leaned in close to her. ‘Wuthering Heights Bakewell Tart. How can you have that? It’s like saying you’ve got a Lancashire Yorkshire Pudding?’

  Bel pulled herself together. ‘I hope I have room for the Linton Trifle afterwards,’ she said, perusing the menu.

  ‘Oh Lordy, watch out: it’s Mrs Rochester,’ said Dan, as the waitress wended her way towards them. She happened to be an extremely white-complexioned woman with a hedge of long greying hair. She was carrying a box of matches and struck one to light the tiny candle on the table. Bel thought she was going to burst from keeping her fit of giggles under control.

  ‘Tell me about chocolate,’ said Dan, after Bertha Rochester had taken their order.

  ‘Brown stuff. Comes in bars,’ said Bel, deadpan.

  Dan tutted. ‘Cheeky. What do you do in the company?’

  ‘PR Director is my official title,’ Bel began to explain seriously, ‘but I end up doing a bit of everything because we are a “family firm” and all of us muck in when needed. I often handle big sales because people like to deal directly with the family, but then sometimes I end up driving some chocolates over in Dad’s van if a client wants them, like, NOW.’

  ‘Do you get a lot of freebies?’

  ‘Loads.’

  ‘Yowzah. Will you marry me?’

  Under normal circumstances Bel would have laughed at that, but the words just didn’t tickle her funny bone because these were far from normal circumstances. Dan noticed her non-reaction.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, cringing visibly. ‘Bad joke.’

  ‘It’s not your fault. It was funny. My sense of humour has a cog missing at the moment,’ said Bel, smiling kindly at him.

  The chilli arrived. It was garnished with a swirl of sour cream and a couple of sliced jalapenos on top.

  ‘So, you like chocolate?’ asked Bel, reaching quickly for her glass of water as a jalapeno stung the back of her throat.

  ‘I love it,’ said Dan. ‘I think you really would have to go far to beat a huge bar of Cadbury’s Fruit and Nut.’

  ‘Washed down with lots of coffee,’ smiled Bel.

  ‘Sitting in front of a roaring fire.’

  ‘Watching a Ricky Gervais film.’

  ‘Cathy wouldn’t eat choc—’ said Dan, without thinking. He bit off the word and shook his head. ‘Sorry.’

  Bel recognized that dark, haunted look in his eyes.

  ‘Richard didn’t either, for the record,’ she said, pushing the rest of the jalapenos to the side of the plate. They tasted like they’d been marinated in nitroglycerin. ‘He was a bit of a food fascist, to be honest. He never got excited about meals out – food was fuel for him, not an indulgence.’

  Dan nodded as if he understood. Bel had a picture of Cathy in a crop top pushing weights in the gym and eating whites-of-an-egg omelette. She could feel the cold vibes coming off the image in her head to such an extent they were giving her brain-freeze.

  ‘In case you were wondering, I eat lots of chocolate,’ said Bel, taking the last forkful of rice. She picked up the dessert menu. ‘So, forget the Linton Trifle, I’m going to have a piece of Brocklehurst Chocolate Fudge Pie instead.’

  ‘Oh sod it. I’ll join you,’ said Dan, visibly cheering. He waved over to Mrs Rochester. ‘Could we have Brocklehurst Chocolate Fudge Pies for two,’ he asked. ‘And two large cups of Grace Pool Coffee.’

  Bel snorted back her laughter at the waitress, who was clearly wondering what the customer was talking about. Grace Pool Coffee? What a ridiculous concept.

  They called in at the farm shop on the way back to the cottages to stock up on supplies. Bel nibbled on all the free samples of bread and cheese on the counter while she waited for Dan to pay for his goods.

  ‘I don’t think I have met anyone who eats as much as you,’ he marvelled. ‘How do you stay so thin? If you turned sideways, you’d disappear.’

  ‘I’m not usually this thin. I’ve lost a lot of weight recently through . . . circumstances. But I am lucky with my metabolism,’ said Bel, mid-munch. ‘I’m making the best of it because I know that one day I’ll wake up, eat a cornflake and put on twelve stone.’

  ‘I like a woman with some meat on her bones myself,’ winked Dan.

  ‘I’ll give you a call when I’m forty,’ Bel said through a mouthful of Hawes Wensleydale. ‘The years will have caught up with me then.’

  ‘It’s a deal. But only if you bring mucho chocolate with you,’ said Dan, opening the shop door for her.

  Chapter 38

  Max nibbled on her lunchtime sandwich and flicked through the glossy magazine. There was a feature about women’s lips. The main picture was of a mouth that made Mick Jagger’s look like a pencil line. It was painted sex-red and sparkled like a disco ball. It was a mouth that a gypsy bride would be proud of.

  ‘Wow,’ gasped Max and she whistled, imagining her own lips twinkling in the church like twin rubies. She was in the grip of a wedding-obsession vice now and her inner radar was constantly on the lookout for embellishments for her big day. She knew she shouldn’t, she knew that Stuart had forbidden it, but she simply couldn’t help herself. Her insides were rebelling against all the spartan plans – like a woman on a diet stuffing herself full of Star Bars. She had to add those lips to her ever-growing list of must-haves.

  Jess entered with a coffee and a plate of biscuits.

  ‘Hi, boss,’ she said in her usual cheery way, then she looked over Max’s shoulder to see what she was reading. ‘Wow’ was her verdict also.

  ‘Look at that lippy. Isn’t it fabulous?’ Max held up the page for her to see it more closely.

  ‘That is major,’ Jess said.

  ‘How do they get that effect?’

  ‘It’s glitter that you paint on to your lipstick. Barry M do it. I think it’s really meant for your eyes but you can put it on your mouth as well. Comes with a sort of top coat, as far as I know.’

  ‘Well, that’s me heading to Boots right now,’ said Max. ‘Sorry to waste that coffee, Jess, but I don’t think I can wait.’

  ‘Oh it’s fine,’ said Jess, flapping her hand. She was used to Max’s inability to ignore an impulse. ‘I’ll make you a fresh one when you get back.’

  Max grabbed her coat and an updated vision of herself drifted into her brain as she stood in the lift: a gypsy bride with sparkling lips. She wondered if she should paint her toenails to match.

  Chapter 39

  They left each other at their respective doors with a mutual ‘see you later’. Dan was burning to write, which he welcomed because after Cathy’s betrayal he’d wondered if he would ever feel passion for anything ever again. Bel was bored within three minutes of the door shutting behind her. She killed time by reading her book and doing a bit more of the jigsaw. Then, at seven o’clock, Dan Regent knocked on her door.

  ‘I seem to have bought too much cheese. Would you care to let me repay you for lunch by sharing cheese toasties and tomato soup with me and indulging in another Ricky Gervais film?’

  Bel found she really had to throttle back on sounding too keen as she said yes, she would like that very much.

  ‘I thought you were going to work,’ said Bel, dipping the edge of her toastie into her mug of accompanying Heinz tomato soup.

  ‘I did. A full day’s word count in a few hours. I think I’ve been bitten by a Bronte muse,’ said Dan, swigging down a large mouthful of red wine.

  He was burning logs in the stove. They were glowing gently with the odd lick of flame and adding a warm glow to the room. An unbidden memory blindsided her of being little, in a cosy pink dressing gown, and sitting on a sofa with Faye eating buttered toast. It must h
ave been her birthday because she always had new pyjamas, a new dressing gown and new slippers for her birthday. There was soot on Faye’s face because she had just stoked up the fire and Bel remembered giggling at it and preferring not to tell Faye that she looked silly. Bel felt a wave of guilt at her meanness – twenty-plus years too late.

  ‘Penny for them?’ Dan asked.

  ‘They’re not worth that much,’ said Bel.

  ‘Try me,’ Dan crunched down on his second toastie.

  ‘I was thinking about my stepmother,’ Bel confessed. ‘The fire jolted a memory.’

  ‘Was she an evil stepmother? Beat you senseless and forbade you from going to the ball?’

  ‘Actually, no, she was always very kind to me. Always.’

  ‘I sense a “but”,’ Dan topped up Bel’s wine. It was called Old Vine and tasted like its name – rich and mature and fruity.

  ‘But I never managed to love her.’ Bel felt another wave of guilt at saying the words aloud, as if Faye might hear them too.

  ‘Why was that?’

  ‘I always felt that Faye had supplanted my mum,’ nodded Bel. ‘But mum died when I was a baby. Faye came along five years later. She never . . .’

  ‘Never?’ prompted Dan eventually.

  ‘She never forced a mother status on me. She always told me that Mum was a star in heaven and was the one that twinkled the most when I looked up at the sky, as if she was winking at me.’

  ‘That’s cute,’ said Dan.

  ‘But if I ever felt that I wanted to call her “Mum”, then she would be so happy.’

  ‘But you never did.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘She sounds a nice lady,’ said Dan gently, hearing a wobble appear in Bel’s voice.

  ‘She’s a really lovely person. Dad adores her.’

  Suddenly, the way she had treated Faye over the years, freezing her out, resenting her, was too uncomfortable to think about. She reached over to her wine and glugged a throatful.

  ‘What did your family think of your fiancé?’