by Matt Dunn
‘Uh-huh,’ said Jed, neutrally. He didn’t feel like explaining what it was that had jolted him back into consciousness. That wasn’t a conversation he wanted to get into just yet. ‘Thought I might just go for a quick run.’
‘On our wedding day?’
She sounded amused – perhaps at the phrase – rather than cross, but even so, Jed felt a sudden flash of irritation, though he knew better than to start an argument right now. A pregnant Livia could be . . . unpredictable. As she’d ably demonstrated yesterday.
‘I won’t be long.’
‘Jed . . .’
‘Honestly, love.’ He padded over to where she lay, leant down and kissed her on the forehead, then – as if worried she’d even read something into that – kissed her again on the lips. ‘Back before you know it.’
‘Okay.’ Livia peered pointedly at her watch again, as if making a special note of the time, in the way someone might in a massage parlour to tell the therapist they’d be expecting the full hour. ‘Try not to get lost.’
‘Yes, dear,’ he said, with more than a trace of sarcasm, though he quickly followed it up with a smile, and as Livia pulled the duvet up to cover her face, Jed slipped out through the door.
He shook his head as he made his way along the corridor, then forcefully jabbed the lift button, Livia’s words ringing in his ears. Right now, the thought of getting lost was actually quite appealing.
Downstairs, Liam was waiting impatiently by the hotel’s reception desk. As usual, he’d left it to the last minute to book his flights, and it had turned out to be cheaper for him to fly out on Friday on some airline he’d never heard of (and, to his annoyance, who’d quite plainly never heard of him, given their refusal to give him an upgrade), stay in a budget hotel in the old town, then head across to the venue this morning. And while the prospect of an extra night in Barcelona was something that would fill most people with joy, it hadn’t turned out to be much cop. He’d spent yesterday evening on a bar crawl in a futile attempt to find a date for tonight’s wedding, and the lack of anyone who recognised him in the four or five places he’d been to (and his lack of Spanish – it was hard to live up to your reputation as a smooth-talker when you only knew the words for ‘hello’, ‘two beers, please’ and ‘where are the toilets?’) had meant he’d drawn a blank on that front.
Still, he supposed, he shouldn’t be surprised. He doubted the series of Big Brother he’d appeared on, where he’d come second (something he’d been immensely proud of until Jed had – rather unkindly, Liam thought – pointed out that second place only meant you were the best of the losers), would have been shown here in Spain. Or anywhere else, for that matter – as for the Dutch girls on a hen night he’d tried to chat up . . . well, even though they’d spoken better English than he did, he’d had to tell them he was a celebrity. Which kind of defeated the point.
Next, he’d turned to Tinder, but the girl he’d met up with hadn’t looked at all like her profile photos, and when Liam had – perhaps being rather ungentlemanly – pointed this out, her suggestion that he buy them both drinks until she did had sent him hurrying (via ‘the toilet’) for the door.
In the end, he’d given up at around midnight, returned to his room, and (in the hope he might learn a bit more of the language that way) watched Alien in Spanish on the tiny television set bolted to the wall above the far end of the bed while working his way through the entire contents of the minibar, which was why he was currently nursing the hangover from hell. To cap it all, he’d checked out of his thin-walled, non-air-conditioned hotel first thing and come to Livia and Jed’s much posher venue early to try to sleep last night’s excesses off, but the receptionist – an extremely pretty Spanish girl with a name he couldn’t pronounce despite repeated attempts (which gave him an excuse for repeated glances at the name badge pinned to her ample chest) – was telling him his room wasn’t ready yet.
‘Are you sure?’
‘I am.’
‘Could you look again?’ – Liam nodded towards the laptop in front of her, then frowned at her badge – ‘Arant, um . . .’
‘Arantxa!’ said the girl, emphasising the ‘sha’ part, then unclipping her name tag and brandishing it right in front of his face in a way that suggested Liam had been doing a little bit too much looking again for her liking. ‘I have checked. Your room is still . . .’ She paused for a moment, as if trying to remember the word. ‘Dirty.’
‘Dirty?’ Liam smirked, then thought better of what he’d been about to say. ‘Okay. In that case, is there somewhere I can go and’ – he fixed her with his best, most winningest smile – ‘lie down for a while? Your room, for example? I’m sorry. Did I say that out loud?’
‘The pool,’ said Arantxa, flatly, and Liam’s smile wavered.
‘The pool?’
‘Through there.’ She nodded towards the double doors behind him. ‘There are sunbeds by the side. You can wait there until your room is cleaned.’
‘How long will that take?’
Arantxa shrugged. ‘There is a bar there too, if you want a drink.’
‘It’s a little early, no?’
‘Which is why I cannot check you in yet,’ she said. ‘They serve coffee. But, if you want, with brandy in it. The dog’s hair.’
‘What?’
‘If you have a hangover,’ Arantxa said, in a way that suggested the ‘if’ was redundant, and Liam opened his mouth to protest, then realised he probably looked the way he felt, and in fact, with the amount he’d drunk last night, he feared they could probably bottle his sweat and make a cocktail with it.
‘Coffee with brandy it is, then,’ he said, thinking, What the hell. After all, it wasn’t every day your brother got married, and while the poster advertising ‘All-day Breakfasts’ in the window of the Irish pub across the street (and showing a picture of the biggest fry-up Liam had ever seen) had caught his eye, he couldn’t guarantee he wouldn’t bring anything he ate straight back up again, whereas a coffee and brandy might just give him the pick-me-up he needed. ‘And it’s “hair of the dog”,’ he said, as if imparting a valuable lesson.
‘Hair of the dog,’ said the girl, glancing at the telephone that had just started ringing on the desk in front of her, as if it were a lifebelt she’d just been thrown. As she hurriedly moved to answer it, Liam reached down and placed a restraining finger on the handset.
‘Will you come and get me when the room’s ready?’
‘Someone will,’ said Arantxa, politely removing his hand, and as she muttered ‘Hotel Catalonia, buenos días’ into the receiver, Liam tried not to take it personally that she’d sounded relieved she might not have to have anything more to do with him.
He picked up his luggage and made his way towards the pool, but as he strode away from the desk, he felt a hand on his shoulder. Hoping it might be the receptionist to tell him the call had been to say his room was ready after all, Liam swivelled round, though the smile he’d fixed on his face wasn’t exactly mirrored by a scowling Jed.
‘You . . .’
‘Bro!’ He dropped his bag and enveloped his older brother in a huge hug, then let him go again quickly; Jed’s arms had stayed by his side. ‘Congratulations?’ Liam suggested, taking a precautionary step backwards.
‘You knew?’ growled Jed, more of a statement than a question, and Liam held his hands up.
‘Liv made me promise. She made all of us promise.’
‘You could have warned me.’
‘You could have said no. Then again, you’d have missed out on the chance to have me as your best man.’
‘I don’t need a best man.’
Liam’s face fell. ‘Guysmaid, then.’
‘That’s not even a thing!’
‘Which is why I’m your best man.’
Jed had opened his mouth as if to say something, then quickly closed it again, so Liam picked his bag up, put an arm round his brother’s shoulders and steered him towards the pool area. ‘Come on, bro. Happy days. Remember what y
ou always used to tell me when we were growing up?’
‘That I couldn’t believe we were related?’
‘No! That it takes forty-two muscles to frown, and only seventeen to smile.’
‘How many does it take for me to throw you in this pool?’
Liam tightened his grip. ‘Hey. Take a chill pill, will you? I think it’s fantastic news.’
‘How is it at all fantastic?’
‘Firstly, it’s you getting married, rather than me, which means – seeing as there’s not a woman alive who I’d let tie me down, not unless we were playing some kind of kinky sex game – it’s the closest I’m going to get to being where the action is at a wedding. Secondly, like I said, I’m the best man, which means I’m guaranteed a shag this evening with one of Livia’s bridesmaids.’
‘Livia’s not having any bridesmaids. Is she?’
Liam shrugged. ‘And . . .’ He hesitated, and Jed shook his head.
‘Thirdly?’
‘Oh. Yeah. Thirdly.’
‘Well?’
‘It’s a great excuse for a party!’
Jed extricated himself from underneath Liam’s arm. ‘Since when have you ever needed an excuse for a party?’
‘True.’ Liam grinned, then he punched Jed lightly on the shoulder. ‘It’s at this point I’d normally say something like “Cheer up, it might never happen”, but it is happening. And in less than . . .’ He glanced at his watch, then frowned. His head still felt very fuzzy, which was making the maths a little hard right now.
‘Ten hours,’ said Jed, desperately, and Liam caught himself. His brother was sounding anxious, and though he couldn’t put his finger on why, Liam feared it was more than just pre-wedding jitters.
‘What’s your problem?’
‘Marriage, Liam.’
‘Huh?’
‘Hello?’ Jed reached across and rapped Liam on the forehead with his knuckles. ‘Our dad?’
‘Yeah, but you’re nothing like him.’
‘I’ve got his DNA, though, don’t I?’
‘Relax. It’ll be fine. A walk in the park.’
Jed was staring at him, the expression on his face suggesting it’d be more like a walk in Jurassic Park. ‘Not everyone has your blind confidence that you can just march into any situation and, you know, do it.’
Liam sniggered, then he remembered Jed was being serious. ‘Trust me.’
‘How can you be so sure?’
‘You and Liv are as good as married anyway.’
‘Evidently not, as far as she’s concerned, otherwise she wouldn’t have felt the need to pull this little stunt . . .’ Jed glared at him. Liam’s smile was widening. ‘It’s not funny, Liam.’
‘It is. A bit. Isn’t it?’
Jed stared at him for a moment, and shook his head. ‘I’m happy you’re finding this all so amusing,’ he said, then he spun round on his heel and marched out through the hotel’s front door.
Liam smiled to himself as he watched Jed go. Though as he slung his bag over his shoulder and headed through the double doors that led to the pool, it occurred to him that his brother hadn’t actually looked happy at all.
Livia was contemplating another half an hour in bed when her phone bleeped: Rachel, texting to say her bus was just leaving the airport – so she messaged her back with a simple C U at breakfast, then hauled herself upright. Jed wasn’t back from his run yet, so she supposed she could wait for him, but like she’d told him earlier, this was their wedding day, and she wanted to make the most of it. Besides, she had things to do. And – thanks to a certain miniature someone jumping up and down on her bladder – she was desperate to pee.
She did what she had to in the bathroom, then opened the blinds and peered out of the window, squinting at the morning brightness. The sky was cloudless, and already a deep blue – another hot one, Livia suspected, so she pulled on her shorts and forced a T-shirt down over her stomach, admiring her trim legs in the mirror. When she’d joined the gym a year ago, Jed had teased her it wouldn’t last, but she’d kept going regularly, even after she fell pregnant – though she hated that phrase. ‘Fell’ suggested it had been accidental, and – unlike today, perhaps – both she and Jed had gone into this with their eyes open.
She considered putting make-up on, but she’d be getting dressed and made up properly later for the ceremony, and given how her condition was beginning to make every activity an effort, the last thing she wanted to do was go through that twice. It was bad enough that she felt the size of a hot-air balloon, although from the front, she could just about pass off as normal, if she covered her bulge (having realistically passed the ‘baby bump’ stage a month or so ago) with something. Like Jed, for example.
Her stomach rumbled, and she realised she was starving; last night’s meal had been fine, but that was the problem with tapas – lots of small portions, rather than one big satisfying plate. The patatas bravas had been particularly spicy, and Livia could still smell the garlic on her breath, but at least she didn’t have a hangover. One of the advantages of her condition – if you couldn’t drink, you couldn’t feel lousy the next morning . . . though in her early stages, the morning sickness had been a cruel substitute. Mind you, by the look of him earlier, Jed had more than made up for her abstinence. Although she supposed she owed him that.
She smiled to herself, though she still felt a little guilty for duping him into today’s events. But being pregnant was a good excuse to behave . . . well, if not badly, impetuously, perhaps. Livia had been worried everything had been about the baby of late, so she’d hoped surprising Jed with this might make things more about them, again. Mark the ten-year anniversary of them meeting with a real milestone. Remind him how much she loved him. And help them to remember that they used to love being spontaneous, had taken such pride in being impulsive. Before their lives really changed.
Still, he’d be fine with everything once it was all over – Livia was confident about that. Jed was one of those people who often needed a helping hand, a little direction, a polite ‘shove’ to get him moving. When they’d first set eyes on each other, in that bar here in the backstreets of the Gothic Quarter, she’d had to flirt her backside off to get him to come over and buy her a drink. Livia had even ended up dancing on the table to try to attract his attention. Though yesterday hadn’t felt as risky as dancing on that table had back then. This time, she’d been confident Jed was a sure thing.
He’d been the same when she’d suggested they move in together, and then where the baby was concerned, initially responding to her suggestion they think about starting a family with a plaintive ‘We are a family, Liv. You and me,’ then eventually agreeing that he did want kids, and that if not actually trying for a baby, they’d at least stop trying not to have one. And when she’d announced she was pregnant, once he’d got over the initial shock (and admittedly, that had taken a while), Jed had been so happy. Excited. Perhaps even more enthusiastic than she was, when the enormity of what was happening had hit her. Livia was sure he’d be the same with getting married. And while a part of her might have wished he had already done the decent thing by getting down on one knee without her having to ask, in typical Livia-and-Jed fashion, it had been up to her to instigate things.
Hurriedly, she smoothed on a bit of lipstick – she had some standards, after all – then collected her room key and made her way downstairs, mouthing a cheery hola at the older Spanish ladies who’d just got into the lift with her, and whose faces had lit up when they’d spotted her distended stomach. Livia loved Barcelona – the people, the climate, the food – and she knew Jed felt the same way, which was why it had been the perfect set-up: coming back to the place they’d first met, a city they both adored, on their tenth anniversary, with her six months pregnant . . . and then, when she’d dropped the bombshell – how the others already knew, and were flying out to celebrate the day with them . . . As Jed had said yesterday, how could he possibly have said no? Even though, for just a moment, when she’d seen the
look that had flashed across his face, that was exactly what she’d feared he was going to do.
And doing it this way was perfect – a throwback to the days when they used to surprise each other with trips to mystery destinations, wild days out or unexpected presents. And though that last one had backfired recently, when Livia had presented Jed with a watch that had cost more than his car and he’d made her take it back, there was no way he was going to think a small affair like this was too ostentatious.
Besides, Livia had never been a girly girl. Not the type to dream of a big wedding, dressed in some meringue-creation of a dress, hordes of annoying nieces and nephews running riot around some draughty old church while she and Jed said their vows in front of a congregation of relatives they hardly knew and a God neither of them believed in, before an orgy of eating and drinking they’d have to foot the bill for. No, this way was much better: just the two of them, and their three closest friends and their partners (though that term was usually rather fleeting where Liam was concerned), a brief ceremony where they’d exchange a few, meaningful words and the rings she and Jed would be picking up later (Livia had already ordered those from a shop here in Barcelona, not wanting to risk Jed spotting them in her luggage), then dinner, a bit of a dance . . . It would be perfect. Back in England, they could do the legal stuff, then hold a party for everyone else. Assuming everyone else was speaking to them after being, as Liam would say, NFI – Not Fucking Invited.
The lift doors pinged open, and her fellow occupants stood back to let her go first, so Livia nodded her thanks and waddled through the ground-floor reception. The hotel was beautiful – an old townhouse (they called them ‘palaces’ here, and given the grand sweep of the stairs, the ornamental fountain in front of the desk and the loftiness of the reception area, she could see why) in the Gothic Quarter, with a pool out on the terrace where they could relax for the day (and next to which they’d be holding the ceremony later). Breakfast, a discreet sign at reception informed her, was in the courtyard restaurant, and as Livia pushed her way through the heavy glass doors, the waiter rushed over to help her.