I smile back. How can I help it? “Look, if you’re sure you won’t be bored … and you don’t mind driving the whole round trip all over again …”
“I’m never bored with you, Grace.” He leans down to give me a swift kiss, and as he does so, he whispers in my ear, “But just in case, why don’t you think up a few interesting things for us to do in that cramped little bed you’ve told me so much about? And I’ll put some serious thought into the matter, too.”
“Go, go,” I croak, practically pushing him into the car and closing his door for him. “The sooner you’re on your way, the sooner you’ll be back.”
I watch him drive away along Main Street, and as I turn back to Polly I see that she’s now off the phone and grinning at me.
“Oh, Gracie. He’s ridiculous.”
I know from the tone of her voice that this is A Good Thing. “I know. I’m so happy.”
“You look it.”
“And so do you!” This is—thank God—finally true. “But look, tell me how everything’s going here. Did you manage to get your dress sorted out in time? How many people have said they can make it?” I’m assuming a fair few, from the fact that I can see a small tent half erected in the Atkins’ back garden, but before Polly can start filling me in on the details, Bella emerges from the side door of the house.
She’s dressed in old jeans and a spattered apron, and there’s a stressed-out frown on her face. She’s holding a vast ceramic bowl of something chocolatey in the crook of one arm and a stainless steel whisk in the other hand.
“Poll? For Christ’s sake, will you get in here and tell Mum she absolutely cannot wear the dress she’s just brought back from Bristol?”
“Oh, God, she’s not bought something white, has she?”
“No. It’s black. And backless.”
“I’ll have you know, Bella Jayne Atkins, that the salesgirls at House of Fraser were lost for words when I came out of the changing room!” Marilyn Atkins has opened up the bathroom window, on the first floor, and is peering out over us, clutching a bit of lacy black fabric to her chest. It reminds me that there’s one thing I didn’t warn Saad about, something far more dangerous than the ancient shower. Polly’s man-eating mother. “They said I looked just like Hilary Swank when she wore that low-back dress to the Oscars,” she carries on, “even if I am twenty years older than her.”
“Twenty!” Bella snorts.
“And it’s not as if I even need to wear a bra, or anything, unlike some people …”
“Mum, look, let me just come up and see it on you, and then we can decide whether or not the dress will go with the wedding’s general look, OK?” Polly squeezes my hand as she starts through the side door into the house. “Grace, mind if I leave you to your own devices for a few minutes?”
“It’ll be a bit longer than that,” Bella hisses at her. “You’re going to have to take Mum to Devizes before the shops all shut and forcibly get her to buy a suitable outfit. For fuck’s sake, all she had to do was find a bloody pastel-colored suit, or something! But no, she has to turn up to her own daughter’s wedding dressed as Morticia fucking Adams!”
“Bells, calm down.” Polly is already on her way toward the stairs. “It’ll all be fine. I promise.”
Wonderful. I’m left alone in the hallway with a gently steaming Bella.
“Hi, Grace,” she says. “And sorry. I suppose you weren’t anticipating an arrival into World War Three.”
“It’s fine,” I say, before realizing that this might have sounded as though I was agreeing that it is World War Three. “I mean, I know what weddings can be like! Especially having them at home. You’re doing such an amazing job, Bella, at this kind of short notice, catering for … how many people is it going to be?”
“Seventy-six confirmed. Might be a few last-minute additions.”
“Oh, yes, um, one of those will be my … er … a friend of mine. If you don’t mind, that is?”
“A friend?”
“Yes, but he’s quite happy to share a bed with me. A room, I mean! What I mean is, you won’t have to worry about sheets or towels or anything, if it’s OK for him to stay the night … it was Polly’s suggestion,” I finally say, faltering under her gimlet stare. “I can tell him not to come back, if it’s easier for you.”
“Oh, no, no, I mean, for heaven’s sake, what difference does one more make?” she says, not sounding terribly hospitable about it. But then Bella isn’t one of life’s natural hosts, albeit that she makes her living out of it. Still, it’s the food part that’s her forte, and she’s already stalking back to her natural habitat, the kitchen, where an entire production line is in place. There are fish kettles poaching things on the gas stove, and casserole dishes simmering on the Aga, and mounds and mounds of freshly peeled vegetables, waiting to go into other casserole dishes, that put my Christmas Day efforts to shame.
Polly’s dad, Brian, is stacking trays of pastry rounds into the freezer and looking almost as scared of Bella as I am.
“Grace, hello! Cup of tea? Piece of shortbread?”
“Oh, no, there’s no need for that,” I tell him before Bella can jump in and bark at him, sergeant-major style, that he has no time to be making cups of tea or putting out plates of shortbread. “Honestly! Actually, I’d really just like to help. I mean, I’m not the greatest cook in the world, but if there’s anything I can be doing in the tent, or answering the phone …”
“Well, I suppose you could be making a start on cutting down some of the holly and ivy from the garden,” Bella says, looking dubious about my talents. “We need enough to decorate the church and the tables in the tent.”
Oh, shit. I’d hoped for something low-key, physically undemanding, and indoors.
“But of course, if you’d rather, I don’t know, go and paint your toenails, or something …”
“Not at all!” I sense more than just a hint of disdain in Bella’s tone. “Holly and ivy it is! Could I just pop my things upstairs first, get them out of your way? And then I’ll come straight back down and get cracking.”
“Sure. I’ll show you up.”
“Bella,” I laugh, “there’s no need for that. I mean, I’ve stayed in Poll’s room a million times before!”
“Actually, you’re in my old room tonight. Let me show you up there.”
This time, I don’t even attempt to argue.
Bella’s old bedroom is a couple of doors along from Polly’s, on the upstairs corridor. I’ve remembered it as painted in a chilly shade of pale blue, with a slightly dingy beige carpet, but either Marilyn and Brian have redecorated or my memories are completely wrong, because the walls are actually cream and there are wooden floorboards instead of a carpet. The bed is going to be a squeeze, though: a small double that makes me think Saad’s suggestion of holding on to each other to avoid spilling out onto the floor was more apt than he realized.
“This is great, Bella, thanks so much! I’ll just get my dress out and hang it up, and then …”
“Let me help,” she says unexpectedly. And not especially helpfully, either, because her hands are coated with a dusting of flour and whatever chocolatey thing it was she was mixing in that big ceramic bowl. A mousse, by the looks of it, or perhaps some kind of cocoa-y cake filling. Either way, not a thing I’d particularly like to get all over my dove gray bridesmaid dress.
“Really, Bella, I don’t want to keep you. You’re so busy …”
“No, it’s fine.” She reaches into the wardrobe for a hanger as I start to pull my dress out of my case. “I’m sorry about what happened with you and your husband, by the way. I hope this wedding isn’t going to be too difficult for you. I mean, obviously now you’re bringing your friend, it might be a bit easier. But I know weddings are hard when you’ve been through a breakup.”
“Thanks.” I don’t want to talk with Bella about my failed marriage, despite the fact that her tone of regret is a good deal more genuine than the Mirandas’ was earlier. “I’m just really pleased that
Polly rethought everything in the end.”
“Yes.” Bella fixes me with a hard stare. “Look, this is probably none of my business. But how did you manage to make her realize she didn’t need to feel so guilty anymore?”
I drop my dress and have to bend over to pick it up before it gets any fluff on it. “Sorry, I don’t know what you mean.”
“Well, I’m assuming you spoke to her that night after she ran off from my Christmas Eve party. I mean, how else would she have realized she didn’t need to sabotage her own happiness just because of feeling so guilty about you?”
I stare at her like she’s speaking Greek. Because as far as I’m concerned, she might as well be.
“Bella, I honestly have no idea what you’re talking about. Why would Polly feel guilty about anything to do with me?” And not guilty about anything to do with you, for example?
“Because of what happened between her and Charlie, of course. And the fact that she didn’t tell you about it.”
I feel like I’m spinning into a parallel universe. I sit down, very suddenly, on the edge of the bed. “What happened between her and Charlie?”
“Oh, God. You really don’t know?” Bella’s eyes have flown wide. “Shit. I just assumed Polly had come clean, and that’s what made her feel OK about allowing herself to be happy with Dev.”
“Come clean about what?” I practically shriek. I’ve stopped being scared of Bella now, and all I’m scared about is what she’s got to say.
“OK, look, it was totally one-sided. And it was years and years and years ago.” Bella is more uncomfortable and panicky than I think I’ve ever seen her look. “Right after you’d just got married, in fact. Charlie asked Polly out for a drink, pretending he had some question to ask her about a twenty-first birthday present for you, and then when she got there, it turned out to be just this embarrassing, crude attempt to get her to sleep with him.”
I blink at her. “And …?”
“And what? You were only just married, for heaven’s sake! Don’t you think that’s appalling?”
“Yes, yes, of course, but I don’t understand why Polly had to feel so awful about it.”
“Because she dillied and dallied about whether or not she should say anything to you. She thought you’d be livid with her and refuse to believe she’d not reciprocated. And then before she’d made up her mind what to do about it, you’d gone and got yourself pregnant with your oldest. Which just killed her. I mean, she honestly felt responsible for ruining your life, just for not telling you sooner so you could leave him …” She tails off as I start to laugh. “What?”
“That’s all?” I feel weak with relief.
I honestly thought she was about to tell me something much, much worse than that. I honestly thought she was about to tell me that Polly had slept with Charlie. Because if she had, I’m not sure it would have made all that much difference that it was, as she said, “years and years and years ago.” Or that I’m not even with Charlie anymore.
“What do you mean, that’s all?” Bella’s eyebrows crunch into a frown. “Your husband—OK, your soon-to-be-ex husband—coming on to your best friend? And her never telling you about it? That means nothing to you?”
“No, it’s not that it means nothing. It’s just that there are so many worse things it could have been.”
“What does that mean?”
“Um, well, she could have given in to his creepy advances. Or ended up having a full-blown affair with him, or something.”
“Yeah, like that would happen.” Bella lets out one of her most derisive snorts. “Like that’s something Polly would ever do to you.”
Now that I think my legs are sturdy enough to stand up again, I get up and busy myself unpacking my shoes. I’m going to be wearing my Jimmy Choos with the bridesmaid’s dress tomorrow. The first time I’ve worn them out in public.
Bella watches me for a moment or two, shaking her head. “Wow. You’re really, really calm about this. And this is something Polly’s been torturing herself with for years.”
I can’t help resenting her implication that I’m somehow to blame for this. “Look, it kills me that Polly’s been torturing herself and keeping a secret! But if she’d just told me, I could have set her straight in an instant. That she’s got nothing to feel bad about. Whether or not I’d still been stuck with Charlie. And if you think it’ll make any difference to her enjoyment of her wedding day, I’ll tell her right now!”
Just as I say this, in fact, Polly’s voice becomes audible out on the landing. “No, I don’t think we can get back to Bristol before House of Fraser closes, Mum,” she’s saying, “but we can make it to Devizes in time before Reflections shuts, as long as we leave right now … Bells? Bella? Are you up here?”
“In my room!” Bella calls, shooting me a look that tells me I’m not to say anything at all about our current conversation. “Success?” she asks as Polly sticks her head around the door.
“Yes, if success means Mum agreeing to try and find something different to wear. No, if it means Mum not going into a massive sulk.”
“I’m not in a massive sulk,” Marilyn Atkins’s voice comes through—sulkily—from the hallway. “I just think it’s interesting that both my daughters seem to want me to look like a washed-up old frump, while they both get to look ravishing for the day. Oh, hello, Grace, darling,” she adds, poking her own head through the bedroom door next to Polly’s. “Will you come into town with us and help me pick something that my daughters won’t disapprove of? You’re so elegant, Grace”—a rather triumphant and spiteful look in Bella’s direction—“that I’m sure you won’t let me walk away with anything unflattering.”
I agree that I’ll head to town with Polly and Marilyn—well, anything’s got to be better than staying around the house to trim holly and ivy, and get the third degree from Bella—and ask for five minutes to change into something a bit warmer and run a comb through my hair.
The three Atkinses all get out of my way to let me do this in peace, and I’m just looking at myself in the wardrobe mirror and trying to zhuzh up my hair a bit when there’s the briefest of knocks on the door and Bella, without waiting for a reply, comes back into the room again.
She’s got a quizzical, puzzled expression on her face.
“You’re saying that Polly didn’t tell you about this thing with Charlie, right?” she asks, not even bothering to apologize for intruding, or offering any small talk about why she’s come back. “After what she said on Christmas Eve? Before she called up the next day and told you everything was OK and she was getting married after all?”
“Exactly, Bella. She didn’t tell me about it.”
“Then what changed?”
“Sorry?”
“Well, something changed, in between her running off on Christmas Eve and her big announcement on Christmas Day. I just assumed it was that she’d told you about Charlie, got it all off her chest, and realized she was being silly to sabotage her own life just because of something she never told you.” She chews her lip. “But if it wasn’t that, what was it?”
I close the wardrobe door and turn around to face her. “I don’t know, Bella. And I don’t think we need to know. The main thing is that she’s getting married tomorrow, to a wonderful man who she loves with all her heart. Isn’t it?”
“Yes. Yes, I suppose that’s the main thing.”
As I follow her downstairs, where Polly and her mum are waiting for me, I can’t help thinking that Bella doesn’t believe this is the main thing at all.
Later on, a little after midnight, I get a text from Saad saying he’s just pulled up outside. So I clamber out of the small, slightly lumpy bed and go downstairs to let him in.
But as I head down the stairs, I realize that not everyone is asleep.
There’s a slightly eerie glow coming from the living room, where all the lights are off, but where I can see, thanks to the eerie glow, that Bella is sitting on the sofa, a laptop computer open in front of her.
&n
bsp; When she hears the creak on the stairs, she spins around, as though I’ve caught her in the middle of opening a jar of ready-made béarnaise, or using cheapo cooking chocolate instead of Valrhona 66 percent.
“Sorry, Bella, I didn’t mean to scare you!”
She just stares at me blankly for a moment or two, not saying anything. When she does speak, she says, “I was just checking a few emails and stuff.”
“Sure! Well, I was just going to let my friend in, if that’s OK?”
“What? Oh, yes. Yes, it’s fine.” She gets to her feet, very suddenly, and makes for the stairs, pushing past me as she goes up them. “I just have to go and find something. Something important,” she mumbles.
A moment later, she’s disappeared into Polly’s old room and shut the door behind her.
Well, that was weird.
But then, I’ve never really understood Bella Atkins. And I’m fairly sure the feeling is mutual.
Anyway, it’s not the time now to wonder about what she’s doing. Because Saad is waiting for me, shivering on the doorstep outside.
“Hello, beautiful,” he says as I open the door. He leans down to kiss me, and despite the freezing air he’s bringing in with him, his lips are surprisingly warm. “How’s that cramped bed been working out for you?”
“It’s OK.” I lock the dead bolt behind him. “Though of course,” I add, as I start to lead him up the stairs, “it’s much better now that you’re here.”
From:
[email protected]
To:
[email protected]
Date:
December 25, 2011
Subject:
Happy Christmas!
Julia,
I did it. Jesus, I really did it. Yesterday, when I took Dev’s call, I ended up telling him everything. And I mean everything.
And you know what, Julia, it was just like you said it would be. He didn’t hang up in disgust. He didn’t do anything in disgust. He just listened, and then when I (finally) stopped talking he asked if he could come over. I don’t know what land-speed record his taxi broke, but he was at my flat twenty minutes later, and as soon as I opened the door he just kind of … folded me into this huge hug. Then he held me for ages and ages, while I howled, and he kept telling me in his lovely, kind, Dr. Dev voice that it was all going to be all right.
There Goes the Bride Page 35