There was a long silence, so I rang again, and eventually I heard Mike’s muffled voice coming towards the door. ‘It’s Lizzy,’ I heard someone else say – Mum, I think.
The door swung open, and there was Mike, in a crumpled old morning suit, with a piece of toast in his mouth, and next to him, David.
I felt cold, standing on the doorstep in the bright sunshine. My hands and feet had turned to water, and my stomach churned. I leaned against the doorframe for support, and stared up at him. Then I pulled myself together. ‘Hello,’ I said, stepping over the threshold.
‘Morning, Titch,’ Mike exclaimed. He kissed my cheek. ‘Well, we’re all very grown-up here, aren’t we? David – Lizzy. Lizzy, this is my friend David. I believe you two know each other.’
‘Hello, Lizzy,’ said David, shaking my hand mock-formally.
Thank God Miles hadn’t come in. Now I was inside, I realized how lovely it was to see David. It was the first time since I’d put the phone down on him. And since I’d started going out with Miles. But it was fine. Because of the water being all under the bridge. I smiled back at him, until I realized he was directing his warmth towards Mike, and not me. His hand was cold, heavy in mine, and he didn’t even meet my eyes as I stared at him. I couldn’t help it. I had always thought Miles looked like him but now it dawned on me that they were quite different. He was tanned. Where had he been?
He released his hand from mine and I felt something rasp against my palm. There was a plaster on his middle finger. What had he done? Was it just a papercut or something.
Mike turned to me and put his arm round me. David put his hands into his pockets.
‘Lizzy,’ Mike said, ‘I think your mother needs you. There’s some kind of horticultural crisis unfolding up at the marquee. Chin – well, she’s on edge already, but your mother’s worried she’s about to go nuclear. Other than that, all’s fine.’ He turned to David. ‘Chin and I had a bit of a dust-up yesterday. Anyway, all in the past. Atonement, I’m all for it. Look at me, atoning away, left, right and centre. So, David old thing, I’ve done you now. Are we square? Lizzy, you still here?’ He removed his arm from my shoulders. ‘Go away now, old girl. I want to talk to David.’
‘I don’t see why,’ I said, nettled.
‘Mike and I need a quick chat,’ said David. He turned to my uncle and said quickly, ‘Honestly, Mike, I know you’re sorry. I’m sorry too. I think we both fucked up.’
‘Well,’ said Mike, ‘the boot’s significantly more on my foot than yours old thing, but decent of you to say it. Hallelujah. Hang on a sec. Let me go and see if the light of my life is up yet. She’ll want to see you, I know. Two shakes.’
He bounded upstairs, singing ‘All People That On Earth Do Dwell’.
‘I’d better go outside and find Mum,’ I said. ‘Golly, it’s ten thirty already. We’ve got lots to do.’
‘Yes, you have,’ said David. ‘Sorry about this.’ He gestured around him, as if to explain his presence.
‘Not at all,’ I said politely.
‘Mike called me yesterday evening. He’s got a bout of penitence he needs to get off his chest. He just wanted to apologize, clear the air, all that kind of thing. He – well.’
‘He was crap. I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘I’m glad he’s apologized. What about Rosalie?’
‘He owes her more than an apology,’ said David, briskly. ‘I’m fine – he just messed me around. A lot of crap happened because of him. You know.’
He stopped. Oho, I knew. But, I reminded myself, these were the waters that were now way under and past the bridge.
David rocked on the balls of his feet, his hands still in his pockets. ‘Anyway, I had to bring over some more cutlery from Mum, so I thought I’d kill two birds with one stone.’ He looked down at the floor, then at me and said ruefully, ‘I’m the mummy’s boy who gets up early to run her errands. I’m going to the bottle bank next.’
‘Right,’ I said, not sure what his point was.
‘And Miles,’ said David, sounding his name like it was a rock dropping into water, ‘Miles swans off to luxury hotels with his new girlfriend for the night.’
‘Yes,’ I said.
David patted his breast pocket. ‘Where are my car keys? Look, Lizzy, it’s OK, all right? I’ve got to go. I haven’t time to say hello to Rosalie.’
‘Oh, right,’ I said, realizing suddenly that it was hard for him, hating the thought that he was miserable – and also, intensely, not wanting him to leave. ‘Look, I’m sorry, you don’t have to rush off because of me. It is weird, I know, but we’re just going to have to get used to it. Stay a little while. I’m going to the garden.’
‘I didn’t mean that,’ David said. ‘Thanks for the sympathy, Lizzy. Very kind of you.’
My face was burning. He opened the door and held its edge lightly. ‘I just meant there’s no time left. I can’t stay. Give my love to Rosalie. See you later, Lizzy. Hope it all goes well. You look great.’
The door slammed behind him, and I patted my flaming cheeks. How dare he? But how stupid of me.
Gibbo and Bozzer left for the church at about a quarter past eleven. Thirty minutes later we all congregated in the hall, waiting for Chin to appear. It was like the gathering of the clan in a Walter Scott novel, minus the kilts. Jess, Tom and I. Jess had on an SJP-style jacket with a flared silk skirt, and looked like a doll, with her curls bobbing round her head. Tom was sleek and shiny in a beautifully tailored new morning suit and plump blue tie. Mum and Dad, Kate, Mike and Rosalie. Mum, already crying, was in a diaphanous Ghost-style creation with a matching pale green hat, while Kate was regal in one of those dresses one finds advertised in the back of the Telegraph Saturday magazine made of what they call fine lawn cotton: puffed sleeves, elasticated waist, button-through, crazily floral. Next to Kate, the fashion yang to her yin, Rosalie wore an extraordinary rose-pink taffeta suit. It had a long tulip-shaped skirt, a creamy, low-cut separate bodice, and a jacket tailored to within an inch of its life, making her waist look like a hand-span. She looked like the Fairy Godmother from Shrek 2. I assumed it must be the kind of thing rich people wear on cruises or to benefits when they’re not quite sure of the dress code but don’t want to be accused of not making an effort. Standing beside her, Mike looked like an old shoe in his beaten-up morning suit, which had been Tony’s and was slightly too big for him. Nevertheless, there was something reassuringly real about him next to Rosalie.
A door upstairs slammed and Mando shouted down, ‘She’s coming!’ We all bristled with excitement.
She was lovely, in my grandmother’s veil, with the prettiest tracery pattern of flowers scattered across it, a simple cream silk sheath dress, plain and beautifully made. Her hair shone, her eyes shone, her face was aglow with happiness and excitement, and she fitted the bill perfectly. Some people aren’t naturally bridal and others are. I hadn’t thought Chin would be but she just was. She was the most beautiful bride I’d ever seen. At the sight of her coming down the staircase, clutching the carved banister, tears filled my eyes and I bent over to shake them on to the floor rather than let them run in mascara stripes down my face and dress.
Mando came down after her, fussing with his tie, his buttonhole and his hair, waving his arms as Chin stepped across the threshold towards the waiting car. ‘Careful!’ he breathed. ‘Oh, the dirt…Oh dear.’
‘Coming, John?’ Chin said, as Dad waited for Mum to pin on his buttonhole. He stepped forward and gave her his arm. She raised herself on tiptoe and kissed his cheek. ‘Thank you so much,’ she said.
They set off for the car and we all followed them, led by Mike. ‘See you there,’ Chin said, smiling at him.
‘Yup, sis. You’re beautiful,’ said Mike, holding the door open for her. ‘Come on, you lot, we’ve got to go. Don’t want to arrive after the bride. Rosalie, where are you? There. Marvellous.’
Dad smiled and got into the car.
Mike turned to us. ‘Tom, you’re taking your mother, yes?’
/> ‘Yes,’ Tom said, swinging his car keys in his hand. ‘Right. Let’s go. Lizzy, are you ready?’
It’s funny how the mind stores certain events and gives them a significance they don’t appear to have when they’re happening. When I look back now I find it strange that I remember sitting in the church. Miles next to me, his hand in mine – in fact all of the wedding ceremony so clearly. The sound of Chin’s voice and Gibbo’s. The heavy scent of lilies. The promise Gibbo had made to us at Christmas in the pub, that if he married Chin we would find out Norman Gibson’s middle name: Tom, Jess, Miles and I stood bristling with repressed hysteria as Ginevra Mary Walter took Norman Lorenzo Gibson to be her lawfully married husband. (His grandmother was Italian.) And I remembered Mike reading from the Song of Solomon, then Kate reading a Shakespearian sonnet, in her clear, beautiful voice, something about true love and impediments, and I remember thinking it made such sense and that it was heartbreakingly sad, coming from her. ‘The marriage of true minds’. I liked that.
And I remember standing outside the church with all my family. We were all a bit embarrassed, as if we were on display and didn’t want to be. Jess took photos of us standing around before the official photographer started snapping away – Mum, fussing; Chin, stunning but mutinous; Tom, licking his finger and smoothing his hair down; Mike and Rosalie standing stiffly side by side, looking like pioneers in an early daguerreotype. Gibbo, tilting alternately left to right, which none of us could understand till the official photos came back and we worked out he’d just been swaying ecstatically from side to side all day, like a very long tall Weeble.
When we were finally allowed to disperse, Chin took Kate and Tom by the hand, whispered something, and they walked over to Tony’s grave; Chin put her bouquet of lily-of-the-valley next to the headstone. I found myself trying to picture him. How different would our family have been if he hadn’t died? I suspected he had been the favourite, the pacifier. I suspected that when Kate met him she wasn’t a cross, inscrutable woman who stomped and huffed, but beautiful, graceful, quiet, which was why Tony had fallen in love with her. Perhaps Mike too. Would he have turned out differently if his brother hadn’t died? I don’t know – but I couldn’t help thinking, as I watched my uncle’s wife and son standing by his grave, that to understand a family you have to know more about them than who’s still in the room.
‘Back to the house!’ Gibbo yelled, after this interlude was over.
It was Chin’s idea to walk back across the fields to Keeper House, and I’m sure it had seemed like a good idea at the planning stage. Surely one of the essential components of the Notting Hill Boho Relaxed Shabby Chic wedding must be the bridal party, followed by the guests, rambling in a delightfully relaxed way across a meadow to the family home for the reception.
In practice, though, it’s a dead silly idea. (1) Who, apart from Kate, wears shoes to a wedding that they can walk more than ten yards in? (2) Who is screaming? It’s the bride, getting delightful May mud and grass stains on her Alice Temperley dress. (3) What was that soft thud? Great-aunt Dahlia has got her walking-stick stuck in the ground and pitched herself head first into the ditch.
The whole wedding party started off through the churchyard, holding hands and looking all understated and lovely, laughing in a carefree way in case a photographer from Country Living should appear (to take some black-and-white shots, grainy and ethereal). But the path across the meadow was still damp enough from the recent rain for heels to sink into the ground and long enough for shoes to start rubbing, and the sun was so hot that after about four minutes the whole party looked less like Kate Moss and her friends on a boho field trip than Moses leading the Israelites out of Egypt – the tail end of the procession, when they were all exhausted.
‘Are you OK?’ Miles asked, as I strode along confidently, trying not to convey the agony of my lovely but treacherous shoes.
‘Fine, thanks.’
‘Really?’ Miles said, hands in his pockets.
Someone moaned.
I could see the house in the distance, a shimmering palace of promise containing my comfy flip-flops.
‘Go down…Moses…Way down in Egypt-land…Tell old Pharaoh…Let my people go…’ I sang to myself, trying to get some rhythm going.
‘What are you grumbling about?’ Miles said.
‘I’m not grumbling,’ I said. ‘I’m singing to take my mind off my blisters.’
‘Oh, good grief,’ Miles said. ‘Stop.’ He crouched to look at my foot. ‘Ouch,’ he said, when I showed him the raw red patch that clashed with my beautiful iridescent lilac nail polish. ‘Come on,’ he said, straightening. ‘Here you go.’
In a lightning quick movement, he hoicked me on to his back, jiggled me around until he was comfortable, and set off. I screamed with shock, then delight. He waved to those we passed, like a merry French farmer. It started a bit of a craze. Chin turned round, saw what was happening and started to laugh. Then she took off her shoes, waving people to walk past her, and went the rest of the way barefoot, laughing as she winced over the pebbly path.
As we reached the lane and the entrance to the house, the wedding car drew up. Out stepped Rosalie and Sophia Gunning.
‘Oh, sorry,’ I said, as Miles staggered beneath me. ‘We all walked – we should have told you we were setting off.’
‘Yes, I know,’ said Rosalie, gazing at me as if I had two heads. ‘We got the car, honey.’ We were in the courtyard and Miles let me slide off his back. ‘You British,’ she added, and advanced towards a waiter proffering a tray of champagne, ‘you perplex me.’
Mike and Kate appeared through the gate. ‘Rosalie, darling, there you are,’ Mike said, going over to her. ‘I missed you. Where did you get to?’
‘Came in the car, darlin’,’ Rosalie said, handing him a glass and smiling mistily up at him. ‘I missed you too. Shall we go in?’
‘Good idea,’ Mike said, kissing the top of her head. ‘My job’s over so I can relax.’
‘What job?’ I said. ‘What have you done today?’
‘Well,’ Mike looked hurt, ‘the reading.’
‘Oh, sorry,’ I said. ‘It was very nice. Very nice indeed.’
‘Solomon knew what he was about, didn’t he? Marvellous stuff,’ Mike said. ‘“Behold, thou art fair, my love,”’ he declaimed to Rosalie. ‘ “Thy hair is as a flock of goats, that appear from Mount Gilead.”’
‘Thanks a lot,’ Rosalie said, stroking hers. ‘Lizzy, see you later. Good luck for the speech, honey.’
‘Thanks,’ I said, turning to Miles. He handed me my bag. ‘Thanks for the ride,’ I said, as Jess limped through the gate, followed by the bride and groom. Chin stopped to put her shoes on, and Sophia Gunning stepped in, with David at her side, their heads together, deep in conversation. Then Bill from the Neptune appeared, helping Aunt Dahlia, with Mum, Dad and the rest of the motley crew.
‘Good luck with the speech, Elizabeth,’ Bill bellowed.
‘What?’ Miles said, releasing me. ‘That’s the…What speech?’
‘What?’ I said dreamily, watching David disappear through the gate, glass in hand.
Chin had reached the gate to the garden, but she heard this and turned round. She tripped back to me. ‘Oh, Lizzy, darling, I forgot to ask you. We only decided last night.’
‘What?’ I said, a cold, clammy fear clamping my stomach.
‘It’s not a big deal.’
As these words always presage something that is a big deal, I gritted my teeth.
‘I don’t want Mike to make a speech. Obviously.’ Chin laughed, girlishly.
‘Obviously!’ I agreed.
‘And John’s done enough. Besides, you know him – he’ll happily blather on to us for half an hour at Christmas but getting up in front of a marquee full of people…he hates that sort of thing. But we all thought you’d be perfect. It doesn’t have to be that long, I don’t want any formal shit or toasts or any of that. Just a few…words. About me, Gibbo, life. What love is, what
it means, why we’re all here, you know. No big deal.’
‘What?’ I said, in a strangled tone.
‘Is that OK?’ Chin asked solicitously, making to leave.
‘No!’ I croaked. ‘Chin, please. Please don’t make me.’
‘But you’re the only person. Your dad can’t.’
‘I’m his daughter!’ I cried. ‘Who do you think he passed it on to? Get Tom to do it!’
‘No,’ said Chin, stubbornly. ‘I want you. Come on. I meant to ask you ages ago, but I couldn’t. Because of the hen night. I knew you hated me. And I was so busy…you know. Because of saving the house.’
Foreseeing that the excuse of Saving the House was going to come up again and again over the years with monotonous regularity, I sighed. She had a point – and I owed her. We all did.
‘What love is, what it means, and why we’re all here. And about you and Gibbo,’ I said weakly.
‘Yep!’ Chin touched the arm of an arriving guest. ‘Hi, see you in there!’
‘But, Chin,’ I said, ‘Aristotle and – people like that couldn’t work that stuff out. What makes you think—’
‘Great. You’re on after Gibbo,’ said Chin, cutting off any further discussion by walking off.
I must remember that, it is an excellent tactic.
THIRTY-TWO
No matter that the sun was shining, Mike was back in the bosom of the family, the house was ours again and it was Chin’s wedding day. The making of the speech hung over me throughout the reception, as if I was one of those cartoon characters who walks about with a small grey raincloud above their head. We stood in and outside the marquee for drinks as the sun beat down. People around me laughed, and I shot them looks of loathing that they could be so carefree.
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