by Lisa Jewell
‘What do you mean, they’re joining us?’
‘I mean George and his friends are staying. Here. With us.’
Julia’s face crumpled with horror. ‘But darling, they can’t – this is your hen night.’
‘I know, I know,’ she hissed, ‘but what could I do? It’s his flat. I couldn’t very well tell him to piss off.’
‘Well, it’s not actually,’ said Julia. ‘It’s both your flat. You both live here.’
Joy shrugged feebly, and Julia and Bella exchanged a glance, which told Joy everything she needed to know about their opinion of her man-management skills.
‘Oh, well,’ breathed Julia, ‘at least we finally get to meet him, the enigmatic George.’
And with that they both charged down the corridor and burst into the living room where George, Wilkie and Marian were sitting in the far corner, sharing a bottle of claret and talking very quietly.
‘Now which one of you two lucky, lucky men is George?’ said Bella, standing in the doorway with his hand on his hip.
Wilkie gulped so hard that his Adam’s apple looked as if it might roll out of his mouth, and Marian just sat and blinked.
‘Er, hello,’ said George, looking more like an accountant than he’d ever looked in his life. ‘I’m George.’
‘Georgie Porgie, pudding and pie!’ squealed Bella, and launched himself at George with his arms spread open. ‘We’ve heard so much about you.’ He kissed George firmly on both cheeks, leaving lipstick kisses, which George immediately rubbed off with the backs of his hands.
‘Hi,’ said Julia, steaming towards George with gently undulating breasts, ‘I’m Julia, Joy’s old landlady. Oh, God, that makes me sound terrible, an old landlady, like Annie Walker or something, but you know what I mean. It’s gorgeous to meet you.’
The colour visibly drained from George’s face as Julia wrapped her arms around him, squashing her bosom flat against his chest.
‘It’s er, very nice to meet you, too,’ he managed before gently extricating himself from her embrace.
Julia stared around the room, trying and failing to find something nice to say about it while Bella adjusted his feather boa.
‘Toke?’ said Marian, passing Bella the bum end of a spliff.
Bella turned to her and sneered. ‘Oh, no,’ he said, ‘disgusting stuff. Never touch it.’
‘Oh,’ said Marian, sadly, ‘never mind.’
For a second the room resonated with the silence of people wondering what to say next, until it was finally broken by the timely chime of the doorbell. Joy breathed a sigh of relief, praying that she was about to open the door to Dymphna and Karen, her lovely sane friends from Bristol, but in the doorway stood Roz and Jacquie, swaying drunkenly and carrying a bunch of blown-up condoms and two bottles of tequila
‘Aargh! Happy Fucking Hen Night!’ They both crashed through the door, forcing a cheap nylon veil over Joy’s head and attaching L plates to her back as they went. ‘Fucking nightmare, finding this place,’ said Roz, looking around the damp hallway uncertainly. ‘Cab driver said he’d only come south if we showed him our tits. So we got out and got on the fucking Tube. God, it’s fucking freezing in here. Have you got a window open?’
Joy disgorged them from their coats, revealing extremely short skirts and Lycra tops with cutout panels. ‘No,’ she whispered, ‘it’s just cold. It’s warmer through there.’ – she indicated the living room – ‘We’e got a blow heater.’
‘Thank fuck for that,’ said Jacquie, passing Joy a bottle of tequila and wrapping her skinny arms around herself.
In the living room, Roz and Jacquie clung vaguely to the wall as introductions were made, clearly horrified that they’d got all dressed up and trekked halfway across London to sit in an ugly room full of freaks.
‘All right,’ they said in unison, gazing numbly around the room, before backing out and dashing into the safety of the kitchen. This left Joy torn between feeling she should stay in the living room, where Bella was completely freaking George out by flipping vigorously through his CDs as if he was browsing in Our Price, and heading into the kitchen to make sure Roz and Jacquie were OK and to get everyone a drink. She decided that they’d probably all survive a few minutes on their own and went to get some drinks.
‘He’s not staying is he, your George?’ said Roz, grabbing her arm urgently.
‘Yes. He is.’
‘You’re fucking kidding me,’ said Jacquie. ‘It’s your fucking hen night.’
‘I know. But he kind of landed it on me unexpectedly, and I didn’t handle it very well.’
Jacquie snorted and lit a cigarette. ‘Christ, you’re not joking.’
‘I’m really sorry. It’ll be fine. Honestly. I promise.’ Joy could feel herself shrinking in their estimation as she spoke. And when she thought for a moment about the ludicrous situation she had somehow allowed George to orchestrate on what was supposed to be her last night of freedom, she couldn’t really blame them.
*
By the time Dymphna and Karen arrived ten minutes later, it was too late – their normality was lost in a fug of overwhelming weirdness. The night was a disaster. It was hanging on to itself by a thread. Joy’s skin itched with the discomfort of it all.
Julia, Bella, Karen and Dymphna were all trying their hardest to pretend that this was a perfectly acceptable excuse for a hen night, talking slightly too loudly and verging on the hysterical. Roz and Jacquie sat smoking furiously in one corner, making no attempt to hide their disappointment, while George sat cocooned by Marian and Wilkie, making absolutely no effort to engage with her friends.
The loud ones grew louder as the night drew out and the quieter ones grew quieter, and when Bella put on a 1970s disco compilation and started dancing on the coffee table Joy had to physically remove herself from the room for a while.
She went to the kitchen and washed some glasses, staring numbly at her reflection in the kitchen window as she did so. She was torn halfway between two existences – pre-George and post-George – and the realization that there was to be no meeting point between the two worlds left her feeling cold with dread.
‘Hi, honey.’ Julia squeezed in behind her and stroked her hair. ‘You all right?’
‘Yes,’ she beamed, ‘excellent.’
‘Having fun?’
‘Fantastic!’
‘Good. George is lovely.’
‘Do you think so?’
‘Yes. And he’s not ugly at all, you know.’
‘Really?’
‘No. He’s nice. I don’t know what you were worrying about.’
‘I’m really sorry,’ she began, ‘sorry he’s here. Sorry I didn’t organize things better.’
‘Ah, well. It’s not the end of the world. And everyone’s having a lovely time.’
‘No, but really. I feel awful. You’ve all made such an effort and I haven’t made any. I mean, I didn’t even buy any mixers,’ she gestured at the fridge.
And it was true. She’d had all day to organize things, to make the flat look nice, but instead she’d spent the entire day in bed with George. It was what they did on Saturdays. George bought breakfasty things the day before – croissants, expensive bread, exotic honey from some far-flung corner of the globe – then they lay in bed, sleeping off the ill effects of the two or three bottles of wine they’d drunk the previous night, listening to the radio, having sex and talking. All day. Until it was time to go out for dinner. And even though today was different, even though they were having a party, for some reason it hadn’t really occurred to either of them to break the pattern and do something about it. George had bought a case of ponderous-looking wine from Oddbins the night before and seemed to think that that constituted a party, but some skewed internal logic had made Joy feel that suggesting a trip to the supermarket to stock up on crisps and mixers would in effect have been suggesting that pushing a trolley around Tesco was a more appealing prospect than spending the day in bed with him and that her friends were therefor
e more important to her than him, and she’d pushed the notion to the back of her mind and gone with the flow.
‘Are you sure you’re OK?’ said Julia, turning to face her.
‘Yes. Honestly. It’s just not what I expected, that’s all.’ You know you can change your mind, don’t you?’
‘What?’
‘About getting married. You know no one would be cross.’
‘Oh, Julia,’ she said with a brittle laugh.
‘Seriously, hon. If you’re having any doubts, any doubts at all, don’t do it. It’s too important not to be 100 percent sure.’
At these kindly words, Joy felt the tear ducts at the bridge of her nose pinch together tightly, followed by a painful scratching at the back of her throat. She turned away to rearrange the glasses on the draining board.
‘I’m not saying you should have any doubts,’ Julia continued, obviously feeling she’d inadvertently offended her. ‘Just that if you did, you should, you know, act on them.’
And Joy knew then that Julia was implicitly telling her that in her opinion she was making a mistake and that she was offering her a winch back to dry land, but the prospect of discussing her impending folly, here, tonight, now, was too much to handle. ‘Well,’ she said softly, controlling an urge to gulp, ‘I hear what you’re saying.’
‘It’s just something I always say,’ said Julia, looking suddenly flustered. ‘To all my friends, before they get married. You know.’
Joy smiled, relieved that Julia was backtracking. ‘Bless you.’ She draped an arm around Julia’s soft, bare shoulder and pulled her towards her for a hug. ‘You’re the nicest person in the whole world.’
‘No,’ said Julia, ‘you are. And you know what they say about nice girls, don’t you’?’
‘No. What’s that?’
‘They finish last. Oh, and they get cancer. So don’t be too nice – eh?’
And then Julia hooked her arm through Joy’s and they headed back into the living room, just in time to see Bella fall on to George’s lap, loop his arms around his neck and slur at the top of his voice, ‘Joy said you were really ugly, but you know what? I don’t think you’re ugly at all. I think you look just like a lovely big fluffy teddy bear.’
Joy listened to the echoing shards of Julia and Bella’s laughter as they left the flat at midnight and got into a rumbling taxi outside the building. She clicked the door closed slowly and headed towards the living room.
George was sitting with his knees brought up to his chest, surrounded by empty wine bottles and smoking a spliff. He didn’t turn around when she entered the room, just stared into the distance, exhaling doughy cushions of smoke. Joy perched herself uncertainly on the edge of the sofa and looked at him. She hadn’t the first idea what to say, what to apologize for first. Every arrangement of words that came to her mind seemed destined to aggravate the situation further, so it seemed safer to say nothing at all. She placed a hand on George’s knee, which he ignored. A moment’s silence passed, then George pressed his spliff into a jumble of butts and uncurled himself.
‘Well,’ he said, reaching to switch off a table lamp, ‘I can honestly say that that was the most appalling night of my entire life. Good night.’
He stalked from the room, leaving Joy sitting in the dark watching an orange circle burn its way through a Rizla in the ashtray and turn to colourless ash.
Thirty-Six
Bella took a pin from his mouth and pressed it firmly into the cream fabric.
‘You’ve lost weight,’ he said, tugging at the dress. ‘You can’t keep losing weight. I’m not going to have any fabric left to stitch together.’
‘I can’t help it,’ said Joy, balanced precariously on top of a stool in the middle of Bella’s bedsit. ‘I’m just not hungry’
Yes. And why’s that? Because you’re miserable, that’s why.’
‘I am not miserable.’
‘You are. I can tell.’
‘I am not. I’m getting married in four days. It’s stressful. There’s so much to organize. And anyway, why would I be miserable?’
‘Because you live in a pigging disgusting flat in south London, because your first love is married to a supermodel, because your fiancé hasn’t spoken to you since your sorry excuse for a hen night…’
‘Bell… ‘ Joy glanced down at him pleadingly, ‘you do promise you won’t tell Julia about that, won’t you?’
Bella raised his eyebrows and snorted. ‘Of course I won’t tell her. We wouldn’t want to burst her lovely, big, pink, romantic bubble now would we?’
‘And anyway – it’s not that he’s not talking to me; it’s more that he’s not using very many words when he does. And I can’t really blame him. I mean, who wouldn’t be upset if they found out that their future wife had been going around telling all and sundry that she thought he was ugly’
Bella shrugged and blanched. ‘Yeah, well. I’m really sorry about that. I shouldn’t drink. I’m no good at it. And anyway, I still don’t understand why you didn’t just tell him that I was lying. I wouldn’t have minded.’
‘Because it would so obviously have been a lie. Why would you say something like that if it wasn’t true? George isn’t stupid. It would just have made it worse if I’d tried to deny it.’
‘So, how much longer do you think this silent treatment’s going to go on for?’
‘Oh, God,’ tutted Joy, ‘I don’t know’
‘Because he’ll have to start talking to you again at some point or he won’t be able to say his vows, then all this…’ he said, gesturing at her dress, ‘would look pretty fucking silly, wouldn’t it?’
‘Look. He’ll come round in the end. This is just his way of dealing with things. He’s hurt. And there’s absolutely nothing I can say to him to make it any better. Even if I tell him that I’ve changed my mind, that I think he’s the most handsome man in the whole world, nothing can take away the fact that I used to think he was ugly. I keep expecting him to call off the wedding, but he’s still going through the motions.’
‘And what about you?’
‘What about me?’
‘Are you still going through the motions? Do you still want to go through with it?’
‘Of course I do.’
‘And you still love him?’
‘Totally. I mean he’s not perfect or anything, he can be moody and stuff, but it’s still the best relationship I’ve ever had.’
‘Yeah, but…’ Bella took the final pin from his mouth and embedded it into the hem of her dress. ‘You say it’s the best relationship you’ve ever had, but that doesn’t mean to say it’s the best one you’ll ever have. I mean, you might meet someone tomorrow who just blows you away, you know, someone who doesn’t only make you feel amazing, but someone who makes you feel complete. Someone with a warm flat, someone with straight hair. Someone a bit more… you. I just don’t understand why you’re settling for second best, I really don’t… ’
Joy stared at Bella in surprise. ‘Second best?’
‘Yes. Because, Joy, my sweet girl, I know this is neither the time nor the place to be saying this, but I really think you could do so much better than Georgie Porgie.’
Joy felt herself stiffen defensively. Well,’ she said tersely, ‘you say that, but actually, could I? Could I really do better than George? I used to think maybe I could. When I met him, it was like he was someone from another planet, I thought he was totally beneath me, but actually he’s about a hundred times cleverer than me, he’s got a really nice body, he’s really good in bed, he’s romantic and sensitive and kind. All his family are dead or missing, he’s had to look after himself since he was eighteen and it’s not surprising that he gets a bit moody from time to time. And I’m not exactly perfect myself. And if I do decide to hang around waiting for some “perfect man”, where will that get me, anyway? Men like that always leave you in the end, they always find someone better to be with, someone more beautiful.’
‘Men like what, exacdy?’
‘Men like Vincent Mellon. Men like Stuart Bigmore. Men like my fucking father… ’
‘Ah, yes,’ said Bella, folding his arms across his chest, ‘your father… ’
‘Oh God, please don’t start that again. This has got nothing to do with my fucking father.’
‘Oh, of course it has. It’s got everything to do with your father. How else would you explain that a week after he left your poor downtrodden mother for a glamorous younger woman, a week after you cut him out of your life, you bizarrely accepted a proposal of marriage from a man you barely knew and didn’t fancy? It’s because you think that if you marry someone who puts you on a pedestal, then you’ll never end up like your mother. But the problem with pedestals, Mrs Pole, is that you can fall off them.’ He grabbed the legs of the stool she was balanced on and shook it from side to side.
‘I am not on a pedestal,’ she tutted, and gripped Bella’s bony shoulder for support. And I am not afraid of ending up like my mother.’ She climbed gingerly off the stool. All I want is to make George happy and have a lovely life. And I really think that once we’re married, all this insecurity and sulking, it’ll stop, because then he’ll know that I’m not going to run off with someone else, that I’m not going to leave him.’
‘That’s what you think, is it?’
‘Uh-huh. He just needs a show of commitment. That’s all… ’
‘Well,’ said Bella, ‘you know what they say. Make a show of commitment in haste, repent at fucking leisure. It’s your funeral.’
Joy threw him a withering look and started to climb out of her dress.
‘Don’t you want to see it?’ said Bella. ‘Don’t you want to see what you like look in it?’
‘No,’ said Joy, ‘not yet. I’ll wait until it’s finished, till all the pins are out.’
‘Fair enough,’ said Bella, appraising her slowly, and adjusting the neckline slightly, ‘but for what it’s worth you are officially the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. In fact, if you had a cock, I’d marry you myself.’
George didn’t start talking to Joy properly again until two days later when she came home with her wedding dress in a huge white bag.