Wedding Babylon

by Imogen Edwards-Jones

  ‘I know.’ He nods in agreement. ‘Usually the man’s a total cunt. He is the most irritating fucking caterer we have to deal with.’

  ‘He’s not that bad.’

  ‘Fucking is. I have been working with him for fifteen years. More. Oh fuck me, I am old,’ he moans, running his hands through his hair. ‘This is a young man’s game, this job. Talking of which, how did Jez do last night?’

  ‘Very well until about two a.m.’

  ‘Yes?’ Bernard’s eyes narrow with suspicion.

  ‘It wasn’t really his fault. He’d done so well setting it all up, supervising one of Piers’ sidekicks – Toby, I think his name was – and the whole party was rocking. It was about two in the morning when I found him round the back, finishing off a bottle of tequila with Esther’s cousin, who is eighteen but still at school.’

  ‘Oh. Not a good look.’

  ‘It would have been fine if she hadn’t projectile vomited all over Jez’s shoulder while he was trying to snog her. Anyway, her mother got involved and Jez was accused of leading her astray, and the girl had to be escorted home by both her parents because she couldn’t actually stand up.’

  ‘OK,’ says Bernard. ‘Not a total disaster. At least he wasn’t caught with his trousers round his ankles giving her one over the bins.’

  ‘No – thank heavens for small mercies. And Esther told me the girl’s been suspended a few times from school already, so she is hardly a Miss Goody Two Shoes.’

  ‘Well then,’ sighs Bernard. He’s been around the block far too many times to let some snogging and sick interfere with his day. ‘Apart from that?’

  ‘Excellent,’ I reply.

  ‘Good, I am glad,’ he says. ‘They are a very nice couple, even if the bloke, Nick, is a little bit ginger.’

  ‘I think he’d say he was strawberry blond.’

  ‘They all do,’ smiles Bernard. ‘The footballer’s fiancée is coming in again this morning. I hope you’ve made some notes about what she might want to do?’

  ‘Yup,’ I say, looking through the pile of paper on my desk. ‘It is all here somewhere, right down to the price of five songs by Elton John.’

  ‘Everyone knows he’s a million a show and he does six a year. It is not so much the price of him, or indeed any of them – Lionel Richie, Donna Summer, Billy Joel, Rod Stewart – it is all their poxy demands that drive me mad. They want their own marquees, private jets, helicopter transport to and from the airport, and that’s just to get them to the wedding. When they’re there, they want their own food and drink and they get all grumpy and pissed off because the schedule has slipped a bit and the poor father of the bride is going on a bit, and they start getting all arsy backstage, saying they were contracted for forty-five minutes between seven and seven forty-five and if they don’t hurry up they’ve got to go. Some of them will literally do their set and cut it short if the speeches have overrun. Don’t you remember, the other day Rod Stewart didn’t even get to ‘I Am Sailing’ before he pissed off.’

  ‘Elton was nice.’

  ‘Yeah, well, he flew over, performed and was back in his villa in the South of France by three p.m. with a million quid in the bank. What’s not to be nice about?’

  ‘That’s true.’

  ‘Oh, and fucking contracts,’ he says, shaking his head. ‘They drive me crackers as well. You can’t video this. You can’t photograph that. And then they come on stage and the whole wedding party lurches forward brandishing their mobile phones, and all the paperwork that you’ve spent weeks tweaking and negotiating back and forth with their expensive lawyers and our equally expensive legal team is null and bloody void. And then the bride and groom go backstage to say thank you and the star turns around and asks where the photographer is, having said we weren’t allowed one anywhere near the private area, and I end up taking shit photos of Elton with the happy couple with my fucking snappy snap.’

  ‘Anyway,’ I say, ‘when Camilla comes in I shall ask her to have a quick search to see who’s on tour around the time of Keeley’s wedding.’

  ‘I thought she wanted Take That?’ says Bernard.

  ‘Oh yeah,’ I nod.

  ‘Lionel Richie is always one of the most popular, and he’s not too bad at about £250,000 – she could always have him.’

  ‘Either that or she’ll ask for someone we’ve never heard of,’ I say. ‘How old is she?’

  ‘Early twenties,’ says Bernard. ‘I hope we get Take That. A boy band.’ He smiles. ‘Now that would be fun.’

  Bernard goes back to his office to put in a phone call to Nigel and shove his head up his backside and thank him profusely yet again for helping him out yesterday. I can hear his grovelling obsequiousness from here and it’s enough to make you want to puke. Then again, I am feeling quite queasy anyway. Two hours’ sleep tends to do that to me – it gives me a dry mouth, and makes me irritably disorientated. I am going to need more caffeine than a junkie fresh out of rehab just to get me through today.

  My mobile goes.

  ‘Penrose.’

  ‘Good morning,’ comes Kathryn’s now familiar depressive voice.

  ‘How are you?’ My heart sinks; I am rather hoping she doesn’t truthfully answer the question.

  ‘Fine,’ she replies, surprisingly. ‘I just wanted to apologize for yesterday. That’s twice I have done that to you now.’ She laughs weakly.

  ‘I know,’ I agree, doing the same.

  ‘Well, anyway, I don’t normally sit and weep in front of people, so I am sorry. God knows what the other woman thought.’

  ‘Oh, Caroline’s fine, she wouldn’t mind, she’s been married herself.’

  ‘So she knows.’

  ‘Yes,’ I agree to whatever the hell she means by that. Keeley is due in the office in about half an hour and I have still got to get some concepts and ideas together for her to have a look at. We also need to get a couple of photographers to come and pitch to her as well. So time is of the essence.

  ‘She knows how stressful the whole thing can be,’ she continues.

  ‘Yes, I suppose.’

  ‘And how difficult it is.’

  ‘Mmm.’ I am flicking through the ideas file we did for a rich Russian last year to see if there is anything that might tempt Keeley. The well-off always tend to want the same sort of stuff. There are various status boxes that usually get ticked – lobster, caviar, a pop star to sing. I remember going out with one rich client just before Christmas and ending up in Boujis nightclub of all places. We were drinking Grey Goose vodka cocktails, but the man still called the waiter over. ‘Oi, garçon,’ he yelled above the loud music. ‘Bring me a bottle of that Cristal champagne. But keep the cork in it. We don’t want to drink it,’ he said, turning to me. ‘We just want to look like everyone else.’

  ‘But I don’t suppose she had a father who was sleeping with the chief bridesmaid!’ she declares, before bursting into tears again.

  I am afraid at this point I put the phone down on my desk and press Loudspeaker. She carries on talking and crying and sharing all her family problems, while I flick through one of our marquee catalogues, wondering if Keeley would like a traditional cream silk-lined number or something a little more adventurous. Occasionally, when there is a pause in the sobbing, I pick up and mumble sympathetic noises down the phone. Finally the gasping and sobbing comes to an end with her apologizing once more.

  ‘I am sorry,’ she sighs. ‘There I go again.’

  ‘There you go again,’ I agree.

  ‘I don’t know what’s wrong with me.’

  ‘Yes – well.’

  ‘I promise it won’t happen again.’ She blows her nose down the receiver.

  ‘OK then, speak soon,’ I say, trying to bring it all to an end.

  ‘Yes, yes,’ she mumbles and hangs up.

  ‘Not the snot monster again?’ asks Camilla, dumping her handbag on her desk. ‘That woman needs a full-time therapist, not a wedding planner.’

  ‘I think she needs to find
a few friends.’

  ‘That dog’s not here today, is it?’ she asks, looking under her desk and towards Bernard’s office. ‘It stunk the place out yesterday. I can’t tell you how pleased I was to drop it off at Bernard’s last night. Did you hear about the cake?’

  ‘I know, good as new.’

  ‘Alice was over the moon. She rang the office last night on the verge of tears – good tears,’ she adds. ‘Saying how great it looks and how much she liked the placements.’

  ‘Great. I like to hear about happy satisfied customers,’ I smile, clicking my pen. Keeley is due in about ten minutes so I need to concentrate on my list. ‘Oh, can you do me a favour, Camilla?’

  ‘Yes.’ She sounds dubious. ‘What?’

  ‘Can you find out if Take That or anyone else is touring in Ireland next year at the beginning of July? You know, for possible acts for Keeley’s wedding?’

  ‘How do you expect me to find that out?’ she asks, curling her top lip. ‘I don’t know where to begin.’

  ‘This coming from a girl who can outbid everyone on eBay for a pair of Christian Louboutin shoes because you have put a programme on your computer,’ I reply. ‘If you can beat everyone to the Louboutins you can find out if the Pussycat Dolls are playing Dublin.’

  ‘No bride wants the Pussycat Dolls at their wedding. “Don’t You Wish Your Girlfriend Was Hot Like Me?” Hardly the song to do a first dance to.’

  ‘Yeah well, just check who else is around. We want to look like we’ve made an effort when she arrives in six minutes’ time.’

  ‘All right,’ she sighs, sitting down at her computer and logging on. ‘Have you heard from Jez this morning?’

  ‘Mmm?’

  ‘I hear he made a total tit of himself at the wedding by trying to shag the fifteen-year-old bridesmaid.’

  ‘She was eighteen and not a bridesmaid and he wasn’t trying to shag her. Well, he might have been, but it didn’t get that far – she puked all over him.’

  ‘Oh,’ she says, looking over her shoulder at me. ‘I’m glad. There’s nothing more pathetic than shagging the bridesmaid.’ She stares at me. ‘It is such an old cliché.’

  ‘Really?’ I say, suddenly feeling an urgent need to shuffle some important papers. ‘Ah.’ The door buzzer sounds at a delightfully opportune moment. ‘That’ll be Keeley.’

  ‘That’ll be Keeley,’ shouts Bernard from his office. ‘No one mention plumed horses and bloody baby’s breath. Bring her straight in here and offer her whatever she wants to drink.’

  A few minutes later Keeley floats into the room. The symphony of honey has been replaced by a bright box-white velour tracksuit with matching white Chanel padded pumps. This time, however, the tracksuit is undone to reveal a white cropped top, high round boobs and a toned bronzed flat stomach, complete with diamond belly piercing. Her honey blonde hair is scraped back into a high ponytail – a look that Bernard is prone to call the Croydon facelift.

  ‘Hiya,’ she says, smiling sweetly. ‘I am on me own this time, so please be nice.’

  ‘Lovely to see you,’ I say, leaping out from behind my desk. ‘Would you like anything?’

  ‘Do you have any carrot juice?’ she asks. ‘I am on this detox diet and I am supposed to have three a day. It tastes disgusting – I have to hold my nose to get the stuff down.’

  ‘I am sure Camilla can pop out and get you one,’ I say, as Camilla flicks me the V behind Keeley’s back.

  ‘Would you?’ asks Keeley, spinning round.

  ‘Sure,’ squeaks Camilla, suddenly feeling the need to scratch her head.

  ‘Shall we go through?’ I say, putting my hand in the small of her perfectly formed back.

  ‘Sorry about the clothes,’ she says, looking down. ‘I have just been on the Stairmaster.’ Lucky Stairmaster is all I can think, as I guide her into Bernard’s room.

  ‘Keeley!’ says Bernard, rushing over to shake her hand. ‘Lovely to see you again. How have you been? Has that great fiancé of yours been scoring goals?’

  ‘They’re not playing at the moment, it’s out of season.’

  ‘So he is hanging around the house annoying you, getting under your feet,’ Bernard jokes.

  ‘Well, we’ve got four and a half thousand square feet so that would be difficult,’ she replies. ‘Anyway he’s out most days playing golf with the lads.’

  ‘Is that what footballers do on their days off?’ I ask.

  ‘They still have to train,’ she replies. ‘But he likes golf, and test-driving cars is his other thing.’

  ‘Sounds great.’ I smile, thinking the opposite.

  ‘So,’ says Bernard, indicating towards the green leather sofa. ‘Any more thoughts on the wedding?’

  ‘Well, yes,’ she says. ‘We definitely want the same castle as Victoria and David, if we can, but the week after, so as no one thinks we’re copying.’

  ‘Right.’ Bernard nods. ‘Anything else?’

  ‘And the food – maybe just a steak? If you can’t do Christmas dinner with the trimmings, then steak and chips is our next favourite.’

  ‘OK. Maybe I should put you in touch with Nigel, one of our best caterers, and you should have a meeting with him so you can see what sort of fantastic stuff he does. I can also put you in touch with Piers, who is very good at a slightly more esoteric menu – a bit of Asian fusion. A few of his chefs have trained at Nobu.’

  ‘Oh, I’ve been there,’ she says. ‘Ever so nice. They do a fantastic chocolate pudding dish. Not that I had any of it, but it looked great.’

  ‘That’s all a good idea then,’ says Bernard. ‘Now one thing we need to organize for you is security.’

  ‘OK,’ she nods.

  ‘I would say about £40,000 should cover it, which should include about £20,000 for police outriders. How has your agent got on with a magazine deal? Because whoever you sell it to, if you are selling it, should pay for the security, or else it will come out of your fee, I think.’

  ‘We are considering offers at the moment.’

  ‘Oh,’ says Bernard, sounding a little disappointed. After his conversation earlier in the week, he was obviously hoping that he had managed to persuade her otherwise.

  ‘They are only offering £500,000 each at the moment, which I think is a little tight, don’t you? Bearing in mind that Keith was one of the top goal-scorers in the league last year and I was runner up in Rear of the Year?’

  ‘Yes, I see,’ nods Bernard.

  ‘And I was Specsavers’ Specs Wearer of the Year last year,’ she adds, waving a white-tipped finger.

  ‘I didn’t know you wore glasses,’ I say.

  ‘I don’t. I wore them for a shoot once, that’s all.’

  ‘Right then, we’ll need to sort out the security and then let’s work out later who is going to pick up the tab, if indeed anyone is. Do you have any preferences about who you have?’ he asks.

  ‘Sorry? Like a firm we like?’

  ‘Well, not so much that, but I once had a Russian oligarch who announced that he didn’t want any black security guards.’

  ‘Really?’ says Keeley, looking shocked. ‘But that’s racist.’

  ‘It is,’ agrees Bernard.

  ‘I despise racists.’

  ‘So do I,’ says Bernard. ‘So you don’t mind who we get?’

  ‘No, just so long as they are proper.’ She crosses her legs. ‘And good looking! That bloke Whitney Houston had in the film The Bodyguard, he’d be nice.’

  ‘I’ll see what Kevin Costner is doing these days,’ I laugh.

  ‘Who?’ she says, looking a little puzzled.

  ‘The bloke from the film.’ She smiles confusedly, giving me the benefit of her bleaching treatment. ‘Never mind.’

  ‘We also need to check to see if there is any public right of way through the castle,’ says Bernard. ‘After last time . . .’

  Bernard and I had a bizarre experience once with the police when we were doing another celebrity wedding a few years ago now. I was on si
te the week beforehand, sitting with the head of security, when a senior police officer came up and asked to see whoever was dealing with the party. We went into the catering tent together to have a chat and he said he wanted to help. He mentioned that there were a couple of footpaths going through this wedding and the public had a right of way and could legally walk into the marquee. I suggested that perhaps we didn’t want ramblers at the party and he said he could shut it for us, by putting a few police here and there. I said, ‘Give me some costs and I will clear it with my client.’ So they came back a couple of hours later and asked for £16,000 for eight policemen, but said that they still couldn’t get the footpath closed. So I said, ‘No, thank you.’ To which he replied, ‘It is going to be looked upon pretty dimly by the press if you end up with hordes of people trying to get in and no proper security to deal with this.’ He then walked off. My head of security then turned to me and said, ‘Did he just threaten a riot? That’s blackmail.’ So we paid him in the end, just to stay off our backs.

  But before we can try and get any further decisions out of Keeley, one of the photographers arrives. Tall, slim, good-looking, with dark curly hair and a twinkle in his eye, Mike is the sort of guy that girls always fancy and he knows it. Keeley’s face brightens up no end as soon as he walks into the room. He charms everyone, which is why he is such a good photographer, and why he is Bernard’s number-one choice.

  ‘Good morning,’ he says, leaning over and planting a very wet kiss on Keeley’s cheek. ‘May I just say you are so much more gorgeous in the flesh.’

  ‘Oh, thank you,’ she giggles.

  ‘So what’s the story?’ He parks his black-jeaned backside in the middle of Bernard’s desk, right between Bernard and Keeley. Bernard looks furious, but Mike is too busy engaging to notice. ‘You, your fiancé, Keith – is that his name?’ He says it like he doesn’t know which wedding he is pitching for. ‘And four hundred of your closest friends?’

  ‘That’s about right.’ Keeley grins away on the sofa.

  ‘My portfolio is next door, if you would like to have a look. But before you see the most beautiful bridal photos of your life, let me tell you a bit about me. I normally do all the big weddings – not always glamorous celebrities like you. I do civilians as well.’ He laughs. ‘So if you are having finger food and champagne, you probably don’t need me! But if you’re spending two million and you are literally covering the whole of the front of the church in flowers then I am your man. Which I have seen, by the way – it looked amazing. I can do three weddings in a weekend. Or I can spend three days with just you. I have a team of assistants who come with. Not all of them are as good-looking as me, but we can’t have everything, can we, Keeley?’