From Notting Hill with Love Actually

by Ali McNamara

  “What is it?” I asked, turning the envelope over in my hands.

  “We’re not privy to that sort of information, miss. We were simply instructed to give you this if you seemed at all moved by the music we played. Just as well you like Ronan Keating, eh? Lucky you’re not a full-on thrash metal fan, or we might have had a different result on our hands!” Dermot and Finlay both laughed at his joke.

  “Er…yes.” I looked down at the envelope. “Should I open it now?”

  “I guess so. Well, we’re interested to know what’s in it anyway, aren’t we, Finlay?” Dermot turned to his silent partner. “We’ve never had a booking like this before.”

  Finlay nodded.

  “I guess I’d better open this.” I turned and looked back at the others. “I’m assuming that’s OK with everyone?”

  Everyone nodded with enthusiasm except David, who stood motionless next to the group now crowding around me.

  Slowly I opened the envelope.

  Inside there was a postcard and, underneath that, a ticket. I didn’t look at the picture on the postcard because handwritten on the other side in black ink were the words—

  If you feel the same…

  Meet me on top of the London Eye tomorrow.

  I’ll wait until midday.

  S x

  I read the card aloud.

  “What does he mean—the top of the London Eye, Scarlett?” my father asked, speaking for the first time. “Why would Sean want to meet you there? And how can he meet you at the top? Isn’t it constantly revolving?”

  “It’s like the movie, isn’t it?” my mother said, smiling. “An Affair to Remember.’”

  “I thought that was Sleepless in Seattle?” Maddie asked, joining in. “Meg Ryan tries to meet Tom Hanks on top of the Empire State Building.”

  “It’s both of them, actually,” Dermot piped up. “Sleepless in Seattle was based on An Affair to Remember.”

  Everyone turned and stared at him.

  “It’s my girlfriend,” he said, blushing under his hat. “She watches all those kinds of films.” His voice deepened. “I’m more of an Arnie guy myself, obviously.”

  We all turned back to the card still held in my hands.

  I shook my head. “This is all just madness. I can’t believe I’m standing out here now even looking at this—let’s all go back inside and continue with the service. I…I shouldn’t have dragged you all out here, I’m sorry.”

  I looked to where David had been standing a few minutes ago but he’d gone.

  “Where’s David?” I asked, looking wildly around me.

  I felt a hand on my shoulder. “He’s gone back inside the church, Scarlett,” my father said gently. “I think he’d heard enough.”

  I looked up at the church and felt a wrench in my stomach. Poor David—what was I putting him through on our wedding day?

  “Are you absolutely sure about this, Scarlett?” Dad asked in the same gentle voice. “Are you sure it’s what you want—to go back in there and marry David? This invite, and the way it was supposed to be delivered,” he said, looking at Dermot and Finlay, “seems just the kind of romantic ending you’d get in one of your movies. Except this time it’s happening for real. Are you sure you don’t want it to end a different way?”

  “I…I don’t know.”

  “How do you feel about Sean?” my mother asked, appearing on my other side. “Do you love him?”

  I hung my head. “Yes, I think I do. But it’s complicated.”

  I could feel everyone willing me to tell them why.

  “It just is, OK?”

  “He obviously loves you, Scarlett,” my mother said, “to go to all this trouble.”

  “I thought you were against him?” I said, turning to her. “I thought you said he was a Daniel Cleaver.”

  My mother looked confused.

  “I believe he’s a character in Bridget Jones’s Diary,” Dermot suggested helpfully.

  We all stared at him again.

  “Yes, I’m aware of that—thank you,” my mother said, slowly turning away from Dermot. “But what’s that got to do with anything, Scarlett?”

  Oh, this was just getting far too complicated to explain now. “Look, forget I said that. It just makes more sense to marry Mark…I mean David.”

  “Why does it, Scarlett?” Maddie asked now. “If you love Sean more? Yes, I know you’re here at the church about to get married, and it would be easier to just go through with it all now. But this is just one day—we’re talking about the rest of your life.”

  “Because…” I stuttered.

  “See?” Maddie continued. “I knew this would happen after I saw you two together at my wedding.”

  “Sean is the chap you took to Maddie’s wedding?” Dad asked in surprise.

  “Yes—why?” I asked, wondering what that had to do with anything.

  “Because David told me about this absolute cretin that went with you to Paris, said he was a right slimeball and was all over you that night. He described him as a complete loser.”

  “David would say that, though—he hates Sean.”

  “And with good reason, it would seem now. But Sean’s not a loser,” Dad said, defending him. “Nor is he a cretin, come to think of it. He’s a very smart, astute businessman. And a nice genuine young fellow too.”

  “How do you know all this, Tom?” Mum asked. “How are you able to form such a rounded opinion of someone you’ve only met the once, like me?”

  My father sighed. “Look, Scarlett, Sean asked me not to tell you this—but I feel now with so much hanging in the balance, I must. Sean has offered to invest in our business. He’s recently bought a chain of cinemas over in the States, and he wants us to provide not only the popcorn makers for every single outlet, but all the food concessions too.”

  “He’s done what?” I asked, slowly absorbing this information. “But that means…”

  “Our business will be made for life, Scarlett—yes.”

  “But…” I couldn’t take all this in. If we exported to America with Sean, that meant we wouldn’t need David’s cinema chain…

  “Sounds like he cares more about your welfare than you realize, Scarlett,” Maddie said knowingly. “If he’s gone to all the trouble of buying a chain of cinemas for you.”

  I shook my head. “They’re not for me—they’re just a business venture. There must be money in it, or Sean wouldn’t be involved.”

  “May I just say something?” a polite voice asked, and someone stepped forward to join our debate. It was Ursula. “I haven’t said anything up until now, because being Sean’s sister you’d all just think I was biased. But it was actually Sean who helped reunite you with your mother, Scarlett.”

  I looked at Ursula.

  “No, it wasn’t. We just bumped into each other accidentally in the cinema one evening—you should know, you were there.”

  “That’s what I thought at the time too. But it was Sean who encouraged us to go around to your house that day. Sean who suggested we take you out for the evening, and Sean who absolutely insisted we take you to that exact cinema.”

  I turned to Oscar, who nodded in agreement.

  “Scarlett, you know Sean and I don’t exactly see eye to eye,” he admitted. “But Ursula’s right. He was the one who insisted it had to be the Coronet. He told us it was because of the Notting Hill connection and we’d be helping you out with your movie thing by taking you there. But the truth of the matter is we found out later he’d actually tracked your mother down, found out she worked there, and even knew what shifts she was on so he could guarantee you’d bump into each other.”

  I stared in astonishment between Oscar and Ursula for a few seconds before turning first to my mother, and then my father, and then Maddie, who all stared back at me with similar expressions.

  “I…I don’t know what to say…I don’t know what to do.” I returned my gaze to my mother. “Mum, what do you think?”

  She thought for a moment. “
Forget what I said to you on the telephone, Scarlett. I think Sean has put an awful lot of expense, but more importantly thought, into trying to win your heart. And you won’t find many men who can do both—believe me, I’ve spent long enough looking for one. And, if it hadn’t been for him, it seems I wouldn’t be standing here now. But only you can decide what to do for the best.”

  “Dad?” I asked, looking at my father again.

  “Scarlett, you have my blessing whatever you decide to do—both now and in the future. But whatever you decide, all I ask is, you forget about the movies for once. This is real life you’re dealing with now, not a film script. You must take it seriously.”

  “But I do take it seriously. That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you all along. In the month I was away I had so many experiences that completely back up my theory, but you wouldn’t listen when I tried to tell you. Life can be like a movie—perhaps not always in the same saccharine sweet way they portray it to be in the cinema, but maybe living with that sort of hope and those types of dreams is the only way you’ll ever find a happy ending in life.”

  “Then why stop now?” I heard a voice behind us call. I turned around and saw David standing high up on the steps of the church. “Why stop, Scarlett, when you’re on a roll? Let’s live out a real movie scene right here, right now.”

  “David, I…”

  “Perhaps we’d better go inside,” my father said, attempting to herd everyone together. “David, you and Scarlett should discuss this in private.”

  “No, why bother?” David said in a tight voice. “You’ve all heard everything else. You might as well hear this too. Plus,” he said, looking directly at me, “it will be so much more dramatic this way, and that’s what Scarlett likes, a bit of drama and excitement in her life—don’t you, Scarlett?”

  Even though it was a warm April morning, I felt a shiver run through me as I stood and watched David speaking at the top of the steps. I never wanted to hurt him. I hadn’t meant for any of this to happen.

  Everyone around us stood in silence as I gazed up at him. Out of the corner of my eye I noticed Dermot and Finlay removing their hats.

  “I’m going to make this really easy for you, Scarlett,” David said, looking down at me. “You know when we hired a wedding planner to help us plan for this wonderful day in our lives, you thought she would be just like Jennifer Lopez in the film?”

  He waited for my answer, so I just nodded.

  “And she wasn’t—she turned out to be more like…now what did you call her? Cruella De Vil?”

  I nodded furiously as Cruella scowled at me from where she was perching on a nearby gravestone.

  “Well, this part of our wedding is going to be just the same as in that movie. Do you remember it, Scarlett? The bit just before the couple are due to get married.”

  I looked up at David glowering at me from the steps above, and I nodded sadly.

  “You do? Good. Well, just like the groom in that movie, Scarlett, I’m going to make this really easy for you and take the choice between me and Sean out of your hands. Because guess what? I don’t want to marry you anymore.”

  There was a sharp intake of breath around the churchyard.

  “I don’t want to marry someone I can’t rely on and trust to be there for me 100 percent. I don’t want to marry someone who thinks I’m only second best. And”—his voice that had been so strong and devoid of emotion when he’d first stood on the steps was beginning to break now—“most importantly, I don’t want to marry someone who is, without question, so completely and utterly in love with someone else.”

  I made a move toward him but he held out his hand to stop me.

  “No, Scarlett. You wanted it this way—you wanted to live like you were in a movie and now you are. I’ve given you your dramatic last scene, just like in The Wedding Planner. But I bet you never expected to be the bride jilted at her own wedding.”

  “David, please,” I pleaded with him as he descended the steps of the church, obviously intending to leave this hellish situation I’d put him in as quickly as possible.

  I caught up with him at the bottom and grabbed hold of his arm.

  “David, wait…”

  “Go to him, Scarlett,” he whispered to me. “He doesn’t deserve you, but go to him if that’s what you want. Maybe you can have that fairytale ending you’ve always wanted—even if it’s not with me.”

  Then I watched as he marched out of the churchyard, quickly hailed a passing taxi, and was soon swallowed up into the swarming London traffic.

  I turned back to the others, who were watching everything that was unfolding in front of them. Then I glanced down at the invitation I still held tightly in my hand; this time I saw the picture on the other side of the postcard.

  “But it can’t be,” I whispered to myself. “How did he know?”

  The postcard was one of those art cards, the sort you get in galleries as a souvenir of one of their paintings. And the painting on the card was of a bride on her wedding day—it was La Mariée.

  It was the painting that had hung in the art gallery I went to visit with Maddie. The one Julia Roberts had given to Hugh Grant in the movie Notting Hill…The song that had been playing earlier had been from the same film. Ronan had sung it in the movie when they’d sat on the bench together in the moonlight—just like Sean and I had.

  Notting Hill was also where Sean and I had first met, in a bookshop—just like Hugh and Julia had.

  Now Sean was giving me this painting too…if I didn’t know better, I would have sworn that Sean knew these films as well as I did! But that was a mad thought, because he hated movies, didn’t he?

  I turned the postcard over and read it once more.

  “Oh my God!” I exclaimed as the realization of something awful hit me. “Where are Dermot and Finlay?”

  Replacing their hats on their heads they emerged from the crowd again. “You were supposed to deliver this yesterday, weren’t you?” I demanded of Dermot.

  “Yes, that’s right, but I did explain—”

  “But it says for me to meet Sean tomorrow…that means he’s there now…today, at the top of the London Eye—waiting for me!”

  I looked for the church clock. “What’s the time?” I asked impatiently when I couldn’t see it.

  Everyone looked at their watches.

  “It’s half past eleven,” Maddie answered first. “He’s still there if you’re going to go to him. Is that what you want, Scarlett? Do you want to go and find Sean?”

  “I do,” I said, almost as though I needed to reinforce the decision for myself now it was finally made. “I do, Maddie. I’m going to go and find Sean, and I’m going to have the happy ending I’ve always wanted.” I hugged her. “Now then,” I asked, looking around at everyone else. “Just how do you get to the London Eye from here?”

  “We’ll take you,” Dermot offered. “We’ve got our car parked around the corner.”

  “No, I couldn’t possibly ask you to do that.”

  “It’s OK. I used to be a London cabbie once upon a time. I have the knowledge,” Dermot said proudly. “Plus it would be our pleasure to help—wouldn’t it, Finlay? After all it’s our fault the invitation was late getting to you, it’s the least we can do.”

  “If you’re sure?” I looked at Finlay, who nodded his agreement silently as always.

  “Come on, let’s go!” Dermot called, already heading down the path. “You’ve no time to lose!”

  I ran after the Blues Brothers, clutching the card and ticket to my chest. “I love you all,” I called back to my parents, Maddie, Ursula, and Oscar as they followed us along the path to the waiting car.

  “And I love you too, Sean,” I whispered, looking down at the card in my hand once more. “Wait for me, won’t you—please.”

  Forty

  I think Dermot fancied himself as a bit of an action hero, because we took off at breakneck speed in the very authentic-looking American police car that he and Finlay had arri
ved in.

  I’d assumed they’d meant they had a normal car parked around the corner—not a replica from the original Blues Brothers movie. But it seemed that Dermot and Finlay took their business very seriously indeed. I was grateful now they hadn’t been able to turn up as Scarlett and Rhett today—because a horse-drawn carriage from the American Civil War wouldn’t have been traveling at anywhere near the speeds the “Bluesmobile” was doing right now.

  But it wouldn’t have mattered what form of transport we’d taken once we began to hit the central London gridlock. As I sat anxiously in the back of the police car, waiting for us to shunt forward another few meters, I suddenly realized what I was wearing.

  “Oh my God, I’m still in my wedding dress!” I panicked from the backseat. Finlay turned the stereo down that had been constantly playing the Blues Brothers soundtrack since we left, and Dermot glanced at me in his rearview mirror.

  “But you do look lovely in it,” he said, smiling.

  “I know, but I can’t just roll up and meet Sean in a wedding dress I was going to marry another man in, now can I?”

  “Hmm,” he said. “That is a bit tricky when you put it like that.”

  “What choice do I have? I can’t very well change now. I don’t have the time or anything to change into.” I leaned forward between the two front seats and looked through the windshield. “Damn it, is this traffic ever going to move?”

  It was just like Glasgow all over again—the day when Sean and I had ridden to the wedding on the back of mopeds. Except this time, I was the bride—running away from my own wedding.

  And yes, I know I was in yet another movie. And yet again it was a Julia Roberts one. But I didn’t have time to reflect on that now, as we slowed right down and virtually came to a standstill a few yards away from the entrance to a church.

  As we sat there waiting to move forward, I realized there must be another wedding taking place today, as the sound of church bells ringing filled the air. I hope yours is more successful than mine was, I thought as I sat well back in the car. I saw a man in full morning dress walk out of the church gates, and I wondered, as he walked toward us, if he was the nervous groom.