I then opened Alistair’s text.
Hi, just back from drinks with Mark. He was on good form, and, in case your mother asks, he stuck to Coke and headed home with Tim just after 10 ? I checked the bar for you when I got back to the Bear but I assume you’d hit the sack. Very sensible and just about to do the same myself. Will look forward to having a drink with you and Felix tomorrow. A x
The text, I thought to myself, was typically Alistair. To a casual observer, it might have seemed like a simple hi-how-are-you, but actually it was very carefully constructed, subtly clearing the air and paving the way for a smooth social encounter.
Firstly, there was the fond, playful acknowledgement of my mother’s caring but judgemental nature, designed to reassure me that he hadn’t been offended by her behaviour towards him in the restaurant. Then he had been sure to reconfirm that he was completely at ease, not only with me but also with my new relationship, by suggesting a drink with us both. His aim, I knew, was to avoid any awkwardness at the wedding and to make it clear that he expected, and looked forward to, an introduction to Felix.
All very sensitive and sensible, I reflected; just like his new girlfriend, no doubt. The same girlfriend whom he, in a very sensitive and sensible manner, was not bringing to the wedding. His invitation had, of course, been a plus-one, but Becca had told me that he hadn’t so much as hinted at bringing her along.
I had mostly been relieved by this decision, but a tiny bit of me was undeniably disappointed at missing out on an opportunity to scrutinise the new woman and guess at what she had that I didn’t. I knew it wasn’t youth – Becca had told me that she was a year older than Alistair, which made her three years older than me. And in the photograph of her and Alistair I had spotted on the Facebook page of a mutual friend, she had looked attractive – nice smile, face-framing hair, trim figure – but not intimidatingly stunning.
On my better days, I convinced myself that Alistair hadn’t upgraded and that his new relationship was simply a sideways move. But occasionally, at moments such as when sitting all alone in a king-size hotel bed, about to attend a wedding with a fake boyfriend because I hadn’t managed to come anywhere near to acquiring a real one in the past eleven months, it was hard not to feel insecure.
‘We’re just so different, Dot,’ was how Alistair had put it, the night he had told me that we needed to talk – the night before he had moved out. And I hadn’t disagreed with him. I had known that we were different from the outset of our two-year relationship. He had a detailed five-year life plan on his laptop – I had week-ahead Post-it notes stuck to the fridge; his taste in decor was expensively minimal – mine was cosily cluttered; he went through life anticipating problems – I fought fires as required. I had recognised all this and had thought that we balanced and completed each other in a wonderfully yin-yang kind of way. What I didn’t know was that while I had spent two years celebrating our differences, it turned out that Alistair had been generously overlooking them and hoping that I would change.
I sighed, deleted his text and, with some relief, finally opened my sister’s. It was a short but sweetly enthusiastic invitation to the day, and I smiled at her unerring ability to say just the right thing, at just the right time.
I gazed at the screen and, taking a deep breath, willed myself to share her texted sentiment.
‘Bring it on.’ I murmured, reading her written words out loud. ‘Bring it on.’
Chapter 10
I had never been a bridesmaid before, my other most likely opportunity having been scuppered when Kate and Fred decided upon a registry office wedding, with minimal fuss and fanfare. I hadn’t been at all disappointed at the time, but the fact that I had never undertaken the role before left me completely unprepared for the amount of manhandling and general abuse which I quickly discovered went with it.
First of all, I was stabbed with pins and scolded by Eileen for losing too much weight, as she made some eleventh-hour alterations to my dress. And then I was tortured with curling tongs, tweezers and eyelash curlers by someone called Kayleigh who, having been born five centuries too late to participate in the Spanish Inquisition, clearly got her kicks from inflicting pain in the name of beauty.
And just when I thought I might be able to relax into the day, following the mustn’t-put-a-foot-wrong formality and emotional intensity of the wedding service itself, I was set upon by a succession of my parents’ friends and relatives, many of whom I hadn’t seen for years, and all of whom were keen to get a picture with ‘little Dottie’.
However, there was a significant upside to all this wedding-related activity, namely that I was fully focused on my sister and the day, rather than on any lingering sadness over Alistair, or peripheral, niggling doubts about Felix and whether our plan would come together or disintegrate faster than Becca’s tissue-paper hula skirt in the rain.
Unfortunately, my carefree attitude regarding Felix eventually went a little too far and I became so carefree as to forget about him altogether. And it wasn’t until I spotted my mother pushing Nanny Flo in a wheelchair up the cobbled path towards him as he stood alone, hands in pockets, in the doorway of the church, that I remembered that I actually had a plus-one at this wedding.
Letting out a gasp, I immediately extricated myself from the photo call in which I was at that moment involved and, hitching up my lilac gown, ran as quickly as was possible in heels on cobbles towards Felix, desperate to reach him before my mother and grandmother did.
I managed it with two seconds to spare, grabbing his arm and gasping, ‘I’m so sorry. Don’t worry, I’m here now, I’ll handle this,’ just as my mother came within calling distance.
‘Oh, hello, darling,’ she beamed. ‘We couldn’t see you in the melee, but Nanny spotted Felix here all on his own and wanted to come over and say hello.’
I nodded, still a little breathless, and bent down to kiss Nanny Flo, who was at that moment extending her arms upwards towards me. ‘Hello, Nanny. How are you? I keep being grabbed for photographs.’
‘Not one bit surprised,’ she said unnecessarily loudly, whilst poking a finger into each ear. ‘You’re looking so beautiful. Isn’t she beautiful?’ She smiled, gazing up at Felix. He looked at me and laughed. Not quite the response I would have liked, but, I decided, better than an outright denial. I managed a weak smile in return.
‘These things aren’t working again, Helen,’ continued my grandmother over her shoulder, removing two hearing aids and passing them to my mother, who sighed despairingly. ‘Load of old rubbish.’
My mother shook her head. ‘Did you put the new batteries in, Mum?’ she asked, bending forward, her mouth stretching and pouting to the max as she slowly enunciated each word in an attempt to help my grandmother to lip-read.
‘You look like a fish,’ laughed Nanny Flo. ‘Doesn’t she look just like a fish, Dottie?’
‘Yes,’ I answered absently, a response which caused my mother to tut loudly. And then, anxious to get the long-awaited introduction over with, I lowered my head, speaking directly into Nanny Flo’s left ear. ‘Nanny,’ I said, raising my voice to compensate for her deafness, ‘this is Felix, my…’ I hesitated, feeling a need to take an extra breath before completing the lie, ‘my boyfriend.’
My grandmother rolled her eyes. ‘I know that,’ she said, still at maximum volume. ‘My body might be in a wheelchair but my brain isn’t in a jar yet, you know.’
‘Felix said hello before the ceremony,’ explained Mum, smiling.
‘Oh, I didn’t realise,’ I said, taken aback and turning to Felix. ‘Well done.’
He looked at me for a moment, then said, ‘Thank you,’ with a slight bow.
‘Yes, and it’s a good job he did introduce himself,’ continued my mother with a disapproving sigh, ‘because none of us would have ever recognised him from that dreadful man-in-the-moon picture you sent to your father!’
‘Man in the moon?’ queried Felix with a frown.
‘It’s just your face, Felix,’
explained Mum. ‘Dorothy didn’t even get your neck in the shot. I don’t know what she was thinking.’ She looked down at my grandmother. ‘I’m just saying about that picture of Felix, Mum,’ she said, pointing at Felix’s face, circling a finger and puffing her cheeks out.
‘I know! I wouldn’t have recognised him in a million years, would I, Helen?’ my grandmother bellowed up from her chair. ‘I said to your mother, “That’s never the little fat lad our Dottie used to bring home.”’
My mother coloured slightly and cleared her throat. ‘Well, we all grow into ourselves, don’t we? And I always thought—’ she began, but my grandmother didn’t pause for breath.
‘And your father said, “He’s been on a diet, Flo.” And I said, “Some diet, Don.” I mean, he used to be almost as big as our Elaine over there.’ She gestured in the direction of my mother’s cousin, who was standing a few metres away with her back to us. Elaine didn’t turn around, but, to my horror, I thought I saw her stiffen.
‘It’s glands with Elaine, Felix,’ said my mother conspiratorially, leaning forward and placing a hand on his arm. ‘Eats like a bird, poor thing. Terribly, terribly sad.’
I closed my eyes and, to distract myself, raised my bouquet of lily of the valley and white roses to my nose and inhaled deeply.
‘And I thought Felix must have had one of those elastic bands fitted, like the woman who used to be on that daytime television programme. You know, the one who was very good on Strictly, with Bruce, God rest his soul,’ continued Nanny Flo before pausing. ‘But I asked Felix and he says it’s all down to eating less and running around a bread mill. Isn’t that right, Felix?’
‘It’s a treadmill, but yes, that’s right,’ I heard him reply. He sounded unperturbed, but I didn’t feel moved to open my eyes and check.
‘And then I told him how he saved my life,’ concluded Nanny Flo abruptly, her voice cracking slightly.
I opened my eyes, lowered my bouquet and bent down, taking her hand in mine and focusing on it, unable to look directly at her, or at anyone else involved in the current conversation for that matter. ‘I love you, Nanny,’ I said.
She smiled and pressed my hand to her cheek. ‘I love you too. And this is my very best day in a long time,’ she added.
I gave her a hug and there was a pause before my mother said, with a slight tension in her voice. ‘Oh look, Dot, your Auntie Dawn is coming over. How lovely.’
I released Nanny Flo and stood up in time to see my mother’s sister in-law advancing up the path towards us. Mum raised a hand and offered my auntie what Becca and I called the Posh Smile. It was the one she reserved for anyone with whom she wasn’t completely at ease, and Auntie Dawn definitely fell into that category. It wasn’t that they disliked each other, and they were in many ways remarkably similar: chatty, well-meaning and devoted to their families. It was just that neither could resist pouncing on any opportunity to outdo the other. It was a mutual compulsion which their respective families found highly entertaining, but I suspected that today I might find it less so than usual. I waved to Auntie Dawn and braced myself for whatever was to come.
‘Oh Dorothy, you look beautiful,’ she beamed as she approached, her eyes flickering distractedly between Felix and myself. ‘And I love your hat, Helen,’ she said, turning to my mother, her eyes moving upward to the latter’s large cream number, which had a twist of pale blue tulle around the base of the crown. ‘I noticed it from simply miles away. Oh dear me,’ she laughed, putting a hand to her mouth and glancing up at Felix, ‘now I’m making it sound like a lighthouse rising from the sea, aren’t I?’
My mother twitched. ‘Thank you, Dawn. It’s from House of Fraser. Not in the sale and it cost an absolute fortune, but Don insisted that I treat myself. And yours is very nice. Is it from that lovely little hire shop you always go to down by the wharf here?’
Auntie Dawn’s head snapped round as I glared at my mother and quite literally stepped in, forcing my way between them and gently pivoting my auntie back towards Felix. ‘Auntie Dawn, I’m not sure whether you’ve met Felix, my…’ I cleared my throat. Clearly this was going to be a recurring problem. ‘My partner.’
Felix held out his hand and smiled. ‘Great to meet you,’ he said.
I was by now used to Felix’s new appearance and largely unimpressed by it, paired as it was these days with all the charm and personality of a spreadsheet. But even I had to admit that when he smiled, he was unequivocally good-looking. Auntie Dawn clearly thought so too, as evidenced by her slightly flushed and breathless response. ‘Well, Felix, how lovely.’
My grandmother laughed and pointed up at Auntie Dawn. ‘She’s blushing!’ she boomed.
My auntie went puce but managed a smile. ‘It is a bit hot out here,’ she nodded, fanning her face with an order of service.
‘Felix and Dottie grew up together and he is now an extremely successful and handsome accountant,’ said my mother proudly, clearly delighted by Auntie Dawn’s reaction. ‘We’re so pleased to have him here with us today.’
‘And I’m even more delighted to be here, and, of course, to be surrounded at this moment by so many beautiful women,’ smiled Felix.
‘Oh, you.’ My mother beamed and playfully tapped his arm. ‘You’re so naughty,’ she added, reaching out and taking my auntie’s hand as the pair were suddenly united in their appreciation of Felix. ‘He had Mum and me in stitches earlier, Dawn.’
‘Really?’ I murmured, feeling my face contort in confusion as Auntie Dawn and my mother melted into fits of girlish giggles. I stared up at Felix. Did he reserve his charmless self just for me? I wondered. Because right now, Mr Dull-As-Ditchwater seemed to have this particular audience in the palm of his hand.
He turned to look at me and I quickly rearranged my bemused features into a smile and attempted to join in the giggling, producing a noise which unfortunately sounded more like machine-gun fire than genuine laughter. Felix offered me a look which I couldn’t pinpoint but which seemed to hover somewhere between disdain and amusement.
‘What did he say, Helen?’ shouted my grandmother.
‘He’s flattering us, Mum,’ said my mother slowly, bending down to place her face in front of Nanny Flo’s, her rubber lips back in play. ‘He said that we are beautiful women.’
‘Ooh, did he now?’ whooped my grandmother as she looked up at me and added her own giggles to the chorus.
I laughed loudly, as I felt I should, but the situation had actually begun to take on a distinctly surreal quality for me. And I was just beginning to fear that my continued fake guffawing was in danger of being replaced by genuine, but maniacal, laughter, when my mother pulled herself together and said, ‘Oh, I think the photographer might want us now.’ She pointed towards Mark as he beckoned to us from a small cluster of trees to one side of the church. ‘Come along, everyone,’ she said brightly, taking hold of the wheelchair and getting ready to push.
I looked at Felix. ‘Do you want to come over?’
‘What kind of question is that?’ asked Mum, rolling her eyes despairingly at me. ‘Don’t you know how weddings work? Felix is your boyfriend, Dorothy. He’s got to be in the formal photographs too.’
‘Oh yes, of course,’ I said, my heart sinking at the prospect of creating a photographic record of the deception, just in case my brain ever decided to take pity on me and permit selective amnesia. I reached for Felix’s arm, but he was already walking towards my mother and taking the handles of the wheelchair from her. ‘Let me push, Mrs Riley.’
My mother stepped back from the chair and beamed. ‘Oh, you are lovely, Felix,’ she said, squeezing his hand. ‘But for goodness’ sake, call me Helen. We’re practically family now.’
Chapter 11
‘Only the best for my girls,’ said Dad as he placed four glasses and an ice bucket containing a bottle of champagne on the table in front of Becca, Mum, Nanny Flo and myself.
‘Oh Don.’ My mother sighed in faux protest. ‘Didn’t I just tell you a moment ag
o that I was going to stick to water from now on?’
‘Well I’m not,’ said Nanny Flo, her hearing aids now fully functional, thanks to two new batteries. ‘So someone better hurry up and pop that cork.’
Dad laughed and picked up the bottle.
It was 8.15 p.m., and having just kicked off the disco with her new husband, my sister had retreated with us to the large adjacent bar to, as she put it, take a little breather from being the centre of attention.
Being the focus of the day was something which I knew would not sit comfortably with someone as self-effacing as Becca. But as I looked at her across the table, smiling up at Dad and still resplendent in her sleek, cream silk gown, I knew that the fact that the day was giving so much pleasure to others would, for her, outweigh any of its more difficult aspects.
Dad popped the cork to a cheer and hand-clapping from Nanny Flo, and then poured each of us a glass. ‘Now,’ he said, as he presented me with the final flute, ‘I’m going to go and find Geoff for a quiet half-pint somewhere, so I’ll leave you ladies to it.’
‘Well, just be sure not to hide away anywhere I can’t find you,’ said my mother, grabbing his arm as he made to leave. ‘I know what you’re like for avoiding the dance floor, and that DJ has solemnly promised me some proper music later on. I don’t want to be a wallflower like I was at Geraldine Mitchell’s sixtieth, when you went to the toilet for one hour and forty-five minutes.’
My father bent down and hugged her, planting a gentle kiss on her forehead. ‘I shall be sure to remain within screeching distance, my beloved,’ he said, and then, having received a kiss and a smile in return, he headed off to find his brother.
‘Cheers!’ said Nanny Flo, raising her glass to us before taking a first sip. ‘Ooh, that’s lovely, that is.’
‘How many have you had, Mum?’ asked my mother, sounding slightly anxious.
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