‘Give it time,’ said Sal. ‘Give it time. Right, I’m going to reception to see if we can’t get this stupid alcohol ban lifted. I’ve had enough of all this elderflower ridiculousness – I’m gasping for an after-dinner aperitif.’ She scraped back her chair and started making her way through the restaurant, pleased and relieved she’d made her little confession. It had been weird, actually, them not knowing everything.
It was busy in there: packed. People were laughing, chatting, eating food far nicer than they’d had to endure. The table by the door looked like they were having fun, Sal thought, as she walked past. A circle of twenty-something blondes, all with high ponytails or poker-straight glossy curtains, were screeching over a jug of some neon-green liquid topped with bendy straws, and a huge plate of toppling posh-looking nachos. That should be them, Sal thought – her and the girls – enjoying themselves like that, not chowing down on radishes and sipping cordial. Dinner had been so disappointing. A health-infused, limp washout. Still, at least she’d thrown her little foxy Niall grenade into the mix. As well as being a confession she was glad to have got out there, she was right – it had made things more eventful. Tamsin had perked up over it and it had given her friends something juicy to talk about. They had seemed pleased for her, too. Total nonsense about her really liking him, though, of course – of course she didn’t! They were just sleeping partners, no ‘L’ word, except ‘Lust’. It would be fun, she would find something about Niall that was flawed and then she would dump him, before anyone got hurt. It was the only way.
Sal strode into reception feeling pretty great, all in all, following her little disclosure, but then almost turned on her heel and strode right out again.
What the hell? It couldn’t be, could it? Surely it couldn’t be.
She ducked behind a pillar and had another look. That man, the one behind reception in the smart suit and the curly-ish hair, the one dealing with the woman in the red top and the white sandals, it looked just like him. It really looked just like him. She’d watch for a bit longer; no one would care that a woman was crouching behind a pillar in the middle of a busy reception area, would they? She wished she had a wig and dark glasses; that would give people something to stare at. Meanwhile, she continued staring at the man behind the reception desk. Surely it wasn’t him? It had been years, and he wasn’t even supposed to be in this country – I mean, what were the chances? Here and now? It did look like him, though, it really did. She’d just wait for him to turn face on and then she’d know for sure.
The man turned his head and smiled at the lady in the red top, handing her something. Then she must have said something funny because he threw back his head and laughed.
Shit! Sal knew for sure. It was him. It was definitely him. It was Steve Marsden, that charming, cocky git from the year above them at Warwick University. Self-proclaimed ‘party animal’ (always the worst kind) who worked for the university’s Entertainments Crew and acted as roadie for visiting bands; Phys Ed student and total gym-bunny who always did a really cringe-worthy dance to ‘Thriller’ at the Monday Night Disco; and, most importantly and potentially catastrophically, Wendy’s One That Got Away. What the hell was he doing here?
Sal waited for him to turn again and then she scuttled out of the lobby and back to the restaurant, where she took her place at the table with a bright smile.
‘How did you get on?’ asked Wendy. ‘Is the ban lifted? Can we start ordering double vodkas?’
‘Nah,’ said Sal breezily. ‘There was no one there to ask. We can try again in the morning. In fact, we could go to the bar now and just lie to their faces, say we’re on The Glamour and see if we can get away with it. Wendy,’ she continued, ‘why don’t you go with Tamsin and find us a seat? We’ll just settle the bill here.’
‘I thought we’d already paid for everything in advance,’ said Wendy, looking baffled.
‘We have, but there’ll be a bit of paper or something to sign, won’t there? Off you go.’
‘See you there,’ said Tamsin politely, getting up from the table and Wendy got up too and they drifted off, Wendy still looking confused.
Once they were safely out of the way Sal leant forward and hissed to Rose and JoJo across the white tablecloth, ‘Ladies, we appear to have ourselves a situation.’
‘What do you mean?’ asked Rose.
‘Yes, what’s up?’ said JoJo. ‘You’ve gone as white as a sheet. Are you all right?’
‘I’m fine,’ hissed Sal, ‘but Wendy might not be. You’re not going to bloody believe this, but Steve bloody Marsden is out there!’
‘Steve Marsden? What? From Warwick?’ exclaimed JoJo, looking absolutely horrified.
‘What?’ cried Rose, her eyes wider that the Channel Tunnel. ‘Steve Marsden? Really? And what do you mean, out there? I thought he lived in Australia!’
‘Yes, he moved there – what, over twenty years ago?’ added JoJo. ‘Something we can never forget, can we? With how Wendy was.’
‘I know!’ groaned Sal, putting her head in her hands. ‘But, I’m telling you, he’s out there, in bloody reception.’ She lifted up her face and stared at them mournfully. ‘And I’ve got a bloody feeling he owns this bloody place!’
Chapter Seven
Rose
Rose couldn’t believe it. Steve Marsden. Here, of all places! And now, on Wendy’s hen night. What were the chances? And running The Retreat? Rose remembered he had studied Physical Education or something, at Warwick; he was often wandering round in a tracksuit, his hands in his pockets, and he was always in the gym. But he’d moved Down Under decades ago! He was someone they thought they’d never see again.
Rose leant back in her chair and exhaled. ‘I can’t believe it,’ she said. ‘Are you sure it’s him?’
‘You’ll see for yourself in a minute,’ said Sal. ‘We’ll go via the lobby to the bar. Grey suit, pink shirt – it’s definitely him.’ She grabbed the menu from the centre of the table; inside was a tall thin brochure about The Retreat which she pulled out. ‘And there, look!’ She jabbed at the small print on the back page. ‘“Proprietor: S. Marsden”. We’re screwed.’
JoJo went white. ‘Oh God,’ she muttered, putting her head in her hands. ‘So not only did I book us on the wrong package, but I also inadvertently failed to notice that Wendy’s bloody Lost Love is the bloody owner of her bloody hen weekend! How could I have got it so wrong,’ she groaned. ‘This is a disaster!’
‘How could you have possibly known?’ consoled Rose, gently rubbing the back of one of JoJo’s hands. ‘It’s not something you double-check, is it? If the ex of the bride owns the hen venue! And the chance of that being the case must be one in a hundred million or something. None of us could ever have predicted this! You’re so not to blame, JoJo.’
‘I feel like it,’ moaned JoJo. ‘I feel to blame for everything.’
‘It’s just a hideous coincidence,’ reassured Sal. ‘One of those awful things. So stop that right now, JoJo.’ She stood up. ‘Come on, people, we need to go! We need absolute, one hundred per cent confirmation.’
They hurried from the restaurant, clutching each other’s arms and almost giggling in a near-frenzy of horrified anticipation. Would it really be him, Wendy’s Lost Love? wondered Rose. And if it was, what on earth were they going to do about it?
They headed for the lobby. As they rounded a marble pillar near the entrance, Rose bumped smack bang into a man coming in the opposite direction.
‘Oh, so sorry!’ she cried, mortified. She literally headbutted his chest. Her nose collided with soft, petrol blue jersey and expensive aftershave and she ricocheted backwards like an astonished skittle.
‘No, my fault,’ said a deep voice and Rose looked up, panicked, completely forgetting what Sal had said about the grey suit and the pink shirt and expecting to see the forty-something version of Steve Marsden standing there. But it wasn’t him; Steve Marsden had – or used to have – brown, curly-ish hair: this man was blond
, very very blond, his hair swept back from his face. He also had a wide mouth, amused-looking lips and piercing blue eyes. ‘I should look where I’m going.’
‘Me too,’ stuttered Rose, gazing up at those dazzling blue eyes and feeling quite weak in their glare. ‘I have form for being a clumsy twit. I’m so sorry.’
‘It’s quite all right, I quite like clumsy twits,’ he replied. ‘After you.’ And he stepped back in order to give them room to pass. He was fit, Rose decided, really fit. He was tall and muscular and had amazing biceps; she could see them, saying hello to her, from the rolled-up sleeves of his polo top. He smiled at her, waiting, and for a couple of seconds Rose didn’t move, she just looked, until JoJo poked her in the ribs and Sal did a less than subtle cough.
‘Sorry!’ Rose said again, looking up at him as they scuttled past. And ‘Blimey!’ she uttered, once they were clear.
‘I know!’ said JoJo.
‘What a hunk,’ said Sal. ‘A very fine specimen.’ They all turned back and admired his rear view, as he walked out of the lobby and towards the lifts. ‘Now, down to business,’ she said, whispering like a highly skilled member of MI5. ‘Without making it too obvious, look over at reception.’
They looked.
‘Don’t make it obvious!’ chided Sal.
Rose lowered her hand from her forehead, where she’d been using it as a kind of search visor; she couldn’t see well at long distances without her glasses.
‘Sorry,’ she said.
She looked again. Behind reception was a man in a grey suit, pink shirt. He was standing up but leaning over a computer screen, his head lowered. Heidi appeared from the office behind and he looked up to say something to her. Oh God, it was definitely him! Steve Marsden. His hair was greying now; his face a little crinkly, from what she could see, at this distance, but it was him all right.
‘It’s him,’ said JoJo, from behind her.
‘I’m afraid so,’ replied Rose and her heart sank. JoJo was right: what an absolute disaster!
Steve and Wendy had been inseparable at university. They’d dated for a year and had the easiest, laziest relationship going. Literally, the laziest. They drank all night, they stayed in bed all day – lectures permitting, they ambled off to pub lunches, they cooked Pot Noodles and ate them in front of the telly; the pair of them put on a stone each when they were together, like some happy, relaxed couples do. And they were always together. The girls still saw a lot of Wendy, of course they did, but Steve was usually there too, his hands in his pockets, his ‘Ents Crew’ T-shirt on his back and a beer in his hand. He and Wendy were very well matched, everyone said so; they were always laughing, they were always snogging – it was easy, Wendy always said. Just such a great, easy relationship, and they adored each other, mostly. Shame Steve had dropped a massive bombshell onto Easy Street halfway through the third year when he’d announced he was moving to Australia, with his parents.
‘But you don’t have to go with them!’ Wendy had wailed at him, more than once and often right in the middle of the Students’ Union, pissed-up students all around them. ‘You’re a grown up! You can just stay here.’
‘I want to go,’ Steve had said, his hands in his pockets, his shoulders raised in a far too casual shrug. ‘It’s such a great life out there. I’m going to do my finals and then I’m off. Sorry, Wendy.’
‘But what about me?’ Wendy had cried, her red curls wobbling above an outfit of bright blue drainpipes, a hot pink Morrissey t-shirt and a pair of emerald DMs. ‘What about us?’
‘I love you, Hammy,’ he would say (Wendy Elizabeth Ham was her full name and Steve had lots of ham-related nicknames for her: Hammy, Hamster, Hambelina . . .), taking one hand out of a pocket to try to wipe away her tears, ‘but it was never going to be for ever. We’re only twenty years old. This is not it, for either of us.’
‘It is for me! Don’t go? Please just don’t go!’
But he was going, and in the end Wendy stubbornly split up with him, after a few weeks of wailing and pleading, saying it was easier to make a clean break there and then when it clearly wasn’t; she spent the remainder of the Third Year mooning after him and crying in the Union when she saw him kissing other girls, and then, disastrously, she slept with him at the end of the summer term, after the Big Ball. A big ball’s up, more like, Sal had remarked at the time, as Wendy was an absolute mess when she and Steve had finally said goodbye, one Saturday morning in June, with her dad waiting outside Halls with all her stuff packed in the car, ready to go home for good. She had cried for weeks. She was utterly devastated. She would never set eyes on him again.
Until now.
‘We can’t let her see him,’ insisted Sal, as they walked slowly to the bar. ‘You know what she was like over him.’
‘It might be all right,’ said Rose, unconvinced. ‘It was over twenty years ago.’ She knew it wouldn’t be; anyone who had known Wendy at that time would have seen how much Steve Marsden meant to her. He was everything to Wendy, once upon a time.
‘Of course it won’t be!’ said Sal. ‘It took her about four years to get over him, didn’t it? She didn’t date anyone again until that biologist with the dodgy shoes.’
‘It was only you who thought his shoes were dodgy,’ said JoJo. ‘Wendy quite liked them, but I agree – it took her years to get over him and years to find someone she might feel the same way about. She’s getting married next Saturday. We really don’t want Steve Marsden throwing a spanner in the works at this late stage. Especially when Wendy seems to have some . . . well . . . doubts about Frederick – not that she doesn’t love him, but that she thinks he’s too good for her, that he’s too posh to be with her, somehow.’
‘I’m a little concerned, too,’ admitted Sal, ‘about how she said it’s been such a whirlwind they might not know each other properly, and whether she’ll fit in with his family . . . especially now she’s met Tamsin.’
‘So what do we do?’ asked Rose. ‘We can’t blindfold Wendy to stop her clapping eyes on Steve. We can’t keep shoving her through doors like we’re in a West End farce!’
‘We’ll just have to do our best,’ said Sal. ‘If we spot him, we distract her. If he appears on our radar, we walk the other way. He might not even be around much, if he owns the place.’
‘True,’ said JoJo. Then, ‘Oh God,’ she muttered, stopping in her tracks. They had reached the entrance to the bar. Rose could just about make out Wendy and Tamsin at the far end, sitting on a plush sofa. ‘I’ve just had another horrifying thought. You know what Wendy was saying about Frederick, how they’re chalk and cheese, essentially . . . Well, she and Steve were chalk and chalk. Remember they kept saying they had an affinity because they’d both gone to state school and they both liked revolting food like pies from a tin and Ginsters pasties?’
‘Oh, that bloody affinity!’ exclaimed Sal. ‘And all that pastry – used to drive me nuts! Yes, I remember. They used to stand on a figurative soap box together, drinking pints of cider and black, and blather on about how marvellous the comprehensive system was. Good God!’ She tucked a short strand of hair contemplatively behind one ear. ‘All the more reason, then, that we try to keep them apart. We don’t want her comparing the two, starting to think Frederick’s not the man for her, if she already feels insecure about him. We’ve met him – he’s perfect for her, isn’t he? Steve Marsden was always a bit of a prat!’
‘He was.’ JoJo nodded.
‘Yep,’ agreed Rose.
‘Right,’ said Sal. ‘I’ll push her up that aisle myself if I have to. In a wheelbarrow. Steve bloody Marsden is not stopping this wedding!’
*
The rest of the evening passed without drama. There were no sightings of Steve; no one had to push anyone through any doors. They sat in the bar and they chatted, about books, about movies, about anything and everything that wasn’t to do with the past, or ex-boyfriends, or lost loves, or whirlwind romances, or anything that might make Wendy worry
. That was, until Tamsin started telling anecdotes about Frederick.
‘I suppose Frederick told you about the time he dyed his hair black and became a goth for a week?’ laughed Tamsin, after firing off about a hundred emails in a minute on her phone. God knows what amongst them had reminded her of that, thought Rose. A defendant who liked Bauhaus?
‘Er . . . yeah . . . of course, ha, hilarious,’ replied Wendy, fooling no one.
‘I think it was just after he and big teenage love Tina Macro broke up – did he tell you? He went temporarily to the dark side. One week only, of playing moody records in his room with the door locked, then it was back to Wham! and Jon Bon Jovi!’
‘Sorry, I need to take this call, said JoJo. Her phone was ringing, in her bag. She hotfooted out of the bar, talking rapidly into it, and they watched her go.
‘What does JoJo do?’ asked Tamsin.
‘Wedding dress designer,’ replied Sal.
‘Wow. Busy?’
‘Incredibly so. The woman never stops. But that’s how she likes it.’
‘Right.’
‘Yes, Wham!’ repeated Wendy, almost absent-mindedly. ‘He loves Wham!,’ she said, unconvincingly. ‘And yes, Tina Marco . . . Poor Frederick, getting dumped like that.’
‘Macro. No, he split up with her—’ Tamsin frowned, looking confused ‘—but felt horribly guilty about it.’
‘Oh yeah, der! Of course he did . . . poor Tina.’
Der?
‘He had a lot of unsuccessful relationships, before he met you, Wendy. I’m glad he found you.’
What a nice thing to say, thought Rose, but Wendy didn’t look happy. She looked like she was scrolling through her mind for any relationships Frederick had told her about. Had there been full disclosure? Did they know enough about each other? Rose could imagine it all going on in there, and when they said goodnight and all went to bed, Wendy still looked preoccupied.
Four Bridesmaids and a White Wedding: the laugh-out-loud romantic comedy of the year! Page 7