A Beautiful Day for a Wedding Read online

  ‘Five? That’s insane.’

  ‘But it’s not just the weddings is it? It’s all the hen dos and rehearsals, I literally have one free weekend between now and the end of August.’

  ‘Eve, they’re not your weddings though, you are allowed to have fun outside of being chief wedding planner you know. Look at you, you’re gorgeous, in a very English sort of way, with your long red hair and alabaster skin—’

  ‘You can tell you’re a beauty journalist,’ Eve interrupted. ‘I’m pale and freckly.’

  ‘And interesting. You’re young, and you’re wasting the summer by being at the beck and call of people who have already found their other halves.’

  ‘Cheers.’

  ‘I’m serious!’ Kat said, emphasising how serious she was by waving a lipstick in Eve’s face. ‘How long have we worked together now?’

  ‘Two years.’

  ‘Two years. And in those two years, how many boyfriends have you had? You’re never going to find someone if you don’t put yourself out there.’

  What was the opposite of rose-tinted, Eve wondered, because it was exactly the same any time a friend of hers became coupled-up; they looked back on their solo days with hand-on-heart relief that they had dragged themselves out of the cesspool of single life.

  ‘See, that’s the difference Kat, it barely crosses my mind to look for a boyfriend, let alone “put myself out there!”’ Eve shuddered. ‘When the time is right, he’ll just turn up.’

  ‘Eve, Eve, Eve,’ Kat shook her head the way you would to a child that’s put their left shoe on their right foot for the fortieth time. ‘Finding a partner requires a massive amount of effort, he doesn’t just “turn up”. Have you learnt nothing from writing about weddings?’

  Kat had a point. It always amazed Eve how much effort some of the brides, and some grooms too, had put into finding someone to marry. If she’d had the job of interviewing couples twenty or thirty years ago about how they met, the stories would have invariably included the words ‘school’, ‘pub’, or ‘nightclub’, but nowadays the hoops that brides jumped through to get to the altar were staggering.

  ‘I like being single,’ Eve said. ‘Anyway, I am far too busy.’

  ‘It’s just that in the two years I’ve known you, you’ve never had anyone special in your life, and you’re pretty cool so I just wonder why, that’s all.’ Kat started putting the lipsticks away in their boxes. ‘You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.’

  ‘There’s no big mystery, Kat. I really liked someone once, and I’m just waiting to meet another person that I like as much, that’s all.’

  ‘So, what happened to him?’

  Eve used the time it took to sweep all her paperclips into her hand and pour them back into their pot to think of an answer that was completely devoid of sentiment. There was no point getting upset about it after all this time. She settled on, ‘I honestly have no idea.’ Which, as it happened, was completely true.

  Chapter 2

  The wedding with the wizards

  There weren’t many instances when you could use the word puce in daily life, but as Eve lay on her back in the park looking up at the sky darkening above her, she knew that puce would be a legitimate description of her face at that moment. She’d been so disappointed when her name had been called out as the winner of a series of ten personal training sessions rather than the chocolate hampers in the raffle at her work’s Christmas party. She’d tried to give the prize away, but everyone she knew either had their own gym membership already or were too much like her and couldn’t think of anything worse than being shouted at while you huffed and puffed in a park after work as dog walkers sniggered by.

  The personal trainer, Juan, had been in regular contact through January, February, even into March, calling her to set up her first appointment – but it wasn’t until early May, when Tanya had admitted that she’d made a ‘mistake’ with the order of Eve’s bridesmaid dress and it was ‘accidentally’ a size too small, that Eve thought that maybe the personal training sessions might not be such a bad idea after all. The first session had been a success. She was measuring the success of it by the fact that she was still alive. And Eve was very hopeful that at some point later that evening, her face would return back to its normal shade.

  ‘Same time on Wednesday?’ Juan asked, his kit bag slung over his shoulder, casting a long shadow over the patch of grass where Eve lay. She didn’t yet have the lung capacity for speech, so just weakly raised her hand and gave him a thumbs up. She thought that she’d just wait a little while longer before heading back home. It was a beautiful evening, perfect for lying back and enjoying the setting sun, and her choice had nothing at all to do with the fact that her legs felt like they were made of concrete.

  The trumpet player downstairs was in full flow when Eve let herself in the front door of Becca’s flat. She had to stop calling it that. It was now her apartment too, and it was an absolute palace compared to the cupboard in New York she’d called home for two years before moving back to London. Living above a live music pub was a godsend when the iPod ran out of charge, but a tad annoying when the band in question was an avant-garde experimental Cuban quartet. Which, thankfully, tonight’s wasn’t. Toe-tapping jazz seemed to be the soundtrack to her evening, which suited Eve just fine.

  Becca had already set up camp on their tiny balcony, which overlooked the pub’s beer garden, placing two beanbags next to a wine cooler that had a couple of bottles already chilling in it. Eve smiled, this was the perfect way to spend the evening. Tonight’s workout had been brutal. Juan’s girlfriend had just dumped him, and his hatred of all women seemed to extend to his clients too. Forty burpees was thirty nine too many for Eve, and every inch of her was crying out for a restorative shower, a glass of something with a strong alcohol content and a night with her best friend listening to Sinatra classics.

  ‘Evening!’ Eve shouted from the hallway through the open door to the living room. ‘Just going to de-sweat myself and be out in a minute. Have you got snacks out there?’

  ‘I have the Chinese delivery menu, which is sort of the same thing,’ Becca shouted back. ‘And you had some post, it was heavy, a book or something. I put it on your bed.’

  Eve knew what it was. She’d recently organised the delivery of sixty-five guidebooks to addresses all over the world ahead of her brother Adam and his boyfriend George’s nuptials on the last weekend in August. The fifth, and final, wedding of the year. It was in the South of France and they wanted all their guests to get as excited as they were, so despite being three months away, stage one of Operation Hype Up The Wedding was the delivery of the guidebooks about the local area. There were three more deliveries planned over the coming months: a bottle of the local wine, passport holders and luggage tags. All of which Eve had dutifully sourced, ordered and, at the moment, paid for on her credit card.

  Ten minutes later, wearing her pyjama bottoms with her long wet hair dampening her hooded top from university, Eve settled down onto the spare beanbag and gratefully took the glass of white wine from Becca’s outstretched hand.

  ‘Now this, this is pretty darn perfect.’

  ‘I’ll say so.’ Becca agreed, stretching her legs out in front of her to poke them between the railings of the balcony, which must have looked pretty odd to anyone sitting in the garden beneath them. ‘They’ve been practising since I got home from work,’ Becca said. ‘It’s been great, like having a mini concert in our living room. I’m going to miss this.’

  Eve knew when she’d moved in that it wasn’t a long-term arrangement as Becca’s wedding to military man Jack was wedding number four of the summer and Jack had been faithfully promised a family house on the base after the wedding. Whenever the thought of Becca moving out popped into her head, Eve batted it away. She and Becca had lived together all the way through university, sharing a tiny semi in one of Brighton’s less salubrious back streets with Tanya, and another friend, Ben. Even though eight years lay between the
m sharing that semi and this flat, Eve and Becca had slotted straight back into being flatmates.

  ‘Have you sorted your costume for Rob’s wedding on Saturday?’ Eve asked, trying not to wince at the word costume rather than outfit. She really didn’t understand why some couples insisted on their guests joining in their theme by donning superhero capes or flapper dresses; what was wrong with a nice wrap dress?

  ‘I’m raiding the school drama department’s store cupboard tomorrow.’

  ‘If you see something for me, can you pick it up?

  Perhaps now, Eve thought, with the chilled wine in hand and the soft jazz rising from the bar below, Becca would be open to talking about the logistics of her own wedding. Considering that she’d been engaged for nearly three years you’d have thought she’d have been further along in the planning process. Eve remembered back to when Becca had broken the news of her engagement, calling her across the Atlantic, as she did most evenings. Their calls were Eve’s favourite part of the day, which she had admitted to no one but Becca, because after all, living in New York was supposed to be fun. If you were to ask any single thirty-year old whether New York was a fun place you’d have to cover your ears with the deafening volume of the resounding yeses, which would be promptly followed by the clink of ice into gin martinis. If you were in media in New York it meant you’d made it. Hit the big time. Written your own success story. You were playing in the major league. Everyone knew that. It was only Becca who knew this wasn’t really the case for Eve.

  That night, almost three years ago, Eve had just carried her dinner across the tiny hallway to her windowless bedroom in a dodgy part of Brooklyn, when she had felt her phone vibrating in her back pocket. She had set the hot bowl of microwaved soup down on a pile of coffee table books that doubled up as her dining table, desk and nightstand and answered the nightly call from her best friend.

  ‘Evening lovely, how’s your day been?’

  ‘Exhausting, soul-destroying, murderous,’ Eve had replied.

  ‘Murderous. That’s a new one.’

  ‘I think that one has staying power. Today, I’ve interviewed a man who lived his life dressed as a baby, a woman whose plastic surgery on her bottom went so wrong it was impossible to sit down, a couple who raised pot-bellied pigs in their house instead of children, and I wrote a feature with the headline “My boyfriend has a Spiderman mask tattooed on his face.”’ Back in the beginning, when Eve had fought off hundreds of other journalists and got the job as Features Editor for What a Life! in the Big Apple, she was horrified at the people knocking on the magazine’s doors to share their stories for the set fifty-dollar fee. There was no way this type of magazine could ever be sustainable, Eve had thought, surely the weirdness would dry up? There must be a finite number of bizarre people around the world? It turned out there wasn’t. And thanks to the page at the front of the magazine listing all the staff members and their contact details, every single weirdo had Eve’s email address.

  ‘Ask me how my day’s been,’ Becca had demanded.

  ‘Becca, how has your day been?’

  ‘Absobloodylutely fabulous. Jack and I got engaged!’

  Eve’s face had burst into a spontaneous smile. ‘That’s amazing news! I’m so happy for you, honestly that’s made my day. My week! Heck, you know what? That’s the best news I’ve heard all year. And it’s the middle of December, so the year is almost up.’

  ‘Jack was such a sweetheart. We went down to Devon to visit Mum and Dad and he took my dad for a pint and asked him, then he took me for a walk through the woods and proposed to me at exactly 3.33pm, my favourite time.’

  Eve mumbled through the spoonful of tinned minestrone she’d just scooped into her mouth: ‘You have a favourite time?’

  ‘Of course I do! Doesn’t everyone? Anyway, stop talking. I wanted to ask you something important. You’re so amazing at planning stuff, and such an organisational fiend, and you’re my best friend, so will you be my chief bridesmaid and also help me plan the wedding?’

  ‘Yes and yes! Oh my goodness, this is so exciting! What are you thinking? A city do in a posh hotel, or a manor house in the country, or a… oh Becca, we could do it abroad!’

  ‘I want a really low-key thing in my parent’s cow field.’

  Eve stopped chewing.

  ‘Eve? Are you still there?’

  ‘I’m sorry, for a moment I thought I heard you say that you wanted to get married in a cow field.’

  ‘Well, not actually married, we’ll do that at the local church, but I want to have the reception in the field behind my folks’ farm.’

  ‘Won’t the cows mind the intrusion?’

  ‘We’ll move them silly. But I love the idea of a festival feel, with bunting and barrels and picnic baskets. Do you think we could pull it off?’

  ‘If that’s what you want, that’s what you’ll get. I’ll start my research tomorrow. This is so exciting, and just the thing I need to take my mind off how shitty my life is.’

  ‘You don’t have to stay in New York you know, you could just come back,’ Becca had reminded her, not for the first time.

  Eve had pretended not to hear her, just like she did every time Becca had said it. Going back to London wasn’t an option. ‘So what time of year are you thinking? If it’s going to be outside, I’m guessing summer?’

  ‘Yes, not the next one though, that’s too soon. Maybe the one after that. Or the one after that.’ It was typical Becca, laid-back to the point of comatose. The vague date did little to quell Eve’s enthusiasm for planning though, and Becca’s engagement had resulted in a new job for Eve too. The following day she’d quickly realised that there was no better antidote to the gritty seediness she usually spent her day delving into than the swirly pink and turquoise fonts of online wedding magazines that had headlines like Super-pretty princess dresses and Best day ever! Every website Eve looked at had little hearts doodled into their company logos. Each photo of couples staring adoringly at each other had a soft-focus finish that made their love seem even more magical. How could you ever be miserable writing about romance every day?

  Scrolling down the page past a link to an article on bouquets called Everything’s rosy and one on honeymoon destinations entitled Paradise found, Eve’s eyes had rested on a little pink box on the right of the page. Above the editor’s email address, were two words that had made Eve’s eyes widen: We’re hiring.

  Without giving herself any time to change her mind, Eve had quickly typed out an email, attached her CV and pressed send. And Eve-the-wedding-guru was born.

  She’d stayed with the American wedding magazine for a year before reluctantly moving back to London to work for its English edition when her dad had died. It had been as though the universe had aligned everything to slot into place: the job opening in London, Becca’s former flatmate moving out; call it coincidence, fate, luck – whatever it was, it meant Eve’s transition back into London life wasn’t as awful as she had thought it might be. It didn’t stop the ghosts taunting her around every corner though.

  A sudden drum solo from the bar below brought Eve back to the present day, and their balcony. ‘So,’ Eve started gently, ‘have you thought about a band for your wedding?’

  ‘Jack’s friends are going to bring their guitars.’

  ‘Oh.’ Eve said. This did not sound good. ‘Are they, um, professional musicians?’

  ‘No, not at all. You know Gavin, Jack’s friend from work? Well, he used to play, and Jack’s brothers, and a couple of other people too – we’re encouraging everyone to bring whatever instruments they have and just have a mash-up.’

  ‘A mash-up?’ Eve realised that she must sound incredibly middle-aged, but she couldn’t help herself. ‘That might be good for the end of the night, for the people that want to stay and carry on the party, but don’t you want some dancing and music that people know?’

  Becca lay her head back on her beanbag. ‘Eve, you’re stressing me out. I’m not like Tanya, who needs everything pl
anned to within an inch of its life. What will be will be, it’s going to be fine. Now be quiet and listen to the lovely music.’

  Eve refused to give up. Not when she’d just published an article about how vital good entertainment was to a wedding. ‘See, that’s my point. Music is really important. If you like this band so much, why don’t you pop down in the next break and ask them for their card?’

  ‘Why don’t you?’

  In the end, Eve did a lot better than that and paid them a fifty-pound deposit to put the date of Becca’s wedding in their diaries. She would tackle the issue of what on earth Becca was intending to feed her guests in the cow field another night.

  ***

  ‘So I got these.’ Becca dumped two big carrier bags full of clothes and props onto the kitchen counter next to where Eve was chopping up some onions for their sausage and mash dinner.

  ‘Oh my God Becca, I only wanted a witch’s hat, not a wardrobe for the entire magic circle!’

  ‘The invitation said to come in your wizardry finery, a witch’s hat wouldn’t cut it. Anyway, I spoke to a few of the other people at work that are going, and everyone is making a massive effort. Rob’s even had a prosthetic nose made like Voldemort’s. Can’t wait to see what his fiancée’s wearing – what’s her name again?’

  ‘Jackie. You’re going to have to remember that tomorrow, it’s very bad form to forget the bride’s name, even if you do only know the groom.’

  ‘Jackie. Got it. And do you reckon Jackie is fully on board with marrying the Dark Lord?’

  Eve smiled. ‘I can’t say that he would be my immediate choice for a groom, come to think of it. Neither would Rob, but that’s by the by.’

  ‘They’re both massive Harry Potter fans, they even got engaged at King’s Cross station next to the Platform 9 ¾ sign.’

  Eve’s knife kept slicing. ‘That’s lovely. Nothing shouts I love you quite so much as the smell of tramps’ urine and fourteen thousand Japanese school kids on a magic tour.’