A Beautiful Day for a Wedding Read online

  ‘You are so unromantic Eve. I think it’s really nice that they share a hobby. Now do you want to see what’s in the bags or not?’

  ‘Absolutely, let’s have dinner first though.’

  ‘Oh, and don’t forget we need to cook the rice for tomorrow as well.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘There was a note with the invitation to say that we’re not allowed to throw confetti, so we have to throw rose petals or rice.’

  ‘Oh my God Becca, they don’t want you to cook it first! It’s dry rice, you muppet, did you think that everyone was going to be hurling handfuls of risotto into the bride’s face?’

  ‘I did think it was a bit odd, if I’m honest.’

  ‘I love you, I do,’ Eve put her arm around her friend’s shoulders. ‘But I honestly don’t know how you manage to get through each day alive.’

  ***

  The next morning Becca and Eve, wearing matching black graduation gowns, waist-length grey wigs and carrying chopsticks as wands, got off a train somewhere in the middle of Sussex and boarded a waiting bus that said Hogwarts Express on the front. Becca wasn’t wrong; the other guests had taken the dress code very seriously indeed, one man even sported an ankle-length white beard that looked like he’d grown it specially for the occasion. A few women seemed to have mistakenly interpreted ‘wizardry finery’ to mean St Trinian’s tarty schoolgirl. The bus was unbearably hot and Eve’s wig was itchy. She could feel beads of perspiration on the back of her neck but felt immediately better when she spotted a woman who was sweating herself into an early grave in a full-on feathery owl costume.

  The vows were taken over a goblet of fire, the bride’s veil was held in place with a golden snitch comb, and when the happy couple knelt down to receive their blessing, written on the sole of the bride’s left shoe were the words, ‘From Muggle…’ and on the right in matching writing, ‘…To Mrs’. At the point where the vicar asked for the rings the couple turned around and looked up expectantly into the sky. The congregation followed their gaze.

  Nothing happened.

  Then Voldemort Rob, the groom, held out his gloved arm and started shouting. ‘Barney! Barney!’

  Silence.

  ‘Barney, Barney!’

  Then Jackie, who had sullied the effect of a two-thousand-pound wedding dress by accessorising it with a stripy red and yellow knitted Gryffindor scarf, joined in, shrilly calling, ‘Barney, Barney.’

  Eve’s shoulders to shake with silent laughter.

  ‘Stop it.’ Becca whispered, stifling her own giggle.

  ‘Barney! Barney!’ Jackie’s father, wearing a stuck-on bushy beard like Hagrid joined in, and before too long the whole wedding party were staring up at the sky shouting at the clouds. It was too much for Eve and Becca who let themselves be taken over by uncontrollable laughter that had tears running down their faces.

  Finally, after what seemed like days of waiting, a bemused looking barn owl, with the wedding rings tied to his claw, swooped in and landed with a thud on Rob’s outstretched arm.

  ‘I can’t breathe,’ Eve gasped.

  Please don’t misunderstand me, Eve wrote in her diary that night. I love a good fancy dress party as much as the next person, actually scrap that, probably more than the next person – but would I want to marry the love of my life wearing Princess Leia style Danish pastry hair buns while my handsome groom donned a Chewbacca costume? Not really, no. It’s not even about what people would say, or what the grandkids would think when they looked through the wedding album. It’s because I don’t really want to marry a hairy Wookiee warrior, I’d rather marry the person I fell in love with, thanks very much.

  There are times and places for costumes – the theatre, for one. Plays would be rather dull and uninteresting if everyone was just wearing normal clothes. Macbeth wouldn’t seem half as loony if he was wearing Diesel jeans and a Lacoste polo shirt and there’s no way that Joseph’s Technicolour Dreamcoat would work if he was wearing a mac from Superdry. Bedrooms – there’s another place where the odd roleplay outfit can work a treat. New Year’s Eve parties, birthday parties, anniversary parties, parties for the sake of having parties. All good occasions for a raid of the old dressing up box. But when I go to a wedding I like a bit of glam; a reason to blow dust off the fascinator that’s on top of the wardrobe; the chance to wear heels and perhaps carry a bag that doesn’t go over both shoulders. It’s very difficult to dance when you’re wearing a head-to-toe owl costume. And I know this for a fact because I’ve seen it firsthand.

  Chapter 3

  It was the second month in a row that Eve had covered the rent for Becca. She understood that being a teaching assistant in a specialist autism centre was more of a vocation than a goldmine, but Eve’s paltry journalist’s pay was not going to pay for a two-bed flat in central London indefinitely. Not to mention, she was still paying off her credit card from her extortionate flight back to the UK from the year before, and all Adam’s bits for the wedding that he hadn’t paid her back for yet. And this summer was costing a fortune with the number of bridal showers, wedding presents, new outfits, and hotel stays she had to fork out for.

  It didn’t help that Tanya’s new itinerary for her hen do this weekend had tripled the original cost. Now Eve had to pay for a facial she didn’t really want (all those oils always made her skin erupt faster than Vesuvius), a night away in a hotel whose rates were far more than other hotels just because it had the word ‘spa’ shoe-horned into its name, and a raw fish platter that was being delivered from forty miles away due to the lack of Japanese eateries in the countryside – a potential bout of food poisoning had now been added to the list of things Eve already disliked about this weekend. But as chief party planner, it was her job to up the tempo, keep smiling, and pretend that she was loving every minute.

  Plastering her ‘aren’t we all having so much fun’ face on, she shoved her clothes in the locker, put the fluffy white towelling robe on, slipped her feet into the white slippers, trying not to wonder if they had been washed since the last person wore them, and padded down the corridor to join the rest of Tanya’s friends who were lounging by the pool. Thank God Becca and Ayesha were there to keep her sane or Eve might well have crawled into the locker and stayed there all weekend.

  The spa only had three therapists, so at any one time during the whole day, three of the hen party were always missing after being officiously summoned by the head therapist, who looked as though she’d been over-indulging on the non-surgical skin-smoothing treatments the spa offered. The rest of the party, and Eve used the term ‘party’ loosely, were left to just sit around a tepid indoor pool with overwhelming smell of chlorine and snack on cups of organic granola. This was not shaping up to be the laughter-filled weekend of silliness that Eve had had in mind, but Tanya looked like she was loving it. She’d even brought along her own sparkly tiara to wear, that she’d retrieved from her bag ‘as a back up’ when Eve had produced a rather more garish novelty version with flashing lights that was swiftly dismissed with a little shake of her head. Thank goodness Eve had two more hen dos on the horizon that she could re-use it for, she knew that Ayesha and Becca wouldn’t be so picky.

  ‘Shall we play some games?’ Eve said, insistent on injecting a smidgen of jolliness into the proceedings. She was met with a steely silence from Tanya’s work colleagues and wide-eyed horror from the bride to be.

  ‘I don’t think we have to do that, Eve. We’re all having fun, aren’t we?’ Tanya replied, filing her nails a little quicker.

  ‘Oh, yes, lots of fun! I just thought that not everyone knows each other yet, so it might be good to go round the group and say how everyone knows you, and maybe a funny story about you, or something?’

  ‘Yes! That sounds great!’ Ayesha said. ‘I’ll start. Well, I’m Ayesha, hi everyone! I first met Tanya at fresher’s week at university in Brighton, when we were standing in the same queue for the Silent Dancing Club.’ Eve knew this story; in fact, she’d di
ned out on this story many times – but looking at Tanya’s stony expression, it wasn’t one that she’d ever repeated to her colleagues, or indeed anyone that she’d met since that day.

  ‘I don’t think we need to—’ Tanya interrupted.

  ‘And the third years that ran the club gave us some headphones and told us to show them our moves. Bear in mind we were stone cold sober, it was the middle of the day, and me and Tanya had a running-man dance off in the crowded union.’

  Becca and Eve started laughing with the memory of seeing this prim and proper Home Counties girl and a crazy short Indian girl with a black bob dance to MC Hammer in complete silence. The floor had cleared around them and people had cheered when they’d finished. Tanya had blushed almost as fiercely as she was doing now.

  ‘You’re a dark horse Tanya,’ said one of the other hens.

  ‘It was a long time ago,’ Tanya sniffed.

  ‘Oh come on, we should totally do it again for old times’ sake,’ Ayesha laughed. ‘I bet you’ve still got some moves.’

  ‘Luke and I have actually been taking dance lessons for our first dance.’ Tanya said.

  This didn’t surprise Eve. Nothing in this wedding was being left to chance.

  ‘Is it going to be one of those dances that starts off really slow and romantic and then the music stops and turns into I like Big Butts and I Cannot Lie and Luke throws you in the air, you whip off the bottom half of your dress and it turns into a stage show?’ Eve asked, giggling as Ayesha and Becca roared with appreciative laughter next to her.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Ok then, shall I go next?’ Eve said, keen to keep the momentum of the game going, despite the blank stares she was receiving from the other hens.

  ‘Tanya and I were in next door rooms to each other in our halls of residence, and we’d never really spoken before, but at the end of the first term her boyfriend from home visited, and—’

  ‘And after that we became friends. Ok, then shall we get the lunch menu?’ Tanya said quickly, craning her neck around, making a show of looking for a member of staff.

  Eve ignored Tanya’s deliberate attempt to shut her up and continued. ‘And we’d all gone out to the union for the Christmas party. There was a boyband there, who was it?’

  ‘5ive,’ Becca said, smiling as she knew how the story ended.

  ‘Oh yes, 5ive! Tanya’s boyfriend had gone on a bit before us back to halls and—’

  ‘Oh look, they have smoked salmon on seeded bagels. Yum,’ Tanya said, scanning the menu she’d just been given.

  ‘But he’d obviously gone back to the wrong room because when I opened my door he was lying on my bed naked with a Santa hat covering his willy!’ Eve guffawed. ‘Literally no clothes on at all! And then he had to run next door with nothing on!’

  The punchline to the story elicited polite smiles from the group, but that was it. Man, thought Eve, this crowd was tough. ‘He never visited you again, did he Tanya?’

  ‘No.’

  A few seconds of silence followed before Becca picked up the baton. Eve could have kissed her. ‘Well, I was on the same course as Eve here, and so when first year ended, we decided to live together in a dodgy house in the centre of town. You know, the kind of student house where you don’t need Blu Tack to keep your posters up, the damp does that for you? And Tanya and a Kiwi guy called Ben shared with us too.’

  ‘Speaking of Ben, has anyone heard from him lately? Is he still in New Zealand?’ Ayesha interrupted.

  Hearing his name spoken out loud made the hairs on Eve’s arms prick up.

  ‘He’s an usher actually,’ Tanya said.

  ‘He’s an usher?’ Eve spluttered out her peppermint tea.

  ‘Yes, he came back from New Zealand a couple of months ago, and now lives in Wimbledon. Luke bumped into him a few weeks ago and they went for a few beers, and he asked him to be one of his ushers.’ Tanya paused, took a sip and airily added, ‘Didn’t you know?’

  ‘Oh my God, I have to tell Amit! They were so close at uni, and when Ben just dropped off the radar Amit was gutted. He’ll definitely want him to be in our wedding party too. Um, if that’s ok with you Eve?’ Ayesha added, a little apologetically. ‘Sorry, I didn’t think.’

  ‘It makes no odds to me,’ Eve lied.

  ‘I didn’t think it would, I mean, it’s been four years,’ Ayesha said. ‘I hope Amit doesn’t ask him to be his best man though, I dread to think what his speech would be like. He’s got ammunition on all of us, and he’s a right cheeky sod when he wants to be.’

  The conversation then moved back to lunch options, but Eve’s mind was swimming. Becca caught her eye and gave her a silent ‘you ok?’ stare. Out of her three uni friends, Becca was the only one who really knew how this news must be affecting Eve.

  ‘At what point are we sacking off the herbal teas and moving onto the champagne?’ Eve said brightly, with a joviality she didn’t feel. ‘We are on a hen do, after all!’

  Despite her initial misgivings about the fun factor of the other hens, everyone seemed to like this idea, and once corks were popped – much to the chagrin of the clean-living staff – the mood lifted a little and the rest of the afternoon was passably pleasant. Passably pleasant. If ever it became Eve’s turn to be the bride to be, passably pleasant was not a term she’d like associated with her last weekend of freedom. In fact, she wouldn’t trust herself not to headbutt whoever described it as that. Not that a hen do in her honour seemed likely any time soon. She was a self-confessed perfectionist when it came to men, and would much rather be listening to jazz on her balcony in her pyjamas than scrolling through Tinder or attending one of those God-awful, soul-withering speed dating nights. When it was the right time for her future husband to show up in her life, he would. There was no point at all in hurrying it. Except she was thirty and her whole family thought she might be a lesbian. But that was neither here nor there.

  After a quick shower and change into their black dresses, which was the standard uniform for the night, Eve and Becca locked the room they were sharing and headed down to the bar. As expected, Tanya had firmly vetoed any type of outfit for the hens, even giving a vehement shake of the head to the suggestion of badges or sash-action. Whilst Eve knew that disobeying the bride’s wishes went against every type of wedding etiquette going, it hadn’t stopped her from surreptitiously handing out twelve rainbow-coloured unicorn horns to the other hens on her arrival at the spa. Now, it might have been the afternoon spent drinking that made the previously stone-faced women happy to go out in public wearing horns on their heads, but whatever it was, the sight of a dozen unicorns in the bar made her burst into spontaneous laughter.

  Even Tanya, who’d managed so far to maintain a concrete-like dignity, was gathering up her friends around her to take a selfie. Sometimes, Eve thought, people don’t know what they want until you give it to them.

  ‘Eve! Get in!’ Tanya ordered. ‘And smile!’

  The sight of a herd of unicorns marching down the high street on a Saturday night was quite the spectacle. Eve guessed correctly that the most fun this Oxfordshire town had seen previously was when the local twinning association got a bit excited on cheap French wine after a boules match on the common.

  Eve had already phoned ahead to the landlord of the Fox and Hounds and warned them to expect twelve lairy women, and to put a few cases of white wine in the fridges. Word had obviously got around, as the pub was packed out with the town’s single male population who gave a raucous cheer as they all filed in. It didn’t take long before an impromptu darts match was underway, the music turned up, and chairs and tables pushed back. Eve was seeing a side to Tanya that she hadn’t glimpsed in years and certainly wasn’t expecting to see tonight.

  ‘Come on Ayesha!’ Tanya shouted across the bar as the familiar start to Can’t Touch This came on. ‘You and me. Right here. Right now.’ Tanya had kicked her heels off under a table and was already flexing her neck and arm muscles. Eve smiled. She’d never say so to Tanya, bu
t this actually did beat a roller disco.

  ***

  Eve knew that the sunlight was going to hurt her eyes before she opened them, so decided not to. She could hear Becca shift position in the seat next to her, so guessed that her friend was stirring too.

  ‘Ow,’ Eve whispered.

  ‘Ow,’ Becca replied.

  They’d missed the curfew the spa manager had sternly imposed upon them as they left the previous evening, demanding that they all return before midnight as the doors would be locked then. It turned out she was true to her word. After the hens had weaved their way through the darkened town centre after a long lock-in at the pub, sometime around 3 a.m., they were faced with a dark, firmly closed hotel. Of course, all eyes fell on Eve, the chief party planner, for a solution, as though she was going to click her heels and transport them all into their cosy beds, or failing that, at least miraculously produce a master key. If Eve hadn’t have been suffering the effects of an endless stream of cheap white wine being poured into her mouth for hours, she may well have come up with a solution more palatable than all of them sleeping in their cars.

  ‘I don’t think my neck works any more,’ Becca moaned.

  ‘My vertebrae seem to have fused together,’ Eve added.

  ‘I think an animal died in my mouth,’ said Ayesha from the back seat. Both Becca and Eve had forgotten she was there, and they both yelped with shock at her voice, before giggling uncontrollably.

  ‘This reminds me of that festival we went to, when our tent got waterlogged so we all kipped in Tanya’s dad’s Volvo,’ Eve said.

  ‘At least that was an estate car so we could all lie in the back, this is a bloody Yaris!’

  ‘It was fun though,’ Ayesha reminisced. ‘Four of us squeezed into the back of it, and Ben in the front.’

  Once again, Eve realised that she’d managed to rewrite history in order to forget that Ben had been there too. Of course he’d been there, he’d even queued up for the tickets for them all.