Always the Bridesmaid
LINDSEY KELK

Copyright

Published by HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in Great Britain by Harper 2015

Copyright © Lindsey Kelk 2015

Cover illustration © Shutterstock.com

Cover layout design © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2015

Lindsey Kelk asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780007582334

Ebook Edition © May 2015 ISBN: 9780007582341

Version: 2019-07-18

Dedication

For Janice

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Acknowledgements

Keep Reading …

About the Author

Also by Lindsey Kelk

About the Publisher

My Bridesmaid Journal

Name: Maddie Fraser

Age: Thirty-one but I definitely don’t look it, honest

My bride’s name is: Lauren Hobbs-Miller

My bride is: My alleged best friend

I have known my bride for: 12 years

How we met: We were flatmates at university

My other bridesmaids’ names are: Sarah Hempel, Jessica Hobbs-Miller-Joyce

Three words that describe my bride: Tyrannical control freak Generous, loving, blonde

Three words that describe the groom: Potentially on drugs

The date of the big day is: Too soon for me to lose weight

How I feel about being a bridesmaid: Like I’d rather pull my womb out with a rusty coat hanger and parade up and down Brighton seafront wearing it as a hat Blessed.

Congratulations!

You have been asked to join your bride on this most important journey, one of lasting love and a lifetime of memories. A bridesmaid is not someone who follows her bride down the aisle, but someone stands who beside her in life. Yesterday you may have been a friend, a sister, a cousin, but from today until forever, you are so much more.

This journal allows you to chart every step of your adventure together, from the day your bride bestows this great honour upon you, up until the day you say goodbye to the fiancée she is today and welcome a wife into your life.

Record every moment, write down every feeling and thought and reflection, for this is one of the most special and beautiful privileges in a woman’s life.

You are no longer just the person you were when you woke up today.

You are a bridesmaid.

1
Thursday May 14th

Today I feel: Exhausted.

Today I am thankful for: Taxis that can find you with an app.

It is an undisputed truth of the modern age that there are now only two kinds of people in the world: people who call and people who text.

Obviously there are a lot of weirdoes knocking around on social media: that girl from your old job who likes everything you put on Facebook, the boy you hung out with during the first week of university and then ignored for three years but who still added you on LinkedIn, and, most worrying of all, anyone who tries to have extended conversations on Twitter direct messages, but, when it comes to genuine, honest to God, help-you-hide-the-body-without-asking-questions best buds in the whole wide world, there are only texters and callers.

My best friend Lauren is a caller. As annoying as I find it, Lauren can’t help but pick up the phone, regardless of what it is she has to say. In my humble texter’s opinion, we don’t need to actually talk about who has been eliminated on Bake Off; selected gifs and the odd emoji can express all of our emotions quite adequately. But Lauren loves to call, and that is why I knew something was up when she sent a text message asking me and Sarah to meet her for dinner.

‘What do you think she wants?’ Sarah asked as we trotted dutifully down the street, right on time. ‘Why did we have to come out tonight?’

By the time I got on the Tube I’d run through every possible scenario, and had settled on a kidnapping. Instead of finding her in the restaurant, there would be a sinister man with a random scar, stroking his beard at the bar and demanding a million pounds by midnight, otherwise he would start chopping off her fingers and sending them through the post. Maybe he would FedEx them; the post was a bit unreliable.

‘No idea,’ I replied. No need to worry Sarah about the kidnapping until it was confirmed. ‘It’ll be nice to have dinner together, though. I feel like I haven’t seen you in weeks.’

Which was a terribly polite way of saying, ‘I haven’t bloody well seen you in weeks, you massive bastard − aren’t you supposed to be one of my best friends?’

‘I’ve been busy,’ she said. Not even an attempt to make up a lie. I’d half expected her to show up with a baby bump, but I was relieved to see she was as rail-thin as ever. Well, not relieved, obviously. No one is ever ‘relieved’ to see their skinny friend is still skinny, are they? And the worst part was, she still had massive boobs. Explain to me how that’s fair. ‘Work’s been shit. I need a new job. Your place is advertising for a PR manager, you know.’

‘Are we?’ I replied, knowing full well that we were.

Sarah unfastened and refastened the top button of her shirt, pulling the collar tight around her throat, muttering to herself.

‘I don’t know why she couldn’t just say let’s get dinner?’ she said, changing the subject again, still burning up about The Message. ‘Why all the drama?’

Because you’d cancel like you have every time for the last month and a half, I replied silently.

‘Because she’s American?’ I suggested out loud.

‘She moved here ten years ago,’ Sarah argued. ‘She does not get to use “because I’m American” as an excuse any more. I’m officially cutting her off.’

‘Maybe she’s moving back,’ I said, hoping it wasn’t true. There had been a lot of talk about her poorly mum and pregnant sister lately. And who would want to spend another miserable summer in the UK when you could be drinking cocktails at your beach house in the Hamptons and bothering your sister’s new baby? ‘She was quite insistent that we had to meet tonight.’

In truth, I was a little bit giddy. I never went out on a week night. Ever. And yes, I know, that sounds sad, but I work a lot and all my best friends are completely coupled up. What’s the point of going out when you could be at home with a bottle of wine, making fajitas and laughing uproariously with your boyfriend/girlfriend/blow-up doll? It’s fine, I get it, I do the same with my significant other, a great big bottle of gin. And yes, we’re very happy together, thank you.

Sarah, on the other hand, did not look giddy. She looked downright miserable.

‘She’s always so insistent,’ she said, tightening her ever-present topknot. Sarah had a look. Sarah always wore her hair up. Sarah always wore perfectly applied black eyeliner and Sarah always wore shirts buttoned up to the throat. And yet, against all odds, Sarah always looks amazing. But regardless, I hated that topknot. I wanted to lop it off with garden shears. But I didn’t, because I’m a Good Friend. ‘Nothing is ever optional with her. I really didn’t want to be out tonight − I just wanted to go home.’

‘I’m not sure what you’re trying to tell me,’ I replied, ‘but I’ve got this weird feeling you’re not especially in the mood for dinner.’

She scowled. I smiled.

‘Well, your make-up looks nice,’ I said, threading my arm through her elbow whether she liked it or not. ‘So that’s something.’

‘Whatever.’

When in doubt, always compliment a woman’s eyeliner application.

Sarah let go of my arm to avoid a pack of terrifying pre-teens hurtling down the middle of the street. ‘I just don’t want to be out all night,’ she said, dodging the kids like a pro. ‘I’m not in the mood. Who wants to be out in London on a Thursday night? No one. It’s full of wankers.’

I caught a glimpse of my overexcited expression in a blacked-out shop window and tried to suppress it before she looked up and slapped it off my face. Wankers and me! If someone wanted to be a full Grumpasaurus Rex, that was up to her. I wasn’t going to let it ruin my evening. Probably.

‘There you are!’

Lauren was squeezed into a tiny space at the busy bar when we arrived, Tweedleglee and Tweedleglum. Sarah allowed herself to be hugged briefly before ordering a double gin and tonic, while I took on the squeezing of a lifetime. Lauren is deceptively strong. Lauren goes to the gym. I believe these two factors are related but have done no research of my own to back that theory up.

‘What’s going on?’ I asked, dancing around from foot to foot and combing my hands wildly through my hair. It had looked fine when I left the office, well, brown and clean but now, surrounded by so many pretty people, not to mention my two blonde best friends, I was certain it was tangled and greasy and needed to be shaved bald. Or possibly tied back in a ponytail. Definitely, one or the other.

‘I’m not telling you until we’ve sat down,’ Lauren said, shaking her very good hair out of her face and into mine. ‘I’ve got a table, and I’ve ordered champagne − you don’t need to get a drink, Sarah.’

Sarah gave her a dark look, slapped a five-pound note on the bar and necked her G&T in two gulps.

‘Champagne?’ I said. ‘What are we celebrating?’

‘God, Maddie.’ Lauren’s eyes sparkled. It actually looked as though someone had already been on the champs. ‘Wait, like, ten seconds.’

Despite Sarah’s less than chipper attitude, Lauren was still smiling when we got to the table. To her face, we always joked that she was so much better put together than we were because she was American, and behind her back (in a nice way, of course), we reassured ourselves that it was because she’d never had a proper job in her life, but tonight she looked extra shiny.

‘So, how are you guys doing?’ she asked, allowing the waiter to pull out her seat. ‘It’s been forever since I saw you.’

‘Standard,’ I replied. Why hadn’t I done something with my hair? Lauren’s blonde mane always curled delicately at the bottom, like a fairy had come along and kissed it. ‘Shona got called in for a mammogram, but she’d heard they hurt so she made me go and get one first.’

‘Your boss made you go for a mammogram?’ Sarah’s eyes widened into saucers.

‘How does someone make you get a mammogram?’ Lauren asked, poking me in the left boob. ‘Jesus, Maddie.’

‘I don’t know,’ I said, slapping her hand away. ‘It was in my diary − I didn’t really think about it until afterwards. I thought everyone was doing it. And don’t poke my boobs in public.’

‘As if that’s even the worst thing she’s done,’ Sarah said, tapping her fingers on the table and watching like a hawk as the waiter peeled the foil off the champagne cork. ‘I think providing hospice care for her incontinent dog was more of an ask.’

I considered this for a moment.

‘He was a lovely dog when he wasn’t shitting everywhere,’ I replied.

‘But he was always shitting everywhere,’ Sarah countered.

‘Did it hurt?’ Lauren asked, wrinkling her little nose at the dog-shit banter. ‘The mammogram?’

I wrapped my hands around my chest and nodded. ‘Even thinking about it hurts. But, you know, they’re important.’

‘They are,’ Sarah agreed. ‘When you need them. You’re a thirty-one-year-old woman with no family history of breast cancer who spent the afternoon with her tit in a vice to appease her boss. That’s different. Is she at least going to get one now?’

‘I’ve scheduled her in for an MRI,’ I said in the kind of quiet voice an embarrassed mouse might use. ‘She didn’t fancy it after she read my report.’

Sarah gave me the look.

‘I don’t know why you don’t just quit,’ Lauren cut in before Sarah could explode. ‘You’ve been her assistant for, like, ten years, Maddie. You could be an assistant anywhere. Wait, don’t open that yet,’ she ordered the waiter as he gripped the champagne cork. ‘I want to make a toast.’

‘Jesus, in that case can I have a Hendrick’s and tonic, please?’ Sarah asked. ‘A double.’

‘Me too,’ I said, raising my hand. ‘Thank you.’

‘You guys …’ Lauren’s voice had a tendency to get a bit whiny when she wasn’t getting her own way. Oddly enough, that didn’t happen often. ‘I don’t want you to get wasted.’

‘We won’t get wasted,’ I promised. ‘Just delightfully tipsy. And you know it’s not as easy as walking out of the door and into another job. Things are difficult everywhere right now.’

‘There are quite a lot of event assistant jobs,’ Sarah pointed out. ‘Have you even looked?’

‘I’m not going to leave one shitty job for another shitty job, am I? And, you know, it’s not always awful,’ I said, preparing to launch into my well-rehearsed ‘Why I Don’t Leave My Horrible Job’ speech. ‘I only tell you the worst parts. It’s interesting. I get to do a lot of different stuff, the rest of the company is nice, it’s only Shona who can be difficult. And I get to meet a lot of people—’

‘Difficult? Can you even hear yourself?’ Sarah replied, unconvinced. ‘Next you’ll be turning up with a black eye and telling us “she only hits me because she loves me”. You stay because you’re scared to leave. I’ve known you too long, Mads. You’ve lived in the same flat for ten years, you’ve had the same job for ten years—’

‘I’ve had the same best friends for ten years,’ I broke in with what I hoped she would take as a threat. ‘Maybe I should make some changes.’

‘I guess you do get to go to a bunch of awesome parties,’ Lauren offered. Lovely, peace-making Lauren. ‘And you always get a ton of free cake.’

‘I do always get free cake,’ I said, looking pointedly at Sarah, who had so often been the grateful recipient. ‘Thank you, Lauren.’

‘But,’ she continued with one of her sweet smiles, ‘if you left, you might be happier. And we might actually get to see you more often.’

Lauren, the two-faced, backstabbing cow.

‘How are you, Sarah?’ she asked, ignoring the look on my face. ‘What’s going on with you?’

‘Nothing,’ Sarah replied as her G&T was set down in front of her. ‘Busy, tired, whatever.’

‘Tough day at work?’

‘They’re all tough,’ she said. ‘Maddie isn’t the only one who needs a new job.’

Lauren cast me a quick glance, which I replied to with wide, nonplussed eyes. When Sarah was in a bad mood, there was very little point trying to force her out of it.

‘Let’s open the champagne,’ Lauren said brightly, beckoning the waiter over with the bottle. ‘Before we start talking about mammograms and dog shit again.’

I smiled broadly. ‘Just your average Thursday night.’

‘This isn’t how I had planned this,’ she said, reaching under the table into her tote bag and pulling out two elaborately wrapped pink presents. There was a lot of curly ribbon involved. I mean, a lot. ‘But I have some news and I wanted to share it with you right away.’

Sarah stared at the presents, stared at Lauren, and took a sharp breath in before downing the rest of her second gin. ‘Oh no,’ she whispered.

‘What?’ I flicked my head back and forth between my friends so fast I’m almost certain I could have sued them for whiplash. ‘What?’

‘Michael asked me to marry him last night,’ Lauren announced, fiddling with her hand for a moment, then displaying a diamond ring so big it could only have come from Claire’s Accessories. There was no way that shit was real. ‘We’re engaged.’

I had never seen her look so happy, and Lauren was always happy. Lauren was happy, I was happy, the waiter was happy, and Sarah was … oh. Hmm. Sarah did not look happy. In case you were wondering, it takes exactly seven seconds to go from silent awe to awkward silence. Before I knew it, we were right in the middle of one of the most uncomfortable situations I had ever had the privilege to experience. Lauren’s smile began to freeze, and her giddy expression turned into tense confusion, while Sarah looked like she was getting a mammogram right there at the table.

‘Are you pregnant?’ I asked.

Apparently that was not the right thing to ask.

‘Jesus, Maddie, no!’ Lauren rolled her eyes and pouted. ‘I’m hoping he asked because he loves me. It happens. Remember when Sarah did it? Big white dress, church, party, bridesmaids?’

‘Oh no,’ Sarah said again, this time in a whisper. Her face was ashen and she refused to make eye contact with either of us, even when I gave her a swift kick under the table.

‘And that’s why I asked you to come meet me tonight,’ Lauren went on, in a Keep Calm and Carry On voice. American born maybe, but that girl had the stiff upper lip of a Brit when it was needed. She could pretend something wasn’t happening like an absolute pro. ‘To ask if you would be my bridesmaids.’

‘Of course!’ I shouted. Bridesmaids! Lauren’s bridesmaids! Lauren was getting married! Argh! I mean, hurrah! ‘That’s amazing, Lauren − come here.’

Hugging seemed like the socially correct gesture, but in half a heartbeat I went from being ecstatically happy to realizing it would make me the spinster of the group. But still, I gave her a hug instead of stabbing her through the heart with my butter knife. I was raised properly.

‘Sarah, isn’t this amazing?’ I asked, widening my eyes at our other friend across the table while Lauren showed off her ring to the waiter, who politely pretended to care.

But Sarah didn’t reply. We should have been screeching and making neighbouring tables offer awkward congratulations, but instead of leaping to her feet and joining the hug, Sarah was staring at her knees with tears streaming down her face.

‘Sarah?’

She held up a hand and tried to choke down the tears so that she could speak. Good old emotionally constipated Sarah had finally exploded. She was too overcome with happiness to leave her seat. It was impressive, really − Sarah never cries. When we went to her grandmother’s funeral, she was the one who elbowed me in the ribs and told me to keep it together. But our dear friend’s unexpected betrothal to a slightly dull man who thought cleaning products were an appropriate expression of love was finally the thing that got to her.

‘I think I’m going to be sick,’ she croaked.

It wasn’t the response either of us had been expecting.

‘What’s wrong?’ I asked. ‘Are you OK?’

She looked up, mascara running down her face, lips pursed tightly together, and shook her head, rubbing her hands together like a Topshop-clad Lady Macbeth.

‘These are bridesmaid journals,’ Lauren said, determinedly upbeat, taking her seat again and tossing the two pink packages across the table, ‘so you can write down all the happy memories, like the time I asked you to be my bridesmaids and showed you my engagement ring and Sarah said she wanted to throw up?’

And that was when I noticed Sarah’s left hand was entirely without diamond adornment. No engagement ring, no wedding ring.

Fuckityfuckfuckcockbollocks.

‘Come on, you two, I’m getting married!’ Lauren said before I could react. She waved her newly accessorized hand in the air, too busy looking at her own ring to notice the lack of someone else’s. ‘What’s wrong? Be happy!’

‘Sorry, don’t meant to be rude,’ Sarah said, raising her champagne glass in a solo toast and then draining every last drop. ‘Steve asked me for a divorce at the weekend, but, you know, here’s to you. Cheers.’

And so, dear diary, on the upside, tonight I was given this lovely journal, but on the downside, I had to endure one of the most uncomfortable evenings of my entire life. On reflection, probably not worth it.

All About You

Being a bridesmaid isn’t just a day to wear a pretty dress and have your photo taken!

As well as getting to know your bride even better than you do today, it’s a time to learn a lot about yourself. Fill in the answers below and you might be surprised to learn what an accomplished and powerful and wonderful young woman you already are.

Remember, there’s a reason your bride chose you!

My hair is: light brown

My eyes are: green

My favourite physical attribute is: boobs

I don’t love my: thighs arse bank balance but they’re mine!

My three best qualities are: loyalty, sense of humour, perseverance (as evidenced by this journal)

I make a great friend because: I’m a good listener, I remember everything and I always have gin

Three things I will practise from this day on for a happier, healthier life:

– Delete all the shopping apps off my phone before I bankrupt myself

– Stop looking at my ex-boyfriend’s Facebook page

– Only look at my ex-boyfriend’s Facebook page once a week

– Read all the big literary books Sarah has given me instead of looking at the Wikipedia entries for the ones that win prizes and telling everyone I’ve read them

– Get fantastic boyfriend and post so many pictures of the two of us that people I don’t know that well unfriend/unfollow me

– Spend time meditating and getting to know myself so I can truly be happy

– Throw out dry shampoo and bloody well wash hair more often

2
Friday May 15th

Today I feel: Like eating All Of The Things.

Today I am thankful for: The fact I’m too lazy to go out and buy all of the things.

Knowing I had to work all day Saturday for the McCallan wedding, I had planned to spend the entirety of Friday night on my arse watching some terrible television and working my way through the millions of emails Lauren had already sent about her wedding and hastily arranged engagement party, set for Sunday afternoon. I know, two days’ notice. FUN.

So far she’d sent me fifteen different wedding dresses, six venues and enquired whether or not we could get Beyoncé to play the reception – and, officially speaking, we hadn’t even started planning properly yet.

Why did I get the feeling this wasn’t going to be an easy one?

I was tapping out the politest version of ‘No, we cannot get one of the most successful musicians in the world to play the reception, you lovely moron’ when the texts from Sarah started. It was her first Friday night as a single woman in ten years, and she wasn’t doing well, despite the seventeen ‘I’m fine’ text messages she’d sent me earlier in the day.

An hour later, she was at my door, Oddbins bag in hand.

‘Sorry it’s such a shit-hole,’ I said, shoving half a pile of magazines off the coffee table onto the floor as she gingerly placed her handbag in their place.

‘It’s always a shit-hole,’ she pointed out, her voice tired and defeated as she handed me a bottle of gin and looked round at the clutter spread all across my flat. Open plan had seemed like such a good idea when I found the place but all I’d really done was double the amount of space I had available to fill with shit. At least she’d had the presence of mind to bring tonic. I never had anything helpful in my cupboards unless you considered an unopened packet of Ryvita and a not quite empty box of Frosties useful. ‘I’m used to it − your shit-hole is reassuring. Drinks. Now.’

It’s easy to let your flat become a takeaway-box-littered shantytown when no one else is there, but it’s hard to defend your appalling housekeeping skills face to face. Ever since Seb had moved out, I’d lacked the motivation to keep the place in order. It was amazing how quickly you could get over dust allergies if you tried.

‘I was going to clean this evening,’ I lied, ‘but I thought essential bonding time with my best friend in the entire world was more important. Do correct me if I’m wrong.’

‘You might actually be.’ Sarah slapped both of her hands down on the kitchen counter and gave me a grim smile. ‘This place is a human rights violation.’

‘Shut up and drink your gin,’ I said, poking my way to the back of a cupboard to find clean glasses. ‘Shona was a real bitch today.’

I’m not proud of myself, but I was putting off talking about the divorce until I had at least one drink in me. I had no idea how to talk about the divorce. If I’d had advance warning, I might have bought in a lot of ice cream and dug up my Pretty Woman DVD, because that’s what we did when Dave Stevenson stood her up for the lower sixth Halloween disco. I didn’t know the protocol for this one.

‘I know we give you shit about it, but you need to find a new job,’ Sarah said, moving a pile of creased sweatshirts from the settee to the armchair and sitting herself down. ‘I can’t believe you got a mammogram for her. Your boss shouldn’t really get a say in your tits unless you’re sleeping with them for a promotion.’

‘How do you know I’m not?’

‘Because of that time Lauren kissed you at the uni ball to impress Stephan Jones and you threw up immediately afterwards.’

‘That was as much to do with Aftershock shots as my aversion to lipstick lesbianism,’ I replied. ‘I could be a lesbian.’

‘You couldn’t even get through an entire series of Orange Is the New Black.’

‘Yes, but that was because I live in mortal fear of going to prison and ending up as someone’s bitch,’ I pointed out. ‘Not because I’m scared of a loving, respectful, consensual partnership with a lady.’

‘You’re not gay, Maddie,’ she said. ‘You’re just a wimp.’

‘Yeah, I know,’ I said, chopping up a sad-looking lemon for our gin. ‘That’s one of the upsides of having a gay sister. You don’t run around going “I wish I was a lesbian, it’s so much easier”, because it isn’t.’

Sarah nodded and held her hand out for a red wine glass full to the brim with gin and tonic. ‘Remember that girl she was going out with in her first year at Durham? What a cock.’

‘It’s not just the chaps,’ I agreed. ‘Women can be just as bad.’

‘Yeah, well, I’m pretty anti-man right now,’ she said, nursing the glass but not drinking.

Here it was. The Talk. We were going to have the talk and I was going to be supportive and caring and she would leave here knowing that she was an incredible person who, in spite of all the pain she was going through, was utterly and completely loved. I was going to say just the right thing.

‘Yuh-huh.’

I suck so hard.

Thankfully, Sarah didn’t seem to mind my friend fail and took it upon herself to start talking anyway. I dropped a lemon in her drink, sat myself down and held my glass tightly. All I needed to do was listen.

‘Things had been shit for a while,’ Sarah said. ‘I suppose I got used to it. He was out a lot and I’ve been working so much … you don’t realize how quickly things can go wrong. It’s got to be three months since we even had sex. I just didn’t realize.’

I nodded in silence. Three months. Was that a long time? I’d forgotten.

‘Then he comes home one day and out of nowhere he’s like, it isn’t working, I want a divorce. Just like that, he wants a divorce.’

‘So, what actually happened?’ I asked, treading as carefully as I knew how. ‘What exactly did he say?’

These were the same two questions I’d been asking her about boys since we were eleven. The fact that we were thirty-one and still having the same conversations was impossibly depressing.

Sarah took a deep breath and blew it out in one big huff.

‘It’s so ridiculous, saying it out loud,’ she said, her big blue eyes tearing up already. And as we’ve established, Sarah is not a crier. ‘It was Saturday, he’d been at the football with Michael and some of the others all day. I was a bit pissed off because, like I said, we hardly ever see each other and he was out so late, and he didn’t tell me what time he’d be home.’

‘So you were perfectly entitled to be annoyed,’ I said.

‘Exactly,’ she nodded, swiping at a stray tear before it messed up her eyeliner. ‘So I was making dinner when he got in, and he got a beer out of the fridge and I said dinner was almost ready and could he open the wine, and he said he didn’t want wine and I said I wanted wine, and he said he wanted to go out and I said I’d made dinner, and he slammed down his beer on the kitchen top and it spilled everywhere, and then he said “This isn’t working”. And yeah, it went from there.’

Sarah was still staring at her gin instead of drinking it, but I was halfway down mine.

‘It’s weird, isn’t it?’ she said, tapping her bitten-down nail on the rim of her glass. ‘You think these things are going to be dead dramatic, and then they’re not. You’re doing something painfully normal and having a totally average chat, and then, there it is. He just says it, just like that. It’s not working. He wants a divorce. Dunzo.’

‘Did he actually say he wants to get divorced, though?’ I asked, looking for a silver lining in this epic pile of shit. ‘Maybe he means he wants a break. Or he wants to fix things? This might be his way of getting your attention.’

‘He’s got that,’ she replied in a voice so light it felt like her words might float away before I heard them. ‘He’s already moved out. He slept on the settee on Saturday and went to stay at his mum’s on Sunday. He’s not coming back, Maddie. He emailed me today to say he’s got a lawyer and I should do the same.’

‘Oh, bloody hell.’ I squeezed her ankle, the most easily accessibly appendage, while she chewed on her bottom lip in an attempt to stop the tears from coming. She’d been gnawing on that thing for so many years I was amazed she hadn’t chewed it right off. ‘Why didn’t you call me before? I could have done—’

‘Absolutely nothing?’

I had never felt so useless in my entire life. I wanted to help but didn’t know how, and when your entire existence is based around being The One Who Helps, that is majorly distressing.

‘I started about a million texts, but I couldn’t work out how to say it,’ Sarah said. ‘Plus I had a yoga workshop.’

I paused, mid-sip. ‘You went to a yoga workshop? The day after your husband told you he wanted a divorce?’

‘I’d already paid for it,’ she said, daring me to argue. ‘And what was I supposed to do − sit around and cry all weekend?’

‘I don’t know whether to be massively impressed or have you sectioned,’ I said. ‘So that’s it? It’s happening?’

Sarah tilted back her glass and chugged it down in three big gulps.

‘When I try to think about it,’ she said, ‘it’s like my brain shuts down. I can’t even process it. Then I’ll be sat having a wee and I’ll look at my hand and think, do I have to take my wedding ring off? Has he already taken his off? I actually googled how long it would take for the groove to go away.’

She held up her hand and stretched out her bare fingers. I felt my own face crumple a little bit as her tears started to come in earnest.

‘Turns out it takes longer than a week,’ she gasped, clenching her hand into a tight fist. ‘I can’t believe that he’s doing this and he’s happy about it. How can someone who said they loved you every day for a decade suddenly decide they don’t any more? I’m sitting at home every night, sleeping in the spare room because I can’t stand to be in our bed, and he’s happy.’

‘Do you think he’s cheating?’ I asked.

She fidgeted with her top button for a moment and then shook her head.

‘No,’ she said with certainty. ‘He said he isn’t.’

‘Right,’ I replied.

‘Why?’ Suddenly she wasn’t looking nearly as certain. ‘He wouldn’t. Would he? Do you think he is? Have you heard something?’

‘Of course not,’ I replied instantly, squeezing her foot to calm her down.

Another white lie in the name of friendship.

Of course I thought he was cheating. Why else would he suddenly decide he wanted to abandon his wife and marriage without giving it a second thought? They’d been together since uni, inseparable for a decade, and now he had randomly decided it wasn’t working out? I remembered when Seb left me, wonderful Shona reminding me that most men don’t leave until they’ve got the next thing lined up. I scoffed at the time but of course, it turned out she was right in my case. Not an insight I would share with Sarah at this stage, perhaps.

‘I don’t want to get divorced,’ Sarah said, her watery blue eyes meeting my red-rimmed green ones. ‘I don’t want to have to tell people I’m divorced and sit there while they wonder what’s wrong with me or do exactly what you just did and assume he was cheating on me. What’s going to happen to me now?’

I stared blankly at the TV that I’d muted when I heard the doorbell but not turned off. A cartoon played silently in the background, a happy dysfunctional family, husband, wife, three kids.

‘I don’t know,’ I said, not wanting to lie any more than I had to. ‘But I do know we’ll get through it. I don’t know what else to say that won’t sound like a load of annoying clichés.’

‘I’m only thirty-one,’ Sarah said, gripping the stem of her glass until her knuckles turned white. ‘I’m not the first person in the world to get divorced, am I? Better now than ten years down the line when we’d have two kids in the mix, isn’t it?’

‘Course.’ I wondered how many times she’d told herself that already this week. ‘You’re totally right.’

‘All I want is to not feel like this any more,’ she said wearily, putting down her glass and pressing the heels of her hands against her eyes. ‘It’s like the worst hangover ever. I feel sick and empty, and every time I forget about it for a moment, it comes back and punches me in the face. And the only person who could make me feel better about it is the person who’s causing it. I hate him so much I can see it, but all I want is for him to come home and tell me he’s changed his mind.’

That part I recognized. ‘Really? You’d take him back?’

‘I don’t even know,’ she laughed, sounding sour. ‘I don’t know what I’d do. How would I ever trust him? I’d always be waiting for him to do it again, wouldn’t I?’

For want of a better response, I shrugged.

‘So what the fuck do I do now?’ Sarah asked, dropping her head against the back of my saggy settee. ‘Am I just supposed to sit here until it stops feeling like someone ripped my insides out with a fish hook?’

‘Would it help if I made you a kale smoothie?’ I offered.

‘It might,’ she said, pulling my hair. ‘But I think I’d rather have another gin.’

‘Good because I don’t have any kale.’ I grabbed the bottle off the coffee table and topped her up. ‘Let me get the tonic out of the fridge.’

‘Don’t bother,’ she said, taking a glug then holding up her glass. ‘To fresh starts, Maddie. Cheers.’

‘Cheers,’ I echoed, wondering whether or not there ever was such a thing as a fresh start, or whether you just picked up a new set of problems.

I can’t believe Sarah is getting divorced. It’s bizarre: I’ve known her for two-thirds of my life, and for the first time ever, I have no idea what to say to her.

Divorce. She’s getting a divorce. I don’t know anyone who got married and isn’t married any more other than Lauren’s parents, and I don’t really know them. It’s so weird. When you’re single you don’t think about that bit, even though in this day and age you’re fully aware of that bit. Getting the ring on your finger is the goal: the white dress, the John Lewis wedding-present list, worry about the rest of it afterwards. Getting married means you’ve won, and I hate thinking like that, I do, but let’s be honest, that’s just how it is. In our super progressive, equal rights, modern society, it’s the one thing no one wants to say but everyone is thinking, however messed-up it is.

Until you’re married, you’re a loser, no matter how great you are at everything else. But what does that make someone who gets divorced?

Divorce is something that happens to my parents’ generation, not my friends. Like in year nine, when everyone’s mum and dad suddenly split up and no one talked about it until Jane couldn’t come to your ice-skating birthday party because she ‘had to see her dad on Saturdays’.

Shit, who will get their cat? They both love that cat. Won’t somebody think of the children?

3
Saturday May 16th

Today I feel: Sore.

Today I am thankful for: Shaving my legs this morning when I couldn’t really be bothered.

I am so confused as to what happened today. All I do know is that it has ended with a strange man in my bed who I cannot ask to leave because it’s impolite, but who I really wish would leave because I’m starving and want to eat some biscuits, and if I don’t, I’m worried I might very well eat his arm in the night.

It started out as a normal day. Well, normal apart from the wedding/divorce debacle of Thursday night and then the depressing divorce-and-gin fest of Friday night, obviously. I got up, I texted my friends, they didn’t reply, and I went to work. The only difference was that my text to Lauren was all about her wedding, rather than last night’s telly, and my text to Sarah just said ‘Are you OK?’ She’d left at ten o’clock last night, teary with mother’s ruin but refusing the offer to stay over with a curled lip at my shabby sofa and the mountains of washing covering the spare bed. Fair play, really.

Ahhh, work. The McCallan wedding.

One of the fun things about working for an events planner is you never know exactly what you’re going to be doing from one day to the next, other than working yourself into a blind, desperate pit of no return seven days a week, obviously. Thanks to ten years in the trade, I am now a passable florist, competent seamstress and an excellent mixologist. Nevertheless, I wasn’t too happy when I got to the reception venue to find out two of the waitresses couldn’t be arsed to get out of bed and come to work, meaning I had to save the day by putting on a pinny and serving a room full of drunk people an absurdly expensive chicken dinner.

It’s amazing how terribly people treat wait staff sometimes. I ask you, how hard is it to say please and thank you? I’d say their mothers would be appalled but most of their mothers were there and quite frankly, in a lot of instances, the mothers were the worst. After spending a year planning every last moment of the McCallan’s big day, running around on the actual day of the wedding, fetching and carrying dirty dishes, while every single assembled guest refused to look me in the eye didn’t half test my moral fibre.

And then I saw him.

He was easy on the eyes, there was no getting around it. His eyes were brown, but a light brown − sort of gold, when you looked at them − and his black hair was shaved close to his head, giving him an air of an Action Man; but somehow, it worked. He had gorgeous full lips, and when he smiled at me I wanted to burn every pair of knickers I owned because I would never, ever be needing them again. He looked solid but smiley, like he’d always have a joke to tell you, and even while he was charming the pants off your parents he’d have his hand on your arse, and at the end of the night, when you’d had one too many, he’d feel you up a bit in the taxi.

‘Hello, everyone.’

Action Man was actually the best man. When it was his turn to give a toast, he didn’t even need to clink his glass. As soon as he stood up, everyone turned around and sat up straight. Without even asking myself why, I tightened my ponytail and bit some colour into my lips. Be still my beating heart.

‘As most of you already know, I’m Will, the best man,’ he said. ‘Or at least I’m the best one that was free today and had his own suit.’

I leaned against the wall, cupping my elbow in one hand, and pressed a fist against my mouth. He wasn’t so tall but he was tall enough, and his jacket hung perfectly from his shoulders, the result either of excellent tailoring or of excellent shoulders, it was hard to tell, but his easy stance and the way he looked around the room, totally comfortable in a situation that others found unbearable, gave me the biggest ladyboner.

Here’s the thing. I’ve always loved weddings. When I was little, I would run around the house wrapped up in a bed sheet screaming ‘I do!’ at the next-door neighbour, and when I was seven and my aunt got married, I didn’t take my bridesmaid’s dress off for two weeks. And that was only because I had the measles and threw up on it. Since then, I’ve been a bridesmaid five times and I would do it five more times if someone asked. How is it not fun? The dress shopping, the hen night, the penis headbands, I love all of it. And then there’s the actual wedding: you get a new frock, you get a free feed, you get to drink from the crack of dawn right through to the next day and not even your parents can complain about it. Weddings are the best.

But after hearing Sarah and Lauren’s news on Thursday, for the first time ever I was beginning to feel the onset of matrimonial fatigue. All of a sudden, everything that had once made me clap with delight had me rolling my eyes instead. Oh, you’re pretending to run away from a dinosaur in your pictures? How original. Choreographed first dance to the song from Dirty Dancing? You guys! It was horrible. Even the thought of stealing macarons from the dessert table didn’t help. I was over macarons. And when a woman declares herself over macarons, you know something is wrong. By the time the speeches had begun, it would be all I could do not to launch myself at the bride and groom and start screaming, ‘This is a sham! True love is an illusion! We’re all going to die alone!’

And for an assistant wedding planner, that was less than ideal.

And so the undeniable hotness of the best man made for a very welcome distraction on an incredibly shitty day.

‘I’ve known Em and Ian for donkeys,’ Will went on. Addressing the room, making eye contact, not using notes. All very impressive. ‘And between you and me, I couldn’t have been happier when he told me they were getting married. In fact, when he told me he was going to ask her, I cried. And then, when he sent me a text to say she said yes, I cried again.’

All the mums began to sniff and coo in unison, while all the single women pulled out lipsticks and powder compacts as they readied themselves to go to war.

Will was doing a good job.

‘You see, it’s hard to meet someone these days.’ He gave a little shrug and looked over at the happy couple. ‘These two met at a wedding, if you can believe it − my little sister’s wedding, actually − and I know it’s a cliché, but I knew they were going the distance as soon as they started going out. Actually, let me clarify that first bit again. It’s not hard to meet someone. It’s hard to meet someone special.’ He cleared his throat and let his voice crack a little, and I may or may not have let out a little squeak.

‘When Ian started seeing Emma, he changed, and I don’t mean that in a bad way. Whenever we saw each other, he couldn’t stop saying her name. He brought her to the football and let her wear the scarf that his dad bought him when he was six, and then, when he changed his Facebook status and his profile photo, I knew it was only a matter of time.

‘I think, when you meet someone who you love so much that you’re happy to tell Mark Zuckerberg and the world that they’re yours, you ought to lock it down. There was never any doubt for him. As soon as they met, no one else even existed to Ian. That’s why I’m not going to stand here and make jokes about his suit and his haircut. Although I clearly could.’

Cue genuine laughter. Cue me flushing from head to toe as Best Man Will picked up the Libbey Embassy champagne coupe that I’d had to order in especially because the bride wanted coupes and not flutes and raised it high in the air.

He was staring right at me.

Not at the little redheaded bridesmaid who was trying to squeeze her arms together to make her demure lilac gown show a bit more cleavage, or at the hot blonde guest who had been crossing and uncrossing her legs throughout the entire speech.

He kept looking at me.

Flushed in the face from running in and out of the kitchen, hair yanked back in a utilitarian ponytail, mascara all over my face after a champagne-opening incident that left me and three other people smelling like a piss-up in a very fancy brewery.

And I had checked − my shirt wasn’t unbuttoned or anything.

‘So if you would all join me and raise your glasses. To the bride and groom.’

As everyone shuffled out of their seats, the women struggling to stand in their too-high heels that would soon be kicked off and replaced with flip-flops, I blinked, breaking the connection. When I looked back, he was smiling at the bride and groom, the moment gone.

Breathing more heavily than is healthy, I slipped back into the kitchen looking for a drink of my own.

‘Sorry to bother you, but have you got a light?’

Hours later, when the buffet had been reduced to nothing more than a few stray cherry tomatoes and the odd splodge of tartar sauce, I was hiding at the back of the venue, holding a Marlboro Light, tearing up at the picture of Lauren’s engagement ring on Facebook and trying to work out how to ask Sarah if she was OK again without saying ‘Are you OK?’, because clearly she wasn’t. When I looked up, a man in a suit (strangely enough) was holding out a cigarette of his own. I blinked a couple of times, my eyes adjusting from the bright white light of the iPhone screen to the semi-darkness of my hidey-hole.

‘Oh, um, I haven’t actually got one,’ I said, squinting. It was one of the ushers. The one whose trousers were an inch too short. You tend to notice strange things when you work two weddings a week for three-quarters of the year. ‘Sorry.’

‘No worries,’ he said, putting the cigarette back in the pack of ten in his inside pocket. He was awfully tall; I supposed that explained the trousers. ‘I’m supposed to have quit anyway.’

‘Probably best then.’ I shuffled from foot to sensibly shod foot, flicking my unlit cigarette between my fingers and tucking my phone back into the waistband of my skirt.

He nodded, pressed his lips together and stuck his hands in his pockets.

‘Did you lose your lighter?’ he asked.

Oh good, awkward conversation. I loved those. Why couldn’t he leave me alone so I could bunk off and text my friend in peace?

‘Oh no,’ I replied, preparing myself. ‘I don’t smoke.’

The very tall usher looked at me strangely.

‘You don’t smoke?’ he asked.

‘No.’

‘But you’re standing outside holding a cigarette?’

‘Yes.’

He took in a short breath that sounded like he was going to say something, then shook his head and stopped himself. Then did it again and didn’t stop himself. More’s the pity.

‘I’m sure I’m going to regret it, but can I ask why you’re standing outside holding a cigarette without a lighter if you don’t smoke?’

It was a fair question; I just didn’t want to answer it. I wanted to read some showbiz gossip on my phone, text Sarah, call Lauren and pretend I hadn’t just pissed away an entire Saturday at someone else’s special day. It didn’t matter if you were wearing Jimmy Choos or a pair of Clarks − if you were on your feet for nigh on twelve hours, you were in pain.

‘My boss smokes,’ I said, shaking a full box of Marlboros at him. ‘And she takes cigarette breaks all the time, so she can’t stop me from taking them. So, you know, as far as she’s concerned, I’ve got a very healthy two packs a day habit. Or unhealthy, as the case may be.’

He looked at me. ‘You’re not serious?’

I looked back at him.

‘Oh my God, you are.’

‘She thinks smoking is better than eating,’ I replied. ‘Fewer carbs.’

‘But smoking will kill you,’ he said, looking at his own pack with a regularly repeated lecture playing over in his head. ‘She does know that, doesn’t she?’

‘We get private health insurance,’ I said. ‘So it all works out.’

‘Fair enough.’ The usher put his cigarettes away and scrunched up his face for a moment, staring at me. ‘I hate weddings,’ he said.

‘Really?’ Who went around saying they hated weddings while they were at a wedding. ‘Why?’

‘There’s so much standing around,’ he said wearily, pushing wavy brown hair off his forehead. Earlier it had been all slicked back and crunchy-looking, but by this point in the proceedings his locks had let loose. He needed a good shot of Elnett; he had to be single. ‘And there’s never anywhere to go. I just want to sod off somewhere and have a sit-down.’

‘Once I did a wedding that had a mini cinema,’ I said, nodding in agreement, ‘but the bride got angry because everyone sat in there all night instead of dancing to the band she’d paid a bloody fortune for. In the end she made us turn the film off and shouted at everybody.’

‘What film was it?’ he asked.

‘Ghostbusters. The groom picked all the films from when they’d been dating but he did too good a job.’

‘I’d give my right arm to sit in the dark and watch Ghostbusters right now,’ he said, sighing. His skin was quite pale and his eyes were quite dark and he really was awfully tall. At least a foot and a half taller than me. Teetering around too tall territory. Just the right height if you wanted something down from the loft, but a nightmare to sit next to if you were flying economy.

‘They had ice cream and beer as well,’ I added, trying not to look at his visible ankles.

‘I might never have left.’ He paused for a moment and then smiled.

He was nice looking when he smiled, a bit less gawky and angular, a realization that only made me feel all the more uncomfortable. I felt myself breathe in slightly and brushed a few stray strands of hair behind my ear.

‘Maybe my fiancée will let me have one at my wedding.’

Stray strands of hair be damned and belly be bloated.

‘And these bloody penguin suits,’ he said, ignoring me and pulling at his stiff collar. ‘If I took my tie off, I’d look like one of you.’

‘One of you?’ I asked. What the cocking cock was that supposed to mean?

‘Oh. Oh!’ he said, hands stuck midair as though he were showing me he had caught a fish thiiiiis big. ‘I didn’t mean anything by it. Just that, you know, I’m dressed like a waiter.’

As soon as he’d said it, I could tell he wanted to take it back. Unfortunately for him, I was not in the mood to let anyone off with anything.

‘And what’s wrong with being a waiter?’ I asked.

He looked even paler than he had two minutes before. ‘Nothing. But I’m a lawyer.’

He couldn’t have been anything else in the world, could he? He had to be a lawyer.

‘And you think being a lawyer is better than being a waiter?’

‘I was just trying to say how funny it is that we’re both wearing black and white, when I’m at the wedding and you’re just a waitress,’ he said.

And there it was. The shovel hit the soil and suddenly he was tit-deep in a hole he couldn’t possibly dig himself out of. Just a waitress? Just a waitress?

‘Not that I think being a lawyer is better than being a waitress,’ he said, the panic setting in. ‘I think it’s brilliant that you’re a waitress.’

I was so angry, I was very nearly ready to be slightly rude.

‘Is it?’

No one had ever made those two syllables sound like such a threat.

He was flustered. I was angry. It was a perfect British combination. I think we both knew it was time for him to give up and walk away, but I knew he wasn’t going to: lawyers never could.

‘Absolutely. I look like a penguin.’ The usher pressed his arms against his side and kicked his legs out. He looked so ridiculous that I almost softened. ‘I think you’re more of a panda.’

And then I stopped almost smiling.

‘How come you’re a penguin and I’m a panda?’ I asked, breathing in again. Had he just called me fat? ‘Because I’m a woman?’

‘Pandas are good!’ he replied, exasperated. ‘Pandas are better than penguins!’

‘Maddie?’ Shona’s voice cut through the darkness.

‘Christ.’ I pulled my cigarette back out, broke off the filter and ground it against the wall before Shona could bust me. ‘Whatever.’

‘Pandas are better than penguins,’ he said in a sulky voice. ‘So much better. Everyone knows that.’

I shook my head and turned on my heel, striding back towards the kitchen as quickly as my ugly practical shoes would carry me.

Wanker.

4

‘MADDIE!’

‘I’m here!’ I picked up pace and ran into the kitchen, to find my boss waiting for me. ‘What’s wrong?’

‘Nothing,’ she said. She was sitting on a stool, leaning her elbows on the big stainless-steel island in the middle of the kitchen. ‘Everything’s fine. Do you want a drink?’

Sometimes this happens. Sometimes my boss Shona forgets she’s a she-beast who would be better occupied guarding the gates of hell and likes to pretend we’re friends. This is how you know she’s a properly evil mental case. The truly psychotic are not consistent.

‘Go on, then,’ I said. I didn’t know if it was a trap or not, but I am not above taking a free drink when it’s offered.

She poured two glasses of champagne into water glasses and pushed one towards with me something resembling a smile. I took it, peeking at the phone in my pocket while she chugged. Shona might tolerate drinking and smoking on the job, but carrying your phone while you were waitressing? She’d replace my champagne with lighter fluid, spark it up and still make me drink it. There was a message from Sarah but it was going to have to wait two minutes until I could escape.

Looking up at my boss, I saw that she was already three-quarters of the way through her Veuve Clicquot. Shona was tall and thin with white-blonde hair that sometimes looked fantastic and sometimes looked as though she needed to shave it off and start again. Today fell somewhere between the two.

‘I don’t think we’re going to need you to serve for the late shift,’ she said, refilling her glass and not refilling mine. ‘I was going to send a couple of the girls home, but why don’t you just knock off early instead.’

‘Thanks,’ I said, utterly relieved.

‘I don’t mean leave,’ she expanded. ‘I just mean you don’t have to waitress. I still need you here to make sure everything runs OK. I’m probably going to go home after this.’

Oh, Shona, you card. It was only ten and I knew full well that we had the venue booked until two a.m.

‘Going somewhere nice?’ I asked through gritted teeth.

‘Maddie, I’m exhausted,’ she announced, rubbing both of her hands over her face. ‘Ever since that slacker Victoria quit, I’ve been doing two people’s jobs. I need a bath, another seven drinks and an early night. You can handle this − I trust you.’

Fighting the urge to charge her with the carving knife resting on the butcher’s block to my left, I pasted on a smile. She was my boss, she was allowed to leave early. Even if I had arrived two hours before her, done all the prep and spent three hours serving at the reception while she sat on her arse in the kitchen drinking herself stupid.

‘Speaking of Victoria—’

‘The slacker.’ Shona nodded.

‘Such a slacker,’ I replied with far too much enthusiasm. ‘Can’t believe she just left like that.’

‘Standard,’ she replied. ‘She was crap anyway.’

For the record, Victoria is neither crap nor a slacker, she’s a very nice lady who happened to marry a man who used to work with us who Shona fancied. Probably best that they’ve both left now, for their own safety.

‘Actually, I meant to ask, is her job still going? Have we hired anyone yet?’

Across the island, Shona lowered her glass from her lips and nursed it in both hands. Very, very slowly, I reached out for the carving knife and placed it in the sink behind me.

‘Victoria was crap,’ she said in a crisp voice, never taking her eyes off me. ‘Compared to me. Compared to most other people in the industry, she was brilliant.’

‘OK.’

I wished I could have recorded that and sent it to Vic. It might have made up for the time Shona emailed the entire office asking them not to eat snacks in front of her because she’d just joined Weight Watchers and we should all support her in her weight-loss journey. It was just about the nicest thing she’d ever said about anyone.

‘But you won’t get that job, Maddie. So don’t embarrass yourself by applying for it.’

For some reason, it seemed as though I had suddenly decided to stop breathing. What?

‘You’re a decent assistant, Maddie, but there’s a lot to learn and a long way to go. You know I’m not an event planner, I’m—’

She cued me to complete the line.

‘An experiential architect,’ I said, trying not to be sick in my mouth.

‘An experiential architect,’ she confirmed. ‘And let’s be honest, you’re not cut out for management, are you? I know I can say that to you without hurting your feelings because we’ve known each other for such a long time.’

Too long, some might say.

‘If you were working for anyone else, I’m not sure they would have been as patient as me,’ she said, raising her glass and sipping. ‘I’m so used to you, it’s like I hardly notice how you let me down me sometimes.’

I didn’t say anything, I just nodded.

‘I mean, you’d have to apply like everyone else, submit your CV, interview with Mr Colton,’ Shona’s eyes sparkled at the very thought. ‘And to be honest, he’s so totally threatened by me, your being my assistant for so long would probably go against you.’

‘It would?’

‘That’s if they even gave you an interview,’ she said, wincing at the very thought. ‘I know everyone likes you, and your job must seem like a lot of fun, but moving up would mean a lot of responsibility. You would literally have to be me.’

I’d have to lose three stone, fuck up my hair and start taking motivational tips from Darth Vader first.

‘Don’t overreach, Maddie. When you shoot for the moon, you end up with your face in the mud.’

I blinked several times and gently reminded my lungs that I needed them to work for me to go on living. They weren’t convinced. It had been a bloody long day.

‘I thought it was reach for the moon and you might land amongst the stars?’ I said. ‘Isn’t that the saying?’

‘To be in the stars, you’ve got to be a star.’ Shona gave me a sharp, kindly look. ‘Do you feel like a star, Maddie?’

I looked down at my slightly too-small-across-the-bust shirt, knee-length black skirt and nana-approved shoes. I did not feel like a star. I felt like a girl at the end of year nine who has grown out of her school uniform but her mum doesn’t want to buy her a new one until September.

‘Do you know what −’ she slipped off her stool in her three-inch black patent heels and sleek grey dress and knocked back the dregs of her drink without so much as a champs shiver − ‘why don’t you take the rest of the night off? No point in having an assistant around if her head’s not in the game anyway, is there? I’d only spend all night worrying and double-checking.’

I wasn’t sure how I’d managed to be so thoroughly insulted and abused but still get away with an early finish, so I kept my mouth shut and my eyes down. Shona rounded the kitchen island and patted me on the shoulder.

‘Go home and think about what you’re suggesting,’ she said as I flinched. ‘Ask yourself if you really want to put yourself through it. I can’t guarantee that your job will still be waiting for you if you decide you want to play at being me and it all goes wrong.’

‘That’s not—’ I started to explain but she cut me off with a sad shrug.

‘It’s just not who you are, Maddie,’ she said with a sympathetic smile. ‘You’re an assistant. You’re good at that. Mostly. Don’t rock the boat.’

Left alone in the kitchen clutching the bottle of champagne, there was nothing for me to do except storm back outside into the gardens. The party was in full flow inside, big picture windows lit up with flashing lights and silhouettes of people much happier than I was. Or at least more drunk than me. Pouting, I considered the champagne and decided it was churlish to waste it just because I didn’t want it. Besides, nothing said thirty-one and going nowhere better than binge-drinking alone.

Staring blindly into the party, I was vaguely aware of a vibration against my right thigh. Phone. It was my phone.

‘Oh no, Sarah,’ I remembered, throwing myself down underneath a tree like a fifteen-year-old with a bottle of White Lightning. ‘You home?’

This was followed by a sad-face emoji and a gun. And that was followed by two Martini glasses and a dancing girl. The phone rattled in my hand as I tried to decipher the pictograms while swigging champagne out of the bottle. Class act all the way.

‘Tell me you haven’t killed yourself.’

‘If I’d killed myself, I couldn’t tell you, could I?’ I typed. ‘I’m still at work, you ok?’

Turns out there wasn’t a better way to ask that question.

‘No.’

And no better way to answer it.

‘Have you seen FB?’

‘No.’ I typed, wondering what fantastic news awaited me on the wonderful world of the Internet. ‘What?’

There was a pause, followed by three little grey dots on the screen.

‘Seb’s missus had the baby.’

If only they had stayed dots.

Seb had a baby. There was a baby Seb. A tiny, red-faced, screaming mini Seb.

And it wasn’t mine.

Seb. Formerly Bash or Sebby, latterly Knobjockey, Cockchops and, most recently and accurately, that absolute bastard who systematically pulled apart every single one of my organs like Cheestrings before getting to my heart, taking it out, freezing it, defrosting it in the microwave, freezing it again, defrosting it and freezing it one last time until all that was left was a leathery bit of offal that would nourish neither man nor beast. I was still getting letters from Direct Line about his car insurance renewal and he was married with a baby.

‘So?’

I tapped out the letters, totally not imagining the former love of my life sitting in a fancy private hospital room holding his new baby while his sweaty but beautiful wife smiled at him knowingly. I had some dregs of champagne and a shirt that was a size too small. The only thing that could even this out was a kebab on the way home.

‘I’ve got to get back to work.’ Lying was so much easier through the medium of text. ‘See you tomorrow?’

‘There you are. I’ve been looking for you.’

A very tall man appeared from nowhere in the semi-darkness before she could reply, and for a split second I was very worried that I might not live to see that kebab.

‘That’s not an incredibly creepy way to address someone you don’t know,’ I replied. It was the insulting usher. ‘I definitely didn’t think you were going to kill me.’

‘Sorry,’ he said, clearly not meaning it. ‘Not smoking again?’

‘No, this time I’m not not drinking.’ I held up the champagne bottle and didn’t smile. ‘Cheers.’

He crouched down beside me and took the bottle, helping himself to a swig.

‘You might be the most interesting waitress I’ve ever met,’ he said, handing the bottle back. Even in a squat he was massive. I’m pretty standard height at five four-ish, but he had to be pushing six five. He would be a very helpful man to know if I needed any light bulbs changing.

‘Thanks,’ I replied, sipping my booze straight out of the bottle in as ladylike a fashion as possible. ‘I try.’

No point explaining I wasn’t a waitress. Might as well be a waitress anyway: most of the waitresses I met did something else. They were actresses or models or musicians or they were at uni studying something fantastic. That or they had lovely families at home and they waitressed as a part-time thing. All I had at home were fourteen back issues of Marie Claire, three still in their mailing bags, and a stale chocolate croissant that I would probably eat when I got home, regardless.

‘I wanted to apologize,’ he said. ‘I think I was rude earlier.’

Seb had a baby.

‘What?’ I looked at him, confused.

‘Earlier, I was a bit out of it.’ He folded himself up into an oversized-schoolboy sitting position. ‘It feels as though I ought to say sorry.’

‘You think you were rude?’ I said. ‘And it feels as though you ought to say sorry? Don’t knock yourself out, whatever you do.’

‘All right, I was rude and I am sorry,’ he replied, overenunciating but still not leaving, which was all I wanted him to do. ‘I’m having a very bloody bad day.’

I took another sip and then laughed.

‘My boss just told me I’m shit and I’ll never get promoted, one of my best friends is getting divorced, the other is getting married, and my ex-boyfriend literally just had a baby with his new wife. As in, an hour ago.’

‘Not ideal,’ he said, combing his hair back off his face. It had completely given up any semblance of style and was starting to curl up over his collar. I thought he looked much better now, less like a young Tory backbencher and more like he’d just come in from taking the dog for a walk before bed. ‘Did you not know he was having a baby?’

Trust a man to completely miss the point.

‘I did,’ I said, ‘but it’s still weird to think that there’s, like, a new human out there that’s half of him.’

The usher thought on it for a moment, his eyebrows coming together slightly, and then he nodded.

‘Why does your boss think you’re shit?’ he asked, taking the champagne again. Without asking, again. ‘Are you?’

‘I don’t think so.’ Blunt but fair. ‘She’s not the nicest person in the world. Or the most reasonable. Or the most sane.’

‘Then why do you work for her?’ He stuck out his tongue as he tried to balance the empty champagne bottle on the uneven grass. Someone was a bit drunk and, unfortunately, it wasn’t me. ‘Can’t you be a waitress anywhere?’

‘I suppose I just can’t imagine it,’ I said. ‘I’ve been doing this for so long, I’m probably a bit frightened of being the new girl. And what if she’s right? What if I am shit?’

It’s strange how some things are easier to say to strangers than your best friends. I knew I wasn’t bad at my job, but there was every chance I wasn’t brilliant at it. It wasn’t like I’d won any awards or been headhunted or anything. The idea of applying for a new job and not getting it, or worse, getting it and then fucking it up, scared me senseless.

‘I don’t believe it for a second,’ he said, reaching out to robotically pat my shoulder with a stick-straight arm. ‘Apart from the fake smoke breaks and getting drunk under a tree during the reception, I bet you’re a brilliant waitress.’

‘The best,’ I confirmed, pushing the carefully balanced bottle over with my foot, much to his dismay. ‘What’s been so bad about your day, anyway? You’re at a wedding. You’re in a wedding. What can possibly have been so bad?’

He closed his eyes and shook his messy head. ‘You don’t want to know.’

‘Well, no, I don’t,’ I agreed. ‘But you brought it up and I’ve asked now, so it would only be polite to tell me.’

‘What on earth is going on out here?’ A voice chimed in the darkness, and the silhouette of another man approached. ‘Am I interrupting something?’

‘When has that ever stopped you?’ The usher unrolled himself and climbed unsteadily to his feet. ‘We’re having a chat.’

Be still my beating heart, it was the best man.

‘Looks like it,’ he said, nudging the empty bottle with his toe. ‘Has he been a naughty boy?’

‘Please shut up, Will,’ the usher said, digging his hands deep into his pockets. ‘We were just talking.’

‘About me?’ He grabbed the knot of his dark blue tie and pulled it away from his neck before unbuttoning the top two buttons of his shirt. He was a very attractive man. Just looking at him made me feel all flighty and unnecessary. ‘Whatever he told you, it’s not true.’

‘Strangely enough, you’re not my only topic of conversation.’ My champagne-swilling buddy was not nearly as impressed with Best Man Will as I was. ‘What do you want?’

‘I came out for some fresh air − things are getting a bit much in there,’ he said, cocking his head back towards the reception. ‘Shouldn’t you be inside with your fiancée?’

The usher stepped back. ‘Shouldn’t you—’

‘I should be a lot of things, but I wouldn’t worry about them if I were you,’ Will cut in before he could finish. ‘Let me guess, he’s making an arse of himself, being horribly offensive and sulking like a little girl?’

‘Sort of,’ I said. ‘Although I’m not sure it was all on purpose.’

For a moment they stood staring at each other, Will with his collar and tie undone and a big grin on his face, and the usher all buttoned up and vibrating with a very British rage. It was like EastEnders versus Downton Abbey. Sitting under a tree where I’d been directing the bride and groom portraits a few hours earlier, watching these two random blokes square off to the sounds of the Village People, it felt as though my very odd day was complete. They were either going to knock seven shades of shit out of each other or kiss.

‘Kiss!’ I shouted.

They both turned round and stared. I shrugged and reached for the disappointingly empty bottle.

‘Right, well …’ The usher adjusted his cuffs, tugging the white fabric down below his jacket sleeves and breaking the testosterone-fuelled spell. ‘I came to apologize and I’ve done it. I hope your day improves, but I should warn you, talking to this arsehole isn’t going to help.’

‘Ouch,’ Will replied, immediately dropping down onto the ground beside me. ‘Ouch, Thomas.’

‘Your name is Thomas!’ I clapped, realizing he hadn’t introduced himself, but then Will casually draped his arm round my shoulders and I lost the ability to speak.

‘Tom,’ Thomas said, rubbing his hand against the back of his neck. ‘It’s Tom.’

‘It’s Thomas,’ Will whispered in my ear. ‘Everyone calls him Thomas.’

Why was he touching me? How could I make him keep touching me? And then how could I turn that into him marrying me and making a baby so I could put it on Facebook for Seb to see?

Thomas the usher didn’t look nearly as happy about my current situation as I was. He gave me one last warning look before turning back towards the party.

‘Bye, Thomas,’ I called.

‘Yeah, bye, Thomas,’ Will echoed, laughing as he turned towards me. ‘You’re funny.’

‘Am I?’

I certainly didn’t feel funny. At least not funny ha-ha.

‘Yeah.’ He peeled his arm away and leaned back on his elbows to take a better look at me. I knew that after a long day at work and several hours in a steamy kitchen I didn’t look my best, but there was nothing I could do now, so I kept my eyes trained on his right ear and hoped for the best. ‘What’s your name?’

‘Maddie,’ I said, a horrible squawk of a laugh bubbling from my lips, as though my name was the funniest thing I’d ever heard. ‘Are you having a good time?’

‘Maddie,’ he repeated, ignoring my question. ‘What did Thomas want?’

‘We were just talking.’ I waved my hands around aimlessly. ‘About nothing. He wasn’t being a knobhead.’

‘Makes a change,’ he drawled. ‘Doesn’t matter though, does it? At least he’s gone. You’re safe now.’

‘Am I?’ I asked. Isn’t that what murderers say right before they kill you?

We were completely alone, no one around but random shadows thrown across the lawn by the party going on inside and a Kanye West soundtrack that I would not have chosen for this moment.

Will was still staring at me, a big smile on his face. It was most disconcerting.

‘I liked your toast,’ I said, smiling back, possibly looking a bit like a loon. ‘Very important job, best man. You were great.’

He ran his hand across his five o’clock shadow, still considering me. I surreptitiously licked my lips and combed a few loose strands of hair behind my ears.

‘Very important job,’ he agreed finally. ‘But it’s been a long day. Too much standing around for my liking. I’m knackered.’

‘It has been a long day,’ I agreed, smoothing the back of my hands across my shiny nose. ‘At least it’s almost over.’

‘You’re done for the night?’ he asked.

I nodded. He nodded back, and then, without warning, slapped my bare thigh so hard I let out a yelp and bit my lip.

‘Listen, Maddie, I was actually planning on sneaking out when I saw you out here,’ he said, jumping to his feet and holding out his hand. ‘Don’t suppose I can give you a lift anywhere?’

This was it. This was the moment. Or at least, it felt a lot like a moment. The kind of situation that a girl who blow-dried her hair properly and got professional manicures would know how to deal with. I glanced down at my bare, bitten-down nails and breathed in. Think of the money you’ll save on a taxi, I told myself. It’s just a lift, I told myself.

‘That would be very nice of you,’ I said, pushing my shoulders back and trying to look more confident than I felt. ‘But I don’t want to put you out. Which way are you going?’

He smiled again, and this time there was no mistaking what he meant.

‘I’ll drop you off,’ he said, helping me to my feet without asking where I lived. ‘Come on.’

‘Only if it’s on your way,’ I said, holding back a Tigger-like bounce in my walk when he did not let go of my hand. ‘Really.’

‘Maddie, I will drop you off,’ he said again, squeezing my fingers as we walked towards the car park. ‘It’s not a problem.’

And that was how, for the first time in thirty-one years, I woke up with a strange man in my bed.

5
Sunday May 17th

Today I feel: Slutty in a good way.

Today I am thankful for: Netflix, Lauren and Mini Cheddars.

I woke up first the next morning, Will still face down in his pillow, snoring and enjoying the deep, restful sleep of a man who had performed. I hadn’t slept quite so well. I don’t know how anyone can relax in bed with a complete stranger, even if they’ve just seen every last little bit of you, up close and personal. Actually sleeping with someone is a lot more intimate than sleeping with someone, as far as I’m concerned.

Rather than wake him up and have to actually converse with the man, I did the only sensible thing I could do. I snuck out of bed, locked myself in the bathroom and panicked. I’d had a one-night stand. I was fairly certain it had been a good one, but it had been a while, and despite what people might say, it was nothing like riding a bike. Or if it was, I was doing it wrong.

‘Hello, what’s wrong, are you OK? You’re still coming to the party, right?’

Lauren would know what to do. Sensible, sweet Lauren.

‘I brought a man home,’ I hissed into my phone, shoving a towel under the bathroom door to muffle the sound of my voice. ‘Last night. I did it with a man. He’s still here. What do I do?’

‘Go you!’ she replied, only sounding slightly surprised. ‘Is he hot? Do you like him? Is he coming to the party?’

‘He is hot,’ I said, examining myself for love bites and thankfully coming up clean. ‘I think I like him, and no, he isn’t coming to the party.’

‘Oh.’ She only sounded slightly disappointed. ‘I think I’ve overcatered. How did you meet him? Tinder?’

‘I deleted Tinder off my phone to make room for the Taylor Swift album.’

‘The last one?’

‘Yep.’

‘Totally worth it.’

‘Totally worth it,’ I agreed, randomly taking the lids off my various lotions and potions and wondering which one would make me look less grey. ‘He was at the wedding I worked yesterday.’

‘Nice.’ Lauren sounded genuinely impressed. ‘Good work.’

I patted a thick white moisturizer onto one cheek. ‘Thank you?’

‘Maddie, it’s not even nine a.m. on a Sunday,’ she yawned. ‘Did you want something, or did you just call to brag now I’m practically an old married woman?’

‘I don’t know what to do,’ I whispered, closing the toilet lid and sitting down carefully, wiping off the cream with a tissue. ‘I’ve never done this before.’

‘You’ve never brought a guy home before?’ I could hear her racking her mental archives even as she spoke. ‘Jesus, woman. You’re two years late on your rebound.’

‘Just tell me what to do,’ I said, wondering whether or not he would stay asleep long enough for me to paint my toenails. Of course they didn’t matter last night, but they mattered this morning. If only to me.

‘Baby’s first one-night stand,’ Lauren cooed. ‘This is so awesome. I am so touched that you called me. Not that you could call Sarah right now, I guess.’

‘Yeah, I can’t imagine that call going well,’ I replied, wincing. ‘Now back to me. Please.’

‘Go easy − you want to look totally natural. Clean your teeth, wash your face, put on mascara and lip balm, maybe a little powder if you’re shiny, but that’s all,’ she instructed. ‘What are you wearing?’

‘Last night’s shirt and my not terribly attractive knickers,’ I said, sniffing myself. ‘Are you turned on?’

‘You want to look cute and comfortable,’ Lauren said. ‘Like, a loose sweater, something lived-in, like you wear it all the time. But a nice one. Do you have any cashmere?’

‘No, I don’t have a nice, baggy, post-coital cashmere jumper in my bathroom,’ I replied. As if I wasn’t stressed enough about my chipped toenails, now I had to worry about not having enough premium knitwear to flounce around the house in as well? ‘Forget what I’m wearing, what do I actually do?’

‘Honey, if I’ve got to tell you that, I’m not sure how you got him home with you in the first place.’

‘I don’t mean sexing,’ I whispered. Maybe I should have called Sarah. Or my mum. Or anyone else alive. ‘I mean, what do I do? What do I say?’

‘I don’t know,’ Lauren replied. ‘Just be cool.’

Oh. Be cool. Of course.

‘Act like it’s no big deal,’ she carried on before I could kick her arse. ‘Or just tell him you have plans and he has to leave.’

‘OK.’

‘You do want him to leave, right?’

I stared at the patchwork paint job on my toes and considered this.

On one hand, he was a handsome man who wanted to put his penis in me and owned his own car. On the other hand, he was, to all intents and purposes, a stranger who had willingly put his penis in me without so much as asking my last name. I probably did want him to leave. He probably wanted to leave.

‘It’s just a one-night thing,’ I said, convincing myself. ‘He was the best man at the wedding. Everyone wants a shag at a wedding, don’t they?’

‘He was best man?’ Lauren asked. ‘And he went home with you?’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

She guffawed down the line with her throaty American laugh. Lauren has an excellent laugh. It’s big and deep and makes women clap and men’s underwear fall off. ‘I’m just saying the best man usually has the pick of the crowd. Good going, girl. You needed to get back on the horse.’

‘It’s nothing like riding a bike and it’s nothing like riding a horse,’ I grumbled. ‘Why do people say that?’

‘Maybe you’re doing it wrong?’ she suggested.

Dear God, my greatest fear come true.

‘Maddie?’

‘Lauren?’

‘Where are you?’

‘Bathroom.’

We’ve been on the phone for kind of a while − you should probably go.’

‘Yeah,’ I said, fluffing my hair and then immediately smoothing it down. ‘It’s fine, isn’t it? Totally fine.’

‘See you later,’ she said. ‘I want to hear all the gory details.’

‘A lady never tells,’ I replied. ‘And you’re disgusting. Love you.’

I hung up, stashed my phone in with the spare loo rolls and stared into the mirror. My green eyes were a bit red, but I had eye drops that could fix that. My hair was my hair and didn’t look any better up or down, so I decided to leave it down for sexy flicking-around purposes, and as for the rest of it, he’d already seen me completely naked from every angle so there wasn’t a lot I could do about any of that.

At least it was one less thing to worry about.

‘Now all I need is a baggy, lived-in, sexy jumper that’s nice,’ I told myself. ‘And the job’s done.’

‘Morning.’

When Will emerged from the bedroom, I was carefully padding around my kitchen in slouchy sports socks, a sort-of clean T-shirt and the Marks & Sparks cardigan my mum had left last time she came to visit. It was a carefully put-together outfit based on something I’d seen in a Nivea commercial slash the clothes that were in my bathroom and seemed all right for the ‘Oh hi, random man I brought home with me last night, hair toss, hair toss’ attitude I was attempting to give off.

‘Morning,’ I squeaked.

Will was standing in the middle of my flat completely stark bollock naked. Bollock being the operative word. This never happened on Nivea commercials. My mother’s cardigan was aghast.

‘I was starting to wonder where you were.’ He stretched, man parts flopping as he went, and wandered across the room to park himself on a bar stool in front of the breakfast bar. Naked. ‘I thought you’d done a runner from your own house for a minute.’

‘I was going to make coffee,’ I said, trying very hard not to look at his penis. But it was like staring into an eclipse: you knew it was bad for you and you still couldn’t help it. ‘Would you like some coffee?’

‘Love some,’ he replied, staring out of my window. Oh dear God, the neighbours. Mrs Meakin’s heart wouldn’t be able to take something like this.

‘So, big plans today?’ I asked, shaking as I pulled out the cutlery drawer. Femme fatale I was not.

‘No,’ Will replied, still naked. ‘I’d more or less written the day off for a hangover. You know how weddings can be. Happily, not the case.’

‘Yeah,’ I nodded, trying not to spill the milk. ‘Weddings, eh?’

‘I’ve got some work to do.’ He tapped his fingers on the kitchen counter and gave my flat the once-over. Happily it was a bit cloudy out so you couldn’t quite see how incredibly filthy it was. Job number one after he left, dusting. Actually, that would be job number three after I’d Dettoxed the stool he was sitting on and had a brief lie down. ‘But, you know, nothing major.’

‘You’ve got to work?’ I asked, but in a totally cool way. ‘I don’t actually know what you do.’

‘I’m an associate at a law firm in town,’ he said, resting his elbows on the counter while I expertly boiled the kettle. ‘I went to law school with Ian.’

I was cursed only ever to be penetrated by men in the legal profession. I suppose it could be worse, but really, was a doctor or an architect too much to ask for?

‘That other man was a lawyer,’ I said, memories coming back to me. ‘From last night. The usher.’

‘Thomas?’ Will pulled a sour-milk face. ‘Yeah, he was in law school with us but he dropped out, so he didn’t qualify when we did.’

‘Why did he drop out?’ I sniffed my own pint of semi-skimmed and thanked the gods of Cravendale for lasting one day past their best-before date.

‘I don’t remember,’ he shrugged, accepting his mug of instant coffee as though it was a golden chalice full of unicorn tears. ‘Because he was shit, most likely.’

It seemed as though I shouldn’t take Thomas’s pep talk from the night before too seriously after all.

‘Do you like it?’ I asked, sipping my coffee and considering him a little more closely. He didn’t seem to be in any rush to leave. Maybe I could afford to be very slightly optimistic. ‘Being a lawyer?’

‘I don’t like the hours,’ he replied, scratching his stubble. On his face, not his neatly topiaried man parts. ‘But the money’s good. And it’s interesting. Do you like your job?’

‘Most of the time,’ I said, not wanting to go into the details. That seemed like a drunk-under-a-tree–with-a-complete-stranger conversation, not a bright Sunday morning didn’t-you-have-your-penis-in-me-a-few-hours-ago-stranger conversation. ‘Unless I have to play waitress for a lot of drunk people. I work for the company that planned the wedding, I was only waitressing yesterday to help out.’

‘Sounds fun.’ He glugged his coffee and smiled. ‘I can’t imagine spending every weekend at a wedding. It must be knackering.’

‘Well, we do all kinds of things,’ I replied, almost for one second forgetting he was naked. And then remembering again. ‘Weddings, birthdays, anniversaries. Sometimes corporate stuff. I’m working on a birthday thing and an engagement party at the moment. Keeps me on my toes.’

‘The last party I had was for my eighteenth,’ Will said. ‘My best friends got me a dodgy stripper and my mum cried. We had it in the village hall. Good times.’

‘Our events tend to be a bit more involved than that,’ I said. I wanted to be diplomatic, but I also wanted the image of a ropey middle-aged village stripper with a fag hanging out of her mouth while she rubbed her boobs on eighteen-year-old Will’s face out of my head ASAP. ‘But I’ve organized burlesque performances before.’

‘Do you fill in for the dancers if they call in sick as well?’ he asked with a shimmy that should never be performed by a naked man, no matter how handsome. ‘Is there something you want to tell me?’

I stood in the middle of my messy kitchen, in my carefully careless outfit, holding my ancient Garfield mug and staring at the nude stranger on the bar stool.

‘God, I was only joking,’ Will said, abandoning his stool and coming over to me. I swallowed hard and looked up at him for as long as I could stand to make eye contact. Which was about four seconds. ‘I’m not asking you to strip for me or anything. Not right now, anyway.’

‘I don’t do this,’ I said, holding my mug of hot coffee away from his body and ignoring the semi that was starting to bother my thigh. ‘I don’t usually go home with people.’

‘You don’t have to explain yourself,’ Will said, still standing in front of me, his peen properly waking up and poking me in the leg. ‘I’m not judging you.’

‘I bet everyone says that, though, don’t they?’ I tried to reach the kitchen top to put my mug down but it was too far away. ‘I bet everyone says “Ooh, I don’t usually do this”.’

‘I don’t know,’ he muttered into my ear, his hands circling my waist and resting on my bum. ‘I don’t usually do this either.’

There wasn’t enough time for me to work out whether he was making a joke, telling the truth or taking the piss, because the next thing I knew, we were awkwardly clambering down onto the floor, my mum’s cardigan was off and we were doing it on the kitchen floor.

Which is a part I will leave out when I tell the grandkids about how we met but have already texted to all my friends. Obviously.

Being a bridesmaid is a huge honour but it’s also a celebration! Tell us all about your bride and your special friendship in the spaces below:

Tell us about the day you met your bride:

We were flatmates at uni and I was very excited to meet a proper American. She bought our love with Peppermint Patties and Reese’s Pieces and Maybelline Great Lash mascara. It was a simpler time.

What were your first impressions of her?

I thought she was incredibly glamorous because she was from New York and she had really cool clothes, like proper Levis and Abercrombie & Fitch jumpers, and she said ‘sneakers’ instead of ‘trainers’. She was sweet and funny and thoughtful, and even though she was nice, she was never a drip. She just seemed so much more grown-up than us.

What were your first impressions of her husband-to-be?

Before I met him, all I knew was that Michael had bought Lauren a Swiffer sweeper for her birthday. Entirely without irony. When I met him at Lauren’s party, we had a perfectly nice conversation about dinosaur erotica and the price of Kentucky Fried Chicken. I still haven’t got over that Swiffer though.

Share a happy memory from when you met your bride-to-be:

Lauren had never had a drink until she moved to England. We changed that pretty quickly and introduced her to snakebite and black. Unfortunately she drank one too many and threw up all over the Student Union toilets and was barred for the rest of the semester. Maybe you had to be there.

What life lesson have you learned from your friendship?

She was the first person who made me look at the wider world and realize there was more out there. She also taught me how to make fajitas, and you can’t put a price on something like that.

6
Sunday May 17th, evening

Today I feel: Full.

Today I am thankful for: Food.

‘Bloody hell.’

When Lauren had sent out the e-vites for her engagement party at her dad’s house, we figured we were looking at a lovely Sunday afternoon of handmade sandwiches in the living room with a glass of Pimm’s in the garden if we were lucky.

It was ten years since we’d been to Lauren’s dad’s house. Lauren’s dad had moved.

‘How is this somewhere people actually live?’ Sarah asked, handing her coat to one of the two people clamouring over it at the front door. ‘Are they his servants? Does he have servants?’

‘I don’t know,’ I whispered, taking a glass of champagne from another bow-tied helper. ‘When did he get this rich?’

We knew Lauren was From Money, but the last time I checked it wasn’t Scrooge McDuck money. I half expected to open a cupboard and have bags of gold coins fall out and smother me.

‘Maybe he won the lottery and she didn’t tell us,’ Sarah suggested as we were shown through the house and out into a marquee in the back garden. ‘Maybe she thought we’d feel weird about it.’

‘She would be right,’ I replied. ‘This is insane.’

A string quartet played in the corner of the marquee and fairy lights were strung all across the ceiling, fighting the dismal British weather to create a happy atmosphere. In the middle of it all stood Lauren, happily clutching Michael her Swiffer-loving fiancé’s arm.

‘Hey!’ She broke away the moment she saw us and rushed over as fast as her four-inch heels would carry her. ‘You’re here!’

‘Nice shoes,’ I said, accepting a hug and a kiss on the cheek.

‘Thanks,’ she said, kicking up a heel as she hugged Sarah. ‘I was thinking about these for your bridesmaid shoes, actually.’

‘All the better to break an ankle in,’ I replied. ‘So, um, when did your dad become the head of an international drug cartel? Because that’s the only person I can imagine would live in this house.’

‘Oh, haha,’ she replied, taking a glass of champagne from another waiter.

Sarah grabbed a second, her first almost finished. ‘What?’ She shrugged.

‘He’s an estate agent,’ Lauren said, waving at more people as they arrived. ‘He gets good deals on houses.’

‘Especially when he has the previous owners killed,’ Sarah added. ‘I’ve always got a Mafia vibe off your dad. Is that how he ended up in America? Is that how he met your mum?’

‘He’s not in the Mafia and he doesn’t run a drug cartel,’ she replied. ‘He’s just having a good year. And since my mom got remarried, he doesn’t have to pay her alimony any more. That probably helps.’

‘Is your mum here?’ Sarah asked, checking the marquee with fear in her eyes. ‘Please tell me she couldn’t make it.’

‘She couldn’t make it,’ Lauren said, entirely unimpressed. ‘It’s a long way for her. She sent flowers. She’ll come for the wedding, obviously. I don’t know why you’re so afraid of her.’

‘Lauren, your mother is the only woman on earth who has ever knocked me out,’ Sarah replied, rubbing her jaw to nurse a ten-year-old injury. ‘And she’s thirty years older than me.’

‘You did hit on my dad,’ she pointed out. ‘It wasn’t totally undeserved.’

‘I didn’t know he was your dad,’ Sarah sulked, rubbing her jaw as though the punch had happened yesterday. ‘And looking at this place, I wish I’d tried harder.’

‘You could have been mother of the bride,’ I said, patting her on the back. ‘It would have been beautiful.’

‘If you’re going to invite drunk nineteen-year-olds to you dad’s company Christmas party, you should provide some sort of handout to tell them who they may and may not kiss under the mistletoe,’ she said. ‘Totally innocent mistake.’

‘You had your tongue so far down his throat, I nearly threw up,’ Lauren replied. ‘You’re lucky I ever spoke to you again.’

‘This is a beautiful party,’ I said loudly, watching as tray after tray after tray of food was brought out and passed around. ‘That is my official and professional opinion. Who did you use?’

‘For the party?’ Lauren asked. ‘No one. My step-mom put it together.’

I stared blankly. ‘In two days? She did all this in two days?’

She nodded.

‘God, maybe Colton-Bryers should hire her,’ I muttered. ‘At least you’ve got good help for the wedding then.’

‘But you’re going to help me with the wedding too, right?’ she said, sipping her champagne. ‘I don’t want to be an asshole since they’re throwing me this party and everything, but I don’t want my stepmother planning my wedding. Besides, you’re an actual wedding planner. And it would be way more fun if the three of us planned it together.’

Yes, I thought, saying nothing. It would be way more fun. Planning a wedding with bridezilla, a divorcée and a spinster. Sob. It seemed pointless trying to remind her I was an events organizer and not just a wedding planner so I didn’t. I just sulked about it silently, alone.

‘So where are you at?’ Sarah followed Lauren over to a plush white sofa set up in one corner of the marquee and sat down. ‘Is the whole thing planned and booked and paid for already?’

‘Oh I wish,’ she said, giving another new arrival a wave. ‘I don’t know how you do this every day, Maddie. Every time I think I’ve decided on something, there are another ten things to work out.’

‘That’s why it’s a job,’ I said. ‘It’s more work than you realize.’

‘Thank God I have you to help me,’ she beamed across the table. ‘My own personal wedding planner.’

‘Yeah, of course.’ I returned her smile, barely. One more time, not a wedding planner. ‘Have you decided on a date yet?’

‘I wanted to talk to you guys about that,’ Lauren said, looking slightly shifty and curling the ends of her blonde ponytail around her index finger. ‘So, it’s like this. Michael’s grandma is over there.’

She pointed at an elderly lady in a wheelchair who was wearing the most spectacular hat I had ever seen.

‘She’s really sick,’ Lauren whispered.

‘She looks all right to me,’ Sarah replied. ‘What’s that she’s drinking?’

‘Whisky,’ Lauren said. ‘I kept having to top her up so I just gave her the bottle.’

‘And now she’s drinking out of it with a straw?’ I asked.

‘Whatever, she’s sick,’ Lauren said. ‘So we’re definitely going to have to get something figured out sooner rather than later if we want her there.’

‘I think you’re going to have to do it this afternoon if you want her there,’ Sarah said with a frown, unable to take her eyes off the woman. Really, it was the most amazing hat.

‘How soon is soon?’ I asked. ‘New Year’s maybe? Next spring?’

‘Like, August?’ Lauren pulled up her shoulders in a faux wince.

‘That’s not that soon,’ I said, calculating on my fingers. ‘That’s fifteen months, totally standard.’

Lauren smiled with all of her teeth and an apology in her eyes. ‘Like, this August?’

‘This August?’ I asked. ‘As in three months from now?’

‘The first, actually,’ she confirmed, looking to me for support, but I had nothing. ‘It’ll be OK, right? Maddie?’

I stared blankly across the table. Two and a half months.

‘My dad said he’d pay for the actual wedding, and my mom is going it pay for my dress,’ she said, flipping her eyes between the two of us. ‘And I’m not doing some crazed pre-wedding diet that’s going to take six months, so that’s not a thing.’

‘People don’t plan their weddings so far in advance just so they can lose a few pounds,’ I said, deliberately not catching Sarah’s eye. We all remembered her pre-wedding diet. They were dark days. Dark, Slim-Fast-filled days. ‘It takes time to make the dress. The ones you try on are samples. Most designers make every dress from scratch when you order it.’

‘But you’ll be able to help me, right?’ she said with pleading eyes. ‘I just want it to be perfect.’

‘Of course I will,’ I replied automatically. ‘But if you want to organize a wedding in three months, you’re going to have to make compromises.’

Why did I suddenly feel like I was at work? Oh, that’s right, because my best friend had just hired me to pull together her wedding in three months and she was planning on paying mates’ rates, i.e. nothing.

‘It’s going to be fine. It’ll be awesome,’ she said. And she was smiling again, clearly having stopped listening to me halfway through. ‘I just know you’re going to help me have the perfect wedding. I‘ve done some research to help you. Do you think we could get the carriage they used at the royal wedding? They can’t be using it now, right?’

Before I could say anything, she reached underneath the sofa, pulled a giant powder-blue ring binder out of her tote bag and dropped it onto the table in front of me with a thud.

‘This is where I’m at so far,’ she said, brushing her hair over her shoulder, all business. ‘Do you want to go through it now or do you want to take it with you and get back to me later?’

‘I think I might take it with me,’ I said slowly, leafing through the pages. Vintage Rolls-Royces for the bridal party, Routemaster bus to take the guests to the reception, Monique Lhuillier, Vera Wang, Jenny Packham, fireworks displays, swans, doves, swing bands, pick-and-mix counter for the reception, chocolate fountain, champagne fountain, sherbet fountains … it was my all worst nightmares wrapped up in a best-friend bow. I wanted to help Lauren, but I couldn’t help feeling a bit sick. ‘You know, I might not be able to get all this for August.’

‘Of course you will,’ she said confidently. ‘You’re amazing.’

‘I mean, yes, I am,’ I agreed. ‘But putting this together this quickly is going to be a full-time job, and at last count I already have one of those.’

‘Can I get you anything at all?’ A waitress appeared at my elbow, pad at the ready.

‘Three champagnes please,’ Sarah said quickly. ‘Do you two need anything?’

Against all the odds, the party was fun. I made a deal with Lauren to keep Sarah away from her dad, and Sarah made a deal with me to keep a glass of champagne in her hand at all times. Thank goodness I’m used to managing conflict on a daily basis.

‘He is fit, though,’ Sarah said, leering at the aforementioned father from our new perch outside the marquee. ‘For an older man, I mean.’

‘He’s Lauren’s dad,’ I said as I looked over at the sixty-something-year-old man clutching the arse of his thirty-something-year-old second wife and gipped. ‘I just don’t get it.’

‘He’s a silver fox,’ she said, actually swooning as he flicked a hand over his far-too-luxuriant-for-my-liking grey locks. ‘Imagine all the things he could teach you.’

‘Like the current value of a shilling and what things were like “when he was a lad”?’

‘Piss off.’ Sarah slid her finger inside the top button of her silk blouse and pulled it away from her neck. ‘I bet he knows his way around a bed.’

I stuffed a piece of puff pastry into my mouth. ‘I think I’m going to be sick.’

‘Ladies, I’ve been thinking.’ Before Sarah made me actually vomit, Lauren dropped into the third chair around our little iron table and all sexual theorizing about our best friend’s father ended abruptly. ‘I’m so sorry about you and Steve. I feel as though messing around with all my wedding stuff is going to be difficult, given everything that’s going on, so if you don’t want to be “involved”, I completely understand.’

Sarah, half-cut and half awake, gave a loud sniff.

‘If I’d known, I never would have done that dumb dinner announcement thing.’ Lauren continued, crumpling her pretty face in a frown, and I knew she meant it − she was the most considerate person I knew. ‘I got carried away.’

Sarah smiled awkwardly and shook her head. ‘And you should be getting carried away − you’re getting married,’ she said, reaching out for Lauren’s hand. ‘Things are weird, yeah, but I want to be a help. I’m sorry if I’ve been weird.’

‘You haven’t been weird at all!’ Lauren said, dashing round the table to give Sarah a hug. ‘You’re going through something so awful, and this is shitty timing. If I could change it, I would, but with Michael’s grandma and all …’

I glanced over at the little old lady in the spectacular hat. The bottle of whisky in her lap was empty now, but the bottle of gin she’d moved on to looked fairly full so I assumed she was all right. And my own personal hero.

‘It’ll be fine,’ Sarah promised. ‘It’ll be better than fine. I’ll be fine and the wedding will be fantastic. Give me something to do − I’m always happiest when I’m busy.’

‘I hate to interrupt …’ Michael, never Mike, leaned over his new fiancée’s shoulder and squeezed her shoulder. ‘But my mum and dad are leaving.’

‘Congratulations, Michael,’ I said, beaming at the groom. ‘Now remember, if you break her heart, I’ll have to kill you.’

He stepped back and stared at me.

‘Why would you say that?’ he asked with big brown Bambi eyes. ‘And at our engagement party?’

No one could accuse Michael of being sharp enough to cut anything. He was very nice and clearly loved the shit out of my friend but I would never forget the time he was discussing films with Sarah and told us all he thought the sequel to Dumb and Dumber was the most underrated film of all time.

‘It was a joke,’ I said, looking to Sarah and Lauren for support and finding none. ‘I was just kidding.’

‘That’s a terrible thing to say,’ he said, gripping Lauren’s hand tightly in his and pulling her away from the table to stand by his side. ‘And you’re supposed to be planning our wedding?’

‘Technically, I’m a bridesmaid,’ I replied. ‘I’m helping to plan the wedding. But I didn’t mean to offend you.’

‘Such an awful thing to say,’ he said to Lauren. ‘You know I would never hurt you. Why would she say that?’

‘I know.’ Lauren narrowed her eyes at me and shook her head. ‘Don’t worry about Maddie, she thinks she’s funny.’

‘I am funny, aren’t I?’ I hissed at Sarah, who shrugged in response.

‘Not as funny as he is,’ she replied. ‘But I don’t think he’s making me laugh on purpose.’

‘I’ll be over in a moment, honey,’ Lauren told her still horrified fiancé. ‘Don’t let them leave until I’ve said goodbye.’

He nodded dutifully and trotted back across the room long legs lolloping, with the look of someone who had just been told his puppy was terminal.

‘Sorry,’ I said, hanging my head in uncertain shame. ‘Sensitive, isn’t he?’

‘What about the bachelorette?’ Lauren suggested, ignoring me completely. ‘We haven’t been anywhere together in forever. We should do something just us girls.’

‘That could be fun,’ Sarah said, looking to me for confirmation. I nodded blankly, slyly checking my phone for a message from Will. Perhaps something along the lines of ‘top shag, will you marry me?’ but alas, nothing. ‘When do you want to go?’

‘Next month?’

‘Perfect. Maddie, what weekends are you working next month?’

‘Huh?’ I said, putting my phone away. ‘What weekends what?’

‘It’s not her fault she’s being stupid,’ Sarah said, batting me in the head with her clutch bag. ‘She’s all shagged out.’

‘Oh!’ Lauren blinked and clapped loudly. ‘Oh my God I forgot to ask you!’

‘Yes,’ I said, not wanting to make too big a deal out of my shagtacular night in front of Sarah. I had given her the briefest of details in an attempt to distract her from goosing Lauren’s dad at the buffet table earlier, but I had a feeling the soon-to-be divorced didn’t want to hear too much about their friend’s amazing one-night-stand at their other friend’s engagement party.

‘And?’

They both stared at me with expectation and it felt weird.

All I’d brought to the table for the last two years, relationship-wise, was how much I missed Seb, and now, out of nowhere, I was the centre of attention. Sarah was getting divorced, Lauren was getting married, I was the only one with shagging stories. Even though they were my best friends, I got the impression that they felt sorry for me sometimes. Having someone new, something promising to talk about, felt like a relief.

‘He’s … I don’t know,’ I said, confused and oddly shy. ‘I like him.’

‘Ooooh, you like him!’ Lauren did a little dance in her seat. ‘Are you bringing him to the wedding?’

‘I think it’s a bit early to be thinking about that,’ I scoffed.

It wasn’t too early. I had thought about it endlessly, ever since he’d left that morning.

Sarah stuffed a whole tomato and goat’s cheese bruschetta into her mouth as a waiter with a shocked face reeled from the drive-by food-snatching. ‘Tell us everything.’

‘His name is Will,’ I started.

‘Will what?’ Lauren asked.

‘Oh,’ I replied, cringing. ‘I don’t actually know.’

‘How old is he?’

‘Don’t know.’

‘What does he do?’

‘He’s a lawyer!’

‘Oh.’ Lauren frowned. ‘Not another one.’

‘How do you know Will isn’t some amazing lawyer who works for a charity or saves children from sweatshops or stops make-up companies from testing lipsticks on rabbits?’ I asked.

‘Is he?’

‘I don’t know,’ I admitted. ‘I know he’s a lawyer, I know he was Ian McCallan’s best man at the wedding yesterday, I know he likes to sleep on his left side and I know he likes to walk around my flat starkers in the morning.’

‘What does he look like?’ Lauren asked, tapping away at her phone while Sarah rolled her eyes.

Rude.

‘Dark hair but really, really short,’ I said. It felt strange talking about him like this as though he was someone I’d seen on TV, not someone real. ‘Nice smile, like, you just want to laugh every time you see it. Golden-brown eyes, great bod.’

‘Give me a comparison.’

‘Um, George Clooney before he went grey?’ I said. ‘Only English and without the gay rumours.’

Lauren squinted at me angrily. ‘George is married now! You’ve got to quit saying that shit.’

‘Elton John was married,’ I replied. ‘And he works in Holborn. And one of the ushers from the wedding really doesn’t like him.’

‘Yeah, well, he probably fancies you as well,’ Sarah said. ‘Men only ever fall out over women and football.’

‘Oh, he plays rugby! I know he plays rugby,’ I replied. ‘And the usher didn’t fancy me − he thought I looked like a fat panda, plus he’s engaged. Will says he’s a knobhead and I’m inclined to agree.’

‘Is this him?’ Lauren held up her phone to reveal an iPhone plus-sized photo of the man I’d been having sex with not three hours earlier.

‘Bloody hell, how did you do that?’ I asked, grabbing the phone out of her hand. I fancied him so much I could hardly stand to look at him.

‘Facebook? I put in Ian McCallan and the wedding photos came up. Ladies, meet Will Jennings. His profile is private but the dumbass who just got married still has his set to public.’

‘Maddie Jennings,’ I said. Online stalking was the best. ‘I like it.’

‘Have a minute,’ Sarah warned, balling up her napkin as she finished her food. ‘What happened last night?’

I didn’t know what to share. We’d snogged like teenagers, and as soon as we were through the door my knickers were round my ankles. It was such a long time since I’d felt anything for anyone, to feel so wanted and to want someone else so much was totally overwhelming.

‘Honestly?’ I asked. ‘You want the details?’

‘I do!’ Lauren squealed.

‘I mean, did you talk about seeing each other again?’ Sarah overruled. ‘Are you properly going out?’

‘Well it’s only been one night so far. Also, I don’t think people actually have the “are we going out together?” conversation in their thirties, Sarah,’ I said. As if I’ve got any idea what I’m talking about. ‘But yes, we did make plans. He said maybe Wednesday.’

‘Which one of these is the usher that fancies you?’ Lauren interrupted, waving a group shot from the wedding in my face.

‘This one.’ I took the phone and enlarged it to show Tom the Usher. ‘But he doesn’t fancy me, honestly − he was just awkward. It was a painful exchange.’

‘He totally fancies her,’ Sarah whispered to Lauren. ‘Let me see him.’

‘He’s kind of nice too,’ Lauren said, passing the phone around the table. ‘Is he a giant or something?’

‘He is ridiculously tall,’ I confirmed. ‘I think this one is his fiancée.’

I swiped through to the next page to show the bridesmaids, zooming in on the obscenely attractive blonde girl who I was fairly certain was called Vanessa.

‘Shit.’ Sarah leaned across the table along with Lauren to get a better look. ‘I thought you weren’t supposed to look better than the bride on her wedding day.’

‘I’m putting the two of you in trash bags,’ Lauren muttered, tapping on the screen. ‘Tom Wheeler. Maddie Wheeler. I kind of like it.’

‘I wouldn’t change my name anyway,’ I said, going back to the picture of the groomsmen and staring at the screen. Gawky Tom on one end of the photo, laughing Will at the other.

‘What happened to Maddie Jennings?’ Sarah asked.

‘She went to prison for killing her best friend,’ I said, looking up for signs of more canapés and handing the phone back to Lauren. ‘Now, tell me more about these trash bags. I need to get them ordered.’

Being a bridesmaid can be hard work! But your bride chose you because she knows you’re the woman for the job. Use this space to remind yourself of your own unique qualities and why your bride can rely on you during this special time.

If you could be anyone, who would you be?

It’s taken me 31 years to find a pair of jeans that fit properly − I’m not starting that all over again. I’ll stick with myself.

If you had to choose between world domination or world peace, which one would you pick?

Would I still be in charge if I chose world peace?

Who or what inspires you?

Lorraine Kelly. Imagine getting up that early for that many years and still having a smile on your face.

What is the one thing you wish you could do if given the chance?

Not end up alone.

Where do you see yourself five years from now?

Still trying to answer this question.

7
Monday May 18th

Today I feel: Conflicted.

Today I am thankful for: Nurofen and Dolly Parton.

‘Maddie, can I talk to you for a minute?’

It’s not every Monday morning I’m yanked into the gents’ toilets by the head of HR, but I’m a curious soul so I went along with it.

‘Is something wrong?’ I asked while Matilda Jacobs checked to make sure all the stalls were empty. I wasn’t sure what would happen if they weren’t; what was the poor sod supposed to do, go to HR?

‘No,’ she replied, washing her hands. ‘It’s just that this is the only place we can talk without Shona listening.’

‘How have I never thought of this before?’ I wondered out loud. That was why they paid her the big bucks. ‘She’s not in today, though, it’s fine. What’s wrong? Why do we need to be Shona-proofed?’

Matilda was a decent woman. She’d been at the company almost as long as I had, only she’d started as the HR assistant and now she was head of the department. I’d started as Shona’s events assistant and I was now Shona’s events assistant. You can see how our career paths have not enjoyed the same trajectory.

‘You know we’re advertising Victoria’s job?’ she asked, folding her arms over her enormous bosoms. It was the only word for them. They were bosoms.

‘I do,’ I replied. ‘Actually, I’ve got a CV for you.’

‘So you are going to apply for it?’ Matilda’s eyes were as big as saucers. ‘That’s fantastic.’

‘Oh, no,’ I said, cutting off her enthusiasm. I had Sarah’s CV. As much as the idea of working with my best friend made me want to do a little sick, I could hardly refuse to help her out right now. ‘Wait, what? Why?’

‘Because Shona emailed me this morning and told me in no uncertain terms that I was not to accept an application from you for the position,’ she said.

Shona. What a massive bastard.

‘Of course, I told her if you wanted to apply, we were legally obliged to put you through the process, the same as any other applicant.’

‘But I haven’t applied,’ I said, panic starting to rise. ‘I have a friend who wants to apply for the job. I’m not going to apply for it.’

‘Yes you are,’ Matilda replied. ‘I want a CV on my desk by the end of the day.’

‘No, really, it’s fine,’ I insisted. ‘I’m very happy doing what I’m doing now. The management side of things doesn’t interest me that much.’

Matilda stood very still, looked me square in the eye, and smiled.

‘Maddie,’ she said. ‘You’re being an idiot.’

I wasn’t sure that line came out of the HR best practice handbook. ‘I am?’

‘You are,’ she confirmed. ‘I’m not asking you to apply to be CEO. I’m asking you to apply for a job you have, to all intents and purposes, been doing for the last nine years. Only I’m asking you to do it for more money, better benefits and without reporting in to a woman who told the MD he couldn’t promote you because she was worried you were taking crystal meth. You didn’t hear that from me.’

‘I wondered who was leaving those rehab brochures in my pigeon hole,’ I breathed. ‘Why are you telling me this now?’

Matilda looked up at the polystyrene panels in the ceiling. ‘Victoria was a very good friend of mine and Shona is not my favourite person in the world.’

‘So it’s not because I’m really, really good at my job then?’ I asked, slightly deflated. Matilda replied with an expression I hadn’t seen since year ten maths class.

‘I’m not here to blow smoke up your arse, Maddie,’ she replied. ‘I’m here to do the best for the company. You should be applying for this job, bottom line. The fact that it will piss off a woman who gave me a six-month subscription to gay.com for my secret Santa last year is a happy coincidence.’

‘I didn’t know you were gay,’ I said.

‘Because I’m not,’ she replied. ‘She told me at the Christmas party that I give off a vibe and should probably get nice shoes if I didn’t want everyone to think I was a dyke.’

‘Classy.’ I’d missed that party because I was in the office sticking Swarovski crystals onto one hundred tealight holders for a winter wedding the following day. Good times.

‘You can email the CV or bring it over, whichever is less likely to cause a fuss. I know she monitors your emails.’

I did a double-take. ‘She does what?’

‘She reads your emails.’ Matilda nodded. ‘Technically all managers can read their employees’ emails, but Shona is the only one who takes advantage of the privilege. I think she’s also your next of kin according to your company pension, so let’s hope nothing happens to you before you get on the phone to Legal & General.’

‘Is that a joke?’ I asked as she pushed past me, folding her sleeve around her fingers to open the door.

‘The fact that you’ve got to ask is why you should apply for this job,’ she called back. ‘Do it now, Maddie.’

‘Morning, Maddie.’ Paul the Perv, deputy sales director, walked in as she walked out and gave me a wink. ‘Any particular reason you’re in the gents?’

‘I’m not sure,’ I said.

‘Let me be the first to welcome you,’ he said, unzipping and beginning to pee right next to me. ‘You’re welcome in here any time.’

‘Thanks, Paul,’ I said, heading straight for the door.

It’s just like they always say. You go nineteen months without seeing a single penis, and then two come along at once.

It should have been a relaxing couple of days. Shona was on an overnight with a PR, checking out some new hotels they were looking after so we could use them for future events, and I didn’t have anything especially pressing on my agenda. I was looking forward to getting some paperwork out of the way, finding a caterer for Lauren, maybe doing a little light online shopping and leaving dead on the dot of five-thirty.

I settled in to my ergonomically sound and bloody uncomfortable chair, cupped my mug of tea in one hand and opened my email to IM Sarah for advice on the job front. Only I couldn’t. HR wanted me to apply for a job that she wanted. She’d asked me if I thought she was in with a chance at Lauren’s engagement party and of course, I’d said yes. Because, according to the CV she had sent me that evening, she was definitely qualified for it. Plus she had more than enough on her plate with the Stephen situation. I’d never seen her so messed-up about anything; I didn’t want to make things more difficult for her. This definitely had to be an in-person conversation. I couldn’t talk to her about this on email.

Instead I clicked on Lauren’s name in the instant messaging bar, sent a dancing lobster and waited for her to respond.

‘You’ve got crabs????’ she typed immediately.

‘No, I haven’t got crabs,’ I replied. I’d know if I had crabs. Wouldn’t I? ‘I’ve got a work problem, I need some advice.’

‘Sounds like a Sarah problem TBH.’

Like I didn’t know that already.

‘I can’t ask Sarah, that’s why I’m asking you.’

‘Thanks.’

‘Don’t get offended,’ I typed as quickly as I could, one eye on Shona’s glass-walled office beside me. In some ways I preferred it when she was in there: at least then I knew where she was. Having her out and about was like knowing there was a spider somewhere in the flat but not knowing when it was going to jump out at you. ‘They’ve asked me to apply for a promotion at work but it’s the same job Sarah wants to apply for.’

‘Sarah is applying for a job at your place????’

Lauren loved to overpunctuate. As the child of two English teachers, it genuinely caused me physical pain.

‘Yes,’ I replied. ‘But I think it would be weird if she worked here.’

‘She didn’t tell me she was looking for a new job. She’s gone radio silence on me. Do you think she’s mad at me because of the wedding?’

‘I think she’s upset about Steve.’

‘It’s so crazy. They’re really really getting divorced?’

‘They’re really, really getting divorced. It’s bad.’

For a moment she didn’t say anything.

‘So she won’t need a plus-one for the wedding?’

I sat staring at my screen for a full minute.

‘Sorry,’ Lauren typed, adding a crying puppy for good measure. ‘Joking. Job. You want it?’

‘Think so,’ I replied. ‘It would be more money. Wouldn’t have to work for Shona.’

‘Is she going to be mad?’

‘Yes,’ I confirmed, running through the revenge scenarios that could await. ‘She told me not to apply and asked HR not to give it to me.’

Lauren replied with a winky face.

‘Wait, wrong one,’ she tapped, following up with a shocked emoji. ‘And you’re not going to tell?’

‘No.’ Wasn’t that the whole point of this conversation? ‘She’s so upset about the divorce, I don’t want to upset her more.’

‘I can’t believe they’re getting divorced,’ Lauren replied before a little blue link appeared in the conversation. ‘What do you think of this dress?’

‘Nice,’ I said, without clicking on it. ‘It’s so weird. I know it’s happening but it doesn’t feel real.’

‘I guess we hardly ever see him,’ she said. ‘How long is it since he came out with us?’

‘I know, I think things were worse than she wants to say.’

I could understand why Lauren was struggling with the concept. When I woke up on Monday morning I only remembered Sarah was getting divorced when I found our wine glasses from Friday night under the sofa. Sarah probably hadn’t even slept. It was this big, huge, giant thing, and nothing had prepared any of us for what it actually meant. It’s so strange how something can affect one person in such a huge way and only have a ripple effect on others. My heart hurt to think of how hard it had to be for her.

‘I think you should apply for the job,’ Lauren typed.

‘You do?’

‘If the company have asked you to, it’ll look bad if you don’t. They must think you can do it. Sarah will understand. Just tell her they offered it to you.’

‘I’ve got to interview, they’re not just giving me it,’ I explained. Underneath the stress of Shona finding out, of upsetting Sarah, and the general terror that I would somehow fuck it up, there was a part of me that was so excited. ‘But could be fun?’

‘Deffo,’ she agreed. ‘And my wedding will be great practice!!!!!’

I’m so lucky to have such good friends.

Lauren always says the best way to get over a man is to get under another one. Maybe she’s right. When I got home, there was a letter addressed to Seb on the doormat, and for the first time I picked it up and stuck it in the box on the telephone table (that had never had a telephone on it) without even considering bursting into tears. Definitely growing as a person.

Plugging in my phone, I dumped myself on the settee and turned on the telly, my mind overrun. Lots to think about, lots to think about. I had to tell Sarah I was applying for the events position, I had to figure out how to work Kevlar into a passable outfit for the office once Shona found out I was applying for the job, and I had to plan my best friend’s wedding. So of course the only thing I could think about was why I hadn’t heard from Will. My own brain was failing the Bechdel test. I was the worst fourth-wave feminist ever. He would be in touch; he was probably still at work. Lawyers didn’t work normal people shifts. Seb used to be in the office until all hours. But then Seb was having an affair …

No.

We’re both playing it cool, that’s all, I told myself, forcing myself up to flick on the kettle before hitting the biscuit tin. He’s got my number, he knows where I live. If he wants to call, he’ll call. After all, the sex was brilliant, if I did say so myself. Why wouldn’t he call? That was not the last I’d seen of Mr Will.

8.02 p.m.

It was absolutely the last I’d seen of Mr Will. Oh God, oh God, oh God. It’s been twenty-nine hours and I haven’t heard from him. He hasn’t texted or called or added me on Facebook or looked at my LinkedIn profile. I think I just had my first ever one-night stand and it feels horrible. Why hasn’t he texted me? I know the rules say wait three days, but no one really waits three days, do they? This is horrible. I feel like such a slag. What did I do wrong? My poor vagina. She does not deserve this!

8.34 p.m.

I’m going to text him. I mean, he gave me his number − he wants me to use it, surely? And it doesn’t matter who texts first, we’ve already slept together. I can send a little message that’s just a ‘hi!’ and it’s fine. This is ridiculous. If I hadn’t had sex with him, I’d send him a text message. If he was just a man or a woman I had met and liked and had stuff in common with and wanted to see again, I would text him. I’m going to text him.

8.56 p.m.

I sent the text. I just said ‘Hi! So happy Monday is over!’ That’s OK, isn’t it? That’s totally normal. That’s like, hey! What’s up! I’m not crazy! He’ll reply to that. And you know, if he likes me, it won’t matter who texted first or what I said, he’ll just be happy to have heard from me. It’ll probably be a funny anecdote in the wedding speeches. ‘She couldn’t wait to hear from me so she texted me first and I was so happy!’ Actually, I think I texted Seb first. So it’s fine.

9.13 p.m.

Hmm.

9.33 p.m.

There are more than a million good reasons for him not to have replied to that message yet. Men don’t check their phones all the time, do they? They can’t put them in their pockets in case it gives them cancer of the nads. He probably hasn’t got his phone.

9.45 p.m.

He’s definitely seen it. There’s no way he hasn’t seen it. Maybe he’s just playing it cool.

10.07 p.m.

What the fuck was I thinking? I should NEVER have texted first. That’s probably the reason it didn’t work out with Seb. Our entire relationship was founded on him having all that power over me, knowing that I caved and texted him because I was so desperate to have him in my life. And it was such a stupid message − I didn’t even ask him a question! How is he supposed to reply if I don’t ask him a question? That’s messaging 101. I am so bad at this. And now I’ve ruined it forever. I’m going to run a bath and leave my phone in the other room and think very carefully about THAT TIME I TEXTED A MAN FIRST AND RUINED MY LIFE.

10.42 p.m.

A text! But it’s from Lauren. Wanting to know if I have an ‘in’ at Vera Wang.

So it begins.

I’m going to bed. I’m being ridiculous.

11.17 p.m.

Just checked. Nothing.

11.33 p.m.

Still nothing.

11.45 p.m.

He replied! HE REPLIED.

He sent me a smiley face! What does that mean?

12.04 a.m.

God, I almost wish he hadn’t sent anything at all … How do I reply to a smiley face? This is insane.

12.32 a.m.

A bloody smiley face? REALLY?

Weddings are all about love and commitment, not just the love between the bride and the groom but the love shared between everyone in attendance. Love can come in a thousand different shapes and sizes. Take a moment to think about this: what does love mean to you?

There’s no love like puppy love! What was the name of your first boyfriend?

Gowri Gopalan. We were both seven. It lasted from morning playtime until afternoon break.

When was the first time you ever said I love you and meant it?

To Seb, two months after we started going out. He said it first when we were on a night out, but I thought he was drunk and being stupid and I couldn’t say it back. I had to wait until we got home and I thought he was asleep, and then I said it and he smiled and kissed me on the top of my head and said, ‘Shut up, Maddie.’

If you could tell the bride and groom something you’ve learned about love, what would it be?

My mum and dad always say they don’t go to bed on an argument. I would say, if he’s got nothing to hide, why won’t he let you use his phone to order a pizza?

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