Authors: Kate Saunders
Bachelor Boys (25 page)
The only outsiders present at the wedding would be me, Neil (best man and maker of the cake) and Peason. We all thought it a pity that we had to have Peason, but Phoebe wouldn't hear of excluding Fritz's girlfriend.
“I know she's horrid,” she said calmly, “but Fritz always has horrid girlfriends. We'll all have to make an extra effort to be nice to her.”
She looked at me when she said this, and I hastily promised to be charm itself. I made a private vow, however, that if Peason said or did one thing to spoil Annabel's wedding, I'd break something over her head.
The weather gods were on Phoebe's side from the start. That Friday morning was hazy and smoke-scented, in golden autumn sunlight, rich but waning. I arrived at the house early, with my new pale gray suit sheathed in plastic. I found myself thinking, as I parked my car, how similar this felt to a funeral. Here was the same sense of dislocation from the real world, the same invisible wall between the ordinary and us.
I found Annabel in the basement, eating her way through a pile of toast. The hairdresser had called, and her blonde hair had been arranged around a wreath of pale pink roses. She was wearing nothing but an old plaid shirt of Ben's and a pair of old blue knickers, and looked as if her head belonged to someone else.
“Here's my matchmaker,” said Phoebe. “Happy wedding day.”
She sat in the wheelchair lent by the hospital, already wearing her dress of soft blue wool and her white corsage.
I bent to kiss her, suddenly giddy with happiness becauseâdespite the
obvious frailty of her wasted bodyâPhoebe looked so like herself. “What's going on? I thought you were supposed to stay in bed till the last minute.”
obvious frailty of her wasted bodyâPhoebe looked so like herself. “What's going on? I thought you were supposed to stay in bed till the last minute.”
“I was, but I felt extraordinarily brisk this morning. I decided to lend Annabel a little moral support.”
Annabel giggled, and said, “I need all the support I can getâI'm sure my boobs have grown overnight.”
I told her not to expect any sympathy from me. I was losing weight again, and I only ever took it off in one place.
Phoebe said, “My boobs vanished after I'd weaned Ben. I went to my cousin's wedding with a bra stuffed full of old tights. And of course one of my bosoms fell out during the speeches.”
We all laughed. There was a sense of happiness that nothing could harm, a warm window overlooking desolation.
We had plenty of time. I made a pot of very strong coffee and took two cups upstairs, where Ben and Neil were waiting for Fritz to arrive with the suits.
“They're late.” Ben was tense. “I bet it's Felicity's fault. Or maybe the hire shop was shut. Or maybe they had an accident.”
I urged the poor agitated man to calm down. “Fritz has worked hard for this wedding,” I reminded him. “He wouldn't dream of missing it.”
“Don't take any notice,” Neil said comfortably. “He does this before concerts.”
Ben grinned suddenly. “Funny to hear you sticking up for Fritz. It's normally my job.”
I thought about this as I went back downstairs. I wondered when I had turned into Fritz's cheerleader, after nearly a lifetime of criticizing him. These days, I realized, it wasn't really possible to criticize Fritz. Apart from his regrettable entanglement with Peason, he wasn't doing anything objectionable.
Downstairs, Phoebe was watching intently as Annabel carefully uncovered the white billows of her wedding dress. “Mind your hairâdon't try to put it on without Cassieâ”
The street door of the basement slammed. Fritz strode in. He had three gray top hats stacked on his head, and three suit bags over one arm.
Phoebe beamed at him. “Hello, darling. Where's Felicity?”
He was smiling, but wolfishly. “Unfortunately, she was called away at the last minute. She had to take a very fast train to Potters Bar.”
Annabel and I telegraphed looks of astonished joyâMother of Mercy, was this the end of Peason?
“What a pity,” Phoebe said, full of compassion. “But you know, Fritz, you'll get over her awfully quickly. Because she isn't at all nice.”
The anger left Fritz's face. He smiled down at her. “I'd noticed, thanks. Sorry if I'm a little late, but we were having a very important rowâthe one that ends with one of you storming out, while the other one shouts things that can't be taken back.” He glanced over at me. “I'm not going to talk about it today. Don't even mention her. This is meant to be a celebration.”
As far as I was concerned, the celebration was in full swing. Peason had exited stage left, the house lights were up and the drama was over. I was very curious to know exactly what the woman had done. It had to be something pretty direâI couldn't remember ever seeing Fritz this angry.
“There's still plenty of time,” I said. “Would you like some coffee?”
From the top of the basement stairs, Ben's voice yelled, “Fritz! Where've you been, you fucker?”
Fritz gave me a fleeting look of gratitude, for not going on about Peason. “I think I'd better go upstairs and put on my costume,” he said.
He left us. We heard shouts overhead, and thundering footsteps.
Phoebe's rapturous eyes were huge in her wasted face. “It's time,” she said. “Put the dress on, my darling. It's time to be a bride.”
Annabel and I were both solemn and slightly self-conscious, as if this moment had been part of the ceremony. I lifted the dress down in my arms. Annabel held my hand to steady herself as she stepped into the skirt. I had let the waist out slightly, to accommodate the bump. When the hooks at the back were all fastened, it fitted Annabel's curves amazingly well. The white stole (upon which I had spent my remaining dress budget and then some) lay in a big gilded box on the table. I opened the box, parting the layers of tissue paper. Reverently, I shook out the gleaming folds of white silk taffeta. I draped it across Annabel's shoulders and stood back beside Phoebe to study the effect.
Annabel was perfect: a Juno in spun sugar; a mass of white with roses of the palest pink blushing in her fair hair.
Phoebe clasped her hands. “Oh, I've never seen anything lovelier! You look like a bride in a story!”
I set this apart as one of the most purely satisfactory moments of my life. I had found a bride for Phoebe's younger (and most worrying) son. True, I couldn't really take any credit as matchmaker, but this was Phoebe's dream coming true. I had helped to write her a happy ending.
She held out her hands. Annabel sprang forward to clasp them. She sank to her knees beside Phoebe's wheelchair, her skirts billowing around them both. Annabel kissed her, all blushing and in full bloom beside Phoebe's paleness.
I never will forget the sight of the two of them together. I thought how odd it was, that the happiest moments of one's life should feel so painful.
Â
We made a surreal, sweet, melancholy procession along the street to the church. Ben and Neil, both immaculate in their hired morning suits, went first. Then Fritz, also immaculate, pushing Phoebe's chair. I walked beside Annabel, on a dry carpet of fallen leaves that stirred around the hem of her long dress. The trees in the street had turned the most glorious colorsâcopper, scarlet, ochre, orange. We moved slowly, and the leaves drifted slowly down around us in the still air, and it was all so strange.
After the ceremony, we were a different processionâeuphoric and dazzled, gibbering with relief that the solemn part was over. Several of the neighbors called to us from their front doors. We sat down to the lunch I had preparedâthree plump roasted pheasants, wrapped in parma ham, washed down with the finest wines that could be got on Fritz's overdraft. Neil made a speech, and sang “Annie Laurie,” which made us all cry. We drank to the bride and groom, to their unborn, unimaginable twins, and to Phoebe. Ben proposed a toast to Fritz and me, thanking us for our hard labor.
Through all this, I watched Fritz as closely as I dared. He did not look like a man with a broken heart. He had elected himself Master of Ceremonies. He bullied us all into having a wonderful time. He made us laugh. He got us all slightly drunk. But there were moments in between when he looked older, and harder all over.
In the pearly light of the afternoon, I unpinned Annabel's dress and helped her into her “going away” ensemble of jeans and jersey.
She pushed her bouquet of pale pink roses into my hand. “This is for you, Cassie. I can't thank you enough. You've given me the happiest day of my life. I meanâdespite Phoebe being so ill. I love Ben so much.”
“You're supposed to throw the bouquet,” I said.
She was serious. “I'd rather just give it to you. That way, I can be sure you'll be next.”
I didn't think it likely, but this wasn't the time to protest about the bleakness of my romantic prospects. The newlyweds were going straight to Annabel's mother and stepfather in Aberdeen. Fritz pushed Phoebe's wheelchair to the front door, so that she could throw an old trainer after their taxi, for luck.
The moment they had gone, Phoebe collapsed. She was exhausted, barely able to hold up her head. Fritz carried her upstairs, and I helped her out of her blue dress. She was too tired even to apologize for her helplessness. Like a small child after a party, however, she wanted me to put her wedding corsage in a glass of water beside her bed.
“To remind me,” she murmured, “what a lovely day it's been.”
I left her in a state of beatific serenity, lying with her face turned toward the flowers.
Downstairs, I found Neil doing the washing-up, back in his normal clothes. He wouldn't allow me to help him. He poured me a glass of brandy with his soapy hands, and told me to take a glass to Fritz.
Fritz was outside, at the very end of the garden, beside the old climbing frame. Nobody had climbed on this for years. Weeds wound around the lower rungs, lashing it to the ground. There couldn't have been a sadder symbol of our growing up.
I gave him the brandy. He smiled. “Thanks. We deserve this, don't you think?”
“I'll say. We worked our tits offâliterally, in my case.”
“Come now, Grimble. I like your bonsai tits.”
“Thanks.”
“How has Mum survived, do you think?”
“She's dreadfully tired, but so happy she's practically radioactive.”
Fritz said, “Mission accomplished, then.” He gulped back the brandy. I noticed that he had not been drinking much today.
“It was a howling success,” I said. “And I get paid today, thank God. So my overdraft lives to fight another day.”
“So does mineâbut only just,” Fritz said.
“Are things really bad?”
He grinned ruefully. “Until we've sold this place, we're totally and absolutely fucked.”
“Ohâfuck.”
“I don't know how we're going to eat when the play finishes. I told my agent to send me up for any part that'll bring in some money. I might even ask Jonah if there's a hut going on the Heath.”
“Can't I help out a bit?”
His smile became warm, and warmed me. “You're very sweet, but you know I'll manage. My agent says there's plenty around for meâif I really will do anything. Apparently, I have an ideal face for commercials. I might get another one.”
“Won't you hate it?”
He shrugged, irritated. “So what? One job's pretty much like another.”
“That's not what you used to say.”
“My dear Grimble, one used to say all manner of fanciful things. You used to say you were going to marry the moose.”
“Okay. Point taken.”
Fritz absently tugged at the rope of weeds around the climbing frame. “The thing is, I don't really care any more. I don't give a fuck about anything except my mother. That was the main thrust of Felicity's gripe against me.”
“Sorry,” I said. “It's been a shit day for you.”
“Not at all. I should've got rid of her ages ago.”
I had to ask. “What happened this morning, exactly?”
“I told you. We had a row.”
“About anything in particular?”
Fritz said, “She wanted to hire two professional nurses, so I wouldn't have to spend so much time looking after Phoebe. She offered to pay for them. When I explained I actually wanted to spend a lot of time with Phoebe, she went berserk. Said I was selfish.”
“God almightyâthis, from the Queen of Selfish!”
He took my hand. “It's all right. I wasn't in love with her, and sex isn't everything. I was beginning to think we'd done all the positions. And I turn out to have only a limited appetite for that kind of sex anyway. I'm tired of screwing someone I don't love.”
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