The Vintage Summer Wedding (27 page)

Once everything was laid out beautifully in front of Anna, and Rachel had got herself a cup of tea and a chocolate and almond croissant, she said, ‘Did you hear about Jackie?’

‘With Doug?’

‘The one and only.’ Rachel laughed. ‘He makes her laugh out loud, she says.’

Anna made a face. Thought of the antagonism between her and Jackie from the moment she’d arrived back and then the realisation that she wouldn’t be where she was without her, would never have taken Razzmatazz to London, would probably never have started on the journey of sweeping up her past if it hadn’t been for her foray onto Tinder. ‘I’m pleased,’ she said with a nod, ‘I’ll be interested to see how it turns out,’ she added, thinking that she actually, genuinely, would. And knowing she would most probably be around to see it play out.

‘Won’t we all.’ Rachel laughed and took a bite of croissant, then added, with her mouthful, ‘So, Anna, while it’s a pleasure to have you here so early, I’m assuming this isn’t just a friendly visit.’

Anna shook her head, her mouth stuffed full of light, fluffy sponge. When she finally swallowed, she said, ‘I’m going to need a lot of cake.’

Walking over to Vintage Treasure, Anna checked her eBay account on her phone. The 3G was crap in Nettleton so she had to sit on a bench and wait while it loaded. The sheepdog lifted its head as she sat down and then put it down again, just a little closer to her flip-flop. She pushed back her first thought of whether it had fleas, and instead gave it a little tap on the head, with just one finger, which she wiped on her top afterwards. It was a start, and the dog didn’t seem to care either way.

Her account loaded.

Six people watching.

Seeing as she’d only put it up an hour and half ago, that couldn’t be half bad.

She thought of her beautiful Vera Wang wedding dress, of how she’d snatched it from Mr Mallory’s hands on the first night, unpacking it at Primrose Cottage, how she’d hung it with such reverence at the back of the wardrobe, the dress-bag zipped up tight. She thought of standing in Selfridges and the assistant buttoning up all the tiny pearl buttons at the back and putting her hand to her mouth in a gasp as Anna had turned around and, while she probably did that with everyone, Anna had felt like a princess.

But of all the possessions that she had left, it was the only one actually worth anything. And what was the point of being a princess in off-white Vera Wang if the ball was full of all the people you didn’t want to be there?

Ooh, seven people watching.

Mrs Beedle was in the garden, sunning herself while reading an antiques magazine and drinking stewed tea.

‘Someone said you were leaving to go to New York,’ she said as she heard Anna step outside on the cracked cobblestones.

‘I’ve had an offer. I don’t know if I’m going to take it,’ Anna said, swallowing, wishing she’d told her herself.

Mrs Beedle turned her head to look at her, ‘If you do go, there are some wonderful flea markets. It could be your first buying trip. I don’t want you to get any old crap though, if I can’t sell it it’ll be coming out of your pay packet.’

Anna laughed, leant against the doorjamb and plucked a sprig of lavender that was poking round the French windows. ‘And if I don’t go?’

Mrs Beedle took a sip of her tea, the marmalade cat winding its way round her ankles, ‘I was thinking France. Hire a van. I haven’t had any good French furniture for a while now and they love it here.’ She paused and scooped up the cat, then said, all innocent, ‘Your father’s going with the lovely Hermione. I thought maybe we could all go together?’

Anna bit down on the start of her smile, ‘If I’m going on buying trips, Mrs Beedle, I’m going to have to start earning more than £6.50 an hour.’

The old woman nodded, her bouffant grey hairdo bobbing, ‘I’m sure we could come up with some kind of agreement. But I mean, if you’re going to be swanning off to New York all the time it can’t be fifty-fifty.’

‘Oh no, I’d never expect fifty-fifty,’ Anna shook her head, watched Mrs Beedle raise a brow at the hint of mocking in her tone.

‘We’ll think of something. But,’ she pushed herself up off the chair, ‘In the meantime there’s work to do, while you’ve been off to London with your auditions I’ve sold half the bloody shop, so you need to get back to,’ she waved a hand, ‘Whatever it is that you do that makes people buy all my bloody crap.’

Anna laughed, twirling the purple flower between her fingers. ‘Mrs Beedle, do you think there’s any chance I might borrow quite a lot of the chairs and those teacups out the back?’

Mrs Beedle paused and narrowed her eyes.

‘It’s for maybe, you know, something maybe to do with the wedding,’ she said, feeling her cheeks go pink.

‘Anna, my darling,’ Mrs Beedle smiled, ‘If in some way this brings your father into the picture, you can have whatever the hell you like. Try and sell them while you’re at it.’ She laughed and shrugged and ambled off out the back to make another cup of tea.

By the weekend, Anna had ten bids on the dress and fifteen people were watching. She had become obsessed with the app, refreshing it every couple of minutes just to see if anything had changed. While the bids were creeping up, she would still be short of cash. Philippe had said that he could source her the wine from a friend’s vineyard in the Dordogne and the champagne straight from the heart of the region, but it was still going to cost. And also, now the Vera Wang was going, she needed something to wear. Luckily the headmaster at Seb’s school had said that if he didn’t see the school trestle tables leaving the building, he wouldn’t know that they were gone. And Billy and Clara’s mum, she discovered when this time she stopped her in the pub to congratulate rather than chastise her, happened to work at The Rose Hotel and would happily sneak a whole bundle of white tablecloths out if she needed them.

Anna had arranged to meet Hermione outside Philippe’s bistro at Saturday lunchtime. She rushed out the shop late to find Hermione lounging back languidly on her little wooden chair, sipping a chilled glass of rosé and conversing with the waitress in fluent French. Her eyes were masked by huge black sunglasses and her hair had been shorn into a platinum crop.

‘Look at you!’ Anna shook her head. ‘This is a very glam new look.’

Hermione shrugged a bony shoulder and threw the menu down on the table. ‘I’m experimenting. I thought it was time for a change. You were doing all this putting the past behind you malarkey and I didn’t want to be left out.’ She raked a hand through the cropped layers and turned to look at herself in the bistro window. ‘Do you think it’s all right? Your dad said I look like a cabin boy.’

Anna held up a hand, ‘He’s an idiot. You look amazing.’

Hermione sucked in her cheeks and glanced at herself from different angles, ‘Yes, that’s what I thought. And you look marvellous, too, darling. Very pinched cheeks and rosy glow.’

‘Yeah, I feel better.’

‘Good. And you’re talking to Lucinda about possibilities in New York? If you go for a month or so, I’ll come out and visit. I haven’t been this year and I need to get some more cranberry bubble bath from Saks, mine’s got about an inch left.’

Anna rolled her eyes and as she sat down, poured herself a glass of rosé and they enjoyed a perfect lunch of perfect food, crumbling chunks of blue cheese on endives dribbled with mustard dressing, flaky salmon and sugar snap peas that burst in the mouth with a crunch, followed by warm chocolate fondant that popped when cut with a spoon, oozing thick, melted chocolate out over the plate.

‘It’s not really as bad here as I always thought it was.’ Hermione said, sitting back and patting her lips with a napkin. ‘It has some plusses.’

‘It has a couple.’ Anna agreed.

‘Not least its proximity to London.’ Hermione guffawed a laugh and then drained the last of her wine. ‘I have something for you.’

‘You do?’ Anna frowned. ‘What?’

‘Don’t sound so suspicious. It’s a gift.’

The last gift Hermione had given her was when they were sixteen and she’d pushed a condom into her hand and thrust her in the direction of where Luke Lloyd was standing by a chestnut tree in the park.

Anna watched as Hermione leant down to get something out of her bag and, then unable to find it amidst all the rubbish in there, hoisted it up on her lap and did a proper Mary Poppins-style search as things clinked and bashed and papers went flying. ‘It’s here somewhere,’ she muttered, pulling out make-up and magazines. ‘Ah, here!’ she said finally. ‘Here it is.’ In her hand was a crumpled envelope, and she thrust it in Anna’s direction. ‘This is for you.’

Eyes narrowed, unsure about what the hell it was, Anna leant forward and took it tentatively, while Hermione beamed with delight.

Tearing the envelope open, inside she found a cheque, made out to Anna, for at least the cost of the wine, a couple of crates of champagne and quite a bit else, if she wanted it. ‘You can’t give me this.’ Anna shook her head.

‘Why ever not?’

‘Because it’s money. It’s too much money.’ Anna tried to push it back into Hermione’s hand and when she waved her away tried to put it in her bag which Hermione swept to the side so Anna couldn’t reach.

‘It’s not my money really,’ Hermione said, exasperated, ‘It’s from the furniture.’

‘What furniture?’ Anna said, her mind distracted by the need to give the money back.

‘The Hungarian furniture!’ Hermione sighed. ‘Mrs Beedle sold the lot for me at some flashy auction, it did phenomenally well. There’s quite a market for it, apparently. I sent him some of the money and, well, my bit I didn’t really want. I mean, what would I spend it on? Let’s say I buy a lovely bag with it, I’d just walk around thinking, it’s my Hungarian divorce furniture draped over my arm. But if I could put it towards something good. Something special that in some way might counteract the divorce, you know wipe it out so that it became neutral space, like a lovely wedding of my friend who I’m glad didn’t listen to me too much when I said stupid things about PlayStation and rugby ‒ you know, actually, I’ve played on that
Grand Theft Auto
, I’m quite good ‒ anyway, if I could help my darling friend out and get to be something important at her wedding ‒ that’s a hint by the way ‒ then that would make it seem worthwhile.’ She paused, pulled her sunglasses back down over her eyes. ‘That would make all the hideousness seem like it was worth it.’

Anna didn’t know what to say. Just sat clutching the cheque between her fingers.

‘Just take the fucking money. OK.’ Hermione snapped in the end, and then laughed, trying to squeeze a few more drops out of the rosé bottle.

‘Thank you,’ Anna said.

‘You’re more than welcome.’ Hermione nodded and then called to the waitress, ‘Excuse me ‒ could I have a glass of champagne? Can you have one, Anna? Surely you don’t need to be sober to sell that stuff, do you? Two glasses, make it two.’ Hermione sat back and raised her head to the sun, feeling the heat of it on her flushed cheeks.

Anna watched her and smiled, hit by the sudden realisation that she was glad she was dating her father, that she hoped that maybe it might last. ‘If you two got married, would you want me to call you Mum?’ Anna sniggered.

‘Oh fuck off.’ Hermione shook her head and reached delightedly for the champagne the waitress brought out.

After a second, Hermione raised a brow and said, ‘I’m still waiting, you know.’

‘What for?’

‘My important role at the wedding. But I don’t want to be matron of anything.’

Anna sat back in her chair and took a sip of the sharp, bubbly champagne. ‘You can be my best woman.’

Hermione pushed her sunglasses up onto her head and said, ‘Yes, yes I like that. I like that very much.’

She bought her invites from Presents 4 You, she’d been worried that they might not extend the range to notecards but there they were, wrapped in cellophane, a stack of white cards with Paris, Milan, New York, Nettleton stamped on the front in black. She sent them out to everyone on the original list, hand-delivered the rest of them to half of Nettleton, and then stood in the queue at the post office to get stamps for Spain and New York.

Lucinda Warren said she wouldn’t miss it for the world and would see if she could snaffle some jewels from the wardrobe department ‒ there was a very lovely tiara worn just the other day by Odette in an outdoor performance of
Swan Lake
.

Her mother waited a week before calling.

‘Anna, I can’t be there.’ Was the first thing she said when Anna answered. ‘I just can’t.’

Anna was in the garden standing on the front path by the honeysuckle, she had known this was what her mum was going to say. ‘That’s OK.’

‘Why you have to have it there, I don’t know. I could have paid for something back in London. I just can’t go back there. The idea of even driving in… I can’t.’

Anna closed her eyes and just felt the warmth of the afternoon sun and the sweet honeysuckle smell wrap round her, keeping her mind clear and her focus forward. ‘I’m sad, Mum, but I understand. I think it would be OK if you came, I think it wouldn’t be as bad as you think, but I understand.’

There was a pause on the other end of the line, she heard her mum cough. ‘Well…’ her mum said, but then didn’t finish. Anna waited.

‘Thank you, Anna.’

Anna swallowed, opened her eyes wide to stop any moisture. ‘You’re welcome.’

‘I’ll send you something.’

‘You don’t need to.’

‘No, but I want to.’

The girl who won the Vera Wang drove down from Nottingham to pick it up and almost cried with excitement when Anna unzipped the velvet-sheened bag to let her look.

A box arrived from her mum a couple of days later. Anna knew what it was just from the colour of the tissue paper when she took the lid off.

There, nestled in the bed of pale blue was the Chanel bag.

Quilted cream leather, a touch worn at the corners, gold chain handles and perfect interlocking CCs on the front. The flood of emotions that just touching it created made her think she’d close the top on the box and shove it to the back of the wardrobe.

But then she opened the card and in her mum’s familiar flourish was written,
Always saved for the most special occasions.