‘I’m probably not wearing the right underwear,’ I said weakly, but I should have known to save my breath.
‘Well, that doesn’t matter,’ said Dorothea bossily. ‘We need an idea of how it looks, so go on.’
Resigned, I plodded upstairs and found the dress, which I put on. I hardly dared glance at myself in the mirror. I don’t have a bad figure, but the peach satin did everything it could to emphasise the bits I usually tried to disguise. It was sleeveless, with a high, collared halterneck that made me look distinctly matronly. The front was completely smooth and unadorned, leaving nowhere for a normal body to hide, and the back wasscooped low, almost to the top of my bottom. Not only was Idefinitelynot wearing the right underwear, but I couldn’t imagine what underwearwouldbe right. I nearly took it off then and there, with a promise to Steph that I would buy something else in the same fabric, but then she shouted up the stairs to me to hurry and I fell into the old habit of jumping to attention. I hobbled downstairs and displayed myself miserably to the assorted company, which now included the woman who had brought the wedding dress. She looked at me with something approaching sympathy while Steph stalked around me with a critical glare.
‘Well, you were right about the underwear,’ was her first comment, warming up. ‘You’ll need your shapewear for this dress.’
‘I don’t have any shapewear,’ I muttered.
Steph, Dorothea, the wedding dress lady and my mother all looked at me in horror. My father poured himself another drink.
‘Well, you’ll have to get some,’ said Steph. ‘Why on earth don’t you have any already?’ I shrugged; I couldn’t be bothered to answer. She ploughed on. ‘Maybe Marnie’ – she nodded at the wedding dress lady – ‘will help you find something. The colour’s draining you, but make-up can sort that out, and you’ll have to get a spray tan a couple of days before. You can come back here for that; I’m arranging for someone to come to the house.’
There was a pause, which I belatedly realised was for me to thank her.
‘I’ll need to check,’ I said instead. ‘I’ll be working then.’
‘Well, you’ll need to figure it out,’ replied Steph, brushing aside the small fact of my job. ‘Right, you’d better go and get changed, both of you – we need to get on with my dress.’
I scuttled back upstairs as quickly as I could in the tight satin and peeled it off gratefully, pulling my clothes back on. Then I perched on the side of the bed and fired off a text to Minty:
Have you tried your dress on yet? I look like an uncooked sausage in mine. Do you think Steph will notice if I wear a knee-length poncho on the day?
I added a few ‘crying with laughter’ emojis, then hastened downstairs before I could get into any more trouble.
I had to admit that the wedding dress Steph had chosen was extremely beautiful, and once I was sitting on the sofa with a drink my father had pushed into my hand – ‘just a single, darling, I know you’re driving, but it might help’ – I started to enjoy myself. No one was looking at or criticising me, and I restricted my comments to the bland and uncontroversial, which met with approval. Steph dragged the whole thing out, even to the extent that my mother was getting twitchy, as the pasta bake she had made was slowly drying out in the oven. But eventually we bid Marnie goodbye and sat down to eat. For the first half of the meal, the conversation revolved around the wedding, then suddenly Steph asked me, ‘Are you still bringing Nick as your plus one?’
I said that I was, dreading where this was going.
‘He won’t stay, you know,’ said Dorothea stridently, helping herself to more garlic bread.
‘What’s this?’ asked Mum, her radar twitching. ‘I didn’t know you were bringing someone, Laura. I thought I was just about on top of the seating plan, and now we’ll have to start again.’
‘I told Steph ages ago,’ I said, not prepared to take the blame for the seating plan.
‘But I didn’t think you wereserious,’ she said, staring at me with her eyes wide open. ‘I mean – Nick Prince!’
She giggled, and Dorothea guffawed.
‘Well, I am,’ I said, putting down my fork. ‘And I don’t see what’s so funny about it. Even if he does go back to LA – well, maybe I’ll go with him.’
Damn. I hadn’t meant to say that.
There was silence at the table as everyone took this in. Steph was the first to recover.
‘You can’t go to LA. I thought you were going to come and help me with the baby.’ Now, all eyes swivelled towards her.What baby?was clearly the unspoken question in everyone’s mind. She looked around belligerently. ‘Hugo and I are going to start trying as soon as we’re married.’
‘How exciting!’ said Mum, her mind probably swiftly moving from table plans to cots. ‘I’m going to be a grandmother, finally!’ I could feel the pasta bake making its way back up again as images flashed through my mind: the miscarriages, the negative tests, Paulo. ‘And how lovely that you’re planning to help, Laura. You can’t go to LA with this Nick, then, can you?’
It was as if the deal was done, my life stitched up into a neat parcel and handed to me.
‘Do you know a lot about babies?’ asked Dorothea.
I shook my head.
‘But she’s going tolearn, aren’t you, Laura?’ trilled Steph. ‘She’ll do some retraining and be just in time! No need to look so glum, Laura – we’ll pay you, of course.’
I pushed my chair back and stood up. I knew I had to leave before I said anything else I would regret. The hilarious idea of me moving to LA with Nick would give them enough to talk about when I had gone.
