‘Sure.’ It’d be nice to have her company. Keep his mind off his parents.
‘Wow,’ Evie said as they went through the double doors out of the room and into the hotel foyer. It was absolutely heaving with people wearing very bright flares, mini-dresses and platform boots. Some moderately tasteful and some not so much. As they dodged round the hordes of seventies-garb devotees, Evie tugged Dan’s arm gently, indicated a board on the wall a few feet away and said, ‘Look, I think that’s a seating plan.’ She scooted over to it before coming back to him.
‘It’s an ABBA-themed wedding,’ she told him when they were outside and out of earshot.
‘What? Really?’
‘Definitely. The tables all had names like “Fernando”, “Money, Money, Money” and “Waterloo”. Socool.’
‘Cool? Really? I mean,wouldyou?’ Dan didn’t think she would. She was a lot of fun, always had been, but from what he knew of her, she was also quite conservative in her tastes. Like, she’d dance manically to ABBA at her wedding reception, but she wouldn’t go for an actual ABBA theme. And if you could make an assumption about a man’s wedding reception taste from a two-minute acquaintance, he’d assume that Euan would go conservative every time, including on the dancing front.
‘Yeah, totally. I mean, maybe not ABBA.’ Evie was silent for a moment, maybe also thinking about Euan. ‘No, definitely not at my own wedding. But I’d love togoto a themed wedding involving costumes. I do like a fancy-dress party. You can always turn it into an excuse to wear an amazing outfit of some kind.’
‘I don’thatefancy dress. I mean, I’ll join in if you twist my arm. But I don’t love it. And I definitely wouldn’t do it at my own wedding. Were I to have one. Which I won’t.’
‘Really? Why not?’
For a mad moment, Dan had the urge to tell her about his family, about himself, his knowledge that every important relationship he touched, he broke, how it killed him that he couldn’t save every damaged child he encountered at work. And how he was scared that if he ever loved someone he’d get hurt like his father had hurt his mother.
He opened his mouth and then shook his head slightly. That would have been that last glass of port talking.
‘Just. You know. Not for me. Various reasons. Here’s the car.’ He opened the boot. ‘And here’s my trusty first aid kit and here are the paracetamol.’
When Evie had glugged two tablets with the bottle of the water they’d brought out with them, she looked over to the other side of the car park.
‘Look at that.’ She started walking towards an old car, sitting in a pool of light from the lamp above it. ‘I love a vintage car. And this is a lovely colour. Is it a Rolls?’
‘Not sure,’ Dan said. ‘I’ve never been a big fancy car fanatic. I’m all about getting from A to B and never breaking down.’ He peered at the little ornament on the bonnet of a woman outstretched. ‘That’s the Rolls thing, isn’t it?’
Evie peered too. ‘Yep. Spirit of Ecstasy. Beautiful. I’d love to own one. Although obviously you’d have to have a modern, reliable car too, as you say.’
Dan smiled at her. She was a woman of contradictions, and he liked that.
‘You finished drooling over the car?’ he asked.
‘Yep. Ready to go back. Thank you for your magic medicine.’
When they got back inside, the ABBA crowd were still milling around but now starting to head back into the function room opposite Lucie’s.
‘Ooh, let’s just get a look at the bride and groom,’ Evie said.
‘Really?’ Dan said, but he couldn’t help smiling. She started edging towards the doors to the room and he followed. She was peeping round the corner of the room, with Dan just behind her, when the band on the stage at the far end of the room suddenly struck up ‘Dancing Queen’ and there was cheering and a stampede from the crowd in the foyer. Evie got swept up in the swirl of people into the room, and Dan really had no option but to follow her since it didn’t feel right to abandon her.
The crowd around them thinned out once they were a few feet beyond the bottleneck of the doors, so they were free to edge back out again, except Evie was pointing at all the décor.
‘It’s all so shiny and sequinny,’ she said. ‘Oh my goodness. Look at the glitterballs hanging from the ceiling. And there’s so muchpurple. It’s fabulous.’ She really didn’t look like she had plans to leave.
‘We should go.’ Dan indicated towards the door with his head.
The band were belting out ‘Super Trouper’ with serious enthusiasm.
‘Just one dance?’ Evie said. ‘Ilovethis song.’
‘This isn’t our wedding,’ Dan said. Although it was tempting to stay in here. His parents, Max, Harry – who might or might not have realised by now that something was amiss – were all in the other room. In here there were a lot of strangers, and Evie, who was already swaying in time to the music.Our wedding. That reminded him of their fallback pact. He’d mention it now as a joke if she weren’t engaged to Euan.
‘I know but we’re already in here and this is agreatsong.’
Dan rolled his eyes at her but allowed her to lead him right onto the dance floor. Evie was immediately Travolta-style pointing, arm rolling and stepping with the best of the actual wedding guests. Oh, God. She had some of them lined up and they were all following her moves.
