The Almost Wife: An absolutely gripping and emotional summer read Page 29

  Jessie is looking across the room now, suddenly distracted by the unexpected sight of Camilla embracing her mother, cocooning her while Claire smiles on. What the hell? Suddenly, Jessie’s fighting to keep track of what the men are discussing while simultaneously trying to lip-read Camilla. Something about being there tomorrow, supporting, door always open. One family now. She needs to get over there but she can’t, if she moves Henry and Dad will know she’s overheard everything. She’ll look deceitful. Besides, now that her dad has unashamedly laid bare her deprived childhood, she’s keen to hear Henry’s take on it all. Is he going to be put off by the picture her dad is painting?

  Graham is leaning back casually against the bookcase, his body turned to Henry, inviting his confidence and advice.

  ‘Well, for a start I think you’re underestimating Adam—’

  ‘Sorry Henry, I didn’t mean it as a criticism, I just—’

  ‘No, no, I know that. I understand you perfectly. But Adam is solid, dependable and the last person to be impressed by wealth alone. We have worked very hard at that. No one more so than Camilla, actually. She won’t mind me telling you this, Graham, but she doesn’t come from money at all. I’m afraid I was rather predictable and married my secretary!’

  ‘Oh, right.’

  ‘Yes, and she has been a much-needed grounding force in this family. People often jump to the wrong conclusion about her but she has a kind, sweet heart and is quite simply the least judgemental person I know. The only thing that irritates her is people getting her so wrong.’ Henry lifts the solid stopper out of the port decanter and refills the pair of them without asking if Graham needs it.

  Never more has Jessie wanted to feel the fuzzy numbing effect of alcohol coarse through her. The drug of choice for the socially awkward. She desperately needs her edges to blur, her mind to file what she’s hearing somewhere deep back in her brain where it won’t be remembered tomorrow, for Adam to appear at her side and tell her everything will be fine. Can someone just please be on her bloody side! And why the hell didn’t she grab a drink before she sat down?

  Her mind trips back now through all the conversations with Camilla, unravelling everything at high speed. The loaded looks, the sideways glances, the confession that she still needs the Debrett’s guide, the silences, all those assumed judgements left hanging in the air but which were never actually said. The way Camilla sat at the bar in Claridge’s that night, witnessing her undignified spat with Claire but never saying a word. Christ, probably thinking all along it was Jessie who was to blame.

  She feels an icy chill creep up over her, the kind that makes it into your bones and stays there, making you long for the comfort of your duvet. The urge to cry is coming at her thick and fast. She mustn’t. But everything that is wrong in the room tonight leads back to her, an incriminating trail to the one person who is responsible for all the hurt and misunderstanding.

  The realisation strikes like a vicious slap across the face, her whole body feeling the aftershock. So much has been decided by Jessie herself rather than said by Camilla, she’s starting to see that now. What a monumental fucking idiot. Not only for causing herself so much angst but for getting Camilla so wrong – and it must all be so bloody obvious to her too. She even tried to warn Jessie. What was it she said that night over supper? There is no point pretending to be something you are not.

  Why hadn’t she listened? She couldn’t have been clearer, could she? The shame is strangling her insides. How could she make both her parents doubt their worth – and why has it taken Henry’s intervention to point that out to her? How will she ever undo this mess now? There aren’t the words or the hours to rewrite it all. She tunes back in to her dad’s protective voice.

  ‘I hope Jessie will enhance your life too, Henry, I hope you will allow her to. Because – she’d kill me for saying it – but she’s so painfully shy sometimes and crippled by insecurities, feelings of never quite being good enough. On that front, I’m afraid we are quite similar.’

  Christ, she wasn’t fooling anyone was she?

  While Camilla’s elegant laugh mingles through the air with Claire’s cackle, Henry takes a huge glug of his port and readies himself to draw a line under every concern her dad has.

  ‘My advice is to make your speech tomorrow, Graham, and enjoy it! And do it with great honesty. People want to hear you speak genuinely and from the heart, nothing else matters.’ There. He has said it, therefore it is true.

  And it’s as if Henry knows someone else is listening in on their supposedly private chat – like he just stopped talking only to her dad.

  Finally, Jessie knows what she needs to do and there is still time. Just.

  30

  Emily

  Jessie’s Wedding Day

  The scent of fresh rose is overwhelming, intoxicating – even to my dulled senses. It hits me before I even make it to the church archway because the bride – perhaps in a moment of utter madness – has completely covered the stone path in what must be hundreds of thousands of fresh petals. This is no mere scattering. This floral carpet is deep – I can see people sinking into its fragrant bed as I pass a few paces behind Mark. The floral archway itself is so dense, guests are squeezing through it in single file, expectations loftily raised for what awaits inside.

  Trees. There are actual real, fully grown silver birch trees, twelve of them, lining the aisle. And they have also had their branches stuffed full of rose heads – creating great petal-filled domes above the congregation. Every pew end is covered in them too. It’s like the rose room at Chelsea Flower Show – just with more roses. There is a pristine white carpet laid the entire length of the aisle and I wonder who will be brave enough to put the first outdoor shoe on that.

  Ten minutes from now everyone will be reaching for the painkillers to relieve the pounding in their heads (I sympathise) from all this heady perfume. Before it’s even started this is easily the most flash wedding I’ve ever been to – and I’m dead. Not ideal, is it? But I’m here for Mark. Today will be difficult for him. Just a couple of weeks ago he was standing at the front telling a very different audience how his very soul was ripped out of him the day I died.

  Everyone told him he shouldn’t come today. It’s too early, Dad said. Why risk it? But Mark has known Henry and Adam for years, organised countless big trips for the Coleridges through his travel business, so he was never going to miss it. I thought he might stay just for the service, slip out unnoticed afterwards leaving everyone else to the boozing and dancing. But now I’m not so sure. Sally is with him.

  This can only be a good thing, I know that, I planned that. She’s sticking close. Looking after him. She kept a respectful distance earlier when he visited my grave, placing a beautiful fresh bunch of flowers there – the exact ones he knows I would have carried on our wedding day. I want to tell him not to waste his money – peonies aren’t cheap – but today, in front of Sally, is it wrong that I need to see I’m not forgotten yet?

  She’s doing a good job of steering the conversation away from me, keeping it focused on what’s going on around them. But I’m tense, so clenched and dreading the moment when someone from way back is going to ask where I am. Are you even allowed to talk about death at someone’s wedding? How will he phrase it? How do you do that without creating an insurmountable flare of awkwardness? Oh God, here we go…

  ‘Ahh, Mark, on your own today, mate?’

  Sally is on it. ‘Hi, I’m Sally. Are you the bride or groom’s side?’

  ‘Mark! Long time, no see, where’s—’

  Here she is again… ‘Would you mind if I drag Mark away? He’s needed at the… you know.’

  And her swift interventions seem to be working. His heart doesn’t feel quite so heavy today, he’s even managing a hint of a smile as he embraces Adam’s parents.

  ‘Mark!’ Blimey this guy is loud.

  ‘So lovely to see you, Henry. And today of all days. Huge congratulations.’ Mark extends his hand to shake but this Henr
y is pulling him closer, getting into his ear.

  ‘Whatever you need, I am here. You simply ask and it will be done. Come and see me at the house, will you? I’d love to talk.’

  Mark only manages a nod, I can see he doesn’t trust himself to say a word in case the dam holding back his emotions starts to crumble. But I can also tell he’s relieved at the confirmation that he was never just a business associate for Henry. And I’m relieved the words are discreet, undetected by anyone else, all too busy taking their seats now.

  Just as the fog seems to be lifting slowly from Mark, this is all getting much harder for me. I see he’s still wearing his wedding band and I’m slightly ashamed to say I smile this time at the stamp of ownership. Surely he’s still mine for now? All those years together don’t get cancelled out in a couple of months. He’s not available just yet.

  Maybe it’s being surrounded by so many people that’s helping. Or maybe it’s the fact that a wedding really is the one place on earth where you can’t be a misery guts. Even if your own wedding just got cancelled at tragically short notice, it’s still not on. You’re still not allowed to cast the shadow of gloom over this happy couple’s day. Quite a pressure.

  As everyone stands, I see Helen at the entrance of the church. She’s crouched low, doing her thing. Wafting, lifting, smoothing the dress – totally in her happy place. Then she moves around in front of the bride and takes both of her hands.

  ‘Do I look OK, Helen?’ the bride’s asking nervously, just as I imagine I might have done.

  ‘You couldn’t possibly look any more beautiful, Jessie. Now, if you do nothing else today please, enjoy it! Everyone is here for you, rooting for you. And the man of your dreams is waiting for you at the end of that aisle, so go and get him!’

  There are tears in Helen’s eyes. Wow! Hundreds of brides, a different wedding dress sold every day and still it moves her. I wonder if this wedding has deeper meaning for her somehow. I can’t read her as clearly as I could a couple of weeks ago but there’s more to the emotion today. Maybe there’s a daughter she’s thinking about, worrying about? The fact I’m struggling to sense things so easily is what’s worrying me. First it was difficult to be still here at all, now the idea of going is slightly terrifying. What am I going to?

  Thinking about Helen makes my mind flip back to Glo. When I left her this morning she was statue-still on the sofa, something clenched tightly in her fist, while Dad packed some of my clothes into black bin bags upstairs. They had been building up to this job – the charity shop run with your dead daughter’s belongings. Treasured things they’ve kept – my first pair of ballet shoes, every framed newspaper cutting charting my achievements and, of course, that raggedy teddy bear from the day I was born – but they both knew, even if they hadn’t been bold enough to say it out loud, that progress has to be made, even in the tiniest steps forward. As Dad gets stronger, he’s going to be the one to make that happen.

  As the door closed behind him, I watched as Glo slowly unfurled her fingers and I saw for the first time what she’d been clutching. A small, soft pink velvet pouch. I knew immediately what was inside. As the tears started to roll down her tired, pale face she loosened the fine cord tie, turning the pouch upside down and spilling its precious contents into her quivering palm. Every one of my tiny discoloured baby teeth tumbled out and I was broken for her. Oh, Mum. Only someone filled with as much love as her could hold on to them for all these years.

  These are odd thoughts to be crashing in on me as everyone is clapping the bride and groom’s first kiss. He’s holding her face so tenderly, eyes full of tears, looking like he never wants to let her go. And that smile. It’s radiating out of her, lighting up her entire face and bathing the room in a warm glow of happiness. Oh, to have enjoyed just one second of that feeling with Mark on our wedding day…

  Guests are making the short walk through a marquee tunnel that connects the church to Willow Manor. I glance around one of the fine drawing rooms, taking in what a mega bucks wedding looks like. It doesn’t have a lopsided, homemade and un-iced cake, that’s for sure.

  I’ve counted and there are no less than eighteen members of staff buzzing around, topping up people’s champagne flutes far more times than necessary. What I wouldn’t give to feel the effect of some of those fizzy bubbles right now, while the old, still-living me hangs off Mark’s arm, just two more guests full of excitement for everything we might enjoy today.

  Ornate morsels of food that look like mini edible art installations are weaving their way through the crowd on silver trays balanced by staff in white gloves. The whole place is alive with the can’t-quite-believe-our-luck energy of the three hundred or so guests. Every now and again a shriek of delight goes up as someone else discovers the… wait for it… dessert room. Thank God none of this lot know my amateur cake was going to be our only pudding.

  And then the moment I’ve been dreading comes. Mark takes his seat for the wedding breakfast, next to a woman with a beautifully swollen belly. Dolly Jackson, the place card reads. Will he be able to handle this, I wonder. A pregnant woman and all the inherently happy forward planning that comes with her? And then…

  ‘Are you here with your wife?’ she asks, noticing his wedding ring. The briefest of pauses hangs between them while Mark readies himself. Sally, two seats away, can’t save him now and I catch the torment on her face as she realises it.

  ‘No. I’m not.’ It’s all Mark can manage as his hand lifts absent-mindedly to the breast pocket of his suit, like he’s checking something is still there. Then I see it myself, the passage that Helen gave him that day in the boutique. He lets his fingers waver there for a moment, confirming its presence and I hear the air escape his lungs with a whoosh of relief that it is. There must be something in the way his eyes are sliding downwards as he declines to elaborate that warns Dolly not to go any further. I like her so much for not pushing him. Others would have. I also like that she is one of those pregnant women who is eating everything in sight, including Mark’s starter – he never did like lobster.

  For me the speeches are always the best part of any wedding day and I’m determined not to miss them today but as the hours tick by, I’m fighting against an almost unbearable tiredness creeping up over me. It’s taking all of the little energy I have left to stay focused, and even so, I’m missing things now, all the subtle conversational nuances are away over my head. Why is Mark laughing? I can’t seem to follow the flow of the chat, and who is this Josh that Dolly is gleefully bad-mouthing to the table?

  The groom’s speech is charming, clever and delivered with the sort of confidence you hope you’ll be capable of mustering in such a moment. But oh, it’s the father-of-the bride who brings me, and everyone else in the room, to their knees. He’s taking us all on a wonderful journey through the love story of the father-daughter bond and it’s opening up my heart all over again, making me long to be that little girl back on my own father’s shoulders as we run the length of the beach – my hair flying on the salty sea breeze, his hands gripping my bruised and bony knees. On a day when we knew only happiness.

  ‘She is everything to me, she always will be.’ He’s standing next to her on the top table, holding her hand while he proudly shares with the entire room all those feelings men of his generation are encouraged to keep to themselves. It’s all pure, honest emotion. ‘I love her more than I ever thought possible and I will continue to until the day I take my very last breath. When she was a small girl, I used to dream about her, waking in the night to check she was OK. Today I have to accept that’s not my job any more. Another man has stolen her heart and I am trying so hard not to let that realisation break mine.’

  Everywhere I look, women and plenty of men are dabbing the corners of their eyes with the expensive linen napkins, until finally he finishes to an explosion of applause that revives me wonderfully – his reward is a big teary hug from the bride that gloriously goes on and on.

  The best man is a disaster. Someone forgot t
o tell him he should be delivering heartfelt hilarity with a touch of humiliation. Where’s the filth? He’s intellectualising the living daylights out of his speech, confusing everyone, but frankly that’s good because it gives us all some time to compose ourselves before the bride gets to her feet. She has everyone’s attention from the get-go.

  ‘Er… this isn’t the speech I was planning to give today.’ She’s actually shaking, shuffling a stack of cue cards nervously while everyone holds their breath before she gives up, abandoning them altogether. Only then does she find her voice.

  ‘It’s amazing how easy it is to lose sight of who you really are when you’re planning a wedding. Growing up, my family meant everything to me, but somehow I forgot what’s important to them and to me. I’ve spent more time deciding on what you’re eating today than in my own mother’s company in the past year. That’s wrong, and, today, Mum, I want to say I am so sorry for that and I promise you, from the bottom of my heart, it will change now, right from today.’

  My eyes slide along the top table between the two older women – which one is her mum, I wonder? Then it’s obvious. Not the one with the exquisitely tailored cashmere suit and what I think might be an actual Philip Treacy hat, but the one bawling in to her napkin, then blowing her nose loudly in it. But who cares? I’d give anything to see my mum ruining some expensive table linen right now.

  ‘I’m only here today because of the endless hours my lovely dad spent working so that I would be top of the class, get the A Levels and that university place. Without any of that I wouldn’t have landed the job that meant I met Adam. You’ve shaped my life in the most meaningful ways possible, Dad, and I love you for that – so much more than I have ever shown you.’ I have to admire her nerve. She’s making me feel a little ashamed that I was so happy for the men to speak for me on my big day… had I made it that far.