A Beautiful Day for a Wedding: This year’s Bridget Jones!

‘Yes, not the next one though, that’s too soon. Maybe the one after that. Or the one after that.’ It was typical Becca, laid-back to the point of comatose. The vague date did little to quell Eve’s enthusiasm for planning though, and Becca’s engagement had resulted in a new job for Eve too. The following day she’d quickly realised that there was no better antidote to the gritty seediness she usually spent her day delving into than the swirly pink and turquoise fonts of online wedding magazines that had headlines like Super-pretty princess dresses and Best day ever! Every website Eve looked at had little hearts doodled into their company logos. Each photo of couples staring adoringly at each other had a soft-focus finish that made their love seem even more magical. How could you ever be miserable writing about romance every day?

Scrolling down the page past a link to an article on bouquets called Everything’s rosy and one on honeymoon destinations entitled Paradise found, Eve’s eyes had rested on a little pink box on the right of the page. Above the editor’s email address, were two words that had made Eve’s eyes widen: We’re hiring.

Without giving herself any time to change her mind, Eve had quickly typed out an email, attached her CV and pressed send. And Eve-the-wedding-guru was born.

She’d stayed with the American wedding magazine for a year before reluctantly moving back to London to work for its English edition when her dad had died. It had been as though the universe had aligned everything to slot into place: the job opening in London, Becca’s former flatmate moving out; call it coincidence, fate, luck – whatever it was, it meant Eve’s transition back into London life wasn’t as awful as she had thought it might be. It didn’t stop the ghosts taunting her around every corner though.

A sudden drum solo from the bar below brought Eve back to the present day, and their balcony. ‘So,’ Eve started gently, ‘have you thought about a band for your wedding?’

‘Jack’s friends are going to bring their guitars.’

‘Oh.’ Eve said. This did not sound good. ‘Are they, um, professional musicians?’

‘No, not at all. You know Gavin, Jack’s friend from work? Well, he used to play, and Jack’s brothers, and a couple of other people too – we’re encouraging everyone to bring whatever instruments they have and just have a mash-up.’

‘A mash-up?’ Eve realised that she must sound incredibly middle-aged, but she couldn’t help herself. ‘That might be good for the end of the night, for the people that want to stay and carry on the party, but don’t you want some dancing and music that people know?’

Becca lay her head back on her beanbag. ‘Eve, you’re stressing me out. I’m not like Tanya, who needs everything planned to within an inch of its life. What will be will be, it’s going to be fine. Now be quiet and listen to the lovely music.’

Eve refused to give up. Not when she’d just published an article about how vital good entertainment was to a wedding. ‘See, that’s my point. Music is really important. If you like this band so much, why don’t you pop down in the next break and ask them for their card?’

‘Why don’t you?’

In the end, Eve did a lot better than that and paid them a fifty-pound deposit to put the date of Becca’s wedding in their diaries. She would tackle the issue of what on earth Becca was intending to feed her guests in the cow field another night.

***

‘So I got these.’ Becca dumped two big carrier bags full of clothes and props onto the kitchen counter next to where Eve was chopping up some onions for their sausage and mash dinner.

‘Oh my God Becca, I only wanted a witch’s hat, not a wardrobe for the entire magic circle!’

‘The invitation said to come in your wizardry finery, a witch’s hat wouldn’t cut it. Anyway, I spoke to a few of the other people at work that are going, and everyone is making a massive effort. Rob’s even had a prosthetic nose made like Voldemort’s. Can’t wait to see what his fiancée’s wearing – what’s her name again?’

‘Jackie. You’re going to have to remember that tomorrow, it’s very bad form to forget the bride’s name, even if you do only know the groom.’

‘Jackie. Got it. And do you reckon Jackie is fully on board with marrying the Dark Lord?’

Eve smiled. ‘I can’t say that he would be my immediate choice for a groom, come to think of it. Neither would Rob, but that’s by the by.’

‘They’re both massive Harry Potter fans, they even got engaged at King’s Cross station next to the Platform 9 ¾ sign.’

Eve’s knife kept slicing. ‘That’s lovely. Nothing shouts I love you quite so much as the smell of tramps’ urine and fourteen thousand Japanese school kids on a magic tour.’

‘You are so unromantic Eve. I think it’s really nice that they share a hobby. Now do you want to see what’s in the bags or not?’

‘Absolutely, let’s have dinner first though.’

‘Oh, and don’t forget we need to cook the rice for tomorrow as well.’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘There was a note with the invitation to say that we’re not allowed to throw confetti, so we have to throw rose petals or rice.’

‘Oh my God Becca, they don’t want you to cook it first! It’s dry rice, you muppet, did you think that everyone was going to be hurling handfuls of risotto into the bride’s face?’

‘I did think it was a bit odd, if I’m honest.’

‘I love you, I do,’ Eve put her arm around her friend’s shoulders. ‘But I honestly don’t know how you manage to get through each day alive.’

***

The next morning Becca and Eve, wearing matching black graduation gowns, waist-length grey wigs and carrying chopsticks as wands, got off a train somewhere in the middle of Sussex and boarded a waiting bus that said Hogwarts Express on the front. Becca wasn’t wrong; the other guests had taken the dress code very seriously indeed, one man even sported an ankle-length white beard that looked like he’d grown it specially for the occasion. A few women seemed to have mistakenly interpreted ‘wizardry finery’ to mean St Trinian’s tarty schoolgirl. The bus was unbearably hot and Eve’s wig was itchy. She could feel beads of perspiration on the back of her neck but felt immediately better when she spotted a woman who was sweating herself into an early grave in a full-on feathery owl costume.

The vows were taken over a goblet of fire, the bride’s veil was held in place with a golden snitch comb, and when the happy couple knelt down to receive their blessing, written on the sole of the bride’s left shoe were the words, ‘From Muggle…’ and on the right in matching writing, ‘…To Mrs’. At the point where the vicar asked for the rings the couple turned around and looked up expectantly into the sky. The congregation followed their gaze.

Nothing happened.

Then Voldemort Rob, the groom, held out his gloved arm and started shouting. ‘Barney! Barney!’

Silence.

‘Barney, Barney!’

Then Jackie, who had sullied the effect of a two-thousand-pound wedding dress by accessorising it with a stripy red and yellow knitted Gryffindor scarf, joined in, shrilly calling, ‘Barney, Barney.’

Eve’s shoulders to shake with silent laughter.

‘Stop it.’ Becca whispered, stifling her own giggle.

‘Barney! Barney!’ Jackie’s father, wearing a stuck-on bushy beard like Hagrid joined in, and before too long the whole wedding party were staring up at the sky shouting at the clouds. It was too much for Eve and Becca who let themselves be taken over by uncontrollable laughter that had tears running down their faces.

Finally, after what seemed like days of waiting, a bemused looking barn owl, with the wedding rings tied to his claw, swooped in and landed with a thud on Rob’s outstretched arm.

‘I can’t breathe,’ Eve gasped.

Please don’t misunderstand me, Eve wrote in her diary that night. I love a good fancy dress party as much as the next person, actually scrap that, probably more than the next person – but would I want to marry the love of my life wearing Princess Leia style Danish pastry hair buns while my handsome groom donned a Chewbacca costume? Not really, no. It’s not even about what people would say, or what the grandkids would think when they looked through the wedding album. It’s because I don’t really want to marry a hairy Wookiee warrior, I’d rather marry the person I fell in love with, thanks very much.

There are times and places for costumes – the theatre, for one. Plays would be rather dull and uninteresting if everyone was just wearing normal clothes. Macbeth wouldn’t seem half as loony if he was wearing Diesel jeans and a Lacoste polo shirt and there’s no way that Joseph’s Technicolour Dreamcoat would work if he was wearing a mac from Superdry. Bedrooms – there’s another place where the odd roleplay outfit can work a treat. New Year’s Eve parties, birthday parties, anniversary parties, parties for the sake of having parties. All good occasions for a raid of the old dressing up box. But when I go to a wedding I like a bit of glam; a reason to blow dust off the fascinator that’s on top of the wardrobe; the chance to wear heels and perhaps carry a bag that doesn’t go over both shoulders. It’s very difficult to dance when you’re wearing a head-to-toe owl costume. And I know this for a fact because I’ve seen it firsthand.

Chapter 3 (#u7019cb4f-9b3e-5646-94f6-37c809c4000a)

It was the second month in a row that Eve had covered the rent for Becca. She understood that being a teaching assistant in a specialist autism centre was more of a vocation than a goldmine, but Eve’s paltry journalist’s pay was not going to pay for a two-bed flat in central London indefinitely. Not to mention, she was still paying off her credit card from her extortionate flight back to the UK from the year before, and all Adam’s bits for the wedding that he hadn’t paid her back for yet. And this summer was costing a fortune with the number of bridal showers, wedding presents, new outfits, and hotel stays she had to fork out for.

It didn’t help that Tanya’s new itinerary for her hen do this weekend had tripled the original cost. Now Eve had to pay for a facial she didn’t really want (all those oils always made her skin erupt faster than Vesuvius), a night away in a hotel whose rates were far more than other hotels just because it had the word ‘spa’ shoe-horned into its name, and a raw fish platter that was being delivered from forty miles away due to the lack of Japanese eateries in the countryside – a potential bout of food poisoning had now been added to the list of things Eve already disliked about this weekend. But as chief party planner, it was her job to up the tempo, keep smiling, and pretend that she was loving every minute.

Plastering her ‘aren’t we all having so much fun’ face on, she shoved her clothes in the locker, put the fluffy white towelling robe on, slipped her feet into the white slippers, trying not to wonder if they had been washed since the last person wore them, and padded down the corridor to join the rest of Tanya’s friends who were lounging by the pool. Thank God Becca and Ayesha were there to keep her sane or Eve might well have crawled into the locker and stayed there all weekend.

The spa only had three therapists, so at any one time during the whole day, three of the hen party were always missing after being officiously summoned by the head therapist, who looked as though she’d been over-indulging on the non-surgical skin-smoothing treatments the spa offered. The rest of the party, and Eve used the term ‘party’ loosely, were left to just sit around a tepid indoor pool with overwhelming smell of chlorine and snack on cups of organic granola. This was not shaping up to be the laughter-filled weekend of silliness that Eve had had in mind, but Tanya looked like she was loving it. She’d even brought along her own sparkly tiara to wear, that she’d retrieved from her bag ‘as a back up’ when Eve had produced a rather more garish novelty version with flashing lights that was swiftly dismissed with a little shake of her head. Thank goodness Eve had two more hen dos on the horizon that she could re-use it for, she knew that Ayesha and Becca wouldn’t be so picky.