The Wedding Diaries

Me: Can’t we? Can’t we? What’s the intrinsic worth of the City jobs? What do they do for us? If the company set up just to employ those people didn’t exist, who would employ them? It’s like ouro … orrob … oroboro … shit. Maybe not that. But their employable skills are in an incredibly narrow band, aren’t they? [trying to hold up fingers close together, to indicate narrowness] They don’t make tables, do they, or build houses? [I’m faintly aware of Thom tapping my arm] Do they? Or do you? Does your bank build a house? [Thom drags my chair away, with me on it, and swaps it with his, leaving me next to a smart looking woman in her forties]

New lady: She’s bloody awful, isn’t she? I had to sit next to her last year, and she spent two hours telling me that public sector teachers are a drain on the country.

Me: [sobering up] Sorry, I’m Kiki.

New lady: Liz.

Me: What do you do, Liz?

New lady: I’m a teacher.

After that, I had a gay old time, sitting with Liz and chatting about our work and families. But I felt Della and her husband glare scornfully at me for the rest of the night, before Thom got me home and gave me quite the talking-to.

If that’s what you want to call it.

December 15th

Bad days. Tony invited me into his office today just to remind me how much we’d spent on Jacki’s book, how much that represented of our annual budget, how much space our Sales team had had to beg for in the supermarkets, and how, basically, the first book I’d ever officially been given for Polka Dot would be the deciding factor in whether any of us got a bonus this year. ‘So you’d better make sure this Perfect Wedding is pretty perfect, yes?’ If I didn’t think that thought about four hundred times a day anyway, I would have brought it to Tony’s attention that no one at Polka Dot had received a bonus in the four years I’d been working there. But thank you for the added pressure. I sulked back to my desk and tried to go over the publicity plan with Alice.

Then his mother arrived.

I could hear her coming from the other side of the building, clattering up the stairwell, banging her oversized golf umbrella against everyone and everything she could, calling out, ‘Anthony! Anthony!’ like her forty-seven-year-old son was a runaway pup. She knew exactly where he’d be, and eventually made her way into his office after knocking piles of books over and pushing paper off any surface she could reach. The door slammed, but we could still make out every word she barked at him.

Pamela: Anthony, what the devil is this I hear about a bloody wedding book? What kind of trash is this?

Aha.

Tony opened his office door.

Tony: [nervously] Kiki! Would you mind stepping into my office for a moment?

Pamela, apparently, is disgusted that we’re publishing the book of a soap actress, convinced that we’re essentially becoming Heat magazine because we’ve got a celebrity telling us her wedding plans. I’m unsure what the difference is between this book and any of the other celebrity stuff we’ve done in the past – could it be that people may actually have heard of this celebrity? – but Tony had told his mother that I’d bought this book, that he hadn’t been happy about this but I’d argued him round and it was on my head. Pamela looked me up and down and gave a snort.

Pamela: I hope you know what you’re doing, young lady.

Tony gave me a beseeching look. I toyed for a moment with the idea of pleading innocence, of explaining the unlikelihood of me being able to buy so much as a dictionary for the office, let alone a red-hot celebrity wedding book, and turning a mystified face to Tony for an explanation. But I also knew in the long run that yes, Tony would take the credit from Pamela if this book went right while I would take the blame if it went wrong, but Tony would not be able to defer my promotion again, once I took his side on this.

Me: I think we’ve got a great chance with this title, Pamela – the market’s there, the product’s good and the costings add up.

I suddenly thought: Shit, if she actually asks me about the costings I’m going to have to faint or something, as I hadn’t seen a single figure on this; but she just looked me up and down again and shooed me out of the office. Phew.

Thom didn’t have a good day either. After last week’s PowerPoint debacle, the pig-men came back as predicted but Thom’s boss, Rowland, has also made it clear that he’s not in his good books. Thom suddenly has to put all the figures past him, and – horror of horrors – has to ‘come and see him’ each night before he goes home. There is no more humiliating discipline at that level, and none more difficult. Thom must time it perfectly – too early and he’s a soft-handed workshy, too late and he’s made his boss sit and wait for Thom to decide to go home, and probably ruined a perfectly good booking at the Ivy. He’s really struggling with this, so it’s probably not entirely my fault that our conversation tonight went:

Me: How was your day?

Thom: Don’t ask. Please, tell me about yours. Distract me from the horrors of the corporate crunch.

Me: [delighted to be asked] Well! Jacki’s cakes were finally ready to be photographed today, and they were … amazing. There was one classic wedding cake with a giant silver crown on top, and one bombe glacé entirely covered with gold leaf, and forty tiers of cupcakes that were individually iced with Jacki and Leon’s initials, and a six-foot wall of cake pops that made up a giant portrait of Jacki and Leon. Now, while I think it’s got impact, I priced up the wall of cake pops and I think that, aesthetically, it might be a bit … de trop.

Thom: For CHRIST’s sake, Kiki, can’t you think of ANYTHING else? We aren’t. Made. Of money. Can you please understand this? I don’t want golden cake walls or a fountain of liquid sugar. This isn’t bloody Willy Wonka, it’s our wedding. Why are you so determined to make a joke of this whole thing?

Me: Wow. That joke really backfired. It actually was a joke, Thom.

Thom: [staring at the table] …

Me: Maybe … I’ll just … go to bed. And think about the political situation in the wider world.

TO DO:

Take Thom out for a relaxing evening

Ask Norman if what Tony said about our bonuses is true

See if I can get The Dress tax-free in the US and ship back with someone over there for a holiday (Alice)

Rings – vintage to match engagement ring?

December 16th

At the wedding shop today for the final snaps before Jacki’s wedding. I was cramming my notebook in my handbag when Reception rang to say my taxi was there, which was something of a surprise since I’d been planning to take the tube. Getting down to the street I found a black cab waiting with its door open – and getting in, I found bloody Pedro in the back, flicking through an issue of Wallpaper like he hadn’t chewed me up and spat me out last time we’d met. He didn’t look up but said, ‘I thought you’d like a lift.’ We rode in silence through the streets until we got to Pudding Lane, where Pedro leapt out of the cab and into the shop. I saw a cab pull up behind us, full of his assistants and equipment, and watched as Zoe got out and came over, saw my sad face peering through the cab window and put her head on one side, saying, ‘Did someone leave you with the fare?’ I was still so wiped out after Thom’s overreaction last night that even these few moments with Pedro left me dumbfounded, so I got out and let poor Zoe deal with it. I heard my phone go, and fishing it out thought that I had a message from Jacki – delayed? Most unlike her – but saw it was actually from Judy the Intern. ‘Did u no bout Carol n Norman? WOW!’ What the …? Does anyone not