Husband Material (London Calling #2)(111)

I didn’t have the same options. I just had a bunch of friends, all of whom were, in their own special ways, utterly unsuitable. Tom was an ex and technically Bridge’s friend rather than mine, both of which made it weird. The James Royce-Royces came as a unit, and it would have felt unfair to ask one but not the other. I refused to ask any of my coworkers, so that left Bridge and Priya. And Bridge should have been my go-to choice because she’d made me her maid of honour and I was owed some freaking payback. Only something about Bridge didn’t scream best man to me.

She was my best friend, but when I thought of a best man, I thought of someone who I’d gone on the pull with in a disastrous attempt to get over a failed relationship. Or drunk absinthe with at three in the morning. Or ranted to about how awful it was that all our friends were pairing off like a bunch of squares while we were young, free, single, and totally miserable. And that…that was definitely Priya.

Besides, when I called Bridge to break the good or bad news, she’d been in the middle of a major work crisis because the acclaimed author of I’m Out of the Office at the Moment. Please Forward Any Translation Work to My Personal Email Address had vanished overnight somewhere in the vicinity of the ?ngelholm UFO-Memorial, leaving only thirty-eight manuscript pages, a cassette recording of Philip Glass’s Akhenaten, and a note saying To the Fairest.

So, yeah, Priya had stepped up. Or at least not told me to fuck off. And was doing a really good job. For a start, she’d totally ignored me when I said I wanted a small, low-key non-gender-specific animal party and instead threw me a massive rager at a friend’s gallery.

She’d even got me a rainbow balloon arch, although she did tell me we were going to shoot it with BB guns at the end of the evening because—and I quote—“I love you and respect your choices, but balloon arches are twee as fuck.”

Whatever. It was my twee-as-fuck balloon arch, and I was going to stand under it for as long as possible. Or at least for a couple of minutes because, it turned out, standing under a balloon arch by yourself wasn’t as much fun as I thought it was going to be.

Everything else, however, was kind of amazing. Which shouldn’t have been surprising on account of how Priya was also kind of amazing—not that I’d ever tell her to her face, in case she thought I liked her or something. The gallery was one of those old Victorian warehouses that had been repurposed just enough to be usable but not so much that it didn’t feel like the owner was elbowing you in the ribs every five minutes, saying Hey, look at that exposed brickwork and those authentic window fittings. Aren’t they funky and incongruous. It was currently exhibiting a bunch of queer artists who did the type of work that I really liked knowing existed, because it made me feel part of an important cultural thing, but didn’t particularly understand because, at the end of the day, queer art was still art. And I was still a total pleb.

Along with the art, there were also drinks, music, lights, and a whole lot of people, approximately half of whom I knew, and the other half Priya knew and had brought along to make me feel cooler than I was. And actually, it was working. I was incredibly cool. I was the sort of person who got to have a super-queer, super-modern non-gender-specific animal party full of exciting people in an exciting venue organised by my exciting lesbian best man. This was, without a doubt, the best part of getting married so far. And the man I was getting married to would have hated it. Well, to be fair, he might have liked the art bit.

For a little while I just floated, drink in hand, basking in reflected relevance, accepting hugs and congratulations from friends, acquaintances, and total strangers. It was like I’d won something, which I suppose from a romantic perspective I kind of had.

Eventually I found Priya, tucked in an alcove, next to a mural depicting The Birth of Venus as a hot, naked twink. She was with Theresa and Andi and deep in conversation with someone I thought was the gallery owner—a tall woman with a shaved head, who looked like she’d been in the art game long enough to give no fucks.

“Thank you for my party,” I said in a rush of un-me-like ebullience.

“Whatever,” Priya replied. “You know I think marriage is bollocks.

But if it makes you happy, fine.”

“Nuanced as ever,” observed Theresa, who had put aside her usual academic chic for a little black cocktail dress that still managed to make me feel like I was late for a lecture.

Priya, though, looked like Priya, rainbow-laced Docs and all.

“Hey, there’s a reason I work in a visual medium.”

“And while I mostly agree on the patriarchal-bollocks-that-should-have-gone-out-with-the-Dark-Ages front”—this was Andi, an intense woman with bleached-blond swept-back hair wearing one of those tank tops that only a very specific sort of person could get away with—“isn’t it an important de jure equality thing? I mean I don’t want us to get married”—she made a kind of circular nod indicating her partners—“but I do think we should be allowed to.”

The gallery owner flashed a ring. “Married woman over here, fine with it.”

“You’re all against me.” Priya rolled her eyes. “Oh, and Luc, this is Abena. This is her place.”

“Thanks,” I told her reflexively, “this is a really great venue.”

“It’s not a venue, mate.” She didn’t seem offended, more like she wanted to make a point. “It’s a gallery. But be honest, would you be here if there wasn’t also a party in it?”