The Two Lives of Lydia Bird(66)

‘But you are?’ I ask.

‘Everyone’s the marrying type,’ Elle says, before Dee can answer. ‘Trust me, I’ve seen all sorts at the hotel. Honestly, there genuinely isn’t a marrying type. It’s more a case of the right time, right person, and bingo, you’re waltzing up the aisle in a meringue.’

Dee huffs softly. ‘Maybe he’s just not a bingo fan then.’

I’m conflicted. Here in this life, Dee is obviously part of my circle. Quite a close part, given that this is my hen night and she’s here in my kitchen with Elle. She must be having more success with Jonah here too, if marriage is on her mind. But then the Jonah she knows here is different, open-hearted and quick to laugh; the man he used to be.

‘Give him time,’ I say. ‘He’s always been more of a thinker. It’ll happen when he’s ready, I’m sure.’

She doesn’t look convinced. ‘Maybe.’

‘Jonah Jones.’ Elle says his name with relish, and then laughs. ‘I had a secret crush on him when I was about sixteen.’

‘You did not!’ I laugh, shocked. She’s never mentioned anything of the sort before.

Pink spots appear on my sister’s cheeks. ‘I never told you. I was embarrassed!’ She drinks half the contents of her glass and then waves it around. ‘What can I say? He had that whole brooding thing going on, all hair and cheekbones.’

I turn away and reach for the bottle to give myself a moment to process the thought of my sister and Jonah Jones. Nope. Not happening.

‘He is handsome, isn’t he?’ Dee says, for all the world like a moony teenage girl.

Elle nods. ‘He’s grown into his face.’

I shoot her a look. ‘Grown into his face?’

She laughs. ‘You know what I mean. He’s got that –’ she points towards her mouth – ‘that Mick Jagger look about him, hasn’t he?’

I can’t say I’ve ever looked at Jonah and thought of Mick Jagger, but I start to laugh because I know what Elle means. His mouth is a fraction too big for his face and he has a kind of louche charisma that can hold a room. Not in the same way Freddie does; he’s energy and heat to Jonah’s laid-back cool. Together they’re night and day, two sides of the same coin. Maybe that’s what’s missing from Jonah in my waking world – he’s lost his heat source.

‘I do love him though,’ Dee says.

Elle and I take a seat either side of her. I smooth my hands over the skirt of my black dress. It’s summer short, party ready and inoffensive, yet I don’t much like it. It’s not something I’d usually choose, and I wonder how I’ve ended up with slightly cool, more conservative clothing tastes here. I’m usually a jeans and T-shirt kind of girl, boho at best. It occurs to me that I’ve still got no clue what my wedding dress is like; how strange and bizarre to not know something like that on my hen night. I don’t even know where it is. At Mum’s, presumably, as I haven’t seen it anywhere here.

‘Want Lydia to say something to him for you?’ Elle offers my services without consultation.

God, I hope she says no.

Dee shakes her shiny curls. ‘How desperate would that make me sound?’

‘Not necessarily, if it’s subtle,’ Elle says. ‘A little nudge to test the waters wouldn’t hurt.’

Dee brightens a bit and looks at me. ‘Do you think so?’

I want to say no, I don’t think so, actually, Dee. I don’t think so at all, because if I push you two together you’re highly likely to piss off to Wales in the none-too-distant future for a hill-walking Welsh life in the Welsh valleys with your Welsh mother. I don’t say that though.

I smile, nod a little and refill our glasses instead, and we clink them, a silent toast to my tentative agreement to broker Jonah and Dee’s engagement. How on earth did that happen?

‘I wish you wouldn’t order duck, Elle, you know how I feel about it.’

Mum turns the offending dish away from her on the Lazy Susan and pauses to help herself to a battered prawn. Despite being a committed carnivore for her entire life, she always has a shudder at the idea of people eating ducks.

‘Double standards,’ Elle says, wielding chopsticks like a pro.

We’re in the local Chinese restaurant, a place I’ve been to many times over the years. Mum and Elle are here, of course, and Dee, plus Julia and Dawn from work and Auntie June, my mum’s sister. Sitting on her other side is my cousin Lucy, who was in the year between Elle and me at school, when she could be bothered to turn up. I’ve no real clue why she’s here; she’s always looked down her slightly too-long nose at me in a way that suggests she thinks she’s a cut above us. She isn’t, for the record. So there’s eight of us altogether, each wearing a sash that declares our place in the bridal party. BRIDE! MOTHER OF THE BRIDE! CHIEF BRIDESMAID! I sneak a glance at Auntie June’s and find she’s a HEN ON A MISSION. What on earth does that mean, I wonder? What would a hen on a mission do? Steal eggs? Spy on a rival coop? I have no clue where that ridiculous train of thought is going but start to laugh under my breath regardless, largely thanks to Dee’s champagne, followed by the wine now being thrown at me as if I’m going to have my liver removed in the morning and will never be able to touch a drop again. As it happens, I’m quite fond of my liver so I’m trying to pace myself, but I’m fighting a rising Sauvignon tide and fear I might go under at some point in tonight’s proceedings.