Before I Do(33)
“Yes, him.” Audrey frowned. “Do you think it means something, him showing up this weekend?”
Hillary paused, popped a second piece of gum into his mouth, then stood up a mop that had fallen across his lap.
“I think there was always going to be something that threw you off today. If it wasn’t some specter from your past showing up with good hair and beautiful cheekbones, it would have been something else.” He fixed her with an unblinking gaze. “Do you think maybe you’re depressed, Auds?”
“You always think everything boils down to people being depressed!” Audrey cried. “I’m not depressed, this is the happiest day of my life.” Then they looked at each other and both started snorting with laughter. That was the problem with Hillary, you could only have a serious conversation with him for so long, and then he would inevitably make you laugh. “I’m serious, Hillary. Help me. What am I supposed to do? Do you think him being here is a sign that I’m making a mistake?”
Hillary looked contemplative for a moment and made a “hmmm” sound. Audrey held out her palms, inviting him to elaborate.
“Did you ever hear the fairy tale about the princess who got everything she ever wanted?”
“No,” Audrey said, rolling her eyes.
“The girl who marries Prince Charming, gets a golden carriage, and moves into a lovely castle with four turrets and room for a day spa. In the twenty-first-century version, she also gets a fulfilling job as a girl boss at a FTSE One Hundred company. She’s emotionally balanced and normal, and together they go on to have a great life. You haven’t heard this one?”
“No, I haven’t,” Audrey said impatiently.
“Do you know why you haven’t heard it? Because it’s a shit story. No one wants to read about the princess who got everything she ever wanted—she’s tedious and dull and irritatingly smug.” Hillary gently shifted his shoulders around so he was looking her in the eye. “We both know perfectly well you’re not actually going to run off with Mr. Cheekbones today. No one does that in real life. You’d get as far as the motorway service station and then turn around and come back again—it would all be painfully embarrassing. Plus, no one else is ever going to let me do a best-man-of-the-bride speech at their wedding, so don’t fuck this up for me. This is the happiest day of my life.”
Audrey started to laugh, and then cry, and then both at once. Hillary pulled her head onto his shoulder and kissed it.
“Just remember what today is all about—you and Josh. You know he’s not my type, but I’ll concede he’s a pretty remarkable man, and he loves you to distraction.” Hillary stretched out his legs. “Can we get out of this cupboard now? I really can’t abide spaces this small. They take me back to the green room at the Donmar Warehouse, and I feel like I’m about to be thrust onstage in an inadequately sized loincloth.” He gave a theatrical shiver.
“Yes.” She nodded. “We can get out of the cupboard now.”
Hillary was right. Of course he was right. Audrey had lost sight of something in the maze last night. She’d lost sight of Josh.
19
Four Years Before I Do
“Why don’t you invite Josh?” Audrey found herself saying next time she, Paul, and Clara were planning one of their infamous Tooting dinner parties.
“Really?” Paul said in surprise. “I didn’t think you’d ever said two words to Josh.”
“I haven’t, but he seems like a nice guy. It would be good to mix up the guest list.”
Paul shrugged and exchanged a look with Clara.
“What’s that look?”
“Nothing,” Paul said. “Josh thinks you don’t like him, that’s all.”
“Why would he think that?” Audrey said indignantly.
“Because you didn’t remember his name when you ran into him in Soho,” said Paul.
“Did he tell you that?” Audrey felt her cheeks grow warm.
Paul looked down at the piece of paper where they’d scribbled a list of names to invite to Saturday’s Sausage Fandango dinner. It was a tradition Clara had initiated, bucking against the trend of elaborate three-course meals. At the Sausage Fandangos, guests were asked to bring their own chair, their own bowl, and at least two bottles of red wine. Clara cooked her now-infamous Sausage Fandango Stew, which consisted of sausages, tinned tomatoes, mixed beans, and enough spice mix to make it taste of something. They would set up a trestle table along the kitchen and out into the corridor, then pack in twenty dinner guests. Anyone who ever came left wondering why everyone didn’t do dinner parties this way.
Paul shook his head but added Josh’s name to the list.
“Fine, we’ll invite Josh, but we’ll have to invite his girlfriend too.”
“Okay,” Audrey said with a purposeful shrug of indifference.
“Kelly,” Paul continued. “She’s a Canadian underwear model. Ridiculously tall. I don’t know if she’ll be down with the Sausage Fandango vibe.”
“Well, we don’t need to invite them, it was just an idea,” said Audrey, but Paul had already added them to the list.
“If we’re inviting Josh, I’ll get him to ask his sister too. She’s just moved to London. I think someone said she was hot.”