‘Are you from Yorkshire?’ another asked.
‘No. I live in London. The bride’s family are from—’
Louis emerged from the restaurant, gesturing for her to join him with an urgent circling motion of the hand, hissing:
‘Edie!’
‘Edie! What a beautiful name!’ the women chorused, looking upon her with renewed adoration. Edie was touched and slightly baffled by her sudden celebrity status. That was Prosecco drunk through a straw for you.
‘Are you this young lady’s gentleman?’ they asked Louis, as he joined them.
‘No, darlings, I like cock,’ he said, taking his drink from Edie while she cringed.
‘He likes who?’ said one of the women. ‘Who’s “Cock”?’
‘No. Cock.’ Louis made a flexing bicep gesture that Edie didn’t think made it much clearer.
‘Oh, he likes men, Norma. He’s a Jolly Roger,’ said one, casually.
Attention shifted to Louis, the not-that-jolly Roger.
‘I prefer a game of Bananagrams and a hot bath, these days,’ another offered. ‘Barbara still likes a bit of cock, well enough.’
‘Which one of you did it, then?’ Louis said, eyeing their costumes. ‘Who’s the prime suspect?’
‘There’s not been a crime yet,’ one said. ‘Rumour has it there’s going to be a body found on the third floor.’
‘Well you can probably rule her out then,’ Louis said, tapping his nose, gesturing at the woman in the wheelchair.
‘Louis!’ Edie gasped.
Fortunately, it caused a cackle eruption.
‘Sheila used to dig her corns out with safety pins. You don’t mess with Sheila.’
‘Looks like she overdid it.’
Edie gasped again and the old ladies fell about, howling. She couldn’t believe it: Louis had found his audience.
‘Great meeting you, girls,’ Louis said, and they almost applauded him. Edie was forgotten; chopped liver.
‘Come back to the table. It’s all kicking off big style in the main tent,’ Louis said to her. ‘The speeches are starting.’
With a heavy heart, Edie excused herself. The moment she dreaded.
An Audience With The Hashtag Perfect Couple, Living Their Hashtag Best Life.
‘Was that free?’ barked the sixty-something man with the hearing aid, dressed as a posh country squire, eyes fixed on the glass in Edie’s hand. Edie and Louis had been put on the odds and sods, ‘hard work, nothing in common’ table. The others had immediately abandoned the hard work and scattered, in the longueur between meal and disco. This sod remained, with his timid-looking, equally tweedy wife.
‘Er, no? I can get you something if you like?’
‘No, don’t bother. You come to these bloody interminable things and they fleece you like sheep. As if the gift list wasn’t brass neck enough. Four hundred pounds for some bloody ugly blue cake whisk, the silly clots. Oh hush, Deirdre, you know I’m right.’
Edie plopped down in her banqueting chair and tried not to laugh, because she thought the KitchenAid was a rinse, too.
She swigged the acidic white wine and thanked the Lord for the gift of alcohol to get through this. The top table passed the microphone down the line to the groom, Jack. He tapped his glass with a fork and coughed into a curled fist. His sleeve was tugged by his new mother-in-law. He put a palm up to indicate, ‘Sorry, in a second, folks.’
‘What’s this crackpot notion of wearing brown shoes with a blue suit and a pink tie, nowadays?’ said hearing aid man, of the groom’s attire. ‘Anyone would think this was a lavender liaison.’
Edie thought Jack’s tall, narrow frame in head-to-toe spring-summer Paul Smith looked pretty great but she wasn’t about to defend him.
‘What’s a lavender liaison?’ Louis said.
‘A marriage of convenience, to conceal one’s true nature. When one’s interests lie elsewhere.’
‘Oh, I see. We’re having one of those,’ he grinned, clasping Edie to him.
‘Forgive me if I don’t scrabble for my inhaler in shock,’ he said, looking at Louis’s quiffed hair. ‘I had you down as someone who likes to smell the flowers.’
Edie had heard more inventive euphemisms for ‘homosexual’ than she expected today.
‘Think you’ll ever bother with marriage?’ Louis said, under his breath.
‘I think it’s more whether marriage will ever bother with me,’ Edie said.
‘Babe. Loads of people would marry you. You’re so “wife”. I look at you and think “WIFE ME”.’
Edie laughed, hollowly. ‘Surprised they’re not making this known to me then.’
‘You’re an enigma, you know …’ Louis said, prodding the bottom of his glass with the plastic stirrer. Edie’s stomach tensed, because meandering, whimsical trains of thought with Louis were always headed to the station of I Can’t Believe You Said That.
‘Hah. Not really.’
‘I mean, you’re never short of fans. You’re the life and soul. But you’re always on your own.’
‘I think that’s because being a fan doesn’t necessarily equal wanting a relationship,’ Edie said neutrally, casting her eyes over the hubbub in the room and hoping they’d snag on something else they could talk about.
‘Do you think you’re the commitmentphobe? Or are they?’ Louis said, moving the stirrer to one side as he drank.
‘Oh, I repel them with a kind of centrifugal force, I think,’ Edie said. ‘Or is it centripetal?’
‘Seriously?’ Louis said. ‘I’m being serious here.’
Edie sighed. ‘I’ve liked people and people have liked me. I’ve never liked someone who’s liked me as much as I like them, at the same time. It’s that simple.’
‘Maybe they don’t know you’re interested? You’re quite hard to read.’
‘Maybe,’ Edie said, thinking agreeing would end this subject sooner.
‘So no one’s ever promised you a lifetime of happiness? You haven’t broken hearts?’
‘Hah. Nope.’
‘Then you’re a paradox, gorgeous Edie Thompson. The girl who everyone wanted … and nobody chose.’
Edie spluttered, and Louis had the reaction he’d been angling for.
‘“Nobody chose”! Bloody hell, Louis! Thanks.’
‘Babe, no! I’m no different, no wedding for loveless Louis any time soon. I’m thirty-four, that’s dead in gay years.’
This was nonsense, of course. Louis no more wanted a wedding than an invasive cancer. He spent all his time hunting for meaningless hook-ups on Grindr, the latest with a wealthy, hirsute man he called Chewbacca to his ‘Princess Louis’. It was just a way of claiming the latitude to take the mickey out of Edie.
‘I did say gorgeous, you diva,’ Louis pouted, as if Edie had