‘Come on, Daisy,’ Connie insists. ‘It’s our anniversaries, we have to celebrate.’
As coincidence would have it, Simon and I share our anniversary, more or less, with Connie and Luke. We met at their first wedding anniversary party and married a year later. It was fast. Too fast? The thought springs into my head and I push it away, mortified by my subconscious betrayal. Things aren’t easy right now but that’s a terrible thought to have. I play with a sachet of sugar in the bowl on the table. I now see that when I was planning my big day, I should have given more thought to the fact we’d be forever sharing our anniversary with the Bakers. I didn’t because, after Simon proposed, all I was concerned with was securing the first date possible in the venue I wanted. I practically ran down the aisle.
‘Don’t you think a joint party will be fun?’ Connie asks.
I don’t. I can’t think why she’s suggesting it. The Bakers are not short of money, so I know they can’t possibly be motivated by splitting the cost. I can’t add anyone exciting to the guest list, we share our best friends and I don’t have any acquaintances that Connie would be keen to meet; I’m a Year Six school teacher, she’s a photographer for glossy magazines, she has the monopoly on glamorous friends. She’s not normally shy of being centre of attention. Honestly? I think I can go so far as to say it’s unusual for her to want to share the limelight. So why this sudden and ardent interest in us hosting a joint anniversary party?
‘It’s not really my sort of thing,’ I reply carefully. ‘People don’t make a big fuss of anniversaries unless it’s a round number,’ I point out. We’ve been married sixteen years; the Bakers have been married eighteen.
‘But why not? That’s a crazy rule! Every year is special.’ Connie has always had her own way of looking at things. To be fair it’s a brighter, more sparkling way than the rest of us and usually I enjoy her joie de vivre but sometimes she can be a tiny bit irritating.
‘I think Simon might have already booked something for us that weekend,’ I mutter. Connie widens her eyes sceptically, but is too polite to say this is very unlikely. I take care of all the social arrangements, I book our holidays, organise flights, car hire, bookings at Airbnb. Truth be known, I also deal with the less exciting admin: insurance, renewing the TV licence and reading the electricity meter to someone in a remote call centre. Simon isn’t the sort to surprise me with a mini-break.
‘I have to do something!’ she says, laughingly. Connie laughs a lot because her life is perfect. I know, I know, no one’s life is perfect but I’m up close and personal with hers and believe me, it is as near to perfect as I can imagine.
‘Fine maybe you do, but why do you need me and Simon to be involved?’
‘I don’t want to bag the date and make it all about me. Us,’ she quickly corrects herself, remembering to include Luke. ‘It’s your date too. It will look bad.’
‘Who to? I don’t care.’ I really don’t.
‘I’ll feel bad,’ she persists.
I might have agreed to a smaller, more intimate gathering. A dinner party for our nearest and dearest could be nice but that’s not Connie’s way. Connie’s wedding anniversary parties always echo the original, triumphant day, which was a glorious, no holds barred affair, full of possibility, romance and big flouncy skirts. Connie loves looking back at her wedding day. She had her old wedding video digitised and they watch it on every anniversary; I don’t doubt she has plans to play it at this party, if it goes ahead. I find taking a trip down memory lane more complex. Sometimes it’s just what I need, today I can’t face the thought of it.
Last night, I barely got any sleep. Simon came back late. He said he’d had to stay at work for an important meeting. If I’d lit a match near his mouth he’d have probably gone up in flames the alcohol fumes were that bad. When I asked him if he’d been to the pub he said yes, just for one beer, but that was a lie, he smelt of spirits and could barely walk in a straight line. I was so angry. It had only been a few days since his drinking and negligence had led to Millie’s accident. I’d hoped his remorse might last longer. We rowed. I called him a bloody liar, he said I was a sneaky bitch. We say some awful things to each other sometimes. Then I cried, he hugged me and told me he has it all under control, that I’ve got nothing to worry about.
You see, he is a bloody liar.
‘Do you think it’s over the top if Luke and I renew our vows?’ Connie suddenly asks. She doesn’t meet my eye but instead stares intently at her half-finished wheatgrass smoothie.
‘Do you need to renew them? Have you broken your vows?’ I ask with the flat honesty that a twenty-seven-year friendship allows. She did. Once. A long time ago. It was a drama. I really don’t want to hear if she has again.
‘No, I have not,’ she says quickly, self-consciously. ‘But I thought it would be romantic.’ She pauses and then, oh-so-casually adds, ‘I thought you might want to do it too. You and Simon.’
And there it is. Her reason for asking us to share a party with them. I had wondered. Now I understand.
It is a pity party.
Literally.
Scalding hot embarrassment seeps through my body, drenching me in shame. Connie beams at me but I know her too well, the smile is shadowed with concern. The side of her mouth quivers ever so slightly. ‘Simon popped round to ours last night.’ She’s trying to sound simply chatty, off-the-cuff. She fails. ‘He and Luke are working together on something at the moment and it needed discussing, so Luke had asked him to stop by.’
I nod as though I knew this already. I didn’t, Simon doesn’t often give me much detail about the projects he works on. He used to. My first thought is relief that his explanation for being late home wasn’t totally inaccurate. Going to see Luke to discuss work, even in a pub, is almost the same as having to stay behind for a meeting.
My tentative optimism is knocked back when Connie adds, ‘Only Simon wasn’t really up for talking about the project. He wasn’t making much sense at all, in fact. Just kept going on about how much Millie had loved camping in the garden. He was sort of fixated on that, you know.’
She doesn’t say it. She wants to say he was rambling and repeating himself, that he was drunk. I know she does because I’ve seen it often enough myself. There was a time when Connie might have dared call a spade a shovel but we’re more careful with each other now. More reserved.
When we were at university together and when we shared a flat after that, we saw each other every day of our lives, but that intimacy has been neglected. I can no longer open up to her without reserve. We’ve replaced one another. We’re married now and have been for a long time. That draws a curtain around certain things. Things like her explicitly saying my husband is a functioning alcoholic. She can’t say it until I do. I have no intention of doing so. We still love each other. I love her boldness, her candour, her volatility. Her panache. I’m also intimidated by all those characteristics too.
As usual, I try to change the subject. ‘I should have brought your camping stove back, I forgot all about it.’
Connie looks briefly impatient as she knows I’m dodging her point. ‘Simon returned it last night, actually.’
‘Oh good.’
‘Well, most of it. He’d mislaid the screw-on pan support bit.’
‘We’ll buy you another,’ I say quickly.
‘Oh wow, no. No need. I didn’t mean that. We never use it.’ She glances at her hands and then carefully says, ‘Luke