The One with the White Wedding. Erin Lawless

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       Chapter Thirty-Three

       I was the maid of honour at a wedding where the bride and groom had written their own vows, and my mate gave them to me to look after until they were needed. Needless to say, beautiful empire-line bridesmaids’ dresses do not have pockets, so I safely placed her beautifully written words of love into my cleavage whilst helping her with last minute touch-ups… Halfway through the ceremony it was time for the vows. My friend stared at me for a full minute before I remembered. So, right there at the front, next to a priest, I had to reach in-between my boobs, only to find the folded paper had slipped out of place and moved, making for an awkward, terribly silent few moments of me digging around.

      Becka, Bath

      Bea inspected the Order of Service she’d just folded together with a critical eye. She was the better part of a glass of wine down and she suspected her accuracy might be suffering the effects. She tried to mitigate the wonky spine by lining up the corners a little more neatly. It was passable; she duly added it to the nearby pile.

      Harry breezed through the front room, hairy shins and knees bravely bared to the December cold; Bea shivered in sympathy inside her cable corded knit and sipped gratefully at her glass of warming red.

      “I won’t be too long,” he promised Nora as he smoothed her hair back and kissed her jaw line. “I’ll just do the one set.”

      “Still, your willpower puts me to shame,” Nora pointed out ruefully, inclining her own glass of wine towards him. Most brides hike up the weight loss efforts in the last few weeks but Nora, particularly with Christmas indulgences sat squarely between herself and the altar, seemed content to slide off the wagon (glass of red in hand). Still, she had definitely slimmed down over the months since her engagement; even just sat cross-legged in front of the sofa in leggings, fluffy socks and an over-sized jumper she seemed sharper, more gamine. Bea was put in mind of the teenaged Nora, that window of time between the melting away of pre-puberty puppy fat and the poor diet of the student years, where Nora had been a bit like this, all cheekbone.

      “Well, can I pick up anything on the way back?” Harry offered, eyes twinkling. “Something for dinner? Another bottle?”

      Nora paused in her folding, clearly tempted. “I shouldn’t…”

      “Are you sure? I’m literally walking back straight past Happy Dragon…”

      “Oh, well then, it would be rude not to!” Bea laughed. “Make mine sweet and sour chicken balls, please!”

      Nora sighed dramatically. “Well, I suppose it will be you that has to deal with the melt-down if my dress doesn’t button up on the day.”

      Harry clapped his hands to his ears at the hint of bridal buttons and Nora laughed. He didn’t want to know even the tiniest detail about the wedding dress.

      “Okay then. How many calories can there even be in special fried rice? Don’t answer that! Let me just see what I’ve got in the way of cash.” Nora unfolded her legs and hopped up to search out her eternally errant handbag, Harry trailing after her as he made a note of what to order later using an app on his phone. Knowing there would soon be greasy takeaway to soak up the alcohol and hopefully improve the straightness of her folding, Bea took another drink. She inspected Nora’s own pile, which didn’t seem all that much better than her own, and felt a little better.

      Maybe she was just looking for the weight of tension, but would Harry normally go out to the gym when she was over? Had he met her eyes for a normal length of time when she’d asked for the chicken balls? For sure Cole had refused to speak to her since her return from France, had ignored every single phone call, every message left, pleading with him to let her explain.

      It’s not like I meant for this to happen, Bea had typed what felt like a hundred times over by now. This isn’t my fault. Maybe if she typed it another hundred times, she’d start to feel like it was true.

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