The Bridesmaid Pact (20 page)

By the time we came to have our first dance, I was floating on a sea of happiness and champagne. This had been the best day of my life.

‘Happy, Mrs Davies?’ said Matt holding me close.

‘Ecstatic,’ I said, as he whirled me round the dance floor.

‘You know, I wouldn’t mind if you were having our daughter,’ he said.

‘Really?’ I said. ‘You don’t want to wait a bit?’

‘No time like the present,’ said Matt. ‘You know, I’d love to be a dad, and Mum can’t wait to be a granny. I think we should go for it straight away.’

‘Well that’s sudden,’ I said, suddenly feeling a bit panicky. I wanted children, I really did, but I thought back to my abortion, and wondered if it would make a difference. I’d never told Matt about it, maybe I should get things perfectly straight before we started down this road.

‘You don’t have a problem with that, do you?’ said Matt.

‘No,’ I said. ‘I’m not sure I’m ready.’

‘Well, no one’s ever ready,’ said Matt, ‘but look at my mum, look how she coped against all the odds. We’ll be doing it together.’

Matt’s mum could have had an abortion and chose not to, as he had frequently told me, he was proud of the fact that she’d brought him up alone, despite her struggles. Maybe now wasn’t the time to come clean. I should enjoy the moment and let the future take care of itself. I let myself drift away in Matt’s arms, thinking how much I belonged there, and tried not to think about the third bracelet, which lay unwrapped on my dressing table, and making me wonder if I’d ever see Caz again.

Back Then

For my wedding, I will have a white carriage like Cinderella and six white horses. And I will wear a big dress just like Princess Diana. And my husband will be very handsome. And my best friends in the whole universe will be my bridesmaids.

Caz, Sarah, Beth and Dorrie. Best friends forever. All four one and one four all
.

Doris, July 1981

For my wedding I will have the biggest, whitest, pouffiest dress I can imagine. Fergie’s would do. My husband will be very handsome. He will wear a white suit and kneel down and kiss my hand. I will have three bridesmaids. They will be Sarah and Beth and Caz.

Best friends forever. All four one and one four all. Doris, July 1986

For my wedding, I’d still really like that big Cinderella dress, even though the others laugh at me about it. And I’d like my husband to lead me on a pony, like Sting did
for Trudy Styler. That would be really romantic. And my best friends, Sarah and Beth and Caz will be my bridesmaids. All four one and one four all.

Doris, August 1994

For my wedding I’d always dreamed of romance, of the beautiful white dress, of being a fairy princess. Dad was meant to walk me down the aisle. Mum was meant to organize the day. And the groom wasn’t supposed to be wondering if his bride would ever be well enough to be a proper wife. At least my best friends are going to be my bridesmaids. That part of the dream is intact. All four one and one four all.

For my wedding, I’d just settle on being well
.
Doris, now

I should have married Darren straight away, when he first asked me. I knew pretty much immediately I’d found the man of my dreams. But I figured we had plenty of time. And then Dad got ill, and everything was too difficult. He deteriorated so quickly, and knowing how much he hated that bloody wheelchair, I couldn’t bear to put him through the humiliation of being wheeled into church. Maybe that was wrong. Because it turns out we didn’t have much time after all…

I first met Darren at work, but we never said much to one another, just talked test tubes when we encountered each other in the lift. I thought he was cute and his obsession with germs rather sweet. I didn’t ever think about how he viewed me. I know I scared off most of the science boffins I tended to encounter at work. I wasn’t like anyone they’d met before. Somehow they couldn’t get their heads
round the fact that just because I liked wearing bright red nail varnish, didn’t mean I couldn’t show interest in the cells I was experimenting on.

But it was one night before Christmas, when I was out with the girls celebrating Sarah’s engagement, that sealed our fate. I’d like to say it was love at first sight, except, much as I want to, sappy romantic idiot that I am, even I don’t believe in a real
coup de foudre
. A great word that, for the sudden rush you get when you fall in love.
Coup de foudre
. It literally means lightning strike, which always puzzled me. Why does Cupid, a Greek god, get muddled up with Thor, a Norse one?

Anyway, I digress. There I was, with the girls in the champagne bar in Kettner’s, and in walks Darren. I remember clocking him and thinking,
Oh it’s the cute guy from work
, but no one could have been more surprised than me when he asked me out. That was the last thing I was expecting. I endured days of teasing from the others about Yakult Man, as Caz had instantly christened him, before we eventually made it on our first date in the New Year.

If I did have a
coup de foudre
, it was probably the moment we met at the restaurant and Darren held the door open for me and took my coat. Old-fashioned as it might sound, I love a guy to show courtesy, and Darren had me hooked from that moment, and no amount of teasing from the others about his microbe obsessions were ever going to change that…

From that moment on, I knew Darren was the one for me. He’d always made me so happy. He still made me so happy. I just hoped I was going to have time to bring him the joy he’d always brought me.

Doris

Matt rang us just as I was clearing away Woody’s tea. As usual, more food seemed to have gone on the floor than in his mouth, but I guess that’s what plastic mats are for.

‘Are you OK?’ I said. He sounded really strained.

‘Not really,’ he said. ‘Beth’s had a miscarriage.’

‘Oh no,’ I said, my hand flying to my mouth. ‘That’s terrible. How is she?’

‘Not good,’ he said. ‘But I was wondering, could you come round? I think she needs a girl to chat to.’

‘Damn,’ I said. ‘Darren and I are booked up for our first meeting with the priest and we have to leave in about ten minutes. I’m really sorry but we can’t get out of it. I’ll ring Sarah to see if she can come though, and I can definitely call in tomorrow. Are you sure she’ll want to see one of us now though? Don’t you need time to yourselves tonight?’

‘Believe you me, that’s the last thing we need,’ Matt laughed hollowly. There was a bitterness to his tone which surprised me. He was the epitome of the supportive, understanding husband. I couldn’t possibly think why he didn’t want to be alone with Beth tonight. Maybe he felt hopeless. I know Darren had felt utterly useless when I was
giving birth and had hated me being in pain. Yes, that must be it. Matt was in shock and felt he couldn’t help Beth, but realized she needed some TLC from her friends.

I rang Sarah, but there was no answer. Then I remembered she was probably at the pool. Sam had swimming lessons on a Thursday. I sent her a text, but didn’t get a reply, so I rang Caz. I was running out of time as Darren and I needed to be out by 7 p.m.

‘Caz?’ I said. ‘Where are you?’

‘Over at Mum’s sorting through stuff,’ she said. ‘I finished work early. Why?’

‘Beth’s had a miscarriage and Matt’s just rung me asking if I’d go over. I’m on my way out and I can’t get hold of Sarah. So I was wondering if you could?’

‘Of course I can,’ said Caz. ‘Oh the poor thing, what a rotten piece of luck.’

‘I know,’ I said, shivering as I thought how I would have felt if I lost Woody. I looked at him gurgling in the corner and felt a sudden rush of fierce protective love. ‘Can you send her my love and say I’ll see her tomorrow?’

‘Of course,’ said Caz. ‘I’ll ring you later.’

‘What was all that about?’ Darren had just come in from work.

‘Beth’s lost the baby,’ I said.

‘Oh, that’s dreadful,’ said Darren. ‘They must be distraught.’

‘I know,’ I said, ‘and I feel awful because I can’t get over there now.’

‘Don’t feel bad,’ said Darren. ‘You always look out for your friends; Beth knows that you’re there for her. Come on, we’d better get on or we’ll be late.’

Mum arrived then to babysit and coo over her grandson and he clapped his hands in delight, saying ‘Na-na. Na-na.’
‘See, he knows me already?’ said Mum rubbing her nose in his face and coochy-cooing all over him. Privately I didn’t like to say that ‘na-na’ was Woody’s default position in the word department. I was just so pleased to see her acting a bit more normally at last.

‘I remember going for marriage lessons with your dad,’ Mum said wistfully. ‘It was different in those days of course. We had to be attending church regularly, and the priest scared me half to death with telling me what a serious obligation marriage was. I nearly bottled out of it.’

‘Seriously?’ I said.

‘Seriously,’ Mum said. ‘Up until the day I wasn’t sure I was doing the right thing. Then, when I saw your dad, standing there at the altar, looking so handsome, I knew I’d made the right choice. And I never regretted it.’

‘What, never?’ I said. ‘Not even at the end?’

‘Never,’ said Mum firmly. ‘I wish more than anything that he hadn’t had to suffer the way he did, but I’m glad I was with him till the end, and I shall miss him every day till the day I die.’

Tears prickled my eyes, as I gave Mum a hug.

‘I miss him too,’ I said.

‘I know,’ said Mum, wiping her own tears away. ‘Now go on, get along with you both or you’ll be late.’

‘Welcome, welcome,’ said Father Miserecordie, as he ushered us into the lounge of the presbytery which I’d last visited in 1987, when I’d giggled my way through Father Cormack’s confirmation classes with Beth and Sarah. Caz, typically, had refused to come.

The room was much cosier than I remembered it. The huge crucifix that had dominated the fireplace in my youth
had been replaced by a more modest one. The dark wooden skirting and dado rails that I remembered making the room so gloomy had been brightened with a flock wallpaper. Even the seats were much cosier than the hard-backed chairs of old.

It had taken a while for me to persuade Darren to come to marriage classes. He hadn’t been brought up in a religious family and didn’t see the point. Nor did he understand my sudden longing for a link with my childhood. I’d wavered for ages about having a church wedding, and I thought it would be too late to book St Philomena’s. But Mum had a word with Father Miserecordie who had suggested we got married on a Friday and miraculously a Friday slot had come up at the hotel we were after. So, here we were, me nervously wondering if we were going to get some kind of Catholic indoctrination of the sort I remembered from childhood, and Darren looking like he wanted to be anywhere else but here. Another indication of how much he loved me, I realized with a jolt.

I needn’t have worried.

‘Would you like a cup of tea, or something stronger?’ Father Miserecordie asked. That was the first surprise.

‘Erm…’ Darren looked at me in bemusement. ‘I wouldn’t mind a beer if you have one.’

I pulled a face.

‘What?’ he whispered. ‘I gave up the pub for this, remember?’

‘Doris, how about you?’

‘It’s all right,’ I said dryly. ‘I appear to be driving.’

Father Miserecordie helped himself and Darren to a beer and poured me an orange juice, then said, ‘How are you both feeling? Is the pressure getting to you yet?’

He gave no hint of our earlier conversation. I was grateful
for his discretion. I wasn’t sure Darren would have understood.

Darren raised his eyes to the ceiling. ‘Well, if I could get Dorrie off the computer long enough to discuss anything more sensible than the colour of her shoes, I’d be lucky.’

How we laughed. Would that our stresses were as minor as that.

‘And you, Doris, are you feeling the strain yet?’

‘Only a little,’ I admitted. ‘It would be nice if my mum could help a bit more, but she hasn’t been too well.’

‘And is that a problem?’

‘Not really,’ I said. ‘My friends are all being great, and anyway, I love organizing stuff, don’t I Daz?’

‘Yup,’ said Darren, ‘that’s my girl.’

We carried on in this vein for several minutes, lighthearted banter covering the way we were both really feeling. The seriousness of what we were about to do had never been more evident to me. Or the sacrifices I was asking Darren to make.

‘So have you given any thoughts to your vows?’ said Father Miserecordie.

‘Don’t we just have to do the usual stuff about for better for worse, in sickness and in health?’ Darren asked.

‘Well yes, that’s the traditional version,’ said Father Miserecordie, ‘but I always think it’s nice if couples make the vows a little bit personal.’

‘Right, so I could pledge my life to Yakult Man and promise to keep you bacteria free forever,’ I said jokingly.

‘And I could promise to always take you on holiday to Disneyland,’ responded Darren.

‘Not
quite
what I had in mind,’ said Father Miserecordie. ‘I was thinking of something particularly special to the both
of you. Darren, is there something you’d like to say to Doris?’

Darren looked embarrassed, but then said, ‘I’d just like Dorrie to know that I’ll love her always, whatever it takes, and I
mean
whatever.’

He didn’t look at me when he said this, but I knew what he meant and I felt silently choked. How could I put him through this? How could I?

‘And you, Doris?’ Father Miserecordie prompted me.

I looked at Darren and my eyes filled with tears.

‘We don’t know what it will take though, do we?’ I whispered. ‘I can’t ask you to do this for me.’

We sat in silence for a minute and then Father Miserecordie said, ‘I know we talked about this before, Doris—’ Darren shot me a look of surprise ‘—but I think you’re wrong. I think you can ask Darren to do this.’

‘How can you say that?’ I said. ‘I’ve got a potentially debilitating disease, and I may die a horribly early death. I just don’t think it’s fair to the man I love to ask him to sacrifice himself for me.’

‘Dorrie, you don’t mean that,’ Darren said. ‘Come on, we’ve been over all of this. I will stay with you through this. You know I will.’

I fell silent then. I couldn’t bear to voice the thought in my head, which said,
Suppose I don’t want you to?

‘What was all that about?’ said Darren as we left. ‘Since when were you talking to Father Miserecordie about your MS?’

‘It was the day after Flo died,’ I said. ‘I was upset and went to church and met him there. For what it’s worth, he’s on your side.’

We didn’t speak again till we got home. Mum left while I went upstairs to look at Woody, who was sleeping peacefully on his side, his thumb in his mouth and a chubby fist stuffed in his ear, an endearing habit he’d inherited from his dad. I gently stroked his forehead. He was so very, very precious to me, and I couldn’t bear the thought that I might not be there to see him grow up.

I came back downstairs again to find Darren watching football on TV.

‘Woody OK?’ he said.

‘Yes, sleeping peacefully,’ I said.

‘You OK?’ he asked.

‘No,’ I said.

‘Didn’t think so,’ he said. ‘I thought you’d got over all that nonsense about not marrying me.’

‘I have…I had,’ I said. ‘Darren, there’s nothing I want more than to marry you. It would make me the proudest woman on the planet to call myself your wife. But it feels so selfish.’

‘Hey, hey.’ Darren took me in his arms and held me close. ‘I know how hard you’re finding this, but you have to stay positive. You might be well for years. We don’t know what the future brings.’

‘But what if it takes you to places you don’t want to go?’ I said.

‘What do you mean?’ Darren said.

‘Oh, nothing,’ I said.

But later, when we sat watching the news and Flo’s face flashed up with a news item about how her family weren’t going to be prosecuted after all, Darren said, ‘Is that what you meant? About places I don’t want to go?’

He knows me so well. It wasn’t hard for him to see the way my mind was working.

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘You should have seen Flo. She was so vibrant and full of life. She just couldn’t take any more. And the thing is, I can really understand why she did what she did. If MS affected me the way it affected her, I think I’d consider going to Switzerland.’

Darren looked at me, appalled.

‘How can you even begin to think that?’ he said. ‘You’re young, your MS may not progress fast – remember as a woman you have a better prognosis. Hell, they might find a cure.’

‘But they might not,’ I argued. ‘And what if I do go rapidly downhill? Have you really thought what it would be like feeding me through a tube, or changing my catheter for me? I couldn’t stand you having to do all that. I’d rather die.’

‘You don’t mean that,’ said Darren.

‘I do,’ I said. I was suddenly furious. How could he be so obtuse? Why didn’t he understand?

‘You must promise me that you won’t think of doing that,’ said Darren. ‘I will be there for you always, but I couldn’t help you to kill yourself. I just couldn’t.’

‘Darren.’ I sat up slowly and looked at him, feeling a sharp pain of regret in my stomach. If I didn’t have him with me on this, I didn’t know what I was going to do. ‘I’m so frightened of what the future holds for us both. I know you say it won’t happen, but I just don’t want to be a burden to you. I’ll promise you anything, but I can’t promise you that.’