Page 66 of A Wedding in Tuscany

‘What?’ she drawls, eyes still closed.

‘I need to ask you something.’

She turns her head in my direction and opens her eyes. ‘Sure.’

‘Did I do the wrong thing this morning?’

‘With the loft? For the wedding? No, I think it’s perf?’

‘No, not the loft. I love it. The loft is wonderful.’ She smiles. ‘I meant with the gift?with Grandma’s pearls,’ I say. Immediately after the words leave my mouth, a dark cloud scuttles across her face?just for a second but there’s my answer.

‘Oh, no, no, no, no. Nothing like that. No, they’re lovely.’ Methinks the lady doth protest way too fucking much.

‘Well, you didn’t seem particularly happy with them.’

‘I said thank you.’

‘Yes, but … I put a lot of thought into your gift and it was like the pearls upset you or something.’ As I’ve been talking, her expression has soured and something occurs to me, something that makes me feel like a right arsehole. ‘Oh, Sez, I’m so sorry. Is it because you miss Grandma?’

She looks down at her hands where she’s interlocking and unlocking her fingers in turn?her tell. I’ve struck a nerve. Bugger, I am an arsehole.

‘No, it’s not … I mean, I do. I miss her and I know you must too, especially her not being here for your wedding, but …’ She’s blinking back tears and I reach for one of her twitchy hands.

‘Tell me.’

‘Oh, Cat, I’m so sorry. They’re such a beautiful present?so beautiful?and thoughtful, just as you said, so thoughtful. It’s … well …’ She closes her eyes again and takes a series of deep breaths, probably a good idea as she seems on the verge of a panic attack. I glance over at Mum and the others but they don’t seem to have noticed. I run a thumb along the back of Sarah’s hand in a soothing motion.

After a few steadying breaths, she opens her eyes and turns towards me again. ‘You’re gonna think I’m an idiot.’

‘I won’t because you’re not an idiot. Just tell me.’

‘Pearls are for …’

She mumbles the second part of the sentence, so I don’t catch it. ‘Sorry?’

She sighs. ‘Pearls are for old ladies, Cat. And everyone keeps telling me that forty isn’t old …’

Oh! The penny finally drops, then bounces on the floor and rolls into a corner where it spins and comes to a rest. My sister is an idiot. Of course, I don’t say that.

‘And I gave you something that’s supposedly for old ladies.’

‘Yeah, that’s pretty much it.’

‘Sez, they’re pearls, not a crocheted toilet roll cover! Audrey Hepburn wore strands and strands of them in Breakfast at Tiffany’s and she was only in her thirties?and she was totally gorgeous in that film. Actually, any film really?absolute stunner. And Marilyn Monroe wore pearls, Coco Chanel, Elizabeth Taylor …’

She’s nodding her way through my impromptu speech on the sexiness of pearls and I sense I’m close to convincing her when her mouth quirks and she asks, ‘Is there anyone alive who wears them?’

‘Yes!’ I say, ‘Rhianna, Lupita Nyong’o, Michelle Obama. Oh, I know! Sarah Jessica Fucking Parker.’

‘I love her!’ Sarah says right as Mum chides, ‘Catherine! Language,’ from across the room. Of course she heard that.

‘Sorry, Mum.’ I start sniggering and glance sideways at Sarah who’s looking back at me, chin down and also laughing.

‘You seem to know a lot about celebrities who wear pearls,’ she says when our laughter dies.

‘As I said, I put a lot of thought into the gift. To be honest, I considered the “old lady” thing myself?’

‘Oh, really?’