Page 25

24 MEG

One Week Until the Wedding

Then, before anybody was acclimatized, or perhaps ready, it was Sunday night, and just one week to go until the big day itself. David and Mark were sitting at Meg and Hannah’s kitchen table, and she and Hannah were holding hands, after they’d all finished as much of the three huge pizzas they’d ordered as they could. It was warm inside, the body heat of the four of them making Meg sweat a little under her jumper; the heat of June had finally arrived, but coming with it rain and clouds, the heavy muggy kind of summer you didn’t want.

David and Meg were talking about all the people they’d met so far on the adventure of planning the wedding and joking about whether they might have missed anybody from the invite list. Hannah, drinking wine from a mug, because they had to remember to buy glasses sometime soon, was talking to Mark about their upbringings. The two were praising their families, but Meg could hear there was an edge to the conversation where they spoke about what it was like to have supportive parents in a relationship with somebody without that same support. Just as she was listening in, David asked her about her parents.

‘I just wondered if you’d heard from them yet?’ he asked. ‘Sorry to—’

‘No, nothing.’ Meg shrugged her shoulders, topping up their glasses with the last of the wine. ‘I asked about Thursday and they didn’t say anything so we’ll have to just wait and see.’

‘And whatever happens ,’ Hannah said, leaning over, ‘it’s going to be okay, and the day’s going to be amazing.’

‘The day’s going to be great,’ Mark agreed.

‘You’ve become a bit of a celebrity in the shop you know,’ David said. ‘Everyone asks after you.’

‘No they don’t,’ Meg said.

‘They do!’

‘Don’t stress her out, David,’ Mark said.

‘Have we run out of alcohol?’ Hannah asked, standing at the fridge looking at what they had left. Initially, Meg and Hannah had invited the pair round for a mini hen do, without calling it that. Music had played softly in the background when the evening began, but Meg had turned it up a couple of times and now they were definitely having to speak louder to be heard above the noise.

‘Unless I pop out and get more,’ Mark said.

‘Unless,’ Meg said, looking at Hannah. ‘We went out to celebrate?’

‘Well, I have a day off tomorrow,’ David said. ‘And the shop’s closed …’

‘Interesting …’ Hannah slowly closed the fridge, and it became apparent from everybody smiling very quickly that they were all game. ‘Shoes on?’

Before they knew it, or could believe it, they were out the door.

Pink Punters was the nearest, and only, gay bar, and they managed to quickly get inside despite a short queue. They were quite early, it turned out, because the place was mostly empty when they arrived, though after half an hour, it seemed like big groups were flooding in after them. Nobody was able to believe they had all, as a group, made it onto a night out, and everybody kept individually saying how surprised they were, how long it had been, and had they all forgotten how to do this?

‘Meg, did you come here when you were young?’ Hannah said.

‘No, no, we were all scared of this place.’ At that point the DJ started playing Madonna, and her vocals rang through the speakers. ‘I’m not sure why.’

It was an odd place, a large white building with original beams everywhere, as if it used to be a large hotel, but now was fitted inside with metal and plastic and a number of different rooms that would make it able to hold the masses of queer people who were there nearly every night of the week, and all that came with crowds being out until the early hours. There was a big half-in, half-out terrace that had large firepits behind metal grates to provide warmth, and groups were standing around them chatting and drinking. The four of them headed inside to dance.

They moved self-consciously at first, until the first drink was finished and Hannah returned from the bar with her round. Then, there was a not unpleasant blur to proceedings that made Meg barely notice the fact there were other people in the room. As if in a mirage, she noticed Gus in a group on the other side of the floor, and she shouted his name. She was sure it was him, though she doubted herself as she got closer. His hair seemed shorter, and it wasn’t until she had manoeuvred in front of him that she could confirm it was him.

‘Meg!’ he screamed and hugged her, and waved to the others. ‘This is my first girlfriend!’ he shouted, to laughs from the group. ‘And last!’

‘Gus! Your hair!’

‘Do you like it?’

‘A new look!’ Meg said. ‘It’s amazing.’

‘Oh my God – one week to go!’

‘Less than!’

‘What are you doing in a club?’

‘Having a spontaneous hen do,’ Meg shouted. ‘I’m so glad you’re here!’

‘We’d better get the hen a drink!’

He grabbed her by the hands and marched her out of the room and back outside towards the chilly bar. Drinks in hand, Meg blurted out everything that had happened since she’d last texted Gus: the message to her parents left ignored and her mum going into Savage Lilies. Gus could barely believe it.

‘What did David do?’ Gus asked.

‘He tried to defend me and work out why she was there, but I think she just … I don’t know, wanted to pretend she was involved in her daughter’s wedding. Which I gave her every chance to do! It just makes me feel so low.’

‘I know,’ Gus said. ‘I know you were really close growing up.’

‘I was an only child! I tried to pretend nothing changed when I came out but … I guess I’m realizing it hasn’t been the same in so long. I can’t remember the last time we had a proper conversation.’

They spoke more, quickly and excitedly, and Gus tried to lift her spirits, asking about her dress and all the details he didn’t know about the wedding. She asked him about texting Ramon, and Gus admitted he liked him, and that though they hadn’t had a chance to meet up, they were looking forward to seeing each other at the wedding. Gus made her promise she wouldn’t tell him any of what he’d said, and so like when they were teenagers again, she pinkie-promised. Soon, she felt good again, and excited about this new chapter.

‘We need to let the past go,’ Gus said, shouting, as they headed back to the dance floor. ‘There’s nowhere better to do it than a gay club!’

The evening was passing in a series of tiny fragments as they drank more: dancing here with them, dancing there with them, toilet, bar, outside, and back again. Meg didn’t really go out in this way anymore. Even two glasses of wine was a rarity, yet she felt like after the months she’d had, nobody would begrudge her the type of night she and Hannah had had when they were younger. All they were missing was Hannah’s old digital camera, and the pretence that they were ‘just good friends’.

Back inside, David had amassed a crowd around him. Of course he had. It seemed to be a mix of people he knew already, some of whom were familiar from David greeting them in the shop, and then genuine strangers he had managed to charm. Together as a group, they went back out to one of the fire pits and Meg ended up talking to Mary, a trans friend of David’s, who spoke about her experience in the local area and her transition when she had first moved. She had beautiful blonde hair and was wearing a shiny mesh top with short-length dungarees in a way that shouldn’t work, and yet did. Her hair was in pigtails.

When Meg shared her journey with her parents, Mary grabbed her hand and said, ‘Things might just take a while … but everything works out.’

‘ If it’s not okay, it’s not the end, is that what you were going to say?’ Meg said.

‘No, that’s rubbish,’ she replied, batting the words away with her hand. ‘That’s stupid, Meg, whoever told you that. Sometimes it is the end, of course. Only if you want it to be. We’re all in charge of our own lives.’

Before Meg could get a chance to thank the woman for her wisdom, Mark gathered them together with a new round of drinks, and they raised a toast to the wedding. When Meg turned around again, Mary had quietly disappeared, back to the friends she had come with, and part of Meg felt like maybe she had made enough friends, maybe she didn’t have room for more. Another, drunker, part of her wondered whether she’d just met a fairy godmother.

‘To old relationships,’ David said.

‘To new friendships,’ Hannah added.

‘And new beginnings,’ Meg added, and they all cheered, whilst Hannah came round to give her a hug.

‘My hen,’ she whispered in Meg’s ear, her hot breath warming against the chill of the night.

‘My wife,’ Meg whispered back.