Late October – One Month Later
Maria polished the counter for the twentieth time that morning. Her shop was immaculate, the display showing party dresses and accessories for the upcoming festive season, and fancy dresses for Halloween. On a large rack in the back she had hung some of her best bespoke gowns, to show what she could do on the wedding front. She assumed Annabel would already have a wedding dress, given that they’d had a wedding planned but had cancelled it, but she had to cover all her bases. She hadn’t wanted to quiz James too much; he had helped her enough. They had stayed in touch, and his texts had gone from concerned to cracking jokes. He was very funny, and she felt like she was going through his day with him. He was even going to come and look at the upstairs of the flat, to see whether anything could be done about creating a living space within her workspace. It was great living with Cassie, but it was two bedrooms, and with Tucker there it was pretty cramped. She couldn’t make it worse by filling it with baby crap, and she was going to have to start buying some soon. If only to get used to the idea herself.
Today was the day James had arranged for his sister and her fiancé to come in and discuss their wedding. They had a date in mind, and even James had sounded dubious when he told her over the phone.
‘It’s a little close to your due date, though, isn’t it? Are you sure you’ll be able to do it?’
Maria looked at the dates in her academic diary.
‘It will be close, true… but I can do it. I have to really, James. I haven’t had any other bookings yet, and I can’t really afford to pay for advertising either. I need to make enough to cover my being off. I plan to bring the baby to work anyway. I can work in the back making up the orders, and Lynn will do front of house, but I will have to pay her for the extra hours…’
‘Okay, okay,’ James said. ‘Just take it one thing at a time, eh? Don’t stress out over everything. Listen, I am here to help, honest.’
Maria had smiled down the phone. All he did was help her; it was nice, but she needed to do this on her own. She couldn’t start relying on a man now, trusting him to be there, to be a part of her life for ever. Even as a friend. She had Lynn and Cassie, as always. That would be enough. She could rely on them, always. Besides, this baby didn’t deserve to lose any more people. She hadn’t had the guts to call the father, and eventually she had got the number from Cassie and flushed it down the toilet one night in a fit of tears and low-fat ice cream. What was she going to say? What did she expect him to do? She could only see problems, and as much as she hated herself for perhaps depriving him of something he might really have wanted to know about, she just couldn’t take the chance. Growing up, she had seen too many families living in two parts. How many children lived with parents part-time? It was unavoidable. Relationships broke down, people fell out of love, new families were formed. She accepted that. The children were still loved, doubly so in fact. She just knew that handing over her child to a stranger for half the week, a stranger who would one day have a family of his own, complete with wife and kids, filled her with dread. She had been just fine after her dad passed, just her mother and her, and Cassie and Lynn. Who was to say this child would need any more? Besides, she hadn’t been the only sad person that night. Not the only one needing comfort. Who knew what he was going through? If it was a fraction of what she was having to cope with, she couldn’t subject him or the baby to any more.
All she knew was, her whole world had shifted in an incredibly short space of time. Without Happy Ever After, she would have felt utterly lost. So that was what she would cling to, making sure her business, and her mother’s legacy, lasted, so she could provide for the tiny scrap of life growing inside her. The rest would just keep her up nights. She hadn’t mentioned to Cassie about moving upstairs yet. She wasn’t sure whether it would take too much money, or whether it would be big enough, but long-term she would need a place of her own. It would be ideal to live above the shop, since she owned it anyway. Then she could live pretty cheaply. If the business was still there of course.
She frowned, taking out her antibacterial spray and spritzing the till. Lynn had taken the day off, unpaid, and had agreed to drop her hours till the baby came. It was beneficial for them both really; Lynn liked to be indoors more in the winter, so the thought of fewer days trudging to work in the cold had appealed to her. She only worked there for the company, Maria knew, and extra ‘fun’ money as she called it. She would squirrel it away half the time. Last year she had booked an extravagant cruise with some of her friends, and had loved every minute. She said knowing she’d earned every penny of the trip made her feel accomplished, less retired and more alive. Westfield was definitely the place for that. If there were some places known as God’s waiting room, this village was the opposite. The retirees around here had more adventures and went on more capers than the younger generations. Her mother had been just the same and would have been right there with them if she had lived longer.
For a sleepy village, there was never a dull moment what with one thing and another. It was only last month that Agatha, Dotty, Grace and Marlene from the craft and natter group at New Lease of Life had done a sponsored skydive to raise more funds for a swimming pool extension at the community centre. They were halfway to their target already, and the whole thing was going to be run by the villagers, independent of the council. How many villages had a silver brigade element like theirs? Not many. It was no wonder that not many people left. It wouldn’t surprise her if the swimming pool turned into a scene from Cocoon.
She ran the cloth over the buttons on the till, running her nail between the keys to make sure she picked up every imaginary speck of dust.
She’d really gone to town cleaning up, but she still felt uneasy. Rattled. She hated feeling like everything was riding on this wedding, but it really was. This was her baby nest egg, the thing that would help her get set up, turned around, and keep things ticking over at the shop. She wasn’t planning on having a lot of time off, but she didn’t intend to struggle either.
The shop door opened and Maria took just a split second to get her game face on before she threw the cloth down on the floor behind the till and turned to face her visitors.
‘Hi!’ she trilled. ‘Welcome to Happy Ever After!’
When she turned around and looked at the dark-haired woman standing before her it was like looking at a female version of James, which she supposed she was. She had his eyes, and Maria found herself genuinely smiling at the woman who was looking back at her nervously.
‘Hi,’ she replied. ‘Maria, right? Wow, you’re just how James described you! I’m so glad you could fit us in today.’ She didn’t look at her stomach, so obviously James had kept her secret. Bless him.
Maria motioned for her to take a seat on the couch she had at one side of the shop, all set up for their meeting with her folders of weddings and events she had done over the years.
‘Is your fiancé coming? Sorry, James didn’t mention his name…’
The door opened and Maria turned to it, her face freezing in pure horror as Tequila Man walked through it, dressed in a neat pinstripe suit and looking a lot less dishevelled than the last time she’d seen him. And with far more clothes on.
Maria stood up, the folder on her lap clattering to the floor.
‘I’ll just be a minute!’ she squeaked, as she dashed over to the man. What the hell was he doing here? Had she told him where she worked?
‘Oh, it’s okay,’ Annabel said cheerfully. ‘This is Mark. My fiancé!’
Mark stood there, looking between the women so rapidly Maria thought his head might fall off.
This can’t be happening, she thought to herself, subconsciously putting one hand on her stomach. How is this my life now?
‘Hi!’ she said, somehow making her legs walk over to him the rest of the way, arm outstretched to shake his hand. ‘I’m Maria Mallory, owner of Happy Ever After!’ Mark’s eyes widened even further and she pulled a ‘go with me’ face at him.
‘Say hello, Mark!’ Annabel said, laughing. ‘I’m sorry, Maria, he’s a little socially awkward at times, I swear.’
‘Er, um… Mark Smith, pleased to meet you.’ He put his hand out, recovering a little. She didn’t take it.
‘Shall we sit down?’ she asked, eager to get this thing over and done with as soon as possible. Her dreams of getting money for her baby were gone now. She couldn’t do this wedding, obviously. Or maybe they already knew? Was this something they’d planned? To confront her? Did James know? She took a seat on the sofa opposite Annabel and busied herself with picking up her folder off the floor, straightening up the contents.
‘Come on, darling, sit down!’ Annabel said snappishly, and Maria flinched. Her hands were shaking so much she was making the folder jiggle on the table. Well, this was it.
She straightened up her clothing, a pretty black-and-white, polka-dot, longline skirt and a cream silk blouse. She smoothed the skirt down over her knees and then looked up at the pair.
They were both looking at her, with very different expressions on their faces.
Mark looked like he was planning his own funeral, and Annabel looked… joyous. Maria couldn’t look away from her face. It was one she had seen many, many times in this shop, on that couch. It was the look of a bride, a happy woman in love. Hell, it wasn’t so long ago that she had sported that very look herself. Annabel Chance was here to plan her wedding. She had no idea. Maria felt ill. She wanted the very earth to split open, right in Westfield, right in the middle of her shop, and suck her and her unborn child into the very core of the earth.
‘So…?’ Annabel started, looking at Mark in bemusement. ‘Sorry, I don’t know what’s got into him. We were thinking spring, next year? I know James told you some dates. We were thinking a country estate somewhere, maybe something a little different? Both of us have been to enough big weddings lately to be bored by the whole cookie-cutter church-wedding scene, so I thought we could maybe think of something else?’
Maria nodded, trying to turn off the screaming voice in her head that was telling her to run for the hills. She picked her notepad and pen up off the tabletop to take notes, and avoided looking at Mark. She could feel him staring at her, and she didn’t trust herself not to do or say something stupid the moment she looked at his face. She just knew the guilt and shock she felt would be mirrored in his own features.
Business, Maria. Business. Just get through the meeting, then you can fob them off later. He will no doubt want another wedding planner to plan his upcoming nuptials. Just this one awkward moment, then you never have to see or think about them again.
‘Okay,’ she said, nodding away. ‘And in terms of colours, themes?’ She had to go through the motions. Maybe if she took some details she could pass them on to the next wedding planner, at least help a little, so as not to let James down. James. The thought of her new friend being caught up in this made her feel sick. She would lose him now. There was no other option. The twist in her gut hit her far harder than she thought it would. Optimus Prime-truck hard.
‘I’m going to be honest with you, Maria,’ Annabel said in a small voice. ‘We did have a wedding planned. I don’t know how much my brother told you…’
Maria finally looked at them both, and they were looking at each other. Or rather, Annabel was looking lovingly at Mark, and he looked like he was considering leaping over her to dash to the exit.
She took his hand in hers, and he seemed to sag into her touch. His eyes crinkled at the corners as his whole face smiled at her. He loves her, Maria thought. That’s good. Right? He wasn’t a mess, he was just a man hurting that night. Just like she was.
She levelled her gaze back to Maria, James’s open, honest eyes in her head.
‘We broke up, so we cancelled our wedding. We’d been fighting a lot, and had let things get on top of us, I guess. We spent some time apart, and then we realised that we really wanted each other. We love each other, and we want our wedding. Just not the one we’d already planned. So when James told us you had a space, we knew we had to see you.’
Maria felt like she was going to burst into tears, but she held it in as best she could. Bloody hormones weren’t easy, on top of her horror and guilt. She had messed with this woman’s life, and the poor girl didn’t even realise it.
‘Okay, well, I have some ideas for venues, locally.’ She handed over her business card to Annabel. ‘You two have a think about colours and themes and tell me what you had planned – then I can avoid it. Email everything to me, and I’ll check my diary and get back to you, okay?’ She stood then, holding her shaky hand out to Annabel as a way of dismissal. Annabel’s smile dulled, but she, being all polite and lovely, stood too, dragging Mark up with her by the arm.
‘Thank you so much,’ she said, shaking Maria’s hand enthusiastically. Maria stepped out, making moves to show them out, but Annabel didn’t move.
‘So, you’ll take us on?’
Maria kept walking to the door. Nearly there. ‘Well, email me, and I’ll see if I can fit it in. I am very busy around that time, so I’ll have to think about it.’
She turned, opening the door, and giving them both her best ‘meeting is over’ smile.
Mark gave Annabel a little nudge to get her moving and, linking arms with her, half-marched her to the door. Seemingly, he and Maria had the same idea. Go figure.
‘Annabel, darling, we’ll send the email, okay? Then we’ll know if it’s possible.’
Annabel looked like she wanted to object, but Maria jumped in.
‘I’ll be in touch. It was lovely to meet you both.’
Mark mumbled a goodbye and practically threw Annabel out of the door. Maria closed the door behind them both, smiling like an idiot through the window until they got into a white car and pulled away. With a slight screech of tyres.
Maria went and sat back on the couch, looking at the folder of smiling couples in front of her.
‘Well, Mum,’ she said to the room. ‘That decides it. The father definitely does not need to know.’
She reluctantly stood up and went to get her phone. She had to call Cassie, tell her what had happened. And get back to work. Every penny counted even more now.
***
Annabel Chance was a woman who was used to getting just what she wanted. Not because she was ruthless, or evil, or selfish. Because she was good. Snow White epic proportions of goodness, sweet temperament and light. She put good things out into the world, believing the universe would pass them on, spread them around, and give a little piece back to her. She was the type of person who recycled, picked up her dog’s poop on walks and put it in a wastebin, never littered. She always had change for homeless people, volunteered when she was in college, and now worked as a nurse at Harrogate Hospital. She believed in the good in life, and now she was on the verge of having her dream wedding once more, but yet again it was feeling out of reach, at risk.
‘She doesn’t think we fit together as a couple,’ she said, looking across the car at Mark as he drove them back to Harrogate. He had abandoned his tie as soon as they got into the car, and was now trying to undo his top button.
‘Is it hot in here?’ he gasped, speeding just a little too fast through the village.
‘Mark, slow down! The office can wait, surely!’ She flicked on the air con and buzzed her window down slightly. ‘We can’t do the wedding on our own, not again. We broke up last time. We need a wedding planner! I’ve been looking into her, and she’s amazing. I really want her. I’m willing to wait even, for her to have a space.’
Mark shook his head. ‘I don’t want to wait, Annabel. We can get another wedding planner. I’ll have a look on the net this afternoon.’
Annabel was already shaking her head. ‘James said she had space, and…’ She bit her lip, a sure sign that she felt bad. ‘I can’t tell you, because it’s not my business, but she’s had a bit of a bad time lately, and I think James really wants to help her too.’
Mark said nothing, wiping his forehead with the back of his hand and staring straight ahead.
‘I don’t mean to be pushy, but I really do think it would be great. Please, Mark, can we try? It was awful when we split up. I never want to go through that again. Please?’
Mark groaned. ‘Let’s just send the email, okay? We’ll see what happens then.’
Annabel clapped her hands together. ‘Thanks, darling! Oh, it’ll be great, I promise!’
Mark smiled. At least, he tried for a smile, but it was more like a gurn.
‘I know, darling, it will be. Let’s just see what happens.’
Annabel sighed contentedly, sitting back in her seat and resting her petite manicured hand on his lap.
Annabel, always so nice. She just knew it was all going to work out, because she had dreamt about it for years, wished for it. Yearned. This was how she was going to be married, and she wasn’t going to give up without a fight.