Celebrity Bride

by Alison Kervin

  We tip the contents of my drawers onto the bed and look at one another in dismay.

  'You're going to have to throw some of this crap away,' says Sophie. 'Honestly, mate, it needs to go.'

  'No, take it. If he loves you, he'll love your stuff,' says Mandy. She's the exact opposite to Sophie; she's the glass spilling over type. Mandy's desperately optimistic about everything and Sophie's the living, breathing embodiment of pessimism. For example . . . Sophie hates her body and says that I don't know how lucky I am to have an hourglass figure. She hates her face and says that I don't know how lucky I am to have my looks. She hates her short, fine hair and says I'm so lucky to have my long, thick hair . . . and on, and on . . . . Mandy just says that everyone's beautiful in their own way and that it's not good to be jealous. We should all just be grateful for what we have and what we've been given. Christ but that woman's a martyr. Give her a few years and she'll be marching around the place with a sandwich board about her neck, singing the praises of the Lord. When it comes to Rufus, Mandy's just thrilled for me and thinks good things happen to good people. If that's true then Mandy will end up married to God.

  'You know, I always knew you'd end up marrying someone rich and famous,' says Sophie. The edge to her voice has subsided a little, but it still rings with concern.

  'I'm not marrying him,' I say defensively.

  'No, but you will,' she says. 'I remember when you went on that first date you said, "It won't amount to anything; I'm only teaching him how to catch Maltesers in his mouth." Now look at you!'

  I remember that first date as if it happened yesterday. It was 29 April. I mention the precise date because, for some reason, the 29th has become an important number in our courtship; it's the day of the month when things of significance seem to happen to us. Back then, in April, I'd never been more nervous in my life. I went out and bought a lovely new outfit from New Look in an emerald-green colour. It nipped in at the waist and made my breasts look massive and my legs look long and shapely. I wanted him to think me elegant and demure so I vowed not to drink and certainly not to go back to his. As far as I was concerned, we'd just be playing Malteser throwing . . . except I guess I knew that there was more to it than that. Sophie and Mandy both told me not to do my bikini line and certainly not to shave my legs then I'd not sleep with him. It's a good policy and, to be honest, it's served me well several times in the past. However drunk you get, it's funny how you don't sleep with a man if you know your legs aren't shaven. Something inside you kicks in and stops you going too far, no matter how much white wine and lemonade you've hurled down your throat. Well, that had always been my experience . . . until Rufus. Perhaps that was when I knew he was 'the one'; because I couldn't resist his manly charms even though my legs looked like they belonged to a small mountain gorilla.

  I was mortified in the morning of course. I woke up bathed in light, as the spring sun flickered through the slats in the blinds and cast dancing shadows across us as we slept. He's got thick cream curtains that he draws across in the winter but, when I first met him, it was just thin slats of expensive wood between us and the morning sunshine.

  I got up and tried to sneak away but it was hopeless. The house is too big to go rushing off anywhere. I tiptoed into the long corridor outside Rufus's massive master bedroom and had no idea how to get out. Eventually I headed off towards the enormous sweeping staircase, taking stealthy little steps, hoping I wouldn't be heard. But then, suddenly, I saw this girl standing in front of me who looked exactly like me.

  'Ahhh . . .' I screamed, running down the stairs, taking them three at a time. As I did so, all the alarms burst into life. I mean all of them; you'd think a prisoner had just escaped from Broadmoor with the noise they made. I stopped dead in my tracks in case there were snipers hidden somewhere and turned to face the girl at the top of the stairs but she was gone.

  Rufus jumped out of bed and came running after me. 'Where are you going?' he asked, running his hands absently through his hair and leaving it all mussed up and looking incredibly super-sexy.

  'I thought I'd head off home. I have to get to work.'

  I glanced up to the top of the stairs and that's when I noticed the enormous, antique floor-to-ceiling mirror. Great, so I screamed and ran down the stairs when I saw my reflection. Marvellous!

  Rufus persuaded me to come back to bed for a while (to be honest, he didn't have to beg too much), then he insisted on organising for Henry, his driver, close friend and general good guy, to take me home. I was sneaked out through the staff doors that run off one of the kitchens (I know, I know, two kitchens: what's all that about?). A girl called Julie, who works in the kitchen, and must be about the same age as me, smiled at me and told me not to worry, the press couldn't get to the back of the house. I smiled back, feeling incredibly grateful for the fleeting moment of warmth and friendship in this big, beautiful, strange house.

  I was hidden between two huge bouncers and chauffeured off in a massive black car. Relief flooded through me as the car moved out of Richmond, across the bridge and towards Twickenham. I'm just not the sort of girl to have a one-night stand and the idea of being caught doing so by the world's press filled me with horror. In the end, of course, it turned out not to be a one-night stand, but the beginning of a glorious relationship. If only I'd known that at the time!

  To my unending amazement, Rufus waited fewer than twenty-four hours to contact me. He rang early the next morning and said that he'd like to see me again . . . very soon.

  The thing is, and this is why the story is odd, Rufus really liked the fact that I was natural and down to earth. I was fighting to be as sophisticated and demure as possible, but he liked the real me. I tried to diet like mad to get down to a size zero but the reality was that he couldn't get enough of my body – saying that he adored my curves and was obsessed with the softness of my breasts (he hadn't touched real ones for twenty years). He loved the fact that I didn't take hours to get ready, and he thought that it was fabulous that I wasn't a diva. It seemed to be that the more I was 'myself ' around him, the happier he was. Being myself comes easy to me, of course, so we both ended up being very happy.

  'You're going to live with Rufus George. He's the hottest film star on the planet,' says Mandy all of a sudden, more to herself than to either of us. Perhaps she needs to keep saying it out loud to herself in order to believe it's true. I know how she feels. I've pinched myself so much over the last six months that I'm quite sore. I'm going to be living on Richmond Hill. Me! On The Hill . . . the one that's full of – this is the important bit – huge celebrities. It's beyond mad.

  'Can I tell people about it now you're moving in together?' Mandy has been beseeching me about this for the past month.

  'No!'

  I forced the two of them to take a vow of silence on the subject of my relationship with Ruf because I wanted to get to know the man without it being all over the bloody newspapers. I went to extraordinary lengths to hide the fact that I was dating the most eligible man on the planet: crawling under garden hedges, buying a false wig, pretending to be from a cleaning company and turning up there in a little pink uniform clutching a mop and a basket of cleaning utensils in order to get past the paparazzi at his gated mansion (he liked that one, actually, and we did have quite a bit of fun with the sponge and the feather duster). The last thing I need right now is for Mum, Dad and Great-Aunty Maude, who thinks the war's still going on, to be interviewed by a bloke in a suit from the tabloids. 'I'm really keen for people not to find out yet, Mand,' I say. 'Please don't tell anyone.'

  The three of us are staring at the huge jumble sale that used to be my bedroom; I know we're all thinking the same thing.

  'Your stuff is never going to be packed up in time,' says Sophie, eventually. 'And how will you get it over to Rufus's place?'

  'I'll throw it all in a cab,' I say, but the reality is that I have an entire £30 to my name and we've just agreed to go out tonight. I must remember to put a couple of quid aside for bus fa
re to Richmond. One of the funny things about dating someone so incredibly rich is that he doesn't think about money. Rufus looks after me astonishingly well but he wouldn't realise that for me to find £10 for a taxi to Richmond is quite a big deal. He buys me fabulous coats worth hundreds of pounds and I end up wearing them in our flat because it's freezing cold and we can't afford to put the heating on. I'm definitely going to be arriving in my glamorous new world with a bus ticket in my pocket which is odd, really, considering he has a driver, four cars and a hundred million dollars in his bank account.

  Money's been the hardest thing to handle since I started seeing Rufus. I felt I had to save every penny to make sure I had enough to get my nails done, my hair blow-dried properly and clothes which looked vaguely OK. Rufus has bought me loads of beautiful clothes and jewellery, but they're terribly impractical – which is great. I love the designer (fake) fur stoles and diamond earrings, but a jumper would be nice. He insists on paying for everything when we're out, thank God, or I'd have been bankrupt. It was the make-up, clothing and hairdressing costs in advance of the dates that were crippling for me. I knew it simply wouldn't do to turn up with badly chewed fingernails, so I had nail extensions. Do you know how much it costs to maintain those things? I could have had two girls' nights out and a takeaway curry for the cost of pointy nails. Every time I was with Rufus I'd flash them at him to make sure he was aware of them, so I hadn't wasted my money. I'd tap them on the table seductively, increasing the racket I was making in response to his lack of interest in them.

  'Are you bored?' he asked me once when I was bashing along with quite some vigour.

  'No,' I replied quickly, and I stopped the nail drumming right there and then.

  The girls have sat down on the bed. They've tipped the contents of the drawers onto the floor. There's stuff everywhere and I haven't even told them how much is nestling under the bed.

  'It might be a silly thing to have done, seeing how much crap you've got, but we've bought you a present,' says Sophie, her brown eyes looking suddenly very sad. 'It's for you to wear at fancy parties.'

  She leaves the room and reappears clutching a white carrier bag. Primark! Oh my God!

  'Ahhhhhh . . . I love you, I love you,' I declare as I pull out the fabulous fitted grey dress that I've been lusting after for simply ages. It's gorgeous, perfect, ideal . . . Thank you so much,' I say, really meaning it. I've been in love with this dress for weeks. Every time we walked past the Primark window, we'd stop and I'd peer in longingly. Rufus has bought me so many things since we've been seeing each other – expensive perfume, jewellery and this gorgeous velvet coat that is unbelievable. He's taught me about designer labels and introduced me to the sort of restaurants I'd only ever read about before, but there's nothing quite as lovely as having spotted something in a shop, lusted after it, and had it bought for you by your best mates. Especially when you know how difficult it would have been for them to afford it.

  'Thanks,' I say, hugging them closely. That's when the tears start falling – tumbling from my eyes as we hug each other tightly in this room littered with clothes, shoes, jewellery and a lifetime's 'stuff '.

  'I'll miss you two,' I say between giant sobs. 'You have no idea how much I'll miss you both.'

  Chapter 3

  HOLLYWOOD STAR SETTLES DOWN

  WITH HIS BRITISH STUNNER. EXCLUSIVE

  By Katie Joseph

  Daily Post Showbiz Correspondent

  Handsome film star Rufus George, the world's most eligible bachelor, is in love. I can exclusively reveal that the heart-throb star of The Jewelled Dagger and Love in the Summer is dating Kelly Monsoon a 28-year-old theatre assistant from Twickenham. Last week the pretty brunette moved into George's £5 million house on Richmond Hill and friends of the actor say he's in love for the first time. She has given up her job and the two are practically inseparable.

  It's a real Cinderella story for curvaceous Kelly who met George when he starred in Only Men at Richmond Fringe Theatre. The couple continued to date when George moved with the production to the West End.

  They have fought hard to keep their love a secret. Even Kelly's family knew nothing of the relationship when approached by the Daily Post yesterday, at their family home in Hastings.

  Maude Monsoon, Kelly's great-aunt, reacted with alarm at the news that her attractive great niece was living with a Hollywood star. 'She's gone to fight in the war,' she said, with a wave of her ration book when we approached her at her nursing home in central London. Shortly afterwards she was restrained behind the net curtains by a kindly care assistant.

  There is no question that the world which Kelly now inhabits – among the richest and most glamorous people in the country – is a far cry from the one into which she was born.

  Do you know Kelly Monsoon? If you do, call the Showbiz desk now on 020 7765 0064, or email showbiz@daily-post.com.

  Noooooo . . . I'm lying on the world's largest bed, under a duvet as soft as bunny rabbits' tails, thinking that nothing in the world can ever go wrong for me again, when Rufus drops the Daily Post onto the end of the bed and I'm greeted by the news that I am, in fact, the news. I've been here a week and I've been rumbled already. Where's all this come from? And what's all the 'Kelly has given up her job' crap? Just because I take a week off, they think I've left.

  'There are photographers all around the house,' says Rufus. 'I was in the kitchen just now and could see them on the CCTV cameras.'

  Shit, shit, shit, fuck, shit. Was it Sophie who spoke to the journalists? I don't understand. It can't have been. Me, Mand and Sophie stood there in Suga Daddys a week ago, on that last night together, drinking, and our shoes sticking to the alcohol-drenched carpet, while we batted away the manly advances of nine hairy builders stinking of beer and fags. I told the men we were lesbians, then Mand, Soph and I swore that we'd look after each other for ever.

  We joked when Mandy took a picture of me and you could see the topless dancers in the background. 'We'll be able to sell that once people find out that you're going out with Rufus George,' whispered Sophie.

  'Oh no,' I cried in mock horror as we hugged each other tightly, much to the delight of the leering builders. The girls swore on their lives that they'd never talk to the press under any circumstances. I promised that I'd never lose touch with them. 'I'll be there for Mand's birthday party on the twelfth. No question.'

  'And lunch on the Saturday,' said Mandy. 'Don't forget that.'

  'Of course I won't,' I said. 'I'm looking forward to it already.'

  It had been such a brilliant evening; me in my beautiful new grey dress, looking a million dollars and attracting loads of attention – all of which was unwanted, of course; since I met Rufus I've been a one-man woman. I wouldn't even let Jimmy buy me a Malibu and pineapple. (That was nothing to with being a one-man woman, though, that was because Malibu and pineapple is truly the worst drink ever created and Jimmy always serves it in a long glass with glacé cherries, tinsel, cocktail sticks and about three umbrellas. He thinks he's working in the bar in Only Fools and Horses.)

  'We're the Three Musketeers,' Sophie had said, raising her glass rather suddenly and dramatically, causing her to splash us all with Purple Nasty. (Yes – Purple Nasty – you heard me correctly – that's snakebite with blackcurrant in it. She's started drinking it since hearing that Charlotte Church and Girls Aloud knock it back at celebrity parties.) 'We will never be parted.'

  'Never,' said Mandy.

  'Never,' I agreed.

  Then we did that thing where you entwine your arms and drink through the arms of the person next to you and we all ended up covered in more Purple Nasty. It was a great night though, and I guess what I'm saying is, I can't imagine either of them letting me down after they promised that they wouldn't.

  'Sorry,' I say to Rufus, despite my conviction that the article is nothing to do with my mates. I feel the need to apologise because the quotes in the piece relate exclusively to me. I hope Mum's OK. And Great-Aunt Maude. She'll w
et herself if she sees the article. No, she will, really. She wets herself a lot.

  Mum's a complete star with Maude; she really looks after her. She's the only one in the family who does. She's always going to visit her even though Maude's own children don't have anything to do with her. I don't know how Mum does it. Especially coping with all the nonsense about the war. You walk out of the sitting room to go and make tea and Maude bursts into tears, thinking you're off to fight them on the beaches or something. 'I'm only going to the kitchen; I'll be back in a minute,' I say, but Maude's never convinced.

  'They all say that but most of them never come back,' she mumbles, sobbing into a lace hankie.

  'The press in this country are a nightmare, but we'll survive, sweetheart,' says Rufus, seeing the worried look on my face as I stare down at the article. He smiles at me endearingly and heads off to find David and request more coffee. Rufus has one of those posh coffee-makers in the drawing room that I love; it radiates a smell like a Parisian café. You press the button on the side and suddenly it's so French you can almost hear the sound of accordions and feel the presence of the Eiffel Tower. The whole place pulsates with the aroma of roasted coffee beans. It's a bit different from the old flat where the mink-lined kettle chugged into action very reluctantly, making more noise than a small factory as it nudged its way to boiling point. When you poured the water out it was full of limescale – like out-of-date almond flakes scattered throughout the water, filling your mouth and lodging themselves in your throat and under your tongue.