Somewhere Close to Happy: The heart-warming, laugh-out-loud debut of the year

by Lia Louis

  I don’t trust Dad. I don’t trust Roman – something I realise I have continued to do, even after he disappeared. I don’t trust the memories, stories, reasons, explanations, moments … I don’t trust anything.

  And I am so tired.

  This PC/D: Lizzie Laptop/Roman/

  Roman signed in on 01/12/05 23:57

  Roman: Are you getting my messages?

  Roman: Liz … … are you awake?

  Roman: lizzie?????

  Roman: You appering offline?

  Roman: appearing^

  Roman: I need to talk to you. Please please please let me know if you see this.

  Roman: lizzie

  Roman: j??????

  Roman: :(

  Roman: You’re obv in bed. Dw. Gonna try n sleep.

  Roman signed out on 02/12/05 00:01

  Roman signed in on 02/12/05 03:03

  Roman: I’m sorry Lizzie.

  Roman: I am so so sorry.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  ‘Hello there, this is a message for Lizzie James. This is Stephanie Akenzua calling from Borough of Camden College regarding the appointment you missed today in relation to the Access to HE Art and Design course you were interested in. If you’d like to reschedule your appointment, you can contact us on the form through our website, or call me directly, by using my extension which is 561, and we can hopefully fit you in some time soon. We hope to hear from you. OK? Thanks. Bye.’

  If Auntie Sharon talked as much about things that actually matter as she does about waists and thighs and the hidden evil of potatoes, I think she would at least be invited to some sort of Amnesty International summit, solving famine or the ever-dwindling rights of women.

  ‘Minna, I have honestly never seen a waist like it,’ she says, for what has to be the seventy-ninth time in about ten minutes. Minna – a really lovely woman who has just finished telling us about the £870 she raised for a children’s hospice – glows red and sort of shrugs, smiling embarrassedly. Auntie Shall reaches across from lounging back on the cushioned cubes in the middle of the dressing room and pats Minna’s midriff. ‘Were you born with it?’

  And I can’t help it. I laugh. Right there. A burst, as my tits are being squashed into a silvery crepe skirted dress by one of the wedding shop assistants.

  Shall swings round and glares at me. ‘What?’

  ‘Nothing. Just, well, was she born with her stomach or did she buy it from Superdrug?’

  All the girls laugh, and Auntie Shall tuts. ‘She knew what I meant. Didn’t you, Minna, sweetheart?’

  Minna laughs nervously and lays her hand, flat to her stomach. ‘I take after my dad. He’s a beanpole.’ She looks at me and pulls at the belt around the dress identical to the one I’m being levered into, except in gold, and says, ‘this sash is lovely, isn’t it? Very elegant.’

  ‘Oh, I hate people like you,’ exclaims Auntie Shall, throwing her arms in the air. ‘I look at a chip and that’s it, I’ve put on a stone. But I bet you eat lots of chips, don’t you, Minna?’

  ‘Um, I don’t act—’

  ‘Carbs and sugar and poof,’ titters Auntie Shall, ‘it just … well, vaporises due to that lovely fast metabolism you must have. Not bloody fair, is it?’ And she turns to look at me. Only me.

  ‘Sorry,’ I croak to the assistant still stuffing my tits in the dress. ‘I really don’t think this is working. I don’t feel comfortable. My boobs … if I could get the bigger size.’

  The dress isn’t working. This whole bridesmaid thing isn’t working. And I suppose that’s what you get for being the last-minute bridesmaid. This is the second dress fitting I’ve been to and both times, they’ve started without me. ‘Oh!’ Livvy had said, as I arrived at some dress shop in the back arse of nowhere by the skin of my teeth, summoned by a rushed, last-minute text. ‘Lizzie! Sorry, we thought we’d get started. Limited time and everything.’

  Katie has looked crestfallen both times, too. When I got here today, she was still dressed, coat and everything, waiting by the entrance. ‘Shall told me she called you,’ she whispered, and I had shaken my head and told her not to let it bother her. But it is bothering me. It doesn’t feel right, and it probably doesn’t look right, either. My irritation at being constantly left off group texts before Katie adds me herself, and always arriving in the middle of fittings and ‘last-minute drinks’ at places I know you have to book, is probably very obvious in my face every time I walk in. And my back is up. I can feel it, constantly tense, shoulders always up by my ears, no matter how hard I try to relax. Because there is no fighting it – I am not wanted here. I am the human equivalent of the cold deckchair on the end of a perfectly made-up Christmas dinner table.

  Livvy walks in the room now, tapping away on her phone. She looks at Minna, then at me, then back down at the screen in her palm. The last couple of times I’ve seen her, she’s seemed quite stressed – harassed is the word Katie used. But then arranging a wedding is stressful, and she hasn’t given herself much time.

  The assistant pulls at the back of the dress again, then stops.

  ‘Please could you—’ I start.

  ‘Bigger size,’ she says quickly.

  ‘Yes, please,’ I say. ‘If you don’t mind.’

  The assistant dashes off through the curtained changing room area and into the main shop. Katie, an image in silver, the material falling down her legs in perfect crepey lines, stands beside me. She presses her lips together as we lock eyes, and we both let out a giggle.

  ‘Any blood left in your old girls?’ whispers Katie.

  ‘Pass,’ I reply. ‘Well, I can’t feel them anymore, so I’m guessing no, but who knows? Stay tuned.’

  Katie laughs, and so does Minna, and I carefully peel off the dress from my chest. Livvy looks up from her phone, her face pale and stony, her mouth, closed and downturned. I smile. She doesn’t catch it – she’s already looked back down at the lit-up screen in her hand.

  ‘How are you feeling about the silver?’ she asks, eyes still fixed on the screen.

  ‘Me?’ I say.

  ‘Mm.’ Her index finger taps and swipes on the phone in her hand.

  ‘It’s really nice,’ I say, and find I feel on edge. I hate that I still feel inadequate in her company. I always have. Ever since we were kids, and Auntie Shall would make her do things she knew I struggled with in front of distant aunts and uncles. We started gymnastics classes together at age seven and after the fourth lesson, I ended up in tears in Mum’s car because I still couldn’t do a simple front roll like the other girls. Auntie Shall and Livvy sat silently in the back seat as I hiccupped tears. The following week, Auntie Shall got Livvy to show Hubble and Mimi how many cartwheels she could do in a row and then she asked me to do one, knowing full well I couldn’t. I hid in the bathroom afterwards and cried, my face so hot and red with embarrassment, I had to use a cold flannel to cool my cheeks down. Hubble found me, and told me gymnasts always have bad joints, and faces that fall off like melting wax once their slicked-back, tight buns are taken out.

  ‘Do you think you’d prefer the gold?’ asks Olivia tightly.

  ‘Um.’ I look at Katie. We’ve pissed her off. Or I’ve pissed her off, that’s more likely. ‘No. Well, I don’t mind. They’re both nice.’

  ‘Well? Gold or silver?’ Her words are so sharp, so tight at the ends.

  ‘Either,’ I say. ‘I really do like both.’

  Katie’s eyes widen a little, and she shrugs. I look at her with raised eyebrows, telepathically asking ‘what the fuck was that?’ and start to peel down the dress, but I stop. It’s done up tightly at the back and if I split it, I will have to pay for it and I do not have that kind of money. It’s a beautiful dress. It really is. Everything Olivia has chosen for this wedding is beautiful. She has exquisite taste. But the price is overwhelming to me, and when I saw the price of this dress alone, I could hardly bear to touch it. I will never forget the pain on Auntie Shall’s face when she thought I’d jammed the zip of one of the seq
uinned gowns she had hired for the bridesmaids to try on for her entrance ‘show’ on the night of her vow ceremony. If that was anything to go by, I did not want to be ruining a dress worth this much, knowing it’ll be coming out of her purse. She’d love that. She’d never let me forget it. So, I just stand in this awkwardly quiet room, half-dressed, the gown cutting into my waist, and I wait. I hold my hands in my lap and look at Katie out of the corner of my eye. I twiddle my fingers, I sigh, yawn, clear my throat, and go to open my mouth, to say something – anything to fill this drab, horrible silence – when Olivia jumps in.

  ‘Do you want to actually be here?’

  I am so taken aback that at first, I am sure she is talking to someone else.

  ‘M-me?’

  Her eyes lift towards the ceiling. ‘Yes, you, Lizzie.’

  My lips part. No sound comes out at first. Heat creeps up my neck, and onto my cheeks. ‘Sorry,’ I say. ‘Yes. Of course I do.’

  But I don’t. I don’t want to be here at all, yet I am trying. I really am. For Dad. For Olivia. For my family. Although in this moment, I don’t know why. All I do know, is that it’s not for me. None of it.

  ‘Then I wish you’d stop taking the piss out of it,’ says Olivia, her cheeks flashing pink. ‘This is my day. This is my wedding. And I would appreciate it if you didn’t stand there taking the mick as you try on £400 dresses that I will be paying for.’

  ‘Well,’ chimes in Auntie Shall, folding her arms. ‘That your uncle and I will be paying for, actually.’ She’s staring at me, eyebrow cocked, as if I am a dog that has just shit on the carpet. She’s enjoying this. And I wish I had a smart answer. A formulated, sensible, smart response, but I can find no words. I am stunned. I have shown up to every fitting, every meeting, even when given a mere half hour’s notice. I was there, at the magazine evening, circling dresses and telling Olivia over and over how lovely she would look in everything. I was the forgotten bridesmaid and I have been acting like a chosen one.

  ‘I haven’t been taking the piss,’ I say, voice wobbling slightly. ‘Honestly, I haven’t, Olivia, and I’m sorry if you—’

  She gives a little laugh, her cheeks now the colour of pomegranates. ‘You are taking the piss, Lizzie. Making smart little remarks, smirking away to Katie …’

  ‘I haven’t been,’ I say to Olivia, my voice louder now. ‘I have hardly said a word tonight—’

  ‘Oh, don’t start acting as if I’m some sort of Bridezilla nut job who’s being totally bloody unreasonable, because I’m not. I’ve been so calm during this whole process, despite the pressure I am under—’

  ‘I’m not. I never said anything of the sort, and I think you’ve handled everything perfectly. I was just pointing out that I’ve barely said a thing and I haven’t been taking the piss and I’m sorry if you feel that I have.’

  The shop assistant appears, a larger dress in her hand, and starts unfastening me. She smiles a tiny, sad smile at me before disappearing behind me. A tiny sad smile that says, ‘yes, this happens all the time, but honestly, if you’ve been in the game as long as I have, love, you learn to take it with a pinch of salt. Even the murders. Water off a duck’s bollocks, that.’

  ‘Olivia,’ says Minna sweetly, clearing her throat. ‘Did you … take a look at those hair pieces I—’

  ‘I just wish,’ cuts in Olivia, standing up so we’re now face to face, only a few feet apart. ‘That every time we’re all together, you didn’t feel the need to make fun. You know, make jokes, make everything a piss-take, act like you’d rather be anywhere else …’

  ‘What?’ I shake my head. My mouth is open and nothing – not even air is coming out. ‘I’m sorry, but … I’m just making conversation, Liv. Having a laugh.’

  And I see Katie now, in the corner of my vision, her phone still in her hand, hanging at her side, and her mouth open with worry.

  ‘But this isn’t a laugh. This is my wedding.’

  ‘I am quite aware of that Olivia.’ My voice is loud now – irritated – and my throat feels as though it’s swelling. I will not cry. I will not fucking cry, standing here, like this, tits out, being hoisted out of a dress as if it has become another layer of skin. ‘I know this is your wedding. That is why I’m here. Every single time you ask me to be somewhere, I turn up, even when you forget me—’

  ‘Oh, I don’t forget you,’ snaps Olivia, arms flailing at her sides. ‘It was once.’

  ‘And I am always here, regardless,’ I say again. My eyes are shimmering with the threat of tears now.

  ‘And then proceed to make fun of everything, disapprove of everything, act like your being here is a favour to us all—’

  ‘That is not what is going on.’ It’s Katie. Standing beside me now, her voice loud – louder than I have ever heard her raise it.

  ‘It is exactly what’s going on!’ Olivia replies, eyes wide. ‘I’m sorry, Katie, you’re a lovely girl, and I know she’s your sister-in-law but … well, it’s not like this is the first time, is it?’

  For a moment, I can’t speak. My pulse booms in my ears. But then, ‘What?’ croaks in my throat. Nobody says anything. ‘What?’ I say again.

  Olivia’s shoulders sag and she cocks her head to one side. ‘I just thought that after Mum’s vow ceremony, you’d be making more of an effort, that’s all.’

  ‘I am making an effort.’

  ‘You didn’t want to wear the dress, at the last shop. You made such a fuss—’

  ‘I didn’t, I just said I don’t feel comfortable in skirts above the knee—’

  My words are lost, as Olivia runs over them, her voice raising. ‘… and I’m standing there, thinking really? You’re doing this? Again? You’re making a fuss, having to be different, all eyes on Lizzie.’ Olivia scoffs a laugh. Anger fizzes in my stomach, in a fiery ball. ‘Creating drama, once again, like you did then, and like you’re doing now—’

  ‘I have never!’ Words fly out of my mouth at speed, as the shop assistant pulls down the dress and leaves me there, in bra and knickers. But I don’t give a toss. I do not care an iota. The room is still and silent now. Everyone stares. ‘I have never in my life created drama for anyone, not now, and especially not then—’

  ‘Right,’ huffs Olivia, shaking her head, then turning away and snatching up her phone from the stool. Shall is watching as if it’s an episode of Birds of a Feather. She is enrapt. All she needs is her dressing gown on and a cigarette, and she could be there, on a Sunday evening in 1989, on the sofa, watching TV.

  ‘I’m sorry you see it that way,’ I say, straightening. ‘I really am. And I’m sorry that the pair of you are still convinced I ruined your vow ceremony, Auntie Shall. I’m sorry that after everything that happened that night – to poor Hubble – that is all you take from it. Your day. Your night.’ Auntie Shall’s eyes widen, as if I’ve mentioned something forbidden. ‘But if you had perhaps taken two minutes out of your day back then … to take me to one side, to talk to me like a real human being, to ask me how I was, instead of treating me like … like I was trouble, or a bloody leper it probably wouldn’t have ever happened. I wouldn’t have ruined your day.’

  ‘So, it’s my fault,’ Auntie Shall says, shooting a look at the bridesmaids behind her, eyes flashing. ‘My fault that you ruined my day and my silken shoes, that you couldn’t control yourself, my fault—’

  ‘I’m sorry what happened, happened,’ I cut in, my face raging with heat. I stand my ground. I don’t move, despite wanting to run; despite the fact all eyes are on me, here, in my underwear, barriers collapsing around me like the sides of a wooden box. ‘But I’m not sorry for being ill. I’m not sorry for who I was.’ My heart hammers in my chest. The shop assistant is by my feet, asking me to step into the new dress. I shake my head. ‘No, thank you,’ I mutter, looking down at her. ‘Not right now. Not today.’ And I turn around and pick up my jeans from the changing booth behind me.

  ‘Oh!’ says Auntie Shall. The sound is an amalgamation of an ‘oh for fuck’s sake�
� and a ‘ha! Told you so, knew it, she always does this.’ ‘So, you’re going, are you? You have a nerve, you do. Not a sodding clue.’

  Olivia says nothing. She just watches me, her cheeks blotched pink, her eyes fixed on the floor, phone to her chest.

  ‘Yes,’ I say, pulling my jeans up and buttoning quickly, tears wobbling at the edges of my eyes. ‘This is meant to be a happy time. I don’t want to be the reason it isn’t.’

  ‘Fine.’ Olivia slumps down onto the cushioned cubes beside Auntie Shall and continues tapping away on her phone, sniffing, and I don’t know whether she’s crying or not. I can’t see her face. It’s silent in here now, bar the odd throat-clear and cough, and the whispering of other assistants to the bridesmaids, animatedly asking, ‘so is that feeling comfortable?’ because nobody knows what to do with their faces.

  I pull on my boots and go back into the changing booth for my coat and bag. I stand for a moment, with the curtains closed, and gather myself. I’m shaking, from head to toe, and although tears threaten to spill from my eyes and shine the spotlight even brighter on me, I feel relief. As if a cloak I’ve been wearing heavily upon my shoulders has been blown away in one gust. I take a deep breath. My heart slows. I catch a tear with my index finger, my lip wobbling, but swallow the rest down. I stare into the mirror, and look myself in the eyes, right through to every version of me that got me as far as standing here. I look at the sixteen-year-old girl that lives inside, somewhere deep down, but still has her fingers tightly around my wrist. Scared. Scared to stand up for herself. Scared to step over the threshold of a college, to attend a simple meeting. Scared to visit her grandad’s grave – so scared that the week after his burial was the last time, because the sight of the dead flowers and that one, single, green, white-budded plant had broken her heart too much to face it again. I nod to her. She doesn’t need to be afraid anymore. It’s over with. We are strong enough to look it all in the face. We are strong enough to walk away.