A Vicarage Homecoming

by Kate Hewitt

  Message received loud and clear. Dan Taylor had been off limits all along, and now he was out in the stratosphere. This was a good thing, Miriam told herself as she processed down the aisle, partnered with one of Simon’s friends from uni whose name she’d forgotten. This was the wake-up call she’d clearly needed.

  After milling around outside the church for a few minutes, everyone decided it was too cold to linger, and they began to head over to the church hall where the reception would be held.

  Miriam gazed in amazement at the transformed hall, which usually had a smell of sweaty socks and old coffee, and was crammed with tables with laminate tops and plastic folding chairs.

  Now the walls and deep windowsills of the hall were bedecked with Christmas flowers—lilies and gardenias tied with red velvet ribbons, and vivid poinsettias and holly. The plastic tables and chairs had been replaced by proper wooden ones, rented from a local catering company, and a few local teens had been hired to circulate with trays of champagne and hors d’oeuvres. Christmas music played gently in the background.

  “This is amazing,” Miriam told Esther. “I can’t believe this is where I had Brownies.”

  “I know, right?” Esther shook her head. “Anna pretty much did it all herself.”

  “Wow.” Miriam had helped with the preparations over the last few weeks, cutting lengths of ribbon for the flowers, as well as writing place names in her fanciest cursive on jars of local honey for table favours, since apparently she had the best handwriting of all her sisters—who knew. But she hadn’t expected the hall to be transformed into such a wonderland.

  “Too bad neither of us can have champagne,” Esther said a bit glumly as she plucked two glasses of sparkling elderflower cordial from a tray and handed one to Miriam. “Cheers.”

  As more people came into the hall, the reception got going properly, and Miriam milled around, chatting to people she vaguely knew from church, as well as meeting a few of Anna’s friends from uni and work who had braved the trek up to Cumbria for the wedding.

  She was also avoiding Dan, who had come into the hall with his date a little while ago. It took some effort to make sure she was always across the room from him without appearing to be orchestrating it, but she thought she managed it.

  Then it was time to take their places at the tables, and Miriam was thankfully seated with the wedding party, a few tables away from Dan. She remembered his date’s name now; she’d written it on the table favour, after all. Jane Godfrey. Miriam eyed her circumspectly as she unfolded her napkin.

  She looked like one of those athletic girls who played hockey in school and probably never binged on ice cream. She had a wide, engaging smile, straight brown hair with no weird wave in the middle like Miriam, and most importantly, she had abs. Miriam looked down at her huge bump and sighed. She was being ridiculous. She knew that. But it was hard to stop.

  Soon, with some throat-clearing and clinking of crystal, it was time for Anna and Simon to be announced.

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” Ian Wells, one of the churchwardens called out, “may I now present the Reverend and Mrs Truesdell!”

  With a flurry of applause and cheers, a radiant Anna and a beaming Simon came hand in hand into the hall. They took their places at the bridal table, and the food began to be served.

  The meal passed happily enough; Miriam was sitting next to Will, who was always good company, and they chatted and clinked glasses as often as they could get away with, so Anna and Simon would be forced—with no reluctance whatsoever—to share a kiss.

  Then it was time for the toasts. Miriam listened, amused, as Simon’s roommate from uni gave a hilarious send-up of his ‘geeky ways,’ but also managed not to leave a dry eye in the hall when he briefly mentioned the death of Simon’s fiancée, whom Anna had told her had killed herself several years ago due to serious depression.

  “And so it’s with a full and thankful heart that I offer this toast,” he finished grandly, smiling at both Anna and Simon. “To the bride!”

  After the best man’s toast, it was Esther’s turn. Although all three sisters had been considered maids (or matron) of honour, Esther, as the oldest and bossiest, had been given the responsibility for the speech.

  Now she stood up, looking both self-conscious and a bit emotional, as she scanned the waiting crowd before turning to her notes.

  “I suppose I drew the short straw, or perhaps the long one, when it came to which of us Holley sisters was going to give the maid—or matron, in my case—of honour’s speech. But the truth is, while I’ve never been much of one for public speaking, I am thrilled and honoured to be speaking today, on all of our behalf.” She glanced briefly at Rachel and Miriam, who were both a bit bright-eyed themselves now. “Of course, there’s someone else who should be with us today, and most, if not all, of you know who that is.” Esther drew a quick, steadying breath. “My brother, Jamie. For the few of you who don’t know, my brother Jamie died in a car accident twenty-two years ago this coming spring. And I know we all think of and miss him every day.” She paused to compose herself. “But this isn’t a sad occasion, and I don’t want to get mired in the sorrow of losing him. The important thing is, he’s here with us in spirit, as my mum said, and in our hearts. And as for the rest of us…well no one could be more thrilled for Anna and Simon than her sisters.” She turned to smile at Anna, who was wiping away tears unashamedly.

  “Anna is the quietest of us Holley sisters,” Esther stated with a smile, “but I think she might also be the kindest. I suspect, as a child, she felt a little lost in the chaos of our household—you know how our home is. Was.” A few nostalgic chuckles sounded throughout the audience. “But I think I speak for every one of my sisters when I say Anna was often the one we turned to, if we needed a quiet, listening ear, or just a hug. And we’ve needed them quite a bit. Well, you know I’ve needed them.” She gave a slightly wobbly smile.

  “Anna might be quiet, but she’s pure gold, and so is Simon. And now that she’s getting married—oops, married—she will be beyond rubies.” Esther blinked rapidly, her eyes bright. “A true Proverbs 31 wife. ‘She brings him good, not harm, all the days of his life.’ You’re a lucky man, Simon, and I know God will be with both of you.” She hefted her glass. “To Simon and Anna.”

  Many people were dabbing at their eyes as they raised their glasses. “To Simon and Anna!”

  Soon after the speeches, the dancing started, and all three Holley sisters as well as Ruth were misty-eyed when Roger and Anna took to the floor to dance to “My Girl.” Then the acting DJ—another parishioner—called all the fathers and daughters out, and with his arms open wide Roger gestured for his other daughters to join them on the floor.

  Laughing, they came, putting their arms around each other as they swayed together, a motley group of five, united in this moment. United always. It was lovely, but as soon as the dance was over, Miriam beat a retreat back to the table. The last thing she wanted to do was get her boogie on when she eight months pregnant.

  “You don’t want to do the Wobble?” Will asked, with a nod to the line dance that was forming on the floor.

  “I am the Wobble,” Miriam answered, and he laughed.

  She settled back in her seat as she watched the dancers; Dan and Jane had not, she noticed, made it out to the dance floor, but then she told herself she wouldn’t care if and when they did. She wouldn’t even look.

  Eventually, Rachel cajoled Esther and Will onto the dance floor, both of them looking distinctly unenthused as they half-heartedly did the Macarena.

  “Come on, Miriam!” Rachel called. “Let’s make it a family event!”

  Miriam saw that her mother and father were actually doing the Macarena, something she wished she could bleach from her mind. “Sorry, not in my state,” she said firmly. She was not going to waddle through the Macarena while Dan and Jane looked on, murmuring over glasses of wine. Not that she’d checked or anything.

  Finally it was time for Simon and Anna to leave o
n their honeymoon—a night at a five-star hotel in Windermere and then a week in a cosy cottage in the Highlands of Scotland.

  Rachel had been appalled when she’d heard about the cottage. “Scotland in December? You realise it is going to be dark the entire time?”

  “We won’t mind,” Anna said, blushing, and Rachel had even looked more appalled.

  Now Miriam was chivvied by Esther towards the bevy of unmarried women who were trying not to look desperate to catch the bouquet. Miriam hung back; she was hardly going to lunge for it in her state, was she? In fact, it was rather pathetic that she was standing here at all, with her big bump of a belly. She tried to turn around, but Esther wasn’t having it.

  “Come on, Rachel’s up there,” she said. “Right at the front, too.”

  “Rachel’s not pregnant,” Miriam hissed, but she knew when to give up and so with a resigned sigh, she turned back to face Anna, who was laughing and looking over her shoulder.

  “Throw it, throw it!” someone began to chant, and others joined in. Turning back round so she couldn’t see, Anna hurled the bouquet over her head and several women got into a scrum going for it while everyone else stepped away sharpish.

  Miriam breathed a sigh of relief and turned around, only to nearly run smack into Dan—and Jane.

  “Oh, hello!” Her voice came out bright to the point of manic. Jane gave her a genuinely friendly smile, which made Miriam dislike her. It was the smile of a woman who clearly did not see a threat.

  “Hey, Miriam. You look lovely.” Dan smiled at her, but Miriam was afraid she saw only pity. After their weeks of friendship, it stung too much even to make a joke about looking like a red whale or blob or whatever. So she just smiled and murmured her thanks, wishing she could move past this moment. She was ready to be home, curled up on the sofa, watching rubbish telly.

  “This is Jane, a friend of mine from uni,” Dan said, and Jane dutifully shook her hand.

  “Dan’s told me so much about you.” Which could mean absolutely anything. Again Miriam smiled, her cheeks aching, and resisted the petty urge to reply, He hasn’t told me anything about you.

  “Have you enjoyed the wedding?”

  “Yes, it was lovely.”

  “Esther did a fantastic job with the speech.”

  “Yes, she did.” Oh, the inanity. Miriam hated it.

  “We were just thinking of heading over to The Queen’s Sorrow,” Dan said a bit awkwardly. “I know you can’t have a drink, but if you fancy joining us…”

  “That’s so kind of you, but I’m shattered.” The words came out of Miriam at lightning speed. That one was a no-brainer. Her, Dan, and Jane at The Queen’s Sorrow while every other spry young person headed over to The Bell, where Sam would no doubt offer drinks on the house. He’d been here today with Rachel, although Miriam had barely talked to him. “I’m just going to head back home and have a bath.”

  “Sounds good,” Dan said, which made things even more awkward. Now everyone was imagining Miriam in the bath.

  “Right, then.” She made eye contact, more or less, with Jane. “Lovely to meet you.”

  “And you.”

  She walked quickly by them, intending to make for the door, but Esther stopped her. “You’re not leaving, are you?”

  “I was thinking about it.”

  “Miriam, this is a wedding and you’re a bridesmaid. It’s only seven o’clock! Come out for a drink. We’ll drown our sorrows in sparkling elderflower cordial.”

  “I’ve had enough sparkling elderflower cordial to float a boat,” Miriam replied. “And I’m knackered. I don’t know how you’re still going.”

  “Everyone’s going to The Bell,” Esther persisted. “Rachel and Sam, Will and I, Mum and Dad, and some others, too…”

  “Sounds like a real party, but I’m going to have to give it a miss.”

  Esther’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “What’s going on?”

  “What’s going on? I’m exhausted, Esther. I’ve been up and on my feet since seven a.m.”

  “No, it’s not that.”

  “Trust me, it is—”

  “This isn’t about Dan, is it?”

  Heaven help nosy—and perceptive—sisters. “Why on earth would it be about Dan?” Miriam hissed, conscious that he was alarmingly close to being in hearing range of this conversation.

  “Because he brought a date to the wedding. Because you’ve been spending loads of time together—”

  “Not that much time, and we’re just friends, Esther. He’s my boss, after all. Jeez.” Miriam shook her head, doing her best to look scornfully disbelieving. “Why is your mind jumping there?”

  “Why isn’t yours?” Esther countered. “It would be natural—”

  “No, it wouldn’t. I’m pregnant, I’ve had enough of men, and it’s not as if he’d even look at me—”

  “Aha, so you are upset because he brought a date.”

  Miriam threw up her hands in exasperation. “I’m going home.”

  “We’re having breakfast tomorrow at the vicarage,” Esther called after her as she made for the door. “Before we tidy all this up.”

  “Sounds fab,” Miriam threw over her shoulder, and then she walked outside. The air was freezing, the night endless, and Miriam wasn’t even wearing a coat. She’d spent last night at the vicarage, and she’d left her coat there. With a sigh she decided to head back and get it along with her other stuff.

  Fortunately, the vicarage was open, as it often was, and Miriam slipped inside, intent on grabbing her bag from her old bedroom before heading up the high street towards home. Then she heard a sniffling sound from the kitchen.

  “Charlie…?” she ventured cautiously, although it had been more of a human sound. She tiptoed around the corner, stopping in shock at the sight of her mum at the kitchen table, her head in her hands. Crying.

  “Mum! Mum, what’s wrong?”

  Ruth looked up, red-eyed and tear-streaked. “Oh, Miriam, it’s nothing. I’m just having a good old cry.” She let out a hicuppy laugh. “I’m all right, honestly.”

  “What do you need to cry about?”

  “Oh, you know. Life.” Ruth sniffed and took a tissue from her sleeve to blow her nose. “You must think me such a ninny, tearing up all the time.”

  “No more than I’ve been.”

  “But you’ve got hormones to blame it on,” Ruth replied. “Although come to think of it, so do I.” She sighed. “It’s just so much to take in… Anna married, you and Esther pregnant, and your father and I all the way over in China.”

  Miriam eased herself into a chair at the table, glad to get off her aching feet. “I thought you were happy in China?”

  “We are, we are,” Ruth assured her. “But I’m not in China now, am I?” She let out a wobbly laugh. “When I’m back here, in this house, in this kitchen, I remember who I was and what I loved. And I miss it.” Ruth’s voice choked. “I miss it so much.”

  “Oh, Mum.” Miriam didn’t know what else to say, but she ached for her mother.

  “It’s not that I’m unhappy in China,” Ruth said, blowing her nose yet again. “Because I’m not. I feel—I know—we belong there, at least for now. And yet…” Her breath came out in a shuddery rush. “I want to be here, too. With you. With Esther. With Rachel. With Anna…”

  “But you are here,” Miriam protested. Ruth wasn’t flying back to China until the end of February, several weeks after Miriam’s due date.

  “Yes, but not just for a visit. When I’m here…” Ruth paused, gathering her thoughts. “I want to be here, the way I was.”

  “You mean as the vicar’s wife,” Miriam said slowly, thinking of the odd tension that had rippled between her mum and Anna over the holiday season.

  “Yes, I suppose, even though that sounds daft and a bit, well—childish.” Ruth sighed. “I know I need to put the past behind me, at least that part of it. I’m not that woman anymore. And Anna is, which is wonderful. I think I’ve been driving her mad this whole holiday
, poor love.”

  “No one could drive Anna mad.”

  “I’m doing my best,” Ruth joked. “But enough about me and my silly woes. How are you, darling?” She reached over to clasp Miriam’s hand.

  “I’m all right,” Miriam said slowly, feeling her way through the words. She thought of the wedding, of Dan and Jane, of this little girl whose kicks she could feel right this moment. She smiled. “I’m all right,” she said again, more firmly this time, because for once—at last—she truly meant it.

  Chapter Fourteen

  With Christmas and the wedding out of the way, Miriam’s due date loomed large and close, with no events to precede it. Her giving birth was the Holley family’s Next Big Thing, and it galvanised her into action, half-excited, half-terrified out of her mind.

  While Simon and Anna were still on their honeymoon, she, Ruth, Rachel, and Esther all spent a day painting her spare bedroom mint green, because she decided, like Abigail Cribbs, she wasn’t crazy about pink. Ruth insisted she be allowed to go on a shopping spree, and so on one sunny day in early January, they drove to a baby superstore in Manchester and Ruth bought all sorts of things—a changing table, a cot, a mobile to hang above the cot, a glider.

  “Mum, you really don’t need to buy all those things,” Miriam said, alarmed at how freely her normally parsimonious mother was waving her credit card.

  “Oh, but I want to,” Ruth cried. “It’s such fun.”

  “Yes, but…” Miriam thought of how much she’d been fighting feeling like a charity case. Insisting on standing on her own two feet, alone. Yet it was hard to do that when she had so many people surrounding her, helping her to stand because they wanted to. To deprive them of that felt mean and even selfish, and pointless besides.

  So she let her mum kit out the nursery, and she accepted the donations that continued to trickle in from parishioners—packs of nappies, bags of second-hand baby clothes, soft toys and board books. Everyone had something to give, and Miriam accepted it all, because how could she not? Why would she not want to?