Kitty thought about that. In fact she had thought about nothing else for weeks now.
“I’ll be as content as anyone has a right to be,” she answered.
They drank their chocolate and ate their cake and toasted each other with a little drop of champagne that Jack had sent over.
“I’d like to see you in your dress,” Georgie said, hoping that if Kitty actually put it on again, it would drive home the seriousness of what she was about to do.
Mildred went into the bedroom with her and Georgie stayed in the sitting room.
“Make a grand entrance, gal,” she urged. When their backs were turned she ran to the window and looked out again.
“Where the hell are you, Harry?” she muttered. There was no time! No time!
Kitty looked magnificent. The gown was a mass of lace and silk, decorated with the tiniest of pearls and fitting her like a dream.
“By! You’re a real beauty,” Georgie breathed, reverently touching the gown.
“When Jack sees you, he’ll love you all the more,” Mildred sighed.
Kitty went to the mirror and saw herself there. She had to agree the gown was beautiful, and the shoulder-length veil, and the crescent head-dress. She recalled the dream when she had seen her wedding dress and the face of the man who was waiting at the altar.
This was not the gown. Jack was not the man. In her mind his name echoed over and over: Harry…Harry…Harry. She pushed it away. Harry was gone. This was her life now!
“I’ve made the right decision,” she said to Mildred’s delight.
“You’re right. Jack is a good man. I know we’ll be happy.” She saw Georgie’s face fall.
“I mean it,” she promised.
“Like Mildred said, he’ll be a good husband and father.”
Something hardened inside her. There it was again. That little niggling worry. She so much wanted a family, lots of children to fill her lonely world.
At ten o’clock, Eddie came to collect Mildred.
“I’ll be back first thing in the morning,” she said.
“Now you two get off to bed. We’ve got an early start.”
Neither Kitty nor Georgie could sleep. Kitty lay awake while Georgie kept creeping out of bed to stare out of the window.
“Bugger you, Harry Jenkins!Harper she moaned.
“You know who your real friends are when you need them.” She even tiptoed out to the phone but decided against ringing his number.
“If you don’t care enough to come when she needs you, then you’d best stay away,” she whispered. Then || she went back to bed where, like Kitty, she slept fitfully until the dawn lit up another day.
At six they were both in the kitchen drinking tea and going through the list of things that should all have been done.
“There ain’t nothing else for you to do but tie the knot,” Georgie said sarcastically.
“Gawd help you.”
Kitty understood her fears.
“You know how I felt about Harry, so I do know how worried you are that I’ve made the wrong decision,” she said.
“But it’s made now, and you’re not making things any easier for me.”
Georgie was mortified.
“I’m sorry, gal. It’s just that, well, in the home, when you used to talk about all your dreams and the way you felt about Harry, it was like I was dreaming with you. Now it’s all gone, and I feel we’ve both been cheated.” Her voice broke.
“I’m sorry, gal.” A tear ran down her face.
“I ain’t much use to you, am I?”
Kitty shook her head. Her lips trembled as she came to Georgie and took her in an embrace.
“Oh, Georgie! Georgie! Don’t ever talk like that,” she murmured.
“You’ll never know what you mean to me.”
They cried quietly, the two of them together; for the precious things that had passed into a time they would never see again, and for what the future held. They cried for all they had lost, and for all they had found in each other, and they laughed through their tears when Georgie suddenly said, “Christ Almighty, gal! That bloody Mildred will be here any minute. We’ll have red noses and swollen eyes and she’ll have us under the cold water tap till the cows come home!”
Fortunately, by the time Mildred arrived at eight o’clock, order was restored; the flat had been cleaned from top to bottom in a fever of nerves; Kitty’s honeymoon case was packed and standing in the hall; Georgie had accepted that Harry was not coming after all, and as Kitty had asked, she put on a smile and got caught up in the excitement of the day though deep down her every thought was with Kitty, for she knew her love for Harry was as strong as ever.
At eleven o’clock, Mildred insisted that they all had a bite to eat.
“Settles the nerves,” she said.
Kitty found that she was actually hungry. She ate two slices of toast and a spoonful of marmalade, then drank another two cups of tea and afterwards soaked in a hot sudsy bath, emerging blossom fresh and wishing the hours away. At last she was resigned to her fate. Once this day was gone, a new one would begin. With Jack. She wanted to make it work. She had to make it work.
At midday the flowers arrived. Kitty and Mildred helped to get Georgie ready, “Look at me,” Georgie declared, twirling in front of the mirror. The dress was a pale blue calf-length creation, fashioned empire-style so as to disguise the fact that she was pregnant.
“Wish Mac could see me,” she murmured. When her smile dipped, Kitty put a comforting arm round her and all was well again.
When Georgie was ready, Kitty was dressed.
“You look so beautiful,” Mildred cooed. Georgie merely smiled. It was still in the back of her mind that Harry might turn up, but that was up to him now.
At twelve-thirty Eddie arrived. Fifteen minutes later, Georgie was looking out of the window for the wedding cars when a big white van drew up outside; its front bumper was badly dented, and the big ugly fellow driving it looked like he’d been in a fight. He looked up with a sorry expression.
“Bloody cheek!” Georgie cried, throwing open the window.
“Get that scruffy thing out of there. There’s a wedding going on, bugger you!”
Kitty came to the window to see.
“Who is it?” she asked, craning her neck to see over Georgie’s shoulders, and heard her friend cry out, “IT’S HARRY! WELL, I’M BUGGERED. HE TURNED UP AFTER ALL!”
Kitty’s heart almost stopped.
“It can’t be,” she muttered, backing from the window.
“It can’t be.” In just one minute her whole world was turned upside down. How could Harry do this to her? How could he turn up on her doorstep just a few minutes before she was going to church where Jack was already waiting? She was desperately afraid.
“Send him away,” she told Mildred.
“I don’t want him here.”
It was too late. Harry was coming through the door.
“You won’t find that easy,” he said softly, his dark eyes pained at the sight of her in a wedding gown.
“I love you, Kitty.”
So many emotions sped through her then: anger, regret and love. Oh!
Such deep abiding love. But Harry had left it too late. The anger was overwhelming.
“If you want to come to my wedding, you’re in the wrong place. You should be at the church with the other guests.” Her calm voice belied the tumult of panic inside her. He looked wonderful; the same tall dark handsome man who had claimed her heart all those years ago; the same tumbling unruly hair and those wonderful dark eyes. But it was too late. Too much had happened. Too many people would be hurt.
Turning to the other three, he asked them, “Please…we need a minute alone.”
Mildred hesitated, with Eddie standing beside her. Georgie dragged them away to the kitchen where they peeped from behind the kitchen door.
“Pray she goes with him,” Georgie urged.
“It’s the only way Kitty will ever be truly happy.”
Harry stepped towards her.
“You and I belong together,” he murmured.
“We can never be happy with anyone else, you know that.”
“Aren’t you happy with Susan?” Kitty’s astonishment betrayed itself in her voice.
“No. Not with Susan, and not with any woman but you.” His fingers touched her face, sending shivers through her.
“I want you to come with me, right now. Nothing else matters. Just you and me. I love you, sweetheart, and I know now I can’t live without you.”
Before she could answer, there was a knock on the door. When it opened a cheery face peered in.
“Wedding cars,” he said. “Best get a move on. The traffic’s building up and I’m a bit late.”
Kitty collected her bouquet.
“Jack’s waiting,” she told Harry, and in a softer voice, “Susan too. I’m sure she’s waiting.” How could she talk so calmly when her heart was fluttering like a million butterflies let loose?
“It’s too late, Harry,” she said.
“Perhaps it was never meant to be for us.”
As she walked by him, he grabbed her arm, his dark eyes disbelieving as he told her, “You’re so wrong, Kitty. It was always meant to be. It’s just that we lost our way for a while.Harper His grip was like iron on her arm.
A flash of anger lit her eyes.
“No, Harry! My plans are already made!”
With that she almost ran out of the flat and down the stairs, where she stumbled into the taxi.
Harry would have followed, but Georgie stopped him.
“Let her be,” she said.
“Let her think it through. Stay here a while.” She noticed how weary he was.
“Kitty’s been through a bad time. I didn’t realise before, but some things go very deep and can’t be overturned in a minute.”
“Tell her I’ll wait,” he said. “I’ll be at the railway station for an hour. After that, I’ll be gone and I won’t bother her ever again.”
“All right. But you have to tell me something, Harry.” Georgie was never more serious.
“Is it really all over between you and Susan?”
“It was never really on.” His tone spoke volumes.
“What will happen to the child?”
Now he was astonished.
“What child?”
Her suspicions had been right. It was a ploy by that wife of his.
“Forget it.” She smiled.
“You’ve told me all I want to know.”
Downstairs she pulled Eddie aside.
“Let me travel with her to the church. You go with Mildred in the other car.” Mildred would have intervened but Eddie walked her away, softly talking to her, and she seemed to accept that there were happenings here beyond her control.
Climbing into the taxi, Georgie slammed shut the door.
“Shift your arse up, gal,” she told Kitty.
“Don’t forget I’m a bit wider now.”
Kitty raised a smile, but kept her gaze firmly fixed on the taxi floor. As it moved away, she asked in a forlorn voice, “I wonder if I had him wrong all along, Georgie?”
“Meaning?”
“How could he do that? How could he even think of leaving Susan when she’s carrying his child?”
There was a little smile in Georgie’s voice.
“I think you should ask him that yourself.”
Kitty turned to look at her.
“I can’t do it, Georgie. I daren’t hope any more. It’s too painful.”
“You never struck me as the type of person who was afraid of pain.”
Kitty toyed with her bouquet, absentmindedly picking at the petals and showering them to the floor.
“Why couldn’t it all have come right in the beginning? Why did I have to send him away all that time ago?”
“Because there’s a right time for everything, and when you sent him away, it was the right time for that. Now it’s time to put the record straight. Marry Jack Harper and I swear to God you’ll live the rest of your life regretting it!”
Kitty knew that what Georgie was saying was right. But what about Jack? What about Susan, and Harry’s child?
“How can we take our own happiness at the expense of others?”
“Because if you don’t, you’ll all end up miserable.”
Soft silent tears flowed down Kitty’s face.
“It really is too late now, isn’t it?” she whispered.
“Because I’ve sent him away again.”
Taking hold of her hand, Georgie asked her in a mischievous voice, “Did you think he would go as easily as that, gal?”
When Kitty turned stricken brown eyes to her, Georgie went on, “He’s waiting for you, at the railway station. But you’ll have to be quick” or this time you’ll lose him forever.”
Kitty let out a cry.
“Oh, Georgie! I can’t let him go again. I just can’t!” Leaning forward she called excitedly to the driver, “We’re not going to the church! We’re going to the railway station…as quick as you can, please.”
The driver went at a fast pace, through the town and on towards Midland Road station. Behind him the two women urged him on, telling him to go ever faster.
“I’m going faster than the old engine’s been before,” he complained. “If I’m not careful I’m bound to get a speeding ticket.”
When Kitty promised to pay any fine he might incur, he took off his cap, scratched his head, gave a big sigh, and with a boyish grin was caught up in all the excitement.
“Hold on to your seats then!” he cried and off they went.
Harry’s train had just pulled in. He looked up and down the platform one more time.
“She’s not coming now, Harry boy,” he told himself. But then he looked up again and there she was, hair blowing in the wind as she ran towards him.
“HARRY!”
She was laughing and crying all at the same time.
“DON’T GO, HARRY!”
The hem of her wedding dress was held bunched in her fists as she passed all the staring passengers. She didn’t care that she was showing more leg than a lady ought to show, and she didn’t care that they had crowded to the windows to cheer and clap as she and Harry ran towards each other. All she cared about was that he was here, and he was hers. She could hardly believe it. At long last, he was hers.
On 15 June, 1982, Harry’s divorce was made final.
Exactly one month later, Kitty walked down the aisle to her beloved man. Everyone said they made a splendid couple. This time Kitty had chosen to wear a completely different style of dress to the one she had almost wed Jack in. But it was magnificent a long plain creation with little pearl buttons at the throat and a gentle slit at the hem.
She carried a posy of pink rosebuds and wore a small round veil that fell just below her cheekbones.
Georgie walked behind her, proud and pretty in a loose-fitting cream dress. Slim now, and happier than she had been in a long time, she had her own life to cherish.
“Just look at the pair of us. Kitty gal!” she whispered as she walked sedately behind.
“I’m buggered if we ain’t as proud as models on a catwalk.”
Among the well-wishers were Harry’s family. His sister Sarah had grown away from him over the years, but now after a long period working abroad, had come to value her family, and rekindle her old friendship with Kitty.
Miss Davis watched from the pews, her face smiling and proud. As Kitty walked by, she whispered her blessing. When the service was over she was off to Australia to visit a long-lost cousin who lived in the outback.
Beside Miss Davis stood a red-haired man, well presented in a smart suit and wearing a tie in which he appeared to be very uncomfortable.
Mac was home. Subdued by a longer term in prison, and realising that he must mend his ways, he now had a job which paid enough to rent a good house and to keep his little family. In his arms was a child, a beautiful baby girl by the name o
f Katherine. This was Georgie’s daughter, and what other name should she give it than that of her darling Kitty? It wasn’t a boy as Georgie predicted, but in a way, she was glad.
Many surprising and wonderful events had taken place in the last year.
Susan and Jack consoled each other after their partners walked out on them; so much so that they were now planning a wedding of their own.
Harry had discovered it was Jack who had been deliberately causing the damage to his business by revealing his rates to other hauliers who then undercut him to win the contracts themselves. Jack had hoped to make Harry’s business dependent on his own company so that he would never be able to try to win Kitty back.
But that was all behind them now. Outside the church bells rang. Harry swept his bride into his arms, and swore he would never let her go.
“This day is the start of our lives,” he said.
It was also the start of their family; a son in the following year and twins two years after that, a boy and a girl.
When the photographs were taken. Kitty took Georgie aside while Harry and Mac disappeared. Kitty kept Georgie talking until after a few minutes she took her by the shoulders and turned her round.
“Look, Georgie,” she said. And when she saw what Harry and Mac had brought to the gates of the church, she burst out crying. It was a minibus. The brightest blue minibus she had ever seen.
“It’s for you, sweetheart,” Kitty said.
“For being the best friend a girl could ever have.” In all these years she had never forgotten Georgie’s cherished dream.
In the years to come, Harry’s business would thrive. He and Kitty’s plan to have a big four-bed roomed house in the suburbs of Blackburn was realised. Georgie and Mac would build up their minicab business to include another four vehicles, and their children would grow up to be fast friends, just like their parents before them.
But for now, on this wonderful summer’s day, Kitty looked up into her husband’s dark eyes.
“I love you, Harry Jenkins,” she whispered.
Kissing her tenderly, he enfolded her in his arms, and she vowed that nothing would ever again tear them apart, only the Good Lord above when the time came.
But there was a whole lifetime until then. A lifetime they would live to the full, until they were very, very old, and their children had children of their own.
Living a Lie Page 40
