‘What?’ Alex asked. ‘What’s the problem?’
‘I’m just not comfortable with having my photo on the blog.’
‘What’s wrong with my blog?’
‘What? Nothing! Nothing, at all. I just meant… well, I’m just not.’
‘He doesn’t like having his photo taken. So, the thought of having a picture of him somewhere that a tonne of people might see it is frightening the crap out of him. That about cover it?’ Alex asked.
Charlie gave him a look. ‘I’m not frightened. It’s a question of comfort level.’
‘Oh, Charlie, mate. You take a sickeningly good photo, and you’re flanked by two hot women. What’s there to be uncomfortable about?’
I saw Charlie waver.
‘Look. I’ll get the blog post ready and let you see it before it goes up. If you’re still not happy with the photo being out in the big wide world, and women drooling over their screens at our new photographer, then you can veto it and I’ll take it off.’
‘What are you taking off?’ Alex asked, suddenly drawn out of his sports magazine.
I rolled my eyes at him.
‘Behave. Or I’ll go and put one of those wedding dresses back on.’
He made a zipping motion with his mouth and settled back on the other sofa.
‘I want to fiddle a bit with these anyway,’ Charlie said, ‘but I can get them back to you later tomorrow, if that works?’
‘Yep. That’s fine. Amy’s got plans with Marcus and this one’s working,’ I said, pointing at Alex, ‘so I’ll probably be working anyway.’
‘OK.’
‘But don’t feel you have to rush, or anything. And don’t you dare delete that photo of the three of us!’
‘I promise.’ He held up his hands in resignation.
‘We’re going to get so many comments once they take a look at him, you know that, don’t you?’ Tilly said.
I grinned. Charlie’s horrified look was back in place.
‘Yep!’
‘I… err…’
‘Don’t worry, Charlie. Who knows? Maybe this mock wedding shoot might end up finding you a real bride after all.’ I did a Disney Princess hand clasp and rocked side to side, fluttering my fake eyelashes.
He gave me a tight smile, but I could see the humour in his eyes. ‘Smart arse.’
I pointed to myself, and did a wide-eyed ‘me?’ action.
Charlie raised his eyebrows, did a quick nod and pointed at me. ‘Did your previous photographer die of thirst, by the way?’
I took the hint, and headed out to the kitchen to boil the kettle. I’d just finished filling it when the doorbell rang.
‘Can someone get that for me, please?’ I called as I began pulling out mugs and spoons.
I heard the door open and close and a male voice, which was shortly followed by a high-pitched wail.
‘What? He can’t!’
27
I put the tin of teabags down on the worktop and rushed back into the living room. Sam, Tilly’s fiancé, stood near the door and Tilly was pacing up and down. She was currently on a path heading away from me. Alex and Charlie hadn’t moved. Alex still had his head buried in his tablet, whilst Charlie was doing something that made him look busy but I suspected otherwise. He’d already scratched the back of his neck twice now.
‘Hi, Sam.’ I walked over and gave him a hug. ‘Everything all right?’ His expression, and Tilly’s frantic pacing suggested that things weren’t exactly tickety boo but I wasn’t sure what else to say.
‘Things are most definitely not all right!’ Tilly turned sharply and began to pace in the opposite direction. ‘My wedding is going to be a disaster!’
‘It’s not going to be a disaster. We’ll sort something out,’ Sam soothed.
‘No! We won’t! Do you know why? Because we’re supposed to be getting married in three weeks and now we don’t have a photographer!’
‘That hardly makes it a disaster,’ Sam replied.
Eeek!
I made to step across but too late. Tilly was off!
‘Not to you, maybe! But this is supposed to be my big day! It’s supposed to be perfect! All of it! With a photographer there to record Every Single Perfect Moment!’
‘I thought it was supposed to be our day.’ Sam frowned.
Oh, Sam, please stop talking.
Tilly turned and opened her mouth but I got there first.
‘Look!’ I said, cutting her off. ‘Do you have your wedding book here?’
Tilly had been hauling the enormous file around for months. It was filled with contacts, cuttings, pictures, notes, recipes, and pretty much anything else that she had ever seen, or any thought that she had ever had, in connection with this wedding.
My assistant, distracted by my intervention, closed her mouth and looked at me.
‘Yes.’
‘Good. Go and grab it, then.’
Tilly looked at me for a moment, then walked over to her bag, and hauled the file out. I motioned to her to bring it over to the sofa and pulled her down next to me. The beautiful make-up that we had so carefully applied for the photo shoot was now streaked with tears and her false eyelashes were looking as though, given the chance, they might well make a break for freedom.
‘He said he’d sorted the double booking out,’ she said, her voice cracking.
Seeing my bouncy, fabulous assistant so unhappy made me want to get hold of that photographer and crack something else.
‘I know,’ I said, reaching out and stroking her hair. ‘I know. But, like Sam said, we’ll get something sorted. There’s five good brains here. I’m sure we can come up with a great plan between us.’
She nodded, not looking at me. A tear plopped from the end of her chin onto my lap, swiftly followed by another.
‘Oh, now, come here. It’s all going to be fine. Just perfect,’ I said, wrapping her in my arms and rocking her as she cried. ‘You’ll see.’
My head was resting against Tilly’s but I lifted my eyes to meet Charlie’s gaze. He was still sitting at the other end of the sofa.
‘Do you think you boys could make some tea, please?’
The English and Irish sides of my heritage often differed but in times of crisis, they converged perfectly. What was most definitely needed here was tea.
Charlie stood, seeming pleased at being given something to do, rounded up Sam and dragged Alex into the kitchen on his way. I heard movement and talking, and soon laughter coming from their direction, which I was glad of. Distracting Sam was a good start for the boys.
When they returned, clearly having also raided my cupboards, judging by the assortment of biscuits accompanying the mugs of tea, Tilly had calmed a little and we’d tidied up her face and hair. She gave a glance at Sam. I scooted up and touched his arm as I moved past, encouraging him to go and sit by his fiancée.
‘Sorry about earlier,’ she said.
‘It’s all right.’ He dropped a kiss on the top of her head and wrapped an arm around her shoulders.
I took a sip of my tea and slid Tilly’s book onto my knees. Flipping to the ‘photography’ section, I found several lists.
‘What do all these mean?’
Tilly peered over to see what I was looking at. ‘Oh. Those were categorised in to how badly I wanted them.’
‘OK. So, this person was your second choice, and so on?’ I said, pointing a French manicured nail at a name on one of the lists.
‘Yep.’
‘Right. So, what about ringing these, and seeing if any of them have that day free still?’
‘I don’t think they will, but we could try. If you don’t mind? I mean…’ she glanced at the clock on the wall ‘… I am supposed to still be working.’
I waved my hand. ‘Priorities.’
To be honest, I didn’t think they would have space either. We were hitting prime wedding season and anyone worth their SIM card would have been booked long ago. Finishing our tea, Tilly and I split her final choice list into tw
o and started making phone calls. Half an hour later, we’d been through all of them. Every single one was booked. I’d had a couple promise to call me back if anything changed but I didn’t hold out much hope. The tears now shining again in Tilly’s eyes showed me that she didn’t either.
‘Are there any more that you liked?’
She swiped her hand under her nose, and I leant and grabbed the box of tissues from the side of the sofa and passed them over. Taking one, she wiped her eyes and nose haphazardly, then shook her head.
‘All the others we considered just didn’t seem to have the sort of look we were going for. They were all really staged, and formal. We want a more relaxed kind of feel, as well as some traditional shots. Ones that really capture our personalities.’ Tilly flicked through a few of the pages in her file. ‘It seems a waste to spend so much money on a photographer that you don’t share the same aesthetic with. I think I’d rather just put those funds towards the honeymoon.’ She let out a sigh, before continuing. ‘I think the best thing to do is to send an email to everyone who is coming, explaining the problem and asking if, after the wedding, they can send us any photos they think are good. I’ll set up a special email address for it, and then we can choose ones from them. Some are bound to be great!’ I could see that Tilly was doing her best to pep talk herself more than any of us.
‘Sounds like a great idea!’ Alex said.
‘I think so too!’ Tilly smiled at him. Alex returned it and then shot a covert look to me and Charlie. No, we weren’t buying it either.
‘Or… I could maybe take some for you?’
Everyone turned to Charlie. A hint of colour began to show around his neck. He stuck a finger in his collar and pulled at it a little. Bearing in mind it was an open-necked casual shirt, the quirk was kind of adorable. ‘I mean, if you really can’t find anyone else.’
‘You’d do that?’
Charlie nodded. His glance flicked briefly to me and I read the panic in it. Somewhere deep inside me, I felt an inexplicable shift.
‘I mean, I’ve never done anything like this before so I feel it’s only fair to warn you that the shots might not be great. But if you show me the kind of thing you want, I’d be happy to do what I could.’
I watched Charlie for a moment and surmised that him being ‘happy’ about it was probably an enormous overstatement. Alex caught my eye and I could see the same thought reflected in his expression.
‘Of course! We could do that, couldn’t we, Sam? Of course!’ Tilly gushed. She jumped up and rushed at Charlie, bumping into him with a huge hug. ‘Thank you thank you thank you!’ Charlie’s eyebrows rose in surprise and the corners of his eyes crinkled in laughter as he returned the hug. I saw Tilly’s shoulders start shaking as tears of relief overtook her.
Charlie tightened the hug. ‘It’ll be all right,’ he said quietly. ‘I promise.’
Tilly and Sam arranged to meet up with Charlie, and show him ideas for the sort of look they were going for, and then I sent her home. It had been a pretty emotional afternoon for them both and I could see Tilly’s telltale tics of when she got tired beginning to show. It was funny what you picked up when you worked so closely with someone every day.
‘I’d better be going too,’ Alex said as the door closed behind them.
‘You have to help me!’ Charlie sidestepped, blocking Alex’s exit. ‘I can’t corral a bunch of wedding guests! I’ll never get the shots she wants!’
Alex pulled his head back and shook it, confusion showing on his face. ‘Then why did you offer to do it?’
‘Because the poor girl is about to get married and has no photographer. And she was so upset and crying! I couldn’t bear it!’
I felt the shift again.
Alex laughed. ‘Mate,’ was all he said.
‘You have to help me,’ Charlie said again, his tone definite. ‘You’re the one with experience in crowd control.’
Alex smiled and slapped him on the back. ‘Fine. I’ll help you. But I’m just saying now, if one of the bridesmaids is hot…’
I cleared my throat.
Charlie and Alex both looked at me.
‘Joking, I promise.’ Alex wrapped an arm around me and squeezed. ‘Just trying to wind up the knight in shining armour here. I promise,’ he said again, whispering it this time, close to my ear, his breath warm on my skin. He let go and dug in his pocket for his phone, bringing up the calendar. ‘What day is it again?’
I told Alex the date. He scrolled through and his face lost its smile.
‘I’m on duty. Sorry, mate, I can’t do it.’
I frowned. ‘But I thought you’d booked it off when I told you about it a few weeks ago? When I asked if you wanted to come with me?’
He threw me a sheepish look. ‘I kind of forgot.’
I nodded. ‘Right.’
‘Oh, God!’ Charlie sat down heavily on the sofa and dropped his head into his hands. ‘Why did I say I’d do it? What was I thinking?’ He pulled his hands down over his face.
I sat next to him.
‘You said you’d do it because you’re a good person and because you can do it. And you’re also much better than that loser she hired in the first place!’
‘Libby.’ He shook his head. ‘You know hordes of people aren’t really my thing.’
‘I do know that. So, I can help, if you want.’
‘Really?’
‘Of course. Besides—ʼ I threw a glance at Alex, eyebrow raised ‘—my date for it cancelled on me anyway.’
‘There we are, then. Problem solved,’ Alex said, holding up his hands. ‘I’d really better be going if I’m going to get to work on time.’
‘I’ll see you out.’
‘I’m really sorry about the wedding thing,’ Alex said when we’d stepped outside my front door to say goodbye in private. ‘I guess I just got distracted with everything going on at the moment.’
‘It’s all right.’
‘Let me make it up to you.’ Sliding his arms around my waist, he pulled me into his warm, hard body. ‘Dinner. Friday night. And I have the whole weekend off. Whatever you want to do.’ He gave me a look that told me exactly what he wanted to do.
‘Sure you don’t want to find a hot bridesmaid?’
He grinned. ‘Sorry, that just slipped out.’
‘Old habits die hard, eh?’
‘Something like that,’ he said softly, as he bent his head. His lips brushed my throat and both of us stopped thinking about bridesmaids.
I dropped my earring for the fourth time in a row, and realised just how nervous I was about this evening as I glanced over at my friend.
‘So, tonight’s the night?’ Amy giggled, stopping in on her way home from work. She was sitting on my bed, watching me move hangers about as I tried to decide on what to wear.
I made a point of pretending not to know what she was talking about.
‘What do you think of this?’ I asked, pulling out a floaty summer dress that seemed to chime perfectly with the warmth of the evening.
Amy ran the delicate fabric through her fingers. ‘Hmm, it is lovely. But it doesn’t really say “rip me off and sweep me away into ecstasy”.’
I fixed her with a look. ‘Sweep me away into ecstasy?’
She shrugged. ‘I’ve got a very dramatic book on the go at the moment. There’s a lot of that going on in it.’
I raised an eyebrow. ‘I see.’ I hung the dress back up. ‘Well, I’m kind of glad it doesn’t say rip me off because it cost a flippin’ fortune. Things could get expensive!’
Amy grinned. ‘Ooh! Sounds like you have some definite plans for this weekend…’
I pulled out another choice and held it up in front of her face, ignoring the insinuations of lengthy romps currently catapulting about in her head.
‘What about this one, then?’
‘Now that,’ she said, ‘is perfect.’
28
‘I’m going to be a bit late,’ Alex said, almost before I’d finished say
ing hello. He sounded a little out of breath and distracted and I could hear noise in the background over the line. ‘Sorry. I know it’s bad timing but something’s kicked off. Can I meet you at the restaurant instead?’
‘Of course. I’ll just get the bus in and meet you there.’
‘Great. I’m really sorry. Hopefully I won’t be too much later than we planned.’ I heard more noises in the background before he came back to me. ‘Got to go. I’ll see you later, babe.’
I made to return the sentiment but he’d already hung up.
Alex’s shifts often overran so I wasn’t worried. Thanks to everything going on in both of our lives right now, we’d actually had far fewer dates than most people who’d been going out for over two months would normally have done. I’d soon learned that his timekeeping wasn’t always the best, thanks to his job, and had adjusted around it. It wasn’t his fault and so it didn’t really become a problem. But tonight was supposed to be special. As Amy had hinted at, not so subtly, tonight might well be ‘the night’. Alex was off for a couple of days and, knowing that, I’d arranged to not work this weekend either, even though there were still a billion things I could be doing. This weekend was going to be about relaxing, being together, about us. That was the plan anyway.
Two hours later I was still sitting at the restaurant. Alone. It was a small, intimate affair, which, when there with a romantic partner, made it perfect. However, sitting at a table laid for two, when there was clearly only one of you, merely gave all the other diners a perfect view of you being stood up. The owner had kindly replaced the breadsticks after I’d gone through the first lot, but I hesitated in eating too many more. I had a feeling that his sympathetic refills might end up with me eating something close to my own bodyweight in bread if I wasn’t careful.
I’d had one text from Alex. It told me that he was still planning to make it, so I’d carried on sitting there. But after another hour with nothing from him, I was thoroughly fed up and close to the edge of livid. Even though I knew it was likely something out of his control, I was still the one sitting there like an idiot. I motioned the waiter over and requested the bill for the two glasses of wine I’d had. Glancing briefly at the owner, I saw a look exchanged between him and the server.
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