The Importance of Being Married: A Novel

by Gemma Townley

  I still felt fantastic the following morning when I arrived at work twenty minutes late.

  “Jess!” Anthony grinned at me. “How’s my favorite fiancée?”

  I grinned back and took a slurp of my coffee. “Oh, you know,” I said, nonchalantly. “Not too bad.”

  “Jess!” Max appeared out of his office. “Listen, do you have a minute? I wanted to have a quick word about the Project Handbag account. Thought you might have some ideas on…”

  He trailed off as the reception doors flung open and a familiar voice stopped us in our tracks.

  “Anthony? Jessica? So sorry I’m late. Do I need to sign in or anything?”

  It was Fenella, her glossy brown hair pulled into a neat ponytail, clutching a large file in her hands.

  “Late?” I asked uncertainly. “I didn’t know you were even coming.”

  “You didn’t know?” She stared at me, then raised an eyebrow at Anthony. “But Anthony and I arranged this at the party. On Saturday night. Anthony, you remember, don’t you?”

  “We did?” Anthony asked, then nodded, shooting me a look of helplessness. “Of course we did. At the party. Definitely.” He pulled a face at me, like a naughty schoolboy. “In which case, let’s go to my office, shall we?”

  “Well, good,” Fenella said suspiciously.

  “I’ll…catch you later, shall I?” Max asked.

  “Yes. Probably best,” I said vaguely. Fenella was now marching Anthony into his office. By the time I’d followed her in, she was sitting down at his meeting table with an expectant look on her face.

  “So,” she said immediately. “What was it you wanted to talk about?”

  I smiled weakly. “Me? Oh, there’s nothing. I mean, you know, whatever you want to talk about.”

  “Oh, but it’s not about me,” Fenella said seriously. “Whatever you have to say, you must say now—we can’t have any surprises later. We’ve got a tight schedule, so anything that needs to be said must be said now.”

  Her eyes were boring into mine and I shot a helpless look at Anthony, who shrugged back and looked like he was stifling laughter. “Right,” I said, clearing my throat and trying to think of something—anything—to talk about. “Right. Well…”

  “Yes?” Fenella looked at me expectantly, then got up and walked toward Anthony’s desk. “You don’t mind if I take a look around, do you?” she asked him, not waiting for an answer. “Helps if I really know the client, you see. I need to get a feel for what you’re looking for. Sorry, Jess. You were saying?”

  I watched silently as Fenella scanned the desk’s surface briefly, her eyes widening slightly at the various piles of paper stacked on top of it. No doubt her desk had no such piles, I found myself thinking. She was probably one of those people who cleared it every night.

  “Well,” I said tentatively, “well, I mean, there’s so much really. You know, all the…wedding plans, really…”

  “House hunting, are we?” Fenella said suddenly, picking up a photograph of a house from Anthony’s desk. “Looks lovely. Perfect country retreat.” She held up the photograph for us both to look at—it was a honey-colored crumbling house with a bright blue sky behind it.

  Anthony got up and quickly moved toward her. “That? Oh, yes. Yes, just something I’ve been looking at,” he said dismissively.

  I started. “You are? I mean, we are? I thought you hated the country.”

  He shrugged and reddened. “And you love it. So I thought, you know, why not have a look.”

  “Really?” I stared at him incredulously, guiltily. I could hardly tell him we were going to have a mansion of our own in a few weeks. “Let me see!” I held out my hand for Fenella to pass me the photograph; Anthony got there first, though.

  “See? No. No, not until I’ve…” he said, taking the photo quickly from Fenella. “It was meant to be a surprise,” he added firmly, putting it in his pocket.

  “A surprise?” I bit my lip. “That’s so sweet. It’s…really unexpected.”

  “Anything for you.” Anthony shot me a benevolent smile.

  “So, anyway,” Fenella said, walking back to the table and picking up her pad. “Wedding plans. You’re right, there is a lot to discuss. Shall we start? I’ve got a list of things to go through that’s as long as my arm, and no doubt you’ve got one, too. Would you like to go first?”

  “Oh, no, I think you should go first,” I insisted. “And I’ll fill in any gaps later. If there are any, that is…”

  Fenella nodded, seriously. “Good idea. Right, so first, I wanted to run an idea by you. Lilies. Thousands of lilies everywhere. What do you think? I mean, the smell alone would be incredible, don’t you think?”

  “Lilies,” I said vaguely. Anthony was making faces at me and I was having trouble keeping a straight face. “Right.”

  “Aren’t lilies usually used at funerals?” Anthony asked, po-faced.

  Fenella shook her head. “No. I mean, yes, sometimes. But I really think that in this day and age one can—”

  She was interrupted by the door opening; Marcia’s head appeared through it. “Anthony,” she said, smiling sweetly. “I need your help on something. Can you spare a minute?”

  “Now?” Anthony looked at her hopefully.

  “Yes. I’m sorry,” Marcia said. “But it’s Project Handbag. I could really do with your input.”

  “Right,” Anthony said seriously. “Well, okay. If you ladies will excuse me?”

  He smiled at me; I looked at Marcia. “If you want,” I said tentatively, “I can help, too. I mean, I’m sure Fenella wouldn’t mind waiting a few minutes…”

  “Don’t be silly!” Marcia exclaimed. “Jess, I wouldn’t dream of it.”

  “No,” Anthony agreed. “You stay here with Fenella. I won’t be long.”

  “Fine,” I called after them as they disappeared from his office. “No problem.”

  “So, we’re agreed on lilies?” Fenella asked, her pen poised over her pad. “Can I tick them off?”

  I nodded vaguely. Lilies. Then I frowned. “Um, lilies—they’re flowers, aren’t they?”

  Fenella looked at me uncertainly. “Yes, that’s right.”

  “Right. It’s just that I thought I was doing flowers.”

  “Oh, I see,” Fenella said, nodding seriously. “So you wanted to do, like, all the flowers? Not just your bouquet?”

  I nodded back, just as seriously.

  “It’s just that flowers are quite, you know, pivotal,” she continued.

  “No, I know that. But I thought we agreed…you know, that I’d do them,” I said, tension creeping into my voice. It wasn’t like I knew anything about flowers, but suddenly, having control over them felt like the most important thing in the world to me. I’d lost Project Handbag; if I didn’t do the flowers, there would be no point to my life. No point to anything.

  There was a silence as Fenella looked at her list. “And you definitely want to do all of them? Ceremony, table pieces, bouquets, the lot?”

  “The lot,” I said, gripping the table with my hand. “Every single one.”

  Fenella cleared her throat. “Well, fine. But do keep me informed. The more I know, the more I can make sure that things don’t slip through the net.”

  “They won’t,” I said, crossing my arms defensively. “The flowers are going to be fine. Absolutely fine.”

  “Great,” Fenella said, forcing a smile. “So I can tick off flowers. Next is catering. I’ve got some menu plans here, and I’ve highlighted in red the ones that I think would work best. Obviously, it’s your choice, but the ones I’ve chosen will, I think, work best as a whole. And while you’re looking at the menus, do you have a sketch of your wedding dress for me?”

  “Not yet,” I said, scanning the menus. “But I will have. I’m going shopping with my friend Helen today.”

  “Today?” Fenella said uncertainly. “You don’t have one picked out already?”

  “No, not yet,” I said, my heart sinking as I glanced at Fe
nella’s list and saw that catering was only number two of twenty-five categories. “But so long as we can wrap this meeting up as quickly as possible, I can’t see there being a problem.”

  Fenella nodded dubiously. “Okay,” she said. “Now for table dressing…”

  The Wedding Dress Shop was near Oxford Street and de rigueur for any would-be bride, according to Helen. It promised to have the right dress for every bride in its adverts, and Helen was determined to put it to the test. I was still out of breath from having run up the tube escalator; Fenella had managed to talk about wedding cakes for over forty-five minutes, making me late to meet Helen by the time I finally got out of the meeting.

  “And then she took out her list, Hel. It was so long, I thought I was going to die.”

  “But you didn’t,” Helen said, opening the doors to the shop. We were met by heavy carpet and walls lined with long white dresses. “And now we’re looking at wedding dresses so you’re going to have to stop thinking about that Fenella woman.”

  “I know.” I sighed. “But I didn’t think I was ever going to get out of that meeting.”

  “Focus,” Helen said sternly as a fierce-looking woman appeared out of nowhere, her eyes fixed on us suspiciously. Her role appeared to be to check fingers for engagement rings, stare down potential interlopers, and ensure that only true brides (with appointments) were allowed to darken their hallowed doors.

  “Do you have an appointment?” she asked immediately.

  “Yes. Jessica Wild.” Helen walked straight past her, seemingly oblivious to the protocol.

  The woman’s eyes narrowed. “And which one of you is Miss Jessica Wild?”

  I smiled awkwardly. “That would be me.”

  She nodded and let me pass. Immediately, a sweeter-looking woman in her fifties approached me, a big smile on her face.

  “Date of wedding?”

  I smiled back. “Week after next. April twenty-third.”

  The woman’s eyes opened wide. “The week after next?”

  I nodded. “We…we’re getting married at the Hilton Park Lane,” I said nervously. “There was a…cancellation.”

  “A cancellation indeed,” the woman tutted. “Well. My name is Vanessa, and I’ll be your assistant this morning. It’s lovely to meet you. Here at the Wedding Dress Shop, we’re all about making dreams come true. So, Jessica, do you have an idea in mind of the sort of dress you’re after?”

  I looked at her blankly. I wanted a wedding dress. Wasn’t that obvious?

  “Um, something white I suppose,” I said. “Or cream?”

  Vanessa looked at me uncertainly. “Full-skirted? Column? Strapless? Lace? Silk?” she prompted.

  “Oh, right,” I said with relief. “Um, I guess I don’t really know, actually.”

  “Nothing that makes her look like a meringue,” Helen said, suddenly appearing at my side.

  “A meringue?” Vanessa turned to her with an expressionless face.

  “Like the Good Witch from The Wizard of Oz,” Helen explained.

  “The Good Witch,” Vanessa said, looking very doubtful. “No. Of course.” She looked me up and down. “And you’re a size…ten? twelve?”

  I shrugged. “Somewhere around there,” I said. “Depending, you know, on the shape…”

  She looked at my ample chest. “Yes. Yes, I can see that.” Then she moved over to the rails and started to pick up dresses, heaping them over her arm. A few minutes later, almost invisible behind the mountain of dresses she was carrying, she led us into a sumptuous changing room complete with podium. “For the bride,” she explained when Helen looked at it curiously.

  Deftly, she hung up all the dresses on a rail, then smiled at me. “Try them on, see what you think,” she said. “From these we should be able to determine the kind of style that suits you best.”

  I nodded and stifled a yawn as Vanessa left us.

  “Okay, this one first,” Helen said, pulling out a huge dress that seemed to have as much fabric as a pair of curtains. I eyed it cautiously.

  “Really?”

  “Really.”

  Unconvinced, I got undressed and slipped into it; ten minutes later, Helen had finally secured all the hook-and-eye fastenings and I turned to look at myself in the mirror. Immediately I started to giggle.

  “What?” Helen said, crossly. “What’s so funny.”

  “It’s ridiculous,” I said firmly. “It’s too big, too froufrou…These sleeves…” I waved my arms, demonstrating the impracticality of the huge marshmallows surrounding them. “They’d get in my food. Small birds would fly into them and be unable to escape. They’d nest in there and I wouldn’t even notice.”

  “You’re wearing a three-thousand-pound dress, Jess. Try to at least appreciate it a little bit, won’t you?”

  I felt the blood drain from my face. “Three thousand pounds? Are you serious? You could buy a car for three thousand pounds. It would cover my rent for six months. Three thousand pounds?”

  Helen sighed. “That’s how much wedding dresses are.”

  “But I don’t have three thousand pounds,” I said weakly.

  “No, but soon you will.” Helen rolled her eyes.

  “I’m not spending three thousand pounds on this,” I said, pursing my lips slightly. “It’s hideous.”

  “Fine,” Helen relented. “Try the next one.”

  The next one was the sort of thing that Paris Hilton might wear—a tiny column that revealed maximum cleavage and had cutouts to reveal a flat, toned stomach. Only I didn’t have a flat, toned stomach; I had my stomach and even Helen shook her head as soon as I’d pulled it on.

  She pulled out a lacy number, then wrinkled her nose. “This one’s only two hundred pounds and you can tell it’s cheap,” she said dismissively. “The lace feels stiff.”

  I took it from her. “Two hundred pounds is not cheap and it doesn’t feel stiff,” I said crossly, even though as soon as it was in my hands I knew she was right. It felt wrong, felt prickly to the touch. I slipped it over my head, and Helen zipped it up.

  “It’s okay, I suppose,” she said, wrinkling her nose. “Shape-wise, I mean. But it’s nothing special. I mean, it’s just a dress. Not…you know…the dress.”

  I looked at my reflection. Helen was right. I looked like a bride in a mail-order catalogue.

  “Fine, unzip me,” I said. “How many more to go?”

  Helen counted. “Ten.”

  She handed me another. And then another, neither of which worked. They either washed me out, made me look fat, or made me look like I was auditioning for a part in a pantomime.

  “I’m never going to find anything,” I said despondently. “Maybe I’m just not a wedding-dress type of person.”

  Helen rolled her eyes. “There’s no such thing.” She handed me another dress, this one made of organza silk that felt soft and buttery in my hands. Sighing, I stepped into it. It was strapless, fitted to the waist, then flowed out in a bias cut.

  “Bias cut is never going to work on me,” I said dismissively, as she fastened the buttons. “It’ll just emphasize my hips.” I stood back in front of the mirror, not looking up.

  “Oh my God.” Helen’s eyes widened.

  “What?” I asked, anxiously. “Is it really that bad?”

  “Not bad.” Helen shook her head. “Not bad at all.”

  She turned me around so I was facing the mirror; I looked up and gasped. It was beautiful. It actually made me look beautiful. Like a bride. Like a real bride.

  The curtain opened and Vanessa peeked in. “Oh. Oh, yes. Oh, you’ve found it,” she whispered. “Oh, I do love this moment. You don’t choose a wedding dress, you see—it chooses you.”

  “Oh my God,” Helen said again.

  I looked back at myself. I did look amazing. Truly amazing. But somehow, as I stared at my reflection, I felt myself go slightly white. Then suddenly I felt myself shaking slightly. It started with my hands. Then my arms were at it, and the rest of my body soon followed.
>
  “What’s wrong?” Vanessa asked in alarm. “What’s the matter?”

  I felt sick. I felt like I was going to faint. The walls were closing in; everything went dark except the image in front of me—a bride in a white dress, so full of hope, so full of expectation. So naïve, so vulnerable.

  “Please, take it off,” I begged. My hands were pulling at the bodice; Vanessa rushed to unzip it.

  “Are you okay? Can I get you some water?”

  I nodded, pulling the dress off with relief. “Water,” I whispered. “Water would be good.”

  Vanessa left and Helen stared at me worriedly. “What’s the matter? You looked amazing.”

  “I…I don’t know,” I said, my voice small and faltering. I was standing in my underwear and I slowly sank down to the floor, pulling my knees to my chest.

  “You don’t know?” Helen asked.

  “I…what if it’s a mistake? I mean, what if it doesn’t work out?”

  “Don’t be silly,” she said firmly. “You’re having wedding jitters. Everyone has them. Just pull yourself together.”

  “Okay. I will. I…” I said, feeling my throat begin to seize up.

  “Jess?”

  I tried to smile, but instead big fat tears appeared at my eyes and started to roll down my cheeks.

  “Jess, what is it?” Helen asked, a look of concern on her face. “What is wrong with you?”

  “Nothing. I mean…Really, I’m fine,” I said, wiping the tears away with the back of my hand. “I mean, people get married all the time, don’t they? It’s no big deal, right?”

  “Not to you, no,” she said, frowning. “Come on, Jess. This is a financial transaction. If it works out, that’s just a bonus.”

  I nodded. “A bonus. Right.”

  “And he’s very good looking,” Helen pointed out. “And you’re having a great time with him, so it all bodes well, doesn’t it?”

  “I guess,” I agreed. “So you don’t think marriage is…I mean, you don’t think it’s that important?”