“Not really.” She sighs. “But I’m thankful you’re here and not Jonathan. I love him, but he’d be so mortified about how I behaved that he’d make me feel even guiltier than I do. He’s such a good person. Too good, almost.”
“She provoked you,” I reason.
“Mm.” She takes a sip of wine and recoils. “Eugh. That tastes like… petrol.”
“It was a bargain, though.”
“True.” She laughs, placing the glass back on the sticky-topped bar. “OK, I have a question I’ve wanted to ask you ever since you strolled into my parents’ kitchen that day and introduced yourself. I haven’t asked because…”
“Because you hated me,” I offer, when she trails off.
“I never hated you.” She frowns. “I didn’t like what you represented. You were being paid to hang out with me.”
I roll my eyes. “I’ve already told you that that’s not—”
“Blah, blah, blah, I know,” she says, waving my sentence away impatiently. “I’m saying that’s how I felt.”
“What was the question you wanted to ask?”
She takes a deep breath. “Why do you like being a bridesmaid? I can’t understand it at all! I can see why people mightwanta bridesmaid, but who would want to be one all the time?”
“I love it!”
“I don’t believe you,” she says firmly. “You have to spend all your time around brides, who all think their day is the most important one. You have to put up with their whining and whinging and demands, and once the big day arrives, you can’t enjoy it because you’re too busy making sure they’re happy. I don’t get it! You’re dedicating your life to a load of nonsense.”
“Don’t hold back, Cordelia! Bloody hell!” I burst out laughing at her tirade. “And you’re missing the point.”
“All right, then.” She winces, taking another sip of wine. “Tell me the point.”
“Weddings are fun,” I say. “At a wedding, everyone in the room is important to the couple and they’ve made the effort to be there to celebrate and support them, to get merry together, to dance stupidly and have alaugh.That’s really for me the best thing about a wedding. Life is one big mess and the world can be really shit. But at a wedding everyone is happy. Everyone is given a few hours of escape from the everyday. How many events can claim that?”
She looks at me thoughtfully. “So you enjoy your job? You like babysitting all these brides?”
“I’m not babysitting them, I’m helping them. And, yeah, I do,” I say, before adding, “although not the parts where the brides throw their smoothies over me and ask me to write to the Queen demanding the loan of her tiara.”
She closes her eyes, nodding slowly. “Yeah. Sorry about all that.”
“Two apologies in one day,” I point out. “I’m not sure what I’ve done to deserve this, but keep ’em coming.”
“I wanted you to quit.” She sighs.
“No kidding.”
She holds up her hands. “I’ve said I was wrong. I’m not… used to having friends. I don’t like having friends, I mean. I likebeing on my own. Or I’m used to being on my own. Jonathan is one of those people who has hundreds of friends. He’s always busy, being sociable. He makes time for everyone and they all love him. When we first met, I never thought he’d be interested in someone like me. I wasn’t exactly his type. But, inexplicably, we clicked.”
“Sometimes that’s the way it is. You can’t explain it.”
She rolls her eyes. “Gross.”
“Why is that gross?” I laugh. “You’re so uncomfortable with emotion.”
“I’m not! You’re just cheesy.”
“Well, I am a professional bridesmaid.”
She takes a large gulp of wine, nearly finishing her glass, and waves the barman over. I take a few swigs of mine to catch up, realizing that it’s easier to drink if I get it down fast without really tasting it. “I’ll get this round,” I say.
“No, I shall get this round,” she insists, waggling her card at the barman, who looks bored with us already. “Two more glasses of your fine wine, good sir.”
