Page 12 of The Ghost of Exes Past

What?! I spin around. ‘You’re fucking with me.’

‘Sorry, sweetheart, I don’t make the rules.’

I feel my body erupting again and have to resist the urge to grab the nearest pillow and scream into it. Why can’t anything ever go to plan? Can I not just enjoy the day I spent months organising? The amount of money we’ve spent on this, and I can’t just let my hair down? I think of the wedding party tomorrow, the evening dress I have perfectly curated: long enough to be demure but loose enough to really let go on the dance floor.

Maybe if we can just get this over and done with now, then I can still have my dream wedding tomorrow. The clock reads 3.57 p.m. – three minutes until I need to go down for the first look. I just need to see Timothy. A real, living, breathing man who will not appear uninvited in mirrors or ask about my exes. The one with an actual pulse. Then I can get back to this time-travel nonsense before midnight and my perfect day can resume … with no ghosts in sight.

I face him sternly. ‘Okay, here’s the plan. I have to go now for the photoshoot, then we’ll go down memory lane again, and I’ll do whatever I have to do to save my soul from … What was it?’

‘Eternal damnation.’

‘Right, eternal damnation. Then I’m going to my rehearsal dinner, and we can do some more. But we must get this wrapped up today so I can still walk down the aisle with the love of my life tomorrow. Got it?’

‘Sure thing, boss,’ Jake replies softly.

‘Great. Now fuck off so I can finish getting myself ready.’ I grab a wet wipe and very gently remove the smudged mascara under my eyes, and quickly open the tube to reapply. Thank God I’m so used to putting on makeup on the London Underground – doing this with shaky hands has become second nature. Then I grab my lipstick, dot a little onto my lips and cheeks, and watch his reflection in the mirror. It doesn’t move. I widen my eyes at him, tilt my head pointedly towards the door as I blot.

‘Can I join?’ he says, straightening up.

‘Me getting ready? Absolutely not, what is wrong with you.’

‘No – the party.’

I turn to look at him properly. He’s not joking. He’s puffing his chest out and swaggering towards me. He’s deadly serious.

‘It might be nice to see some familiar friendly faces. Truthfully, I miss weird Aunt Susan. Will she still be layered to the high heavens? Plus, I’m already on the list … People are expecting me.’

I brandish my lip gloss at him like a knife. It’s the closest thing to a weapon I have and we both know it. ‘Stay away from my wedding, Jake. I mean it. Promise me you’ll stay here, and I’ll come back as soon as I can so we can hold hands, pretend we’re friends, and do the eternal damnation avoidance thing together.’ He shrugs. ‘Jake, promise me!’

‘All right, all right … keep your hair on.’ He waves his hands and walks indifferently over to the sofa, picking up the TV remote. ‘Do they have Sky Cinema here?’

‘Figure it out yourself, arsehole!’ I shout, slamming the door behind me on my way out.

Timothy’s arms are around my waist and his chin is resting on my shoulder, and the photographer is saying something I can’t hear because I’m too busy noticing how warm he is. How solid. How uncomplicated and present. Despite that, I’m shivering. Adrenaline? Or because it’s December in an old and proven-to-be-haunted manor house, and I couldn’t fix my blazer button in time so it had to go. The blinding flashes come to a stop, and Timothy, being the gentleman that he always is, shrugs off his jacket and places it around my shoulders.

The first thing that attracted me to him was his smile. Specifically, his deep dimples and the way that when you make him grin, time seems to slow; also, how that mole on his cheek lifts with his lips. Then his eyes: chocolate brown and kind. And yes, I might have a type, because Timothy is tall. Not Jake tall, but broad and solid and, crucially, not dead. A jaw covered in the perfect amount of stubble, the slightest suggestion of a moustache above his lip - the kind of face that turns heads when he enters a room. He’s also extraordinarily successful. Gets a lot of attention. I’ve decided to be gracious about that rather than smug, which has been an ongoing effort.

I look up at him as he sweeps a hair from my face and kisses my forehead, his hand still cradling my chin. I hear cameras clicking away again. Is it possible for a heart to beat so hard, it’s visible in a photograph?

Okay, everything is going to plan … Apart from the fact my dead ex is in my bridal suite. I’m ignoring that for now and focusing on the night ahead. After our photos, we are making our big entrance into the saloon (think dark-wood panels, enormous fireplaces, gold chandeliers, a grand staircase, a Christmas tree in the corner – no tinsel in sight, thank God – and, most importantly, free-flowing booze) where all our guests are waiting.

Once everyone has a glass in hand, we’ll kick off with short speeches from the father of the groom and of course Jules, grandmother of the bride, before sitting down to a seven-course tasting menu, inspired by some of our favourite dishes from throughout our relationship … a taster of things to come tomorrow.

The photographers reposition us in front of another fireplace. This one has a mantelpiece draped in ivy and holly, with a fat church candle at either end. I’m handed a flute of Crémant from the Loire Valley – Timothy and I went on holiday there two years ago and I fell in love with this buttery fizz. So much so that although Timothy is a champagne snob of the highest degree, it was never really a question it would appear on tonight’s menu. I take a sip, feel my shoulders drop for the first time in hours, and allow my body to melt into Timothy’s behind me.

This is probably our last moment somewhat alone, before the big day tomorrow. I’m aware of it and want to soak it up. I’ve read enough about what brides say they regret – yes, I researched it, because of course I did – and it’s always this: not stopping. Not taking ten minutes just to stand with the person you’re marrying, among all the chaos. I’m determined not to be part of that statistic.

I feel Timothy straighten up as I take another sip.

‘Darling, you and your surprises … How did you magic up a floating bottle of fizz?’ he whispers into my ear, amused, and I follow his gaze to just beyond the photographers, where Jake is helping himself to a glass without any urgency. ‘Technology these days …’ He shrugs as I almost choke on my drink.

It’s not technology. It’s my dead ex-boyfriend. And I have approximately five seconds before the glass floats to and pours into an invisible mouth – and, oh God, the photographers. The photographers who have been pointing their cameras at everything in this room and have been for the last twenty minutes. Is it possible to photograph a ghost? Will there be orbs in my wedding photographs? Or some sort of blur, some unexplained flash of light, some smoky echo of Jake’s face that will end up in every photo frame and slideshow for the rest of our lives and I’ll have to explain to our children and to their children that no, I’m not haunted, it was just old and dusty in the manor and … Oh, will they be able to tell looking back that I’m being haunted? Is being haunted visible? I’ve managed difficult press before, but I’m not sure even I could spin this. So I do the only thing I can think of – I grab Timothy’s face and kiss him. A long, passionate kiss, tongues and all. I crack one eye open to make sure Jake has moved, but catch the photographers looking awkwardly into their cameras, twiddling their fingers instead … Okay, good, they’ve stopped taking pictures but perhaps I’m going in a little too Love Island for a rehearsal dinner.

I pull away. Timothy is laughing and wipes his mouth with the back of his hand, cheeks flushed.

‘Belle,’ he cringes, loosening the bow tie around his neck.

That’s when I spot Jake wandering over to Jules. My glass nearly slides from my grip. I lean into Timothy, tell him I need to reapply my lipstick – with a wink, for good measure – and then slip away across the room.