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‘Please don’t try to call. I am too angry and upset to speak to you right now. I’m staying at an airport hotel tonight and going to go to Ibiza in the morning. The honeymoon is non-refundable, and I have the fundraising meeting with the Almond Project out there this week, so I need to go. You’ll have the flat to yourself this week. We can talk when I’m back.’
Audrey stared at the words, rereading them, willing them to be different. He sounded so cold.
‘He’s going on your honeymoon, without you?’ Clara said. She sounded horrified.
‘I wouldn’t want to waste a five-star hotel in Ibiza either,’ said Hillary. ‘I mean if you’re going to be heartbroken, you may as well be heartbroken surrounded by luxury and sunshine.’
‘He’s got a meeting out there with this tree charity he’s on the board of. Oh, I don’t want him to be heartbroken.’ Audrey felt as though her heart was being compressed in a vice. ‘Poor Josh.’
Another text pinged through, and Audrey immediately looked back at her phone.
‘Is it him again?’ asked Clara.
‘No. Brian’s asking what I want done about the wedding presents. Oh hell, what do I want done about the wedding presents?’ Audrey wailed.
‘Let me deal with Brian. Cakes and crises are my forte,’ said Hillary, reaching back to pat Audrey on the knee.
When they arrived back at the Kennington flat, Hillary and Clara both insisted on staying the night. It was eleven o’clock now, and they didn’t want Audrey to be alone. Clara went to call Jay, whom they had left behind at Millward Hall, to check he’d got the girls to bed without her. Hillary riffled through Audrey’s cupboards, found some crisps, and then wrapped himself in a blanket on the sofa next to Audrey.
‘I feel like I went a little bit mad back there,’ Audrey said. ‘It was like the wedding version of The Shining.’
‘Don’t be too hard on yourself,’ said Hillary, putting an arm around her shoulders. ‘Getting married is scary at the best of times. I find it hard to commit to what I want to eat for lunch each day, let alone a lifetime of sex with only one person. Add in a few omens and heart attacks and ghosts of boyfriends past, and honestly, Audrey, it’s a wonder that things went as well as they did.’
‘How did anything go well?’ Audrey asked.
‘Well, we’re all alive to tell the tale, and everyone looked fabulous. I don’t think anything’s unfixable.’
Audrey reached for a handful of crisps.
‘I think Fred was this fantasy embodiment of “the perfect guy”, but I never really knew him. Him showing up this weekend just reminded me of the person I was at twenty-two, when I thought I knew who I was, what I wanted. It reminded me how stuck I’ve been. Maybe I’m not sorted enough to get married.’
‘Bullshit,’ said Hillary, making a single clap with his hands, just as Clara came back through from the spare room.
‘Excuse me?’
‘I call bullshit on what you are saying. I don’t like this narrative that’s crept into books and films. This idea that you are not worthy of love until you have your life sorted out, that you need to be sure in your career, completely mentally stable and happy before you can be loved. I fucking love you, whether you’re a work in progress or a finished article. So should Josh, and so should you.’ Audrey had rarely seen Hillary so animated. ‘Do you really want to live in a world where only the sorted people get to be in love?’
‘I agree,’ said Clara. ‘Do you think I’m a finished article, do you think Jay is? Everyone’s just winging it, working life out as we go along.’
‘Weren’t you saying how difficult it’s been between you lately?’ Audrey said with a frown. ‘I feel like if you and Jay find marriage tough, what hope does anyone else have?’
‘Of course it’s tough. I haven’t slept for months, my hormones are all over the place, but I wouldn’t be without Jay, not really, not for a minute.’ She paused. ‘I’m sorry if I made you think that I wasn’t happy. I wasn’t being fair on him earlier, he’s been amazing this weekend, really stepped up with the girls. He even suggested he could do more flexible hours when I go back to work. It’s made me feel like we’re a proper team again.’
‘Oh, thank goodness.’ Audrey pulled Clara down onto the sofa, so she could hug a friend in each arm. ‘So, you don’t think I need to have a career epiphany and start going to therapy?’
‘Hopefully you will do both those things, but they shouldn’t be a precursor to being lovable.’ Hillary narrowed his eyes at her. ‘Even if you’re always a bit indecisive, and selfish, even if you change jobs as often as you change your underwear, we don’t care.’
Audrey felt herself tear up. ‘I think that’s one of the nicest things anyone has ever said to me.’ She wiped away a tear. ‘Where have you put my brutally sarcastic friend?’
‘Occasionally he needs a day off. Seriously though, you should tell Josh what happened with Benedict and your mother, give him a chance to understand.’
‘I feel pathetic that I let that man get to me. People out there have actually been abused, have been physically hurt and I – well, I don’t think I ever felt entitled to be as upset about it as I was.’
‘If it upset you, you’re entitled to be upset,’ Hillary said, firmly.
‘A hundred per cent,’ said Clara.
She leaned over to Hillary to close the circle in a full group hug.
‘I still can’t believe Josh is going on our honeymoon without me,’ Audrey said, softly.
‘Don’t look so defeated. What would Scarlett O’Hara do?’ asked Hillary.
‘Cry? Steal? Make herself a dress out of the curtains?’
‘She would get herself on a plane to Ibiza, and she wouldn’t take no for an answer,’ said Hillary triumphantly.
‘You really think I should just turn up at the airport and insist on going too?’
‘Your name is on the ticket,’ he replied with a shrug. ‘Today may have been a disaster, Audrey, but tomorrow? Tomorrow is another day.’
