‘The trouble with a July wedding, or August come to that, is that so many people go away on holiday, don’t they? It seems everyone tends to book well ahead these days.’ Caroline Kittering poured coffee from the cafetière into tiny bone china coffee cups. ‘Toby, be a dear and pass that to Sarah.’ She looked enquiringly at her husband. ‘Jon-Jon?’ Dr Kittering roused himself from his reverie and took his coffee, and Caroline went on, ‘A summer wedding is by far the nicest, I always think, because there’s less chance of the weather letting one down. Though nothing’s guaranteed, is it? You remember your cousin Camilla’s wedding last June, don’t you, Toby? The weather was perfect all week, then on the day it absolutely bucketed down, and everyone had to huddle in the marquee instead of having drinks on the lawn as planned, and all the guests who had parked in the paddock were stuck in the mud, and Mervyn had to get duckboards, or whatever they call them, to get people out. They even had to use the local farmer’s tractor …’
Sarah wound a strand of blonde hair round one finger, indulging in a fantasy which involved kicking Caroline’s chair over and stuffing a napkin into her busy mouth as she lay flapping on the Axminster. Dear God, would the woman never shut up? Letting Toby’s parents get involved in the wedding plans had been a huge mistake, but there was no going back now. Jonathan Kittering was her father’s oldest friend, and the Kitterings had been over the moon when she and Toby had announced their engagement. It had been Caroline Kittering’s idea to help with the wedding arrangements, since Sarah’s mother was dead, and Sarah’s father had agreed to it before Sarah could say anything. So here they were, spending the weekend at the Kittering’s house near Egham, and talking about absolutely nothing but the bloody wedding.
She glanced sideways at Toby, and he slipped her a wink. She felt a small surge of affection, but it ebbed quickly away. Looking ahead to her married life, she saw a pageant of ritual visits stretching ahead. Sunday lunches. Christmases, dreary hours spent listening to Caroline Kittering – Wittering, more like – trying to animate her existence with endless talk about people and events, while Toby’s father, the retired paediatric consultant, sat in a postprandial glaze of boredom and inertia, and the late afternoon light faded over the Surrey countryside, and the years passed by. She felt overwhelmed by a sense of claustrophobia. She couldn’t wait to be out of here and heading up the M25 in Toby’s Porsche towards London and real life.
‘So perhaps June is the best month. Or maybe even May? What do you two think?’
Sarah realised that Caroline was asking her a direct question, and roused herself. ‘Well, Toby and I haven’t really discussed it yet.’ She turned to look at Toby.
‘No,’ agreed Toby. ‘We’ll have to give it some thought. Though those are probably the best months.’
Caroline sipped her coffee. She was a small woman, with a very downy face, bright, questing eyes, and a dumpy, pear-shaped figure. Sarah, who found it hard to believe that such a short woman could have such an enormous arse, couldn’t help worrying about the genes. What if she had a child with a backside that big? A tiny baby with an outsize bottom, straining its nappy the way Caroline Kittering’s buttocks strained the fabric of her Country Casuals skirt. She’d just have to hope that any children they had took after Toby and his father, who were both tall and more or less conventionally shaped.
‘Well, you’ll have to get your skates on,’ said Caroline. ‘Not long till November, and next year will be on us before we know it. Lots to do! If we’re going to have the wedding here we’ll have to start thinking about a marquee, and booking the church.’ She turned to Toby’s father. ‘Jon-Jon, it might be an idea if you had a word with the vicar. St Luke’s gets very booked up.’
Christ, thought Sarah, a six-month run-up, and it could only get worse as the detail kicked in. To say nothing of post-wedding fallout. Camcorder footage, photo albums, fond reminiscence. She hadn’t realised how oppressive being drawn into the bosom of Toby’s loving family would be. Her own experience of family life, as an only child, had been quite different, everyone casually and fleetingly affectionate, but operating largely in their own separate spheres. Even before her mother had died when Sarah was fifteen, family intimacy had never been on this intense, need-to-know-and-interfere basis. How did Toby stand it? Perhaps with two sisters and a brother the effect was diluted.
Then again, maybe there were worse things than marrying into a boring family. The in-laws of a recently married friend of Sarah’s had turned out to be as mad as a box of frogs. The wedding had been hilariously awful, with family rows and drunken, spiteful speeches. At least Caroline and Jon-Jon were safe and reliable. Perhaps she would come to find something reassuring in their dreary conventionality, their nice house, their nice neighbours, and their fearful self-satisfaction. The countrified middle classes hanging on by their fingertips to a disappearing way of life in the face of collapsing banks, terrorist threats, the disappearance of rural post offices, socially engineered universities, imploding property prices and The Third Runway.