My Fake Wedding(130)

‘Instead of making himself useful mixing daiquiris for George, you mean,’ says Janice and we both burst out giggling like we haven’t done for the last week.

And laughing feels good.

I don’t mention that without George and David giving me a room and an office and a place to stay, I’d never have got Neat Eats off the ground. They’ve given me a career to be proud of. I can’t throw it back in their faces, now can I?

OK, so I conveniently forget it was Sam’s idea in the first place. I can’t think about that now. I’ve got enough to worry about what with the very strong likelihood of my forgetting my vows. And the possibility of the Home Office getting wind of the fact that I’m marrying a gay foreigner and paying a visit to our wedding.

And not just to throw confetti.

It’s nice to see George and David so happy. And I’m relieved to know that Janice is going to be OK. She took this week off work to help me as I baked an enormous pink wedding cake and decorated it with love hearts, silver balls and pink Jelly Tots. Together, we made tiny prawn toasts with sesame seeds sprinkled all over them, miniature crispy duck pancakes and cooked up huge vats of hot and sour soup, chicken with cashew nuts and squid in black bean sauce.

Visiting Sam that one last time has taught me one thing.

I’ve definitely made the right decision.

I know who my friends are.

And I won’t be sleeping with any of them.

As I pull on my dress—a long, elegant sweep of sheer pinky gold (Didier has done me proud) and Janice puts the finishing touches to my hair and takes me outside to the waiting taxi, I squash any remaining doubts I might be having and decide to treat today as one big party.

My party.

And I’ll cry if I fucking well want to.

But then I might just as well laugh.

The way I’m feeling, who can tell?

‘Just one thing,’ Janice whispers as we climb into the black cab. ‘You may well be entering a sexless marriage but where there’s a will there’s a way.’

‘What?’

‘Remember when Rory Wilsher dumped me?’ she says, un-twisting one of the spaghetti straps of her Barbie-pink maid of honour’s outfit. ‘I used to spend a fortune on taxis. Even to work.’

‘Oh yes,’ I remember. ‘You did. I thought that was because you were too grief-stricken by your loss to manage to walk.’

‘Bollocks it was.’ She grins. ‘Now, sit there. Right in the middle.’

I obey, shifting along a bit, almost dropping my bouquet of pink rosebuds on the floor of the car.

‘There,’ she says. ‘Feel anything?’

‘Yes,’ I say, a grin spreading across my face. ‘I think I do.’

‘There you go. Better than a vibrator any bloody day.’

We’re still laughing when we reach Chelsea registry office. I’m still a bit pissed from all the champagne I’ve drunk that morning, but George—bless him—remembers to put a blanket over my head as we trot from the car to the building, so that in the likely event that my mother is doing a Peter Jones run this fine Saturday morning, she won’t spot me and have kittens all over the pavement.

‘People will think you’re a pop star,’ he says as we make our way up the steps.

‘That’s what I’m afraid of,’ I grumble. ‘Hurry up, will you? I can’t see fuck. And I don’t want to attract attention to myself.’

David’s friend Straight Rigby gives me away in the end. I’ve never met him before but he seems very nice. And though it all seems very strange, being the only straight person (apart from Rigby and Janice) at my own wedding, I realise I don’t really mind one bit.

At least there’s no one from the Home Office here. The whole thing looks suspiciously gay.

I don’t think all the pink helps. And the glitter confetti’s a bit the wrong side of camp, too.

I sneak a quick look round the audience and notice that there are actually other straight people here. Poppy and Seb have turned up. Poppy, pregnant and blooming in a tube of dark purply-pink silk. Seb in a dark suit with a matching purply-pink tie. Bless them. This so isn’t their thing but I’m glad of their support. And—ohmigod—sitting in a seat at the front on the other side, twinkling away at me as if her life depended on it, is George’s mum. She blows me a kiss. I look at George, who is beaming.

‘I told her,’ he mouths.

My heart fills with pride. I knew he could do it. And it’s all obviously fine. His dear old mum has come to his boyfriend’s wedding.

I knew she was cool as fuck.

The only person that’s definitely missing is Sam.

I sigh. No matter how much I’ve been trying to pretend otherwise, I’ve been half hoping he might turn up and stop the wedding in its tracks. Bang on the floor, Four Weddings and a Funeral style, when it gets to the bit about ‘If there is anyone present who knows a reason why this marriage should not go ahead’.