The Wedding Crasher, page 21
‘Well in that case, I don’t know what I’m going to do with my life. The thought of going back to school is making me feel a bit sick. Josh is moving to senior management, so he’ll be coming in to observe me. Setting targets. Living the megalomaniac life of his dreams.’
A look of horror passed over Lola’s face. ‘That’s proper fucked up. Why didn’t you get out of there when you had the chance?’
‘I’ve only been thinking ahead one month at a time. Anything else makes me feel weak and useless.’
‘You know what will help provide you with some clarity?’ said Lola, nodding decisively.
‘What? No, no, no.’
‘Yes. Wait here.’
Lola pushed her chair back and trotted towards the hotel, her heels clacking on the paving slabs. In her absence, Poppy tuned in to the crickets whirring in the darkness and the gentle breeze that carried laughter from the open windows. After five minutes, Lola returned with a deck of cards and a velvet bag that she placed on the table with a clunk.
‘You know I think tarot cards are bullshit,’ groaned Poppy.
‘Because you’re uneducated and shrouded by modern life’s insistence for clean, lateral logic. Embrace it. Serious face, okay?’
Poppy sighed and straightened up. Lola took Poppy’s hands and flattened them on the table, palms facing the sky.
‘Now. Important question. Would you like to hold a crystal?’
Poppy burst out laughing, the exertion of surfing having settled painfully in her underused muscles.
‘Fine. You don’t deserve one. Okay, here we go.’ Lola cut, shuffled, and restacked the deck. She took Poppy’s hand and dangled it over the top, nodding as though this confirmed something. Next, she laid down three cards, each one placed on the table slowly and deliberately.
‘How long have you been doing this?’ asked Poppy. ‘Be honest, did you buy a course on Groupon?’
‘Shh! You’ll put me out of alignment. Okay. This one represents the past,’ said Lola, turning a card over.
Poppy angled her head to read it upside down. ‘Oh, great,’ she said. ‘Death. Really?’
‘No, this is good!’ said Lola, pushing the card towards her.
‘“Death” doesn’t sound good,’ said Poppy, pointing at the card. ‘The knight is literally a skeleton riding a horse with red eyes.’
‘It means rebirth. Change, you know? Which you’ve had.’
‘In abundance.’
‘Did you turn it around? Because it means something different if it’s flipped the other way. Stagnancy and resistance. Ring any bells?’
Poppy ignored her. ‘What’s the next one, oh Grand Mystique?’
‘The present. You, where you are now.’ Lola paused, her hand flat on the card to ensure Poppy was paying attention before she continued. Poppy rolled her eyes, laughed, and gave Lola a thumbs up. Lola flipped over another card. ‘Oh, ma chérie!’ Lola gasped, red fingernails held at lip level. ‘The Fool!’
‘It gets better and better,’ said Poppy, rolling her eyes.
‘Now, the Fool can be bad, but I don’t feel like that applies to you,’ pondered Lola, resting her chin on her hand. ‘The fool is on a journey, sometimes wise, sometimes mad, sometimes both.’
‘That sounds exhausting. Are you sure it doesn’t involve a nap and a family bag of minstrels?’
Lola made a pinch gesture in the air to stop Poppy talking. ‘You move towards the edge of the mountain, planting your feet, taking a risk, you know? You have a choice to make.’
‘Wasn’t the last one about making choices?
‘No, the last one was about… hmm. Hang on, I forgot.’ Lola pulled out her phone and began to tap on the screen.
Poppy jumped when her camera bag vibrated. ‘Did you just send me a text?’
‘No. Fuck, don’t let anyone see your phone,’ said Lola, her voice dropping to a whisper.
‘It’s in a flap at the bottom of my camera bag. I can’t reach it,’ said Poppy, ducking below the table. ‘My strap is caught around your chair leg.’
Lola grappled with the buckle and pulled out Poppy’s battered iPhone. They stayed under the table as a member of kitchen staff wheeled a trolley along the terrace, the silverware rattling as it passed over uneven tiles.
‘Who is it?’ said Poppy, bumping heads with Lola as she tried to look at the screen.
‘It’s an unknown number, but a Bath location. I’ll answer it. Security won’t get fussy if it’s me, I’m taking calls all the time.’
‘No, it’s okay, I’m sure it’s just a PPI thing, or—’
‘Hello?’ said Lola, leaning back in her seat. ‘Yep, Poppy speaking.’
‘Lola, don’t worry, it’s—’ Lola held a finger up and rolled her tongue around the inside of her cheek, her neatly outlined brows furrowed.
‘Sorry, he’s done what?’ said Lola, glancing at Poppy.
‘Give the phone to me.’
Lola shooed her away and sat back in her chair. ‘This has not been arranged with my consent. No, you listen to me. That is my property and you need permission from the homeowner to arrange viewings.’ Lola held the phone to her chest and blinked in shock. ‘That fucker! He’s trying to sell your house!’
‘Lola, pass it here and I can—’
‘In future, anything relating to the house should be directed to me via my solicitor.’ Lola blocked the microphone with her hand to address Poppy. ‘You do have a solicitor, don’t you?’
‘No,’ said Poppy, her stomach tight.
‘Why the fuck not?!’
‘I haven’t got round to it.’
‘Jesus.’ Lola uncovered the mouthpiece. ‘I’ll forward you a name and email address tomorrow.’ Poppy rapped the table and gestured for Lola to give her the phone, panic rising. She stood up, the metal seat sticking to her clammy legs as she reached over the table. Lola took a step back, her voice less brash as she spoke down the line. ‘No, I’ve been on a work assignment. Very exclusive. Barely any phone signal.’ Poppy could hear the caller from where she sat, but the words were indistinct. This time, Lola didn’t interrupt. ‘Sorry, how long ago?’ She looked at Poppy. ‘Right. Like I said, I’ll be in touch.’
She ended the call and passed the phone over, fixing Poppy with a cold stare.
‘Who was that?’ said Poppy, despite knowing exactly who it was.
‘An estate agent. They seem to think you’re selling your house.’
‘It was inevitable, I suppose.’
‘Poppy, this is your house. I just went all-guns-blazing on that poor woman thinking that Josh had organised it without telling you.’
‘He said he was thinking about it,’ said Poppy, angry at how small her voice became when she was forced to talk about him.
‘You broke up with him. Just because he’s hurt doesn’t mean you can let him treat you like this. How do you know he’s not going to use this as a chance to get back at you?’
‘Because he wouldn’t.’
‘He could, which means he will.’
‘I’ll sort it, don’t worry.’
‘I’m not worried about me. I’m worried about you. That estate agent said that you’ve been ignoring her emails and calls. Do you even want to sell the house? Move somewhere else, start afresh?’
‘I do, but I haven’t had time. You need a PhD to understand the paperwork. I don’t trust that—’
‘You’ll go through with it?’
Lola broke eye contact. Up at the hotel, the receptionist waved at them both and pointed to a man next to her who wore a linen jacket with a silken scarf bundled underneath his chin.
‘Christian is here!’ she called. ‘The photographer!’
Lola put the phone behind her back and waved in return. ‘I’ll come and meet him!’
Poppy picked up her camera bag and opened the flap for Lola to put the phone inside. ‘Looks like you’ll get to see your puffins before the end of the week,’ she said, the shadow of their previous conversation momentarily forgotten. She raised her eyebrows, as though trying to make a point. ‘I’ll catch up with you later.’ Lola clacked up the terracotta stairs, switching into the professional, exuberant persona she adopted for guests at Loxby.
When Poppy pushed her chair in, she noticed a lone tarot card face down on the floor. She pinched their empty glasses with one hand and picked it up. A jester looked back at her, one knee angled as he danced on the edge of a cliff, a white rose in hand.
‘Thanks a lot,’ she said, her stomach sloshing with anxiety as she slid the card inside her bra.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Poppy was used to being the refuge of students who wanted a legitimate excuse to stay off the playground at lunchtime. For some reason, she attracted the kids who listened to old Belle and Sebastian albums and still used Tumblr, which were two things that seemed stuck in a time warp from when she was a teenager herself. They spent their lunch hours making collages with blunt scissors and talked at length about friendship groups that shifted with the force and devastation that usually came with living on a fault line. Consciously or not, Poppy often found herself as the reluctant keeper of confessions, but something about Ottilie’s hot and cold treatment made her suspect that there was something bigger at stake.
When a soft tap sounded on Lola’s door at midnight, she got out from the duck-down cover she’d just climbed under, having dismissed Ottilie’s insistence of a clandestine meeting as a temporary reaction to stress. Poppy opened the door, her eye mask caught in a matted lock of hair, and blinked in the bright hallway light. Ottilie blinked back. Without a word, she slipped inside before Poppy had a chance to greet her.
‘You’re going to have no nails left at this rate,’ said Poppy as Ottilie sat on a wicker sofa by the window.
She pulled her heels in, eyes wide like a cat in a carry cage. ‘Does anyone know I’m here?’ Ottilie asked.
‘I don’t know – do they?’ said Poppy, registering the nervous energy that hummed around Ottilie like a force field.
‘Not unless you’ve told someone. No Lola?’
‘No, she said she’d be back late.’ Poppy rubbed her eyes. ‘I thought you wanted to talk about shots for Saturday, but since Christian showed up, I figured you’d be having that conversation with him.’
‘Did you really think I wanted to talk about photography? God, no. That’s the furthest thing from my mind. This place. I never know whether the conversation I’m having is the conversation I’m having. Do you know what I mean?’
Poppy lifted the duvet to find the robe that she had swiped from the pool house earlier and pulled it on like a cocoon. She had to try and find a way to stuff it into her rucksack before she left.
‘I can trust you, can’t I?’
‘I’ll be honest, you’re freaking me out a little bit. Has something happened? Is Will okay?’ asked Poppy.
‘Will? He’s fine. His cousins have flown in from North America and want the whole “British” experience, so they’ve gone off to shoot something wearing tweed, which is ridiculous. Tweed is for winter. When my dad learnt that he stopped wearing ordinary clothes from November through to February.’
Poppy tightened the belt on her robe and took a tentative step forward. ‘Do you have friends coming over? I’d use it as an excuse to watch Bride Wars and eat my weight in brie, but I can’t speak for everyone.’
‘My girlfriends aren’t arriving until Saturday afternoon. Reception only.’
‘Really? That seems unfair. So, it’s only your mum and dad for the ceremony?’
‘Yep. The actual ceremony is small and intimate, but still, I overheard Will’s dad talking about how my friends “would make it feel like Ibiza in low season” so I don’t need to think too hard about why the capacity has been capped until after the formal proceedings are over. We’re going to throw another party back in London. I haven’t told Will yet, but you know, that’s the plan.’
‘Two celebrations? Like Kim and Kanye?’
‘No,’ said Ottilie, revulsion passing across her face at the thought. ‘We’re not having half as many roses.’
‘Mmm. Five thousand is enough when you think about it.’
Ottilie stood up, fingers spread to emphasise her point. ‘I don’t think you’re taking this seriously.’
Poppy laughed. ‘I would, but you haven’t actually told me why you’re here. I’m only really qualified to talk about photography. How helpful I’ll be outside of that, I don’t know.’
Ottilie took a deep breath. ‘I need to lie in a bath.’
‘Sorry?’
‘I find it much easier to talk when I’m surrounded by a body of water.’
Poppy would have laughed if it weren’t for how anxious Ottilie looked.
‘How long are you going to be? If I’m leaving tomorrow, I need to check when the sea tractor is running.’
‘Someone will do that for you,’ said Ottilie, waving her hand in dismissal as she walked past Poppy to the bathroom.
She heard the taps run and glanced at the clock. She couldn’t get used to the way so many of Will’s family treated time like a commodity that they deserved more of than other people. Resentment built up in her chest, as it had done all week. Each request from Lola, Ottilie, and Lord Mountgrave stacked higher and higher like a Jenga tower, one movement away from toppling over.
‘Come in here. I’ve made you a nest of towels, see?’ Poppy heard Ottilie slip into the water. She walked to the bathroom with her eyes closed, hand outstretched until she reached the doorframe. ‘Sorry, I always forget that some people aren’t as comfortable with nakedness as I am,’ said Ottilie.
‘It’s not a big deal; I’ll face the wall,’ said Poppy, squatting to the floor. Ottilie turned over, but not before Poppy saw a tattoo that stretched down her spine. A half-moon curved between her shoulder blades above a trail of stars dotted between each nook of her vertebra. Ottilie caught her eye.
‘Oh, God. Don’t look at that. I’m getting it covered up. It’s huge, isn’t it? I forget it’s there most of the time, but it’s a bit loud. I blame my late teens. I never understood the concept of moderation at that age, even when it came to tattoos. I’ve slowed down since then. Got some perspective. I’ve swapped cocktail bars for church groups, can you imagine? I didn’t realise how much I need philanthropy to maintain any semblance of a normal life. It’s not like that here. Loxby is a bubble. A toxic bubble most of the time.’
Poppy shuffled so that her back was resting against the side of the bath. She stifled a yawn, not yet sufficiently alert for Ottilie’s verbal memoir.
‘Is that where you met Lawrence?’
Ottilie paused, thrown by Poppy’s interjection. ‘What?’
‘At a church group? Is that where you met Lawrence?’
She paused. ‘Yes. An Alcoholics Anonymous group used the hall. Lawrence must have mentioned that he had some issues getting sober? I used to volunteer there – helped source catering, made coffee, you know? Super rewarding. It’s indirectly how I met Will, actually. Lawrence introduced us, then I went to Laos as part of an outreach programme run by the church and he was booked into the same hostel. After that, I stopped going out four times a week and figured out what I want instead. Will grounds me like that. We didn’t come back to England for three years and by the time we did, we were engaged. I only had a faint idea about all of this,’ said Ottilie, gesticulating at the marble-clad bathroom they were in.
‘It’s not a horrible surprise, is it?’ said Poppy.
Ottilie exhaled audibly. ‘No, but you’ve seen what it’s like. I feel like a fish trying to climb a tree. Every time they change our plans without telling me, it’s like I’m the problem.’
Poppy nodded without realising. She knew what that was like.
‘That’s why I wanted to come to you. Will trusts you and I know you want the best for him. He told me a bit about you and your ex-husband. Josh, was it?’ Poppy hadn’t heard him described in the past tense before. They weren’t officially divorced yet, but what difference did that make?
‘Did Josh’s family ever do that? Make you feel like you couldn’t breathe?’
‘Yeah, but it stemmed from him I suppose. In his mother’s eyes, Josh was the golden boy. He was… very good at rewiring my thoughts. I wanted so badly to be good enough for him that I forgot to be good enough for myself.’
Ottilie put a damp hand on her shoulder. Rather than being annoyed at Will for telling Ottilie about her relationship, Poppy was comforted to know that it wasn’t all in her head. The feelings she frequently pushed down came gurgling up to the surface. Regret. Shame. Embarrassment. Will had seen the cracks in her fledgling relationship, as had Lola, and to a lesser extent, her dad. Why hadn’t she?
‘Josh was very good at manipulating situations to ensure I’d say or do something in a certain way. Weekend trips to London after an argument, antique camera reels from specialist auctions, explosions of love that felt filmlike and swoon-worthy. I won’t even get started on his proposal. He made it look like it was all for me, when it was actually all for him.’
Ottilie sat up a little and pushed her wet hair back from her face, her skin less pink and blotchy than before. ‘That’s how I feel.’
‘In that case, what is it about Will that you love?’ asked Poppy.
Ottilie slipped deeper into the water. ‘He walks three miles to buy my favourite coffee beans on a Saturday. When I had the flu and said I missed the park, he brought a potted tree up to our apartment balcony. He’s kind to his mum. And he adores me. I love him. So much. Despite everything he’s attached to, I love him. It’s his family that are the problem. I know you’ve not had the best experience with marriage – I hope you don’t mind me saying that – but I like the idea of knowing that Will and I have each other’s backs. We’re each other’s best defence against whatever his family throws at us.’
‘Wouldn’t that be the case anyway, married or not?’
‘Yes, but… that’s not what I mean. I know it’s gauche to admit it, but I like grand gestures. I like symbolism and ceremony, being part of a legacy, but doing it our way. Will is infuriatingly loyal. I want to do something that shows how serious I am about our life together, because he deserves that from me. I’ve never doubted his integrity, not once. I’m sure you’ve noticed what he’s like – pouring himself into his relationships, friends, family, and everyone in between.’
