The Wedding Crasher, page 6
At the lawn’s edge, a man-made cave had been sculpted into an overhang, pockmarked by flint, seashells, and broken masonry. A low rectangular window framed the horizon. As the sun dipped low, the sea blushed pink, the two on the cusp of kissing.
She should message Josh. Nothing weird. Just to say she’d arrived safely. Poppy reached for her phone, but something stopped her from going any further. He hadn’t asked her to. She hadn’t said she would. This was how it was going to be. Instead, she flicked her phone camera on and lifted it to take a picture, the horizon flooded with colour that never translated accurately on screen.
‘Put it away, quick!’ said Lola, appearing at her side. She waved her hand as though Poppy had pulled a cling-film-wrapped rock of heroin from her knickers. Poppy glanced at Lola.
‘What?’
‘Your phone! Shove it somewhere it won’t be seen.’
Poppy did as she was told. ‘Why, what’s up?’
‘There’s a social media ban on the island. All the guests have to hand over their devices on arrival and they get locked in a safe behind reception. I know, it’s massively OTT. Nothing shouts “fun” like a list of rules as long as the Bayeux Tapestry.’
‘But professional photography is okay?’
‘Oh, yeah. The family can approve those photos; they can’t approve what Uncle Lesley puts online when he’s self-medicating with oysters and Crémant. Honestly, boomers should never have been given access to Facebook.’
‘No phones, got it.’
‘Not within sight anyway, or I’ll be in the shitter. I’m surprised you managed to slip through without a heavy frisking. I quite enjoyed mine, but don’t tell anyone. Bad feminist moment. If it’s an emergency, you can make a call at reception, but there’s a steroid-fuelled security guy called Big Steve who hovers beside you the whole time. Quite intimidating, but I’m weirdly into it.’
‘It sounds a bit… overcautious? What are they expecting to happen?’ asked Poppy.
‘It’s complicated, but there’s a big business announcement happening this week, or that’s what I’ve gathered. I’ve noticed that when you’re working at a place like this, a lot of the really rich people will quite literally pretend you don’t exist, which means eavesdropping is a piece of piss. Needless to say, there are a lot of whispers about The Mountgrave Foundation and it’s not speculation about what the first dance song choice will be.’
‘Now you’ve said that, I haven’t got a clue who this couple might be.’
‘You’ll know when you see the groom, I’ll just say that…’
‘If it’s Orlando Bloom, you’re not allowed to tell him that I got off with his poster so often as a teenager that his mouth quite literally disintegrated.’
Lola laughed and leant against the balustrade, chin tilted to catch the sunlight. ‘Not quite. I’d had three months of meetings with a publicist before I knew who the bride and groom were. I think they might have been sussing me out before a contract was signed. This?’ she said, gesturing to the hotel. ‘Is a way bigger job than I thought I was signing up for. You know me. I’m all about the event. I wanted to step up to this scale eventually, but I thought it might be three years down the line. I took it on as a favour. You know what Will is like. Kicking a puppy wouldn’t feel half as bad as saying no to him. I didn’t quite put two and two together at the time, but when someone says “my family like to get involved”, you think “mother-in-law has a penchant for lavender”, not “my family members occupy three spaces on the annual Forbes Rich List”.’
‘Hang on, Will? Will who? Is Will the groom?’
‘Will!’ said Lola, rolling her head in a semi-circle to stretch her neck, her eyes heavy with fatigue. ‘You know, Will.’
‘I don’t know a Will Mountgrave.’
‘He wasn’t called that when you knew him at uni.’
Poppy slipped her flip-flops back on and paced from one end of the grotto to another. ‘No… not that Will.’
‘Yes, that Will. He’s never used his full name. No wonder. Imagine if we’d known he had all this at his fingertips,’ said Lola, winking. ‘This is why I knew you’d want to come – I just couldn’t say anything.’
Poppy felt her pulse thrumming at her wrists. ‘Hang on, this makes no sense. If he chose his name, why did he go for one that makes him sound like a Dickensian undertaker?’
Lola folded her arms and smirked playfully at Poppy. ‘So, let me get this straight. You find out that Will Graves is from a family wealthier than the Murdochs and it’s his fake last name that shocks you the most?’
‘Well, yeah. You don’t assume people are rich, do you?’
‘Babe, some people do. I can guarantee that ninety-nine per cent of the guests here have no idea who’s paying for what.’
Poppy laughed to give her face something to do, but inside she panicked. The last time she’d seen Will, they hadn’t exactly left on good terms.
‘I thought you’d be made up. You were good mates, weren’t you?’
‘We drifted apart in second year, so…’ Poppy shook her head. ‘Won’t he find it weird that I’m here? Are you sure we’re talking about the same Will?’
Lola’s eyes widened and her nostrils flared. ‘Will used to bulk buy packet mac ‘n’ cheese and eat it from the saucepan. I’ll admit, that doesn’t exactly scream “rich kid”, but yes, it’s him.’
‘Do you want to check first?’
‘Check what?’
‘That he’s okay with me being here—’
From the grotto door, Poppy heard a voice.
‘I ate multiple saucepans of cheap macaroni back in the day and I only glow in the dark at weekends. Powdered cheese is the best kind, right?’
Lola directed a Colgate smile at Poppy, clapping her hands in girlish glee as she turned to look at the man who had joined them in the grotto. Poppy’s cheeks flushed with embarrassment. When he saw her, Will’s frog-like grin glitched. It was him. Will who had slept on the other side of a shared wall in their dingy, third-floor halls. Will who she’d saved from rugby initiations when he was paralytic in a disabled toilet wearing just his socks and a stripy tie. Will who had brought her a doughnut every Saturday after his weekend shift at Sainsbury’s.
‘Pops?’ he said, his cheeks flushed pink. ‘What are you doing here?’
Chapter Eight
May 7th, 2008
‘When’s your deadline?’
‘9am.’
‘That’s in eight hours.’
‘I know. Loads of time,’ said Will. Poppy sat on the edge of his single bed drinking water from a chipped mug. He slumped beside her, his bony hip padded by the cushion he had duct taped around his torso. They had settled on panda costumes for the Noah’s Ark themed club night that took place in a refectory on campus, both in black t-shirts with a round patch of white fur safety pinned to their bellies. The overall look was more adorable than spooky, but Poppy had enjoyed watching Will’s fluffy ears bobbing above the crowd as he returned with a round of drinks.
Will pulled a red ethernet cable from the side of his mattress and tugged it over to his desk. ‘Do you think your essay will be better or worse after half a crate of Stella?’ asked Poppy.
‘Better. I scraped a third on my last one and I actually tried. I’ve got three cans of Red Bull in the fridge to help me transition out of party mode,’ said Will.
‘And into cardiac arrest?’
‘If Red Bull was bad for you, why would they sponsor so many sports teams?’ said Will. He tried to plug the cable into his laptop, but the wire folded back on itself, his coordination clumsy.
Poppy yawned and rubbed her eyes. When she looked at her hand, it was smeared with black face paint. ‘Oh, shit. I forgot I was wearing this.’ She stood up and pulled open Will’s wardrobe.
‘Where’s your mirror gone?’ she said, looking at the back of the door.
‘It’s behind my dressing gown. The Jedi one.’
‘And the reason you have two dressing gowns is?’
Will turned around, as though this was a debate he’d been looking forward to having. ‘You see, this is something people don’t understand. There are varying tiers of cosiness depending on the occasion. Winter and summer have their own requirements. If anything, I’d have a third dressing gown for sprinter.’
‘Huh?’
‘March to June. Nine to fifteen degrees is a tough nut to crack. If you think you can shove your blankets to the back of the wardrobe you’ve got another thing coming, I’m telling you straight.’
Poppy laughed and shook her head. ‘It’s no wonder you never got on with the rugby club.’
‘Bunch of tossers. Can’t see the appeal of drinking someone else’s piss for banter.’
Poppy went to their shared kitchen, soaked a paper towelette, and returned to Will’s room to scrub at her skin. When she was finished, she took another one and tossed it to Will. It landed on his cheek with a wet splat, his head jerking upwards from the first sagging stages of sleep.
‘In the nicest way possible, I have no hope that you’re going to finish that essay.’
Will held his finger on the ‘x’ key and threw a goofy grin in her direction.
‘Here’s a better idea. I have a streaming link for Point Break and a bag of chicken nuggets in the freezer. If we load it up now, it will have buffered by the time they’re cooked.’
‘But… my essay?’
‘Get up early and do it then.’
‘I can’t. I’m going to yoga with Gabriella at seven.’
Poppy shut Will’s wardrobe door. She left his room, took some baby wipes from her washbag in the communal bathroom, and continued scrubbing her neck. She had removed the worst of her panda make-up, but now looked like she’d been through an emotionally turbulent break-up.
‘Why would you agree to yoga that early? Are you mad?’ said Poppy. ‘Who even does yoga at 7am other than weirdos and show-offs?’
‘Gabriella does. She teaches it.’
‘You are a walking cliché.’
‘She’s really into intense breathing. Too much sometimes. It’s like having sex with Darth Vader.’
Poppy shook her head and covered her ears. ‘I don’t want to hear any more.’
‘You know, out of everyone in the flat, you’re the only one who goes pinker than the Pope when sex is mentioned.’
‘That’s because everyone lies about it,’ she said, skirting over the fact that she’d never done it herself and hadn’t corrected those that assumed otherwise. ‘Harry told us last week that he shagged Swedish twins on his sixth-form hockey tour.’
‘I think he did,’ said Will earnestly.
‘Of course he fucking didn’t. His mum still buys his pants. So, are we having a nugget party or not?’ Poppy said. She wiggled the panda ears that she’d attached to an old Alice band. ‘Also, you should text Gabriella and cancel yoga. If you fail first year and get kicked out, who am I going to convince to leave clubs early with me? Just go yoga-ing another time.’
Poppy dropped her grey baby wipe in the bin, removed the safety pins from her T-shirt, and walked to the kitchen. Will followed her, his panda eyes smudged like he’d attempted to contour with black paint and given up halfway.
‘I want her to think I’m a cool early-morning smoothie-drinking yogi.’
‘You’re not though.’
‘Yeah, but she thinks I am and that’s what I’m concentrating on for now.’
Poppy tore the bag of nuggets open and inspected a baking tray that one of their flatmates had left on the side. In the corners were the blackened remnants of another meal along with a layer of sausage grease. Poppy covered it with a sheet of tin foil, slid the tray of nuggets into the oven, and stood against the door to warm the backs of her legs.
Will took a carton of orange juice out of the fridge, his T-shirt riding up as he unscrewed the lid and drank. Poppy squinted at his stomach. ‘Have you shaved your belly?’
‘No.’
‘You have!’
Poppy ran to the other side of the room and lunged for Will. He tossed the empty carton towards a Jenga tower of recycling and lowered his elbow to protect himself.
‘Let me see!’ she said, pulling at the hem of his shirt as he tried to push her away in mock annoyance.
‘No, no, ah! I’m ticklish! It’s a trick of the light!’
‘Liar!’ she said, grappling with Will. They bumped into the fridge, which showered them with Domino’s coupons.
‘If I go down, I’m taking you with me,’ said Will, wrapping his long leg around the back of Poppy’s knee.
‘I have the strength of a thousand wolves!’ said Poppy, holding him up for a moment before they lost balance and tumbled to the floor.
Will made a gagging noise and shook his head from side to side. ‘I always suspected that Sam clipped his nails in here and now I know for sure.’
Poppy extracted her leg from underneath Will and sat on him, one knee either side of his lap.
‘One peek,’ she said.
‘No way.’
‘One peek and I promise not to mention it to anyone. I’m supplying you with nuggets and I paid for your club entry tonight.’
‘This is exploitation.’
‘Shut up and show me.’
Will pressed his lips together and looked down uneasily before slowly interlocking his hands behind his head. Poppy lifted his shirt and gasped.
‘Will! No!’
‘What?’ he said with blameless intonation. ‘Come on, girls don’t like hairy bellies.’
‘Bollocks! I’ve never thought this was something I had to have an opinion on until right now.’
‘So you shouldn’t care that I tidied myself up.’
‘I don’t, but you should only do that for you, not because someone you’re sleeping with told you to.’
‘That is a very quick assumption to make,’ said Will, pushing himself up onto his forearms. Poppy felt his hip bones press into her thighs.
‘Tell me it’s not true then,’ she said, folding her arms.
Will lifted his chin and blinked at her coolly. ‘It’s not true.’ She inched her fingers towards his ribs. Will wriggled beneath her. ‘Okay, okay, it’s true! But why does that have to be a negative thing?’
‘Because you’re not being yourself around her.’
‘Maybe this is the new version of me. As Dickens once said, “we contain multitudes”.’
‘That was Shakespeare.’
‘Excuse me, I’ve read Far From the Madding Crowd. And watched the film. I’m obliged to; it’s Mum’s birthday tradition.’
‘That’s Thomas Hardy.’
‘We’ve all read books, Poppy, no need to boast about it.’ His attempt to be serious was hijacked by a cautious smile. Poppy rolled her eyes.
Will sat up, his eyes almost level with hers. Neither of them moved, as though doing so would break the momentary ease between them. A fluorescent bulb flickered overhead and the fridge hummed beside them, but still, she didn’t move. His expression changed into something she hadn’t seen before – eyes soft, lips slightly parted. He put his hand on her knee and moved his thumb in a cautious circle, the weight of it heavy and iron-hot through her eighty denier tights. Will raised his chin. Poppy leant down.
The oven beeped. Will bit his lip and let his hand fall to the floor as Poppy sat upright, the warmth that had pooled in her stomach now taut with tension. The timer continued to sound in an off-key pitch, but neither of them knew what to say.
‘I should turn that off.’
‘Mm-hmm,’ muttered Will, rubbing his chin.
‘You know what Mini Hitler will do if she hears it,’ said Poppy, internally screaming at herself for cracking their eggshell moment by drawing attention to their hermit flatmate who had a low tolerance for noise and had bought her own whiteboard to detail each resident’s decibel readings past eleven o’clock.
Poppy stood up, inched her skirt down, and pulled the tray out of the oven with a twice-folded tea towel. She scooped nuggets into a dish with a fish slice, her face hot with a feeling that sat somewhere between embarrassment and dissipating lust. When she turned around, Will was still on the floor staring straight up at the ceiling, his fingers interlocked at his chest.
She slid down the fridge door and slipped her feet under the small of Will’s back. It wasn’t quite clear what had passed between them, but she wanted to offset the lingering awkwardness between them. Poppy balanced her bowl in the soft curve of Will’s stomach, fished out a nugget, and smeared it with ketchup.
‘This was an excellent choice,’ she said, her voice far more upbeat than she felt.
Will stared at a polystyrene tile in the ceiling.
‘Hey. Food,’ she said, nudging him.
‘Do you think it’s possible to find a girlfriend who’s happy with everything about you?’ he said.
Poppy sighed. ‘Probably not. “Everything” seems unreasonable. But on the other hand, no one should feel like they’re underperforming just by being themselves. Take my grandparents – absolutely adorable – held hands when they walked to the corner shop and everything, but even then, they only liked, maybe… seventy per cent of the stuff the other one did? Beyond a shared appreciation for garlic bread and conspiracy theories about Princess Diana, it was the person they loved. Everything else was surplus to requirement.’
‘What about your parents?’ he said, inspecting a nugget in the light.
‘Way more complicated. They split when I was about ten but couldn’t pay for a divorce, so Mum moved out and Dad’s been unsuccessfully trying to replace her ever since.’
‘Were they happy when they were together?’
‘No.’
‘Quick response.’
