Chapter 38
We wake up to rain on the day of the wedding. We travelled back up to Broughton the day before.
‘Raining,’ Dot says. She’s already propped up with pillows and she looks beautiful in the early morning light.
‘It can do what it likes,’ I say. ‘I’m marrying the woman I love today and nothing can put a dampener on things.’
She grins. ‘That’s the spirit. Cup of tea in bed?’
I can hear her talking to Julie downstairs.
Julie slept on a camp bed on Erin’s floor last night and I hope she hasn’t been up half the night.
Erin won’t emerge for a while yet. On the morning of my first wedding, I felt like there was so much to do, but I’m calm this time.
Serene. Something might go wrong, and that’s fine. I’ll have Dot with me.
An hour later, Dot and I have had our tea and we’re in our dressing gowns when there’s a ring on the doorbell. Hayley.
‘You’re not working today,’ I say. ‘Everything’s done.’
‘I can’t help it. And as I’m down here, since you so kindly invited me, I wanted to come and wish you the very best and give you this.
’ She hands me a card, and Dot comes up behind me to look at it over my shoulder as I open it.
There’s a rainbow on the front, and the words ‘All you need is love’.
Dot starts humming the tune, and I open the card to see what Hayley’s written inside.
For Mabel and Dot, I can’t wait to celebrate your lifetime of love. Thank you for letting me be a part of it. Hayley x
‘Don’t cry,’ Dot says, giving me a quick poke in the ribs. ‘There’s going to be a lot of this, you know?’
‘What, people saying the most lovely things to and about us?’
‘I hope so,’ Dot says.
‘Have you got the rings?’ Hayley asks.
Dot points to the small boxes on the table next to the front door.
‘The vows?’
Dot taps the side of her head and Hayley gasps. ‘You’re doing them from memory? No prompts?’
‘No prompts,’ Dot says. ‘I’ve loved Mabel since I was a girl. I’ve had plenty of time to practise.’
I’m not quite so brave. I know my vows by heart, but I’ve got a printed version folded up in my clutch bag, just in case.
‘I think you’re all set, then,’ Hayley says. ‘I’ll see you at the dance hall!’
I want to ask her not to go, suddenly. To stay with us, just in case we get something wrong.
But then she’s waving and rushing back to her car and Erin’s coming down the stairs, her short hair messy and her eyes crusted with sleep, and Julie’s putting the kettle on yet again, and I know it’s all going to be fine. Perfect.
We laugh such a lot, getting ready. A woman comes to do our hair and makeup and I’m sure she wants to tell us to calm down more than once.
It feels real when we put our dresses on, helping each other with the clasps and buttons.
‘If you’d told me, when we were younger…’ Dot says.
She doesn’t have to finish the sentence.
I know. We couldn’t have imagined this, then.
It was so far from the realms of what we knew and understood.
But here we are, standing in front of one another, hands clasped, about to promise what remains of our lives.
And we have no idea how long that will be.
Whatever it is, I’ll take it. I’d take half an hour of being Dot’s wife.
I have a sudden memory of watching Dot across the dance hall.
She was with Bill, dancing, and then the band finished one song and Bill leaned in to say something to her and she laughed, her head thrown back.
And I knew, in that moment, that what I felt for her wasn’t just friendship, as powerful as friendship can be.
I remember having one clear thought: I love her, and it is impossible.
She crosses the room to the window, says the car’s here. We gather up our bits and pieces and go downstairs and Julie cries, like I knew she would.
There are three men standing outside the registry office.
They’re sheltering from the rain under the awning of the building.
John and William, and Peter. Dot had dinner with the three of them last week, and she says that there are bridges to be built but that everyone was pleasant to one another.
For me, it’s the first time I’ve seen the three of them together.
Their similarities outweigh their differences.
Peter’s standing a little bit apart from the other two, but I don’t think you’d notice if you weren’t looking closely.
Dot hugs each of her sons, and then turns to me.
‘Shall we?’ she asks, and we go inside.
We have to go into a little room and answer some questions before we get to the good part, and when we enter the room where the ceremony’s being held, they’re all sitting there, craning their necks to look at us.
Dot’s family, my friends. I thought they’d stay separated, but Erin’s sitting with Sean, and Tasha and Kirsty are next to one another, having presumably bonded over their pregnancies.
Dot chose the music for this part, and it’s Elvis.
‘Can’t Help Falling in Love’. I feel tears start to well and bite the inside of my cheek because I don’t want to start crying already.
Dot says her vows first. We stand opposite one another, holding hands, and it’s almost too much to look at her directly.
‘Mabel, a few months ago, you told me I should make a list. That we should make one together. Because it was a list that brought us back together. You even started it for me. The first item was to get married. But we soon discovered that we couldn’t achieve that without doing a lot of other things, like talking to my wonderful ex-husband Geoff and finding my son Peter.
I wouldn’t have done those things without you by my side.
But now that I have, I’m able to tick off the most important thing on that list, which is to marry you.
I haven’t had a lot of luck with marriages, before now.
But I really think this last one is going to stick. ’
Everyone laughs. And then it’s my turn.
‘Dot, we were apart for more than sixty years, and I missed you every day. Sometimes I’d hear your answer in my head when someone asked me a question.
It was as if I knew you better than I know myself.
All my life, I was happy enough but there was something not quite right.
When I found you, it was like things slotting into place.
Like that jigsaw we spent all that time on.
Everything made sense. And that jigsaw had a missing piece in the end, because nothing’s ever perfect or whole.
But I think this – our love – is probably about as close as you can get.
So thank you for standing here with me and promising to love me.
I promise to love you, Dot Brightmore. I don’t know how to do anything else. ’
I see several people reaching into their bags for tissues, patting at their eyes to avoid ruining their makeup.
And then it’s done, and the registrar says we are wife and wife, that we can kiss.
I put one hand on Dot’s cheek and kiss her lips, the way I’ve done so many times, but not enough.
Behind us, there’s a cheer, and I look around at the faces of the people gathered here, see that they’re genuinely happy for us. Joy. It’s contagious.
And then we’re signing the marriage certificate and having some photos before we’re back in the car and heading to the dance hall.
‘We did it,’ Dot says. ‘I can’t quite believe it.’
‘I can,’ I say. ‘It was the easiest decision I’ve ever made.’
I look down at our rings and I know, better than I’ve ever known anything, that I am in the right place, with the right person. And it doesn’t matter that it took us most of our lives to get here. It was all leading to this.
Dot reaches for her bag and takes out a folded piece of paper and a small pen. When she opens the paper up, I see that it’s the list we made.
Dot and Mabel’s first list
Marry me Get married
Find Geoff
Talk about Peter and his dad
Move to Portsmouth
Leave Broughton
She takes the pen, smiles at me, and runs a line through the first item. ‘Done,’ she says.
The rain’s stopped and the sun’s trying to break through the clouds when the car pulls up outside the dance hall. Hayley’s stood outside with a big white umbrella, but we don’t need it. We get out of the car and make the short walk to the doors, and when Hayley opens them for us, we go inside.
It’s like stepping back in time. Like a second chance. Like putting things right.
‘Shall we dance?’ Dot asks, grinning.
And we do.
* * *