Chapter 29
‘There was a problem with your paperwork,’ Belinda said as I concentrated on breathing. ‘I got a voicemail from the Registry on Friday, but my cat hasn’t been well, so I only just listened to it.’
‘What was the problem?’ I asked, in my steady dealing-with-a-disaster-at-work voice.
‘The intended marriage notice wasn’t properly completed,’ she said. ‘Normally, I check everything. But you dropped it off just before the deadline and I was in such a rush and you two seemed so... reliable. I didn’t check it.’
‘What was the issue?’ I asked. I’d had a bad feeling about Belinda from the minute we’d met – what kind of person used a wine bar for their office?
There was a short pause.
‘You forgot to sign the form,’ she said.
I stared at the acid-green wall in front of me for a moment, not knowing what to say.
I’d stuffed up the form. I never messed up forms. I always read paperwork from start to finish, and then again just to make sure I didn’t miss anything.
I was diligent, vigilant even, about things like that.
My brain whirred back to the day I’d been dealing with the forms. It had been the day after I’d had anaphylaxis. The day after Alex had been in my bedroom. The day Matt and I had spent the afternoon in bed. I’d been distracted that day in a way I normally wasn’t. I hadn’t been totally myself.
My stomach fell. It was my fault. This time I couldn’t blame the curse. This was on me.
‘Can we still get married?’ I asked and braced myself for the response.
‘Maybe,’ Belinda replied, which didn’t fill me with confidence.
‘How can I fix it?’ I asked.
‘You can apply for an exemption to shorten the notice period,’ she said. ‘I’ll provide you with a letter to say I’m willing to marry you on your original date.’
‘Thank you,’ I said automatically. ‘Can I do it without Matt finding out?’ I asked, before I could think of a better way to phrase the question.
‘No, he needs to sign the application,’ she said sharply. ‘And legalities aside, I don’t think the foundation for marriage is a lie.’
‘Yeah, of course,’ I said, chastened. ‘I’ll fill in one of those forms and lodge it tomorrow.’
‘Okay,’ she said. ‘It should take a few days before it’s approved or rejected. Please let me know as soon as you’re informed of the outcome, so we can look at my availability for other possible dates.’
Other possible dates . These words hung in the air after the phone call ended. Our wedding was in less than three weeks’ time. Invitations had been sent out (twice), dietaries gathered, flowers had been ordered, outfits paid for, a honeymoon booked. But apparently none of it would be happening.
I felt sick. I knew that there were options. We could go ahead with our wedding party and get legally married later. Matt would be devastated – I knew that this moment, when we bound ourselves in front of all the people who loved us, was the bit that mattered, the part that meant everything to him.
God, how was I going to tell him that I’d stuffed up like this?
Matt called me as I was grating parmesan.
I’d decided to break the bad news and then apologise profusely as soon as Matt arrived home.
I had a plan: I was going to cook (pesto pasta counted as cooking) and make a bright pink mocktail and a bucket of buttery popcorn.
Then, I’d mention that there was a teeny palaver with the legal part of the wedding, but that I was totally across it and he just needed to sign a form.
And then we’d watch a movie and cuddle up together.
I quickly pressed the green button on my screen, eager to know how far away he was, and how long I had until it was time to break the news of our latest wedding road bump.
‘Sorry. The traffic’s been insane. And I stayed with the guys to pack up the house,’ he said. I smiled despite my pounding heart. Of course Matt had helped clean up after his own buck’s night.
‘Oh, no worries, fine, no rush. Though, I thought I’d cook dinner, so how far away are you? Just so it’s not cold because there’s nothing worse than—’
‘Becs,’ he said. ‘Is everything okay?’
I took a deep breath, fighting the strong urge to continue to filibuster. ‘Well... um, there’s been a bit of a wedding hiccup,’ I said. ‘But I’ll fill you in when you get home.’
‘What’s wrong?’ he asked, and I could hear an undertone of concern enter his voice.
‘Am I on speaker?’ I asked, knowing that one of Matt’s friends was giving him a lift home.
‘No.’
I took a deep breath, willing my years of mindfulness training to kick in.
‘So, I stuffed up the wedding form, the one we need to get legally married,’ I confessed into my handset far too quickly, my words running into each other.
I’d wanted to achieve a tone that made it clear that while I was aware of the seriousness of my mistake, I absolutely had everything under control.
Instead, I knew I sounded both guilty and manic.
‘Okay,’ he said slowly. ‘What happened?’
I swallowed hard. ‘I didn’t sign it. I just.
.. missed it,’ I said. ‘There’s a way to fix it.
We need to go through an exemption process.
It might... it probably will... be okay.
’ I tried to sound as upbeat as I could, but I knew it wasn’t the most convincing performance.
I imagined him in the passenger seat of one of his groomsmen’s cars, absorbing the news.
‘I’m really, really sorry,’ I added.
‘It was a mistake. They happen,’ Matt said quickly. ‘We’ve fixed everything else. We’ll fix this.’
‘Yeah, exactly,’ I said, and exhaled. It was the same thing he’d said when we’d found out there was a nationwide shortage of roses and then when our videographer cancelled on us because she’d gone viral on TikTok and was throwing herself into full-time content creation.
‘I’ve prepared the form. It just needs your signature when you get home. ’
Matt didn’t reply.
‘Hello. Are you still there?’
There was no reply. He was probably on a highway with patchy reception. Had we been cut off?
‘Hello! Matt?’ I tried one more time.
‘Yeah, I’m here. Sorry. That’s what I was calling about,’ Matt said.
‘I just checked my email, and I have a meeting first thing in Sydney tomorrow. I think I’ll need to be there for a few days.
I’ll have to get the last flight out tonight to make it in time.
So, I’ll need to ask the guys to drop me straight to the airport – I won’t have time to come home. ’
All I wanted was to fall into Matt’s arms, to inhale all the good summery things he’d smell of after a day of cricket and swimming at the beach – sun, salty air, sunscreen, fresh grass.
Except right then I wasn’t in a position to get upset or be anything but supportive – I’d just thrown a grenade at our wedding plans.
‘Yeah, okay,’ I said. ‘I hope you can get some rest on the flight. I’ll email you the form to sign?’
‘Great,’ he said. ‘I better go.’
‘Love you,’ I said, but the call had already ended.
‘The CEO decided to accept our recommendation,’ Miranda said. It was Monday morning, the ATG executive team had just met, and Miranda had pulled me into her office straight after the meeting.
So ATG had decided to shelve Alex’s work. His tool would never be used in hospitals and clinics. Patients, with hidden but diagnosable heart conditions, would be left untreated.
‘The good news is that Alex Lawson is going to be offered an extremely generous salary to stay on at ATG for the next few years.’
‘I assume they’re not planning to tell him about their plans for his work before he signs his new contract?’ I asked, trying to keep my voice level and neutral.
‘There’s no legal requirement for them to disclose commercially sensitive information during contract negotiations,’ Miranda said, a slight edge to her voice.
‘And there’s excellent news,’ she barrelled on, before I could make a rebuttal.
‘ATG were so impressed with our frank advice that they’ve given us a new, much more substantial case.
They want us to do a review of all the companies they’re considering buying in the context of their overall strategy. ’
I tried to look thrilled. And normally I would have been. To gain an interesting piece of work from an enormous client was a win. I felt numb.
‘I want to keep the same team on this new project. Are you going to be able to lead this new case?’ Miranda asked me with a meaningful stare. I picked up the subtext: was I able to do my all for this company given my relationship with Alex and the outcome of our advice?
Could I? My job checklist had been the true north on my career compass, for almost a decade now:
1. Work with smart people on interesting problems.
2. Earn enough money to eat, etc.
3. Help people.
To date, I’d felt confident that all my criteria remained checked.
Of course I helped people. Some of my colleagues even described our job as being like doctors for businesses.
People gave us their problems and I worked with a team to solve them.
I’d done a pro bono secondment at an organisation that ran the biggest food bank in the country.
I did charity fun runs every year in a T-shirt emblazoned with the Stern & Co logo.
But while I knew that I’d helped ATG to make a decision to move their company forwards, right then I was struggling to feel that.
Right then, I just felt like I was working for a company that was about to throw away groundbreaking research that could actually help people. That could have saved Alex’s mum.
I checked my phone in my lap. There were no new messages.
I felt a pang of worry in the pit of my stomach.
Matt hadn’t called that morning and he hadn’t messaged me the night before either.
He usually did when he travelled, even if it was just to say he’d landed and got to the hotel safely, good night and that he loved me.