Epilogue
FREYA
Three years later
‘You may kiss the bride.’
There’s cheering from the congregation as I turn to Jake and he very tenderly lifts my veil and then brushes my lips with his.
Then he kisses me again, for a little longer.
The kiss is beautiful, holding the promise of all the things we’re going to do later on when we don’t have to go full PG for the benefit of our audience, not least our wonderful eighteen-month-old daughter, Zara, who’s on the front row being held by Jake’s mother.
‘I’m Mrs Jake,’ I whisper to him.
‘And I’m Mr Freya.’ He grins at me and I beam back at him. I can’t believe how lucky I am.
We’ve both learnt a lot more about ourselves over the past three years since the evening we agreed to officially date. Jake’s learnt that he does have the right to be happy. And I have learnt that I really am good at loving people (Jake and Zara for a start) and that they love me.
We’ve also learnt that we both took a very surprise pregnancy in our stride. I did not adore pregnancy but I love motherhood, and Jake was wonderful while I vomited my way through not just my first trimester but also my second and most of my third, and is equally wonderful as a father.
‘Looking forward to tonight when everyone’s gone,’ Jake murmurs into my ear.
‘Shhh,’ I admonish him. ‘I’m looking forward to having a fab day and evening with our family and friends.’
‘Are you not looking forward to tonight?’ He leans in and tells me some of the things that he’s particularly looking forward to and laughs when I squeak out loud, because a couple of them are naughty.
‘Maybe,’ I say. ‘But first, it’s time to party.’
We’ve chosen to get married in the Devon village where Lizzie and I now have an alpaca farm business.
We both still have our day jobs, so we have a farm manager, but we both visit as much as possible, and it’s doing very well combining wool and milk production with alpaca experiences.
We chose the village for the wedding partly because it’s gorgeous and on the coast and we love it here, and partly because Sonja was threatening to gatecrash if we had it in London.
We’ve reached a truce with her. She’s stopped trying to shit-stir (she was such a nightmare that we honestly both almost suspected her of somehow getting me surprise-pregnant so quickly just to test us) plus she finally gave me the autograph for Maud and agreed to meet her for lunch, which Maud adored, and in return we’ve agreed to go on her show every few months with a little update.
Something that helped us a lot was that there was a huge public backlash against her nastiness to us and she had to fight to keep her job and promise to be a lot nicer from then on.
She and her producer did suggest that she attend our wedding and that they show footage of it on Wake Up Britain, to which Jake and I both had an immediate and massive reaction of no way.
(I also refused point-blank to let her video me in labour.
Obviously. And won’t let her show photos of Zara. Obviously.)
Jake and I are in the middle of dancing in a group on the beach, me and Lizzie waltzing together, and Jake and Dan together (Lizzie and Dan are engaged and have three-month-old twins) when Max – whose debut thriller just came out to huge acclaim – wheels over to us.
(The first time we spoke and he said he couldn’t go places by himself because of his disability was a little lie to get me to visit him, a visit for which I never cease to be grateful.) He’s in the wide-wheeled beach wheelchair that he treated himself to out of his advance, going at top speed (seriously impressive).
‘That bloody woman’s here,’ he says.
‘Not…’ we all chorus.
‘Yep. Sonja.’
‘Fuck me,’ Jake says.
‘Later, sir,’ I reply (okay, fine, I have had too much champagne, but in my defence it’s my wedding day). ‘And focusing on the essentials, I do not want cameras.’
And up pops Sonja in our faces with her phone camera held towards us.
I do my best smile while trying to put lots of other people between us and her, and then oh my goodness, the bliss, she’s so intent on getting her photo that she doesn’t notice a big wave coming behind her. It drenches her and washes her phone out of her hand.
‘Wow.’ I’m in awe. ‘Karma in action.’
‘I’m always grateful to Sonja and the programme, though,’ Jake says as he begins to jog forward to haul her back onto her feet. ‘For introducing us.’
‘Me too,’ agrees Dan.
‘Yeah, fair enough,’ Lizzie and I agree.
Fine.
Jake looks at me over Sonja’s wet head and we nod at each other.
‘We would love you to stay on condition that you take no photos,’ Jake says as he and Sonja walk back towards us. He turns his own phone video on and says, ‘I’m recording this. We request you not to take any photos of us and we will take legal action if you do.’
After Sonja has agreed – and has downed three glasses of champagne and is dancing with a delighted Maud on the beach – Jake says, ‘The legal action thing. Easier said than done. We’re in public and we’re adults. She could totally get away with taking photos of us.’
‘But she won’t now,’ I say happily.
Sonja is very good company once she’s abandoned the idea of treating us like a story, and actually her presence is really no bad thing at all, because our story did begin with her.
In fact, after dinner (we hastily squish her onto a table of people around her age where she hits it off very well with my recently divorced Uncle Geoff), when we’re doing our speeches (I do one too because I’m not going down the patriarchy route), Jake and I both reference her and thank her.
When the night draws to a close, a very tipsy Sonja, leading Uncle Geoff by the hand, comes over to us.
‘I feel so fond of you both,’ she coos, all rancour over the no-photo thing apparently forgotten. ‘I feel like your fairy godmother. And now—’ she leans in and does a stage whisper, which I’m sure can be heard by at least half of Devon ‘—I might be your new aunt.’
I sneak a sideways glance at Uncle Geoff, and, yes, he does look wide-eyed and jaw-dropped panic-stricken.
‘Fingers crossed,’ I say, crossing them for Uncle Geoff to make a safe getaway from Sonja rather than for her to join the family, as Jake laughs long and loud next to me.
‘Thank you, Sonja,’ he says. ‘For the love challenge. I won, and found my amazing Freya and our happily-ever-after.’
‘I might have lost the actual challenge but I won because I met you,’ I tell Jake. It’s totally fine to be super-sentimental on your wedding day. Obligatory, even.
He puts his arms round me from behind and I turn so that I’m facing him and wind my arms round his neck.
‘I love you,’ I tell him.
‘Love you too.’
‘You both won,’ says Sonja fondly as Jake and I share a lovely long kiss.