Chapter 3
THREE
You wake, your head heavy as an anvil. Dry mouth, full heart. Please, Nora, you say, from your side of the bed. Legs tangled, warm as toast. Don’t ever let me drink again.
You just need caffeine, she says into the pillow, and you deduce that this means she needs caffeine, so you drag yourself to the kitchen to make coffee and the actual toast, take it back to her to eat in bed; Sunday morning prerogative.
Soft light through the window on the duvet.
What a great night, you say. Stupendous.
Something niggling at you, though: did you lose your own shoe?
It’s in the bathtub, for some reason, Nora says.
You laugh at this, and she does too, but only a little. Like her mind is elsewhere. You kiss her bare shoulder, leave a smear of butter on her skin from your mouth.
Tell you what, you say. Having everyone there, last night?
Almost everyone, says Nora.
Having everyone except your stubborn feminist of a mother there last night, you say, got me pretty jazzed for the actual wedding.
You don’t tell her you’ve been jazzed about the idea of it, for years; don’t tell her you’ve often thought about what your wedding day might look like, even when you’d agreed you wouldn’t have one.
Fleeting thoughts, over the past decade, like how it might feel to win the London Photography Prize.
How you’d fare in old age, or with fatherhood. Just musings. Pictures in your head.
Yeah? Nora says, as she props herself up to eat her toast. Crunch of her teeth, crumbs on the sheets.
Yeah, you say. You had any thoughts?
Not really, she says, dabbing at the fallen crumbs with her finger. Have you? And you say a few, actually, and take your notebook from beside the bed and flip to the notes you’ve been making since she said yes, by the river that lunchtime, yes yes yes.
Oh, she says, a note of surprise, on seeing your black biro scrawls. Wow.
Nothing major, you say. Just brainstorming locations and stuff. I’ve been to some real stunners with work, over the years.
She nods, her hair mussed from sleep. I figured we’d just do it locally, she says, as she brushes it behind her ears.
And we can, you say. I just don’t know of anywhere around here, really. Unless we look into, I don’t know, a room above a pub or something. But that doesn’t seem special enough. Or very us.
A gallery could be cool, Nora says, as she sweeps yet more crumbs off the duvet. Like I say, I’ve not really thought about it. But I guess something … different, would be nice. Intimate.
Different and intimate, you write in your notebook, before saying okay, that is a wildly unclear brief, but you accept the challenge. She smiles at you, then, that soft Nora smile. Slight gap in her front teeth, speck of burnt toast on her chin.
Affordable, she clarifies. And handmade.
Got it, you say, as she puts the plate down on her bedside table.
Interesting you say that, you tell her, because I was talking to Clara and TJ last night, and her cousin bashed out this glorious day in under three months, apparently, all because they were willing to move on a cancellation.
They said it was the most relaxed wedding they’d ever been to. Tenth of the price, too.
Nora nods again. Sips her coffee. You do the same, enjoying the dark roast, hint of blackberry; just the right amount of milk. Then she sighs. Her skin radiating heat, like it does in the night when you wake, sometimes, and she’s twitching in dreams.
Bren came last night, she says.
A moment of quiet, post-toast, the rush of a distant train.
Bren, you repeat. As in, fridge magnet Bren?
Yes.
What! Nora! Why didn’t you introduce us?
She drinks more coffee, then shrugs as though she is sad; her shrugs have emotions, you have learned.
I don’t know, she says, and you can tell it’s the truth. I was so thrown, she admits. And kind of drunk. And there were so many people around, and we didn’t talk much, and then when we could’ve said hi, you were passed out on the sofa. Wearing only one shoe.
Oh gawd, and she says it’s fine, rubs your arm, vaguely, with sympathy. Looking at the bedroom wall now.
You could’ve woken me, you say, and she says sorry, yeah.
He’s come home, then?
I guess, she says, pressing her coffee mug to her cheek. I don’t know how long for, though.
You didn’t ask?
It didn’t come up. He just sort of … ate pizza, and talked to people.
I guess that’s what you do at parties, you say, and she makes a noise of agreement, though you’re not sure she actually does. More coffee, swallowed. Mug put down on the toast plate as she gets out of bed, pulls on a sweatshirt she’d left hanging on the radiator, for warmth.
It’s just so Bren, she says, with her head beneath the fabric.
What is? Turning up at engagement parties?
She emerges without answering, picks up her hairbrush and tugs it through her hair.
He flew all the way from Queenstown to come to our party, she says, when he’s not been home for twelve years. Didn’t even come back for his mum’s sixtieth.
But you’re close, you remind her, you’ve always said so. Far closer than he is to his mum.
Yeah, she says again; all these yeahs, and no certainty in her voice. Keeps brushing. A car drives past the window, drone of the engine fading into the Sunday morning quiet.
Maybe, you venture, he just wanted to surprise you?
He did say that, she admits, swapping the brush for a scrunchie and gathering her hair into a bun.
She’s next to the Sophie Derrick painting you bought her for her thirtieth birthday, and there is a moment where you realise you will always get to see her like this, in the mornings, beside that painting, strands of hair by her face, bed-creases on her skin.
And it is so familiar but almost profound, in that familiarity.
Like the painting itself. Because to take home a piece of art, your grandfather once told you, you have to really love it, Robin: you have to want to keep it around, forever. Want to be with it, every damn day.
Well I’d have liked to have met him, you tell her.
Yeah?
Yeah! I’d have thanked him for all of the magnetised objects he’s sent us over the years, you say, stretching your arms above your head. Without him, there’d be nowhere to stick our shopping lists or takeaway menus. No outlet for our undying love of pineapples wearing sunglasses.
It’s a pie wearing the sunglasses, Nora says.
And where would we be without our pie that looks like a pineapple?
She turns to you, hair up, sweatshirt over her pyjama bottoms. Feet bare, blush of colour in her face. Love, you are sure, in her two-tone eyes.
Right here, she says. Probably.
Right answer, you say, swinging your legs out of bed now too, to start cleaning up from the night before.
Speakers on, music playing, you love this song, you call to Nora who is still in the bedroom, I love this song!
Humming because you don’t really know the words, something about clear minds and best things and coming a long way as her phone begins to ring.
You hear Josie’s ringtone and Nora’s voice, the lilt and fall of it through the baritone and trumpets; so jubilant, this track, definitely one for the wedding playlist, you’ll write that down, when you’re done, Nora’s voice carrying through the open door saying I know, I know, Josie. Don’t thank me, I did nothing.