Page 2 of A Midlife Marriage

Plushly carpeted and ambiently lit, the bridal department of Selfridges was feminine, pastel, spacious and hushed. Glass cases showed off jewellery, veils and pearl-encrusted bags. Racks of gowns with intricate lacework and luxurious satin, hung from black velvet hangers. It was a space that demanded reverence, a place for believers. It was not, Helen realised as she looked down at her chest, the place to wear Jack’s gift: a t-shirt bearing the printed words:Head-Smashed-in-Buffalo-Jump.

She glanced across the room. The only other customers she could see were a group of three women, sitting on a rose-coloured sofa. They were sipping wine, and the scene was suddenly so reminiscent of another bridal department, in another time, that it produced an image behind her eyes clearer than anything in front of them: her mother, with her Krystal fromDynastybob, glass in hand, gasping every time Helen had whooshed forth from the changing room. Bursting into tears, every time. Holding her glass out for a refill, every time. What a wonderful day that had been. They’d had tea and sandwiches after. She remembered the notepad lying on the table betweenthem, her mother picking up the pen and writing.You’re going to want presents for the bridesmaids.Sadness pressed her chest.Wasit,hadit, really been her, neck to toe in statin frills? Whoever it had been, it felt to Helen now like a person she didn’t know.

The last couple of years had seen the scaffolding of her life, dismantled. Her marriage had ended, her children had grown and never had been the change in both her and her scenery, been clearer than in the six weeks of her trip across America. She’d climbed a mountain. Several mountains. She’d hiked through a forest, while blowing a whistle to keep bears at bay. What would her mother say about that? What would she have said to see Helen blood-smeared, as she skinned a hide? Yes, she had helped to skin the hide of a deer and eaten the meat, sitting around a campfire with five fellow Frontier-Wildcraft-Co. adventurers. Turning away, from the women on the sofa, she took a deep and measured breath. She didn’t know what her mother would say, and the sadness that pierced her now took its strength from understanding that she would never know. But wasn’t that the fate of all mothers? And the sad inheritance of all daughters? It took so long for women. When her mother had died, she had still been fenced in by domesticity. And by the time her own daughter, Libby, was free, really free, would she still be around to see, appreciate and guide, as Libby began again? The thought pushed her back her a step, her hand resting on the desk. ‘Oh, Mum,’ she murmured. ‘I wish you could have seen the view from Pikes Peak.’

4

Like so many before and so many to come, Caro was caught in the spell of a beautiful dress. Lost in a dream of reflected ivory, wrapped in a sheath of satin cut so perfectly it was like a fairy-hand had poured it across her hips. Held like a queen by the weight of material, enriched by embroidered pearl strands that gave an effect of sunlight on water. Ensnared by the moment, she felt herself to be beautiful. A beautiful woman, in a beautiful dress. Everything she had never believed she could be.

She put her hand behind her neck and scooped her hair up. It was longer now, a more relaxed style than the precision bob she had kept when she was in the office every day. With the other hand she traced the seam of the sweetheart neckline that mirrored perfectly the shape of her collarbones, the elegant slope of her shoulders. She would, she thought, as she turned to the side, wear her hair up on the day. She wasn’t too old. In fact, longer hair made her look younger, feel more attractive. It made her … Shaking her head, laughing, she put her hands together and held them at her chin.

Everything made her feel more attractive these days! The sun-kiss of time spent outside, the diamond daisy engagement ring on her left hand, even Tomasz’s t-shirts which she’d taken to wearing. At first it was simply that they were so comfortable, now she continued the habit just to see him pick them up from the bed and hold them to his nose, inhaling her scent. Every time it gave her a thrill, all the more exciting for its novelty, more rousing, as the awareness of this new power she possessed, cemented itself. Because if at the beginning anyone had told her, she would not have believed them. If anyone had said, just wait, Caro. Be patient through your twenties, don’t fall prey to worry through your thirties, bide your time in your forties, your moment will come … her younger self would not have been reassured. Could not have imagined it possible to be this age and feel this vibrant, this alive. She turned, angling the mirror to see from the back. Surely then, this was her moment. Why shouldn’t she grow her hair to her waist? And why shouldn’t she wear this incredible strapless, form-fitting dress? She was engaged to a wonderful man who loved her deeply, and in just over three weeks they would be married.

From behind came a soft whispered hush as the curtain swished open an inch and the assistant leaned in. ‘Your friends have arrived,’ she said.

‘Thank you.’ Caro turned back to face the mirror. She had arranged to meet Helen and Kay today because she wanted them to see the dress beforehand. Who else could she ask? She had no sisters, no female cousins, no aunts and the idea that she might have shared this scene with her mother when she had been alive, was inconceivable. All those years, idling away a weekend afternoon on a business trip, passing the bridal department of Macy’sin New York, or Robinsonsin Singapore, wondering at the women she glimpsed inside, she had neveronce progressed to imagining a similar scenario for herself. What is unimaginable, cannot be imagined.

And yet here she was.

She ran her hand across her hip and as she did her palm caught on the material, calloused skin against satin, a rough and ugly sound.

‘Are you OK?’ the assistant said.

‘Fine.’ She nodded; her hands clasped together now. They were rough as tree bark. Never mind. She had three days before the investor presentation on Wednesday, her last job. More than enough time to splash out on some treatments. She would use her own card and Tomasz needn’t know. Having semi-retired nearly a year ago, she was back doing freelance consultation in her role as Investor Relations manager, the flexibility of which she enjoyed. But Wednesday really would be her last job. The smallholding in Cumbria, they had recently moved to, with the intention of becoming self- sufficient, was going to be full-time work.

The assistant leaned in. ‘We can always add in a little netting here,’ she said indicating the neckline. ‘If you feel too exposed.’

But looking at herself in the mirror, Caro shook her head. Exposed was the last thing she felt. She was, finally, a beautiful woman, in a beautiful dress and she wanted the world to see.

5

‘It’s perfect, Caro. You really did look beautiful.’

Kay nodded. ‘There’s a glow about you.’

‘An aura,’ Helen added.

‘You look like a woman in love.’ Kay smiled.

They were sitting at a corner table in the lower ground floor café. Navy plush velvet on the arms of their chairs, mirrored panels on the wall. Atea of finger sandwiches and fresh scones and champagne laid out before them.

‘Thank-you,’ Caro said, and her cheeks flushed with pleasure.

‘Now!’ Kay took a sandwich from the bottom plate of a three-tiered stand and plonked it on Caro’s plate. ‘I want to hear all about Hollybrook Farm ––’

‘It’s not a farm, it’s a smallholding.’

‘Of course.’ Kay nodded, mouthing to Helen, as Caro turned her attention to her plate, ‘a smallholding.’

‘A smallholding.’ Helen mouthed back and winked. ‘What’s the difference?’ she said lightly.

‘Between a smallholding and a farm?’ Caro took a tiny bite of the tiny sandwich. ‘A smallholding doesn’t have much more than ten acres. A farm doesn’t have less.’

‘Oh.’ Helen frowned. ‘But you have chickens?’

‘Yes, and a goat. And tonnes of courgettes. And summer cabbages.’ Laughing, Caro held her hands up. ‘Look at my hands. I’ve decided, I’m getting everything done while I’m in London. Pedicure, manicure, facial, the lot.’

‘And this is definitely the last job?’ Kay said.

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