Page 53 of Close to You
Jane has another mouthful of wine, though I know her well enough to realise that this is to stop her from having to reply. She doesn’t understand why I said ‘yes’ to David’s proposal. She’s been with Ben for such a long time that she’s never had that fear of growing old alone.
David waves across to someone behind the bar and the waiter scuttles across with a small glass of sherry for Mum. If there’s no one around to hold her up, she’ll be down like a pensioner on a winter’s day within the hour.
What Jane doesn’t understand is that a marriage proposal is a line in the sand. A ‘no’ is the end. It’s not as if the couple carry on as they did before, waiting for the subject to come up again at a later date. A no is a no is a no.
I love that David believed in me.
He was the only one. Not Jane and definitely not Mum.
Since we met, my life has got better. It’s like his faith in me forced things to happen. I got personal training clients; I was offered more classes. I had my first chance to talk in front of an audience, when the local college wanted me to address a group of young women. My career was going nowhere and now, ten months after meeting David, it’s finally heading in the direction I want.
A no is a no is a no – and so I said yes.
Across the room, Mum has her sip of her sherry and, almost as if it’s some sort of potion that has transformed her, she starts to giggle. It’s often hard enough to get anything from her other than a frown – but then this is, perhaps, where David’s true talents lie. It’s not in the buying and selling; it’s in the way he makes people feel about themselves.
‘Don’t take this the wrong way,’ Jane says with a nervousness to her tone, ‘but it’s only been ten months…’
‘I know.’
‘I’m not saying you’re wrong, or anything like that. It’s just…’
I could make her squirm, but the truth is that I know what she’s saying.
‘I know it’s quick,’ I say, ‘but if he’d asked me in a year, I’d have said yes then. All it’s doing is bringing things forward.’
A no is a no is a no.
‘I’m thirty years old,’ I add.
‘That’s still young.’
I can’t help but glance across to the group of young women who are hanging around near the rugby players on the other side of the bar. The room is split in two, with this side for our engagement party and the other for a regular night in the rugby club. The women are either late-teens or early twenties; all slim and wearing short dresses and too-high heels. Their backs will hurt in the morning, or maybe they won’t because they’re young. Youth is everything.
I want to say that I don’t think any other men will get down on one knee for me. It took me this long to find someone who will.
A no is a no is a no.
David insisted on having an engagement party, saying that he wanted to show me off. I put down the deposit on my credit card because they don’t take cash. It’s strange, largely because there’s almost nobody he knows here. It’s mainly my friends from school. He didn’t invite Yasmine, even though I said he should. There are a handful of people that went to university with Ben, Jane and David – but he’s not speaking to any of them anyway. He’s giving all his time to my mother. Over the past ten months, I’ve often wondered how many friends he really has – but the same is true of me. There’s Jane, possibly Ben, and then… I’m not sure.
Mum rests a hand on David’s knee and then rocks back laughing. The last time I saw her cackling like this was at the repeat of the Morecambe and Wise Christmas special. She insisted it was new, even though one of them had been dead for a good thirty years at the time.
‘I better go and help him out,’ I say.
Jane raises her glass and says she’s not planning on going anywhere soon. ‘Ben’s busy with his football mates from uni,’ she adds.
As I cross the floor, I glance across to Ben, who is in the middle of a circle of sporty-looking thirty-somethings. They each have pints of lager and I can imagine them reminiscing about the glory days of when they spent semesters playing football and getting pissed.
When I get to David, I stand over him and touch his shoulder. It’s hard not to notice that my mother’s features instantly sour.
‘Why don’t you go and spend some time with your friends…’ I say, not making it a question.
He takes the hint and stands, squeezing my hand almost imperceptibly. I expect him to head off to be with Ben and his old football mates, but, instead, he crosses to the other corner of the room and disappears behind a group of people.
I take the seat he was in next to my mother, although she is seemingly now interested in an unremarkable patch of wall.
‘Thanks for coming,’ I say.
‘What else was I going to do?’
