Page 3 of Always the Bridesmaid

I do a last check in my shoulder bag for my passport (tick), wallet (tick) and smartphone – on which I double check I have all necessary QR codes (tick). Then I re-check that I have removed all plugs from sockets in the apartment, with the exception of the refrigerator.

Finally, I drag all thirty-two kilos of suitcase (not a gram of my luggage allowance wasted) into the elevator of my old townhouse-style apartment block, bump it down the ten concrete steps from the red-brick building and make it to the cobblestoned sidewalk.

Heading east onto West 14th Street, I raise a hand, still lugging the case, and watch a yellow cab swerve toward the sidewalk to pick me up. Feeling guilty after the driver near breaks his back lifting my luggage into the trunk, I decide not to complain when he forces it over the lip with a strong battering from his knee.

I let out a happy sigh as the cab heads toward New Jersey and Newark Airport, where I will be meeting the gang ahead of our flight. The seven of us – Drew and Becky, Brooks and Izzy, Jake and Jess, and I – haven’t been together for more than a few hours since our mini-break in the Hamptons last summer.

We had been staying in Drew’s beachside holiday home to celebrate his engagement to Becky, which was ultimately gatecrashed by Jake’s realization that he was in love with Jess. With a little nudge from moi, he had accepted Jess wasn’t just his flat mate, his best friend, or even his friend with benefits. Nope, she is his soulmate.

On arrival at Terminal B, I feel bad enough about the weight of my luggage to tip the driver more than usual. I settle the fare using my smart watch, then hand him thirty dollars in notes.

I fluff the strands of hair I’ve left hanging loose to shape my face – which is akin to a basketball shape without framing – and, struggling into the terminal, I locate a screen to confirm my luggage check-in point. As I make for the drop-off, I’m surprised to see a twenty-year-old woman with a funky new haircut, wearing workout leggings and a top that exposes a toned but not-really-required-to-be-on-show midriff, charging toward me.

During breaks from college, Cady, Brooks’s daughter, ordinarily lives with her mom, Brooks’s ex-childhood sweetheart, but in recent times she has been spending increasing amounts of time with her dad and Izzy.

Cady’s relationship with Brooks was rocky throughout her preadolescent and adolescent years, as she went through every phase a girl of her age goes through: from gothic to emo, from nerd to class clown, from stubborn tantrums to grown-up forgiveness. Brooks found those years difficult, partly because he recognized himself when he had been through some of those same phases.

Since meeting Izzy, though, he’s reconciled his relationship with Cady and she has become a huge fan of Izzy’s, no doubt connecting over cool things that I don’t understand like Instagram, TikTok and whatever the latest social media trends are now. Only a year ago, Cady hated the way her dad was constantly dressed in workout attire, often marked with his own branding: BA or Brooks Adams. But now, seemingly Cady’s latest trend is to wear workout gear too, perhaps inspired by Brooks and Izzy, or more likely the front page of every magazine focused at young women and MTV viewers.

‘Sarah, I’m so pleased you’re here. Dad and Izzy are on one,’ she says, rolling her eyes. ‘Izzy took an eternity to get ready apparently, but you know what Dad’s like, Mr Impatient. He probably packed seven pairs of boxer shorts, two gym kits to put on rotation, and by force of being a groomsman only, a shirt and suit. Anyway, we’ve only been here for ten minutes and already they’re driving everyone mad. You’ll calm everything down, I know you will.’

I’m very much aware of the fire between Izzy and Brooks, which they will doubtless resolve between the sheets once they’ve landed in London, if not the bathroom of the airplane.

I hug Cady, kissing her cropped, highlighted and spiked hair. ‘I like the new look,’ I say, more to be kind than because I think it’s the best look for Cady. ‘Why are you all still this side of security?’

I look over to the small Starbucks where everyone is sitting – Brooks, Izzy, Drew, Becky, Drew’s parents, his sister Millie, her husband Eddie and their two young kids – surrounded by small cases and bags of hand luggage on the floor.

I can see from a distance that Drew is stressed and I hope it has nothing to do with the wedding or the trip.

‘That’s the next drama,’ Cady says. ‘Uncle Drew isn’t coming.’

‘What do you mean he isn’t coming? Why?’

‘Something to do with work. Some case and boxes of documents or something. Why don’t you drop your bags and I’ll get Dad to buy you a coffee, then you can find out for yourself?’

I smile. Cady will force Brooks to buy coffee and it hasn’t even occurred to her that she could do so herself. Ah, to be young and dependent.

Something tells me, perhaps the look on Drew’s face and the hand that he is currently dragging through his short hair, that I ought to find out what is going on before handing over my luggage to be Heathrow Airport bound.

My eyes connect with his as I am hugged and welcomed by everyone else. I’ve worked for him long enough to know that, right now, there is something pressing he needs to do before he can go to London. When I finally get to hugging him, I ask quietly, ‘How big is it?’

He presses his lips together and, once again, his hand goes to his hair: his stress tell.

‘The other side in the Rolando case have made a last-minute disclosure. Turns out the damn thing is six boxes’ worth.’

‘Six boxes! That’s not last minute, that’s burying us in paperwork.’

‘You don’t need to tell me that,’ he says. ‘And you just know that the smoking gun we’re looking for will be in one of those six boxes.’

‘So what are we going to do?’ I whisper, mindful of the others. ‘Can’t one of the associates or paralegals go through the boxes for you?’

‘You know I don’t trust anyone to find this needle in a haystack. No one except you and me. I’m going to stay until I find that damn weapon, then I’ll get a later flight out. I’ll be in good time for the wedding. I’ll hopefully sort this today and fly out tomorrow.’

‘Jake’s stag night is tomorrow,’ I tell him, fully au fait with the week’s schedule since I created it. ‘You can’t miss your brother’s last hurrah.’

I look around at the faces of my nearest and dearest, and Drew’s family, and there’s no way I can let Drew stay back.

‘I’ll stay,’ I say, trying to hide that my entire mood just deflated. I hold my shoulders upright and back and force a smile on my glossed lips. ‘Like you say, it’ll be a quick job, we’ll find the weapon, settle the case, and I’ll be on the next flight out to London.’

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