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  His hot flush of a few moments ago had passed, and now he was freezing. Ok. Come on, Beaton. Stir yourself. You didn’t go through Sandhurst for nothing.

  He opened his eyes for the second time. And this time, though he would have liked to have shut them once more, he was unable to, because they were wide with shock.

  In front of him, a bright red 93 bus was passing just a few feet from his naked, hairy body. As it sailed down the road towards Wimbledon Village, he saw teenagers sniggering in the back window, and the outraged face of a middle-aged woman with her mouth open. Trust me, I’m more surprised than all of you, he thought to himself, as he scrambled to cover himself with his hands, and looked around desperately for his clothes. Fucking hell. Fuck! Not far away, Tom could hear a police siren. He looked around, and, covering himself with his cupped hands, legged it over the round and into the undergrowth on the edge of the Common.

  Hamilton House. 8.15 am

  ‘Come in,’ she called, and shifted over to make space for him to sit on the edge of her bed.

  But the head that appeared in her doorway wasn’t the bushy-eyebrowed one of her father, but the pale and worried face of her mother, pale pink velvet dressing gown clutched around her thin body.

  ‘What’s the matter, Mum?’

  ‘He’s gone,’ Carrie White replied, looking bemused.

  Tara pushed herself up on one elbow. What was her mother talking about? Oh God. Had Tom changed his mind? Tara went hot and her mouth went dry. Being jilted at the altar was her most dreaded fear. Ever since… She shut her eyes. Not again. Please, please, not again.

  But her mother was shaking her head. This wasn’t to do with Tom.

  ‘Dad,’ her mother was saying. ‘He got up half an hour ago as usual, made the coffee, and then came upstairs, got dressed and walked out of the door. Wearing his cords. He didn’t even bring me a cup of coffee. Wearing his cords.’

  ‘Mum. Calm down,’ Carrie was on the verge of tears. ‘He’s probably just gone for a walk. To get the papers.’ But the papers were delivered and David never went for a walk before breakfast. Her mother was shaking her head. ‘Mum, spit it out, what now?’

  She looked at Tara with teary eyes.

  ‘He said – he said he was leaving. He said he couldn’t believe what I’d done, and he was leaving.’ And Carrie burst into tears.

  Cannizaro House Hotel, Wimbledon Common. 9am

  ‘They’re meant to be getting here at what time?’ Mr Proudfoot, the maitre d’ of Cannizaro House’s restaurant asked Jane, the hotel’s wedding planner, though he knew the answer perfectly well. He just needed to hear it one more time.

  ‘Twelve o’clock.’

  Mr Proudfoot nodded slowly. ‘Twelve o’clock,’ he repeated. And they both stood and stared at the large room before them, which, just a couple of hours previously had been in perfect condition, the twelve round tables in their positions, each with their ten chairs covered in white slip covers adorned white bows, the cutlery gleaming, ready and waiting for the fresh flower arrangements to be placed in their centres and the final touches to be completed. Now, though, the tables were invisible under a thick layer of damp, sooty, plaster dust.

  Beyond, the smaller room where the ceremony itself was to have taken place, and where the fire had started, was even worse. The once pale green and cream curtains were now just a few frazzled strips of frayed fabric. In the bar, the bottles of champagne that had been chilling in ice buckets had popped and exploded in the heat, and shards of green glass covered the floor.

  ‘I suppose we should be thankful for small mercies,’ Jane said.

  ‘Which would be?’ Mr Proudfoot asked.

  ‘Well.’ She crossed her arms, searching her mind for an upside to the situation. Jane liked to think of herself as a positive, glass half-full kind of a person. She thought it was important to count one’s blessings. But even she was struggling, now.

  ‘At least it happened sooner, rather than later. Imagine if the fire had started during the wedding. You’ve got to admit, that would have been worse.’

  Mr Proudfoot gave a tiny nod. He did indeed have to admit that yes, that would have been worse.

  ‘And,’ she continued, having got into her stride, ‘maybe it’s good luck. Like rain.’

  ‘Like rain.’ That was pushing it, for Mr Proudfoot, and Jane began to lead him away. They didn’t have much time to decide what on earth they were going to do.

  ‘Come on. We’ll go to my office and make a plan. At least nothing else is going to go wrong, now.’

  Mr Proudfoot’s brow knitted together, and he frowned. ‘You’re probably right.’

  At that moment, his mobile phone buzzed in his jacket pocket, and he answered it. As he listened, Jane could see his Adam’s apple sink down in his throat, and then bob back up again, and he began to sweat a little, on his forehead. That was not a good sign. Mr Proudfoot did not believe in displays of emotion in front of members of staff.

  ‘That was the florist,’ he said, slowly. ‘She was phoning from a hospital trolley in St Mary’s. She’s gone into labour six weeks early.’

  He swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing again. ‘She’s very sorry, but she’s been unable to finish the table decorations and flowers, and she can’t deliver them. For obvious reasons.’

  He and Jane surveyed the devastation in front of them once more. Jane sighed.

  ‘To be honest, Mr Proudfoot, I think that’s the least of our worries,’ she said.

  Jane was nothing if not pragmatic.

  Outside in the garden of the hotel, as he and Jane rushed past, Mr Proudfoot noticed that a tall man with unusually bushy eyebrows was sitting on one of the benches, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees, and smoking a pipe. Strange. But he didn’t have time to worry about it. He had a wedding reception to try and salvage. Mr Proudfoot had never let a bride down, not in all the thirty-nine years of his career in hospitality, and he wasn’t going to start now.

  Hamilton House. 9.45am

  The White family’s kitchen was not, as it should have been less than two hours before Tara’s wedding, full of the bustle and activity of the last minute preparations, neighbours dropping in to wish her well and the bouquets that she had so carefully chosen, tight little puffs of freesias and lily of the valley and roses bound with white ribbons resting in long, shallow boxes on the scrubbed pine table. The flowers weren’t there at all. But, just like Mr Proudfoot at the hotel, the flowers were the least of the White family’s worries.

  ‘But Mum, why? I don’t understand.’

  Lucy, Tara’s oldest friend was standing by the hob, making coffee, her face made up and her hair in rollers, wearing an oversized men’s shirt and boxer shorts. The phone rang and she leant over to answer it. ‘That’s probably him now,’ she said.

  ‘Do you think it’s some sort of mid-life crisis?’ Tara asked. Carrie’s face crumpled.

  ‘No,’ she sobbed. ‘It’s all my fault. I’ve been a stupid, stupid woman, and I’ve ruined everything. The whole wedding’s spoilt and it’s all because of me.’

  Tara’s face began to show her frustration. ‘Mum, you have to tell me what’s happened, or I can’t…’

  ‘Um,’ said Lucy. ‘I’m afraid I’ve got bad news.’

  Carrie and Tara’s heads jerked up in unison. ‘Tom?’

  ‘No. The…Well, it doesn’t look as though today’s going to be going ahead exactly as planned. But Carrie, I can tell you that this, at least, isn’t your fault.’

  Tara, Carrie and Lucy stood, pale-faced among the wreckage of the hotel function room. Despite the hurried clearing up Mr Proudfoot and Jane had done, there was no disguising the fact that no wedding reception was going to take place in the hotel that day.

  ‘Bloody hell,’ said Lucy.

  From behind them came the familiar sound of Benjy sucking air through his teeth, a habit he’d picked up at school and which Carrie was always berating him for. Now, though, she just turned around in relief.


  ‘Benjy!’

  ‘Man. This is really fucked up.’

  ‘Well. Yes. That would seem to sum up the situation,’ said Carrie.

  ‘I went to the house and Mrs Watson said you were all here.’

  ‘Why were you coming to the house, Benjy? You’re meant to be with Tom,’ Tara snapped.

  ‘Yeah,’ Benjy said, rubbing his neck. ‘About that…’

  Tara took one look at the guilty expression on her brother’s face, and at the room around her, and burst into tears.

  Just then, Benjy lifted his head and looked out of the tall window that stretched from floor to ceiling, behind where his sister was standing, sobbing.

  And he saw something that made his bushy eyebrows shoot up in surprise, and relief.

  ‘Don’t cry Tara – hey, don’t cry! You’ll make your face all puffy. And ugly,’ he said seriously. Despite herself, she laughed.

  ‘He’s had a bit of a shaving disaster, that’s all. Cut his ear because he was all shaky.’

  ‘Oh God,’ Tara’s lip trembled.

  ‘He might be half an hour late, he’s got to have a few stitches, but he’s going to be fine. It’s all going to be fine.’

  Benjy pulled his sister to him and patted her shoulder as she sobbed. He nudged his mother, and pointed to the lawn beyond the window.

  Sitting on a bench, smoking a pipe, was David White. Carrie raised her eyebrows in surprise. Because, beyond the forlorn figure of her husband, was the other missing player in the days planned events – her not-quite son-in-law, flanked by what looked like two policemen, gesticulating wildly at Benjy from behind a small shrub. And, if Carrie White wasn’t mistaken, it looked very much as though the shrub was the only thing he was wearing.

  Carrie White took a deep breath. It was time to pull herself together. She gently stroked her daughter’s cheek.

  ‘Benjy’s right, Tara. Stop crying. It’s all going to be ok.’

  Tara sniffed. ‘But how?’ she wailed.

  ‘Don’t you worry about that. You go home with Lucy. Wash your face, do your make-up, get dressed. Have a stiff drink. I’m certainly going to.’

  Tara looked at her mother in surprise. Carrie continued.

  ‘That’s right. A double gin and tonic. And then, Mr Proudfoot here and I, and Jane…’ she looked to the pair for support. Mr Proudfoot stood tall and gave a little bow. ‘Have got work to do.’

  Cannizaro Gardens. 12.30pm

  Tara stood, legs trembling slightly, holding on to her father’s arm, around the corner of the hotel, waiting for the string quartet to start playing her entrance music.

  ‘Good job it’s a nice day,’ David White said. ‘One stroke of luck, at least.’

  Tara smiled. They were silent for a moment.

  ‘Why did you leave, this morning, Daddy?’ she asked, quietly. David gave a deep sigh.

  ‘Because I’m an old fool,’ he said. ‘Because I found out your mother had been keeping something from me – for my own good - and I threw my toys out of the pram. I should have thanked her. Instead I behaved like a spoilt child.’

  ‘But what? She wouldn’t tell me anything.’

  David looked at his daughter in her lace wedding dress, her face glowing and excited, showing no sign of her earlier tears. And he leant down and kissed her forehead.

  ‘Just a silly thing. Storm in an old fool’s teacup. I’m sorry I let you down. I saw red. I would never have missed the wedding, you know. I wouldn’t do that to you.’

  She nodded. ‘I know, Daddy.’ She smiled at him. He wasn’t telling her the whole truth. But she wasn’t going to push him on it, not now.

  The music changed. Tara took a deep breath. And slowly, she and her father, walked around the corner of the building, into the sunshine.

  The sloping gardens that sat at the back of the building had been hurriedly transformed by a team of helpers, gathered and headed by Mr Proudfoot. Hotel staff, guests who had arrived early, even a couple of students who had been studying (sunbathing) on towels in the garden, had all been pressed into service. Chairs had been carried out from the function room on the backs of the volunteers, like ants carrying crumbs. Dust from the collapsed ceiling was wiped off where possible, and where not sheets that trailed onto the grass looked almost like the smart chair covers that had been planned.

  Tara was carrying a hastily put together bouquet of roses that Jane had run to the florist in the village for, tied with the only ribbon she had been able to find at the last minute. It came from the party shop, and had pink kittens on it, but they were only small, and from a distance it just looked like a random pattern. She hoped. There were no table centres – there were no tables. And instead of the ornate floral columns that were to have provided the decoration for the ceremony, the gardens provided the backdrop.

  As Tara and Tom walked back down the makeshift aisle, the string quartet playing ‘I do, I do, I do’, a great cheer went up from the crowd that had assembled to watch the wedding.

  ‘Bigger congregation than we’d bargained for,’ Tom said, grinning, and waving at his cricket team, in their whites, who had turned up when they had heard what had happened. As had Carrie’s book club, all of the White’s neighbours from the street, Tara’s hairdresser, the guys from the wine shop in town… Carrie had spent half an hour on the phone, rallying the troops. ‘If Tara can’t have the wedding she planned, I’m going to make sure she gets the wedding she deserves,’ she had said.

  They reached the end of the aisle, and a swarm of small children who had been on a nature day in the park rushed up to them, showering them with handfuls of daisies (the petals that were to be used as confetti were still in the back of the florist’s car, in St George’s car park).

  A stream of waiters emerged from inside the hotel, bearing trays of canapés. The hotel kitchen had been undamaged, and as soon as he had been given the all clear by the fire brigade, the chef had raced back inside to get the job done. One of the ushers had been dispatched to Majestic wine for new glasses and bags of ice, and cases of champagne had been quickly chilled in the kitchen sinks.

  Tara turned to Tom. ‘Did you really cut yourself shaving? I can’t see anything wrong with your ear.’ She stood on tiptoe to look, and kissed it.

  Tom took a deep breath. Behind his new wife, he could see his father-in-law take Carrie in his arms, and begin to slowly dance around the lawn. There would be time. There would be time for Tom to tell Tara where he had woken up that morning, and why his feet were covered in little scratches. And why a couple of local PCSOs were among the people watching them get married, having almost arrested Tom as he made his way across Wimbledon Common for indecent exposure, until he had explained his predicament. There would be time for David White to explain to Tara just why he had walked out of the house that morning. To explain about the letter that Carrie had kept hidden from him, with the results of the tests that he had had done some months ago at Parkside. There would be time for all of that and more. But for now, Tom just kissed his wife.

  ‘No, he said,’ I didn’t cut myself shaving.

  ‘Thought not. Benjy always was a bad liar. Tell me on the plane?’

  Tom nodded. He watched David and Carrie waltzing slowly around the gardens, her cheek on his shoulder.

  ‘Yes. I’ll tell you on the plane. Oh, and I’ve got a surprise for you.’

  ‘I’m not sure how many more surprises I can take today, to be honest.’

  ‘You’ll like this one. I promise. It turns out that the chauffeur who was going to drive us away started the fire. Because he’d been fired for being drunk.’

  Tara closed her eyes. ‘Tom. Seriously…’

  ‘Wait, wait, wait… I’ve organised something else. Something better. I promise.’

  She opened them again. ‘You promise?’

  ‘I do. I do, I do, I do….’

  When Tara and Tom reached the hotel driveway, she burst out laughing. The fire engine had been festooned with ribbons and balloons begged and borrowed
from every shop in the area while they had been enjoying their improvised reception. The firemen in their blue overalls were lined up in the driveway, making an aisle for Tom and Tara to walk through, and, as they reached the end, two of them swept Tara up and deposited her gently on the side of the vehicle, then gave Tom a leg up to join her.

  ‘As good as the back of a Merc?’ Tom asked.

  ‘Better,’ she said.

  ‘I’m sorry today hasn’t gone how we planned. I’m sorry about your big white wedding, babe.’

  Tara grinned, and kissed him. ‘But I did. Look. Look at all the people who helped, who made it happen, despite everything. How could it be any bigger, or whiter, or more weddingy?’

  They looked down from the engine, at hundreds of people in the driveway of the hotel, cheering and blowing kisses, handkerchiefs waving in the air. And she threw her bouquet into the crowd, as the fire engine pulled away, its horn beeping, and it floated down towards the ground and into the arms of Jane, who caught it, and gave out a little ‘ooh’ of pleasure, and determinedly did not look at Mr Proudfoot, who stood, stiff and still perfectly groomed beside her. And blushed, as he reached down and took her hand in his.

  KINGSTON UPON THAMES

  Streetlights

  Patrick Binding