affairs and beach stones

Peacehaven, November 1999

WATCHING YOU LOOK out of your window at the rain, I wonder if you remember the day Harry and I were married, and how it poured like it would never stop. Probably that day seems more real to you than this one, a Wednesday in November in Peacehaven at the end of the twentieth century, where there is no relief from the drabness of the sky or the wailing of the wind at the windows. It certainly seems more real to me.

The twenty-ninth of March 1958. My wedding day, and it rained and rained. Not just a spring shower that might have dampened frocks and freshened faces, but an absolute downpour. I woke to the sound of water hammering on our roof, clattering down the guttering. At the time it seemed like good luck, like some sort of baptism into a new life. I lay in my bed, picturing cleansing torrents, thinking of Shakespearean heroines beached on foreign shores, their past lives washed away, facing brave new worlds.

We'd had a very short engagement – less than a month. Harry seemed keen to get on with things, and so, of course, was I. Looking back, I've often wondered about his haste. At the time it was thrilling, this dizzy rush into marriage, and it was flattering, too. But now I suspect he wanted to get it over with, before he changed his mind.

Outside the church, the path was treacherous beneath my sateen shoes, and my pillbox hat and short veil gave me no protection. All the daffodil heads were bent and battered, but I walked tall down that path, taking my time, despite my father's impatience to reach the relative safety of the porch. Once there, I expected him to say something, to confess his pride or his fears, but he was silent, and when he adjusted my veil, his hand shook. I think to myself now: I should have been

aware of the significance of that moment. It was the last time my father could make any claim to be the most important man in my life. And he was not a bad father. He never hit me, rarely raised his voice. When Mum wouldn't stop crying over the fact that I was going to the grammar, Dad offered me a sly wink. He'd never said I was good or bad, or anything in between. I think, more than anything, I puzzled him; but he didn't punish me for that. I should have been able to say something to my father at that moment, on the threshold of my new life with another man. But, of course, Harry was waiting for me, and I could think only of him.

As I walked up the aisle, everyone but you looked round and smiled. But that didn't matter to me. My shoes were soaked through and my stockings were splashed with mud and you were best man instead of Roy, which had caused some trouble, but none of it mattered. Even the fact that Harry wore the suit you'd bought for him (like yours, only grey rather than dark brown) instead of his uniform hardly registered with me. Because once I reached him, you passed him the ring that made me Mrs Harry Styles.

We followed the ceremony with beer and sandwiches in the church hall, which smelled very like St Luke's – all children's plimsolls and overcooked beef. Sylvie, now actually pregnant, wore a plaid frock and sat smoking in the corner, watching Roy, who'd appeared to be drunk even before the reception started. I'd invited Julia, who I felt sure was becoming a firm friend, and she came wearing a jade-green two-piece and her wide smile. Did you talk to her, Louis? I don't recall. I just remember her trying to start up a conversation with my brother Harry, who kept looking past her towards Sylvie's breasts. Harry's parents were there, of course; his father kept slapping everyone on the shoulder, rather too hard (I suddenly saw that this was where Harry got it from). His mother's shelf-like bosom was larger than ever and stuffed into a floral blouse. After the ceremony, she kissed me on the cheek and I smelled the slight staleness of her lipstick as she said 'Welcome to the family' and dabbed her eyes.

All I wanted was to leave that place with my new husband.

What did you say in your speech? At first no one listened very hard; they were all too keen to get to the luncheon-meat sandwiches and the bottles of Harvey's. Still, you stood at the front of the hall and carried on regardless, while Harry looked around anxiously, and after a while, the sheer novelty of your fulsome, velvety voice with its Oxbridge vowels pricked people's ears. Harry frowned a little as you explained how the two of you had met; it was the first time I'd heard about the lady on the bicycle, and you enjoyed yourself telling that story, pausing for comic effect before you repeated what Harry had said about her being a batty old bird, which made my father laugh uproariously. You said something about Harry and I making the perfect civilised couple – the policeman and the teacher. No one could accuse us of not paying our debt to society, and the people of Brighton could rest easy in their beds knowing that Harry was pounding the streets and I was attending to their children's education. I wasn't sure how serious you were, even at the time, but I felt a little twinge of pride as you said those things. Then you raised your glass in a toast, drank your half of stout down in a few gulps, said something to Harry that I couldn't hear, patted him on the arm, firmly kissed my hand, and took your leave.