Part Seventy-Six
Tuesday Evening
After having spent the afternoon walking through town, buying things here and there, Elizabeth took James to the Palace. Elizabeth had thought they should appear responsible people by dressing well and James had wanted to wear a suit because he was certain that William always wore suits. He did not want to feel underdressed in somebody else's home.
He preferred to meet Elizabeth's parents in Elizabeth's home, he thought as she led him around the building. The size of it did not daunt him. His own home was large as well, though not as big as this. "Why aren't we going inside?" he asked.
"They're probably outside."
And she was right. Her parents were having a drink on a terrace together with two young women, whom James recognised as sisters of Elizabeth's, but he did not know which ones. He hoped they would not stay to dinner, because in that case he would really feel outnumbered.
He discovered the girls were Sarah and Anne, the two youngest, and that nobody had told them anything yet. They were extremely curious about him, something that only increased when their mother greeted Elizabeth and James very warmly and even their father offered his congratulations in a reserved manner. James felt nervous under their stares and giggles, but fortunately William called them to order.
"Oh, let them," Emma said indulgently. "We are all excited. Even your father," she said to Elizabeth in a low voice. "But he thinks it doesn't look well on him."
James glanced at William to see how he bore this, because he was sure he had heard.
"I'm not really very excited," William denied.
That caused a dismayed reaction from Emma. "How couldn't you be?"
"I managed to get rid of our biggest gossips for the evening, but that's no guarantee that they wouldn't hear of it eventually." William looked at his two youngest daughters pointedly, forbidding them to speak to their eldest sisters about this.
"Is this something nobody is allowed to know?" Elizabeth asked, looking a little upset.
"No, it isn't," her father said patiently. "But have you got any idea of the kind of attention the first baby of the next generation will receive? People have been waiting for it for twenty years. They will want to know what you buy, what you do, what you eat…"
"How interesting could that be?" Elizabeth grumbled.
"Apparently it's very interesting."
"Well, they already know about James."
"Who do?"
"I don't know. They do."
"Reporters," James clarified.
William was not surprised. He did not know how they found out, but they always did. "That always happens. You are not, however, angling for a new film role, so you should limit your interaction with the press."
"No Shakespeare, James," Elizabeth said in amusement. He smiled at her and her sisters giggled. "What?" she asked, feeling embarrassed. She had probably not done this often enough, which would be why her sisters were so interested. They would now be wondering how someone as awkward as she could have caught the attention of someone like James. He was now talking to her father about football and the abilities of the national coach.
"I like him," Anne whispered at her. "Where did you find him?"
"In a parking garage."
"What were you doing there?"
"Parking." That seemed logical. What else could you do there?
"When are you getting married?" asked Sarah.
"I think we came to discuss that and not football," Elizabeth said with a sideways look at her father.
He had heard her. "Did you read that thing I sent you?"
"Not completely yet."
"We don't have to stick to that, do we?" James asked.
"You may use it as a guideline. Do you want a big wedding?"
"Not terribly big, no," Elizabeth said quickly. "But you probably have a whole list of people who should be invited."
William smiled. "Maybe, but that depends on how many you want."
Elizabeth had not expected to be given the choice and she did not immediately know what to say. "Oh." She looked at James. Maybe he did.
"I won't notice them anyway," he said with a shrug.
"Why not?" she asked.
"Well, it would be a bit strange if the bridegroom was more interested in the guests than in the bride."
"Oh." She blushed. "What I don't want is that my real friends would have to sit in the back because important people I don't know have to sit in the front rows. I don't mind important people, but they have to stay out of sight."
"Some aren't used to that," William said cautiously. He would like to see it happen, but he knew some people were going to feel insulted and Elizabeth should know it in advance.
"Are we allowed to sit in the front?" Emma asked.
"And we?" Anne added.
"Important people have no other choice but to sit at the back what with the number of relatives we have," James snickered. That would be an easy solution. "How many chairs to a row?"
"That would depend on where it's held," said William. "But in a big church, maybe two times fifteen."
"I can find fifteen close relatives."
"Wouldn't it be strange, though, if all men sat on one side and all women on the other?" Elizabeth mused. She pictured James' family sitting on one side of the isle and her own family on the other. "All colour on one side and all dark suits on the other?" She giggled. "TV stations would protest."
"I have a mother," James protested.
"And you have a father," said William, but he did feel a bit lonely sometimes with a wife and five daughters. "I think we should mix."
"We're in only favour if James' family has any single men," Anne said with a giggle.
"No mixing," Emma warned William.
Part Seventy-Seven
Tuesday Evening
William and James had decided on a week for the wedding, but not yet on a specific day. A lot of preparations could easily take place without knowing that anyway. It was all the same to Elizabeth. She had no pressing jobs or appointments that would be in the way and she was glad her father and James had come to an agreement, since picking a date really depended on them.
For his part, James felt a bit embarrassed that they had left Elizabeth so completely out of it. She had not seemed to mind, but he was still not comfortable with it. "It feels as if I'm making a deal with your father and not with you," he complained when they were in the car driving home. While in some circles the bride had no say in anything, their case was supposed to be very different. He was not negotiating with Elizabeth's father for the hand of his daughter.
Elizabeth brushed it off. "Oh, don't worry about making one deal with him when you're making so many with me."
"Really?"
"Really."
The week had been chosen so the pregnancy would not be too obvious at the wedding and yet it should not be too soon either, because there had to be enough time for preparations. William had thought it was a rather short period and he knew it would call on all of his organisational talents to pull it off. Fortunately, he possessed those to a sufficient extent.
Contrary to what Elizabeth believed, he also knew how far he could go in making it a public occasion. While she had no problems with the date, she did have her reservations about the grandeur her father would undoubtedly want. She guessed James would not mind anything, used as he was to making a spectacle of himself. The only thing he might mind was that he would have to greet rows of boring people he did not know. Nevertheless, she was certain he could do that. Perhaps even she could do it if she was happy enough to forget about everything else.
"He's not going to make any arrangements you won't like," James said, in case that was something she was worried about. He thought he had seen a frown there.
"I hope so." Elizabeth was not so sure. Her father might say it was all up to her, but he might try to steer her in a certain direction anyway. He had been brought up in a certain way and with certain ideas. His idea of a daughter's wedding had not been tested yet and it still existed only in his mind, so he really could not say he would go along with whatever she wanted. He would have to, but they might find out they disagreed fundamentally on some issues.
"He said so."
"I know he said so, but he might find out he can't. If I can't go along with certain things, why couldn't the same be true for him?"
James considered that. "You wouldn't go along with people who didn't try to keep your wishes in mind. You wouldn't force your sisters to have the same kind of wedding as yours, because they are different people."
"So you're saying my father will try to do what I want?" she asked slowly.
"I don't think I'd be here otherwise," James mused. He had received the stamp of approval. "Or maybe I'm stuck in the middle somewhere. I'm not driving."
Elizabeth frowned at that. "I can't follow you."
"I've obviously passed the test, because I'm allowed to be here, but maybe I'm still hanging on a little, because you're driving me around." And she had had to show him where to go. "Usually men are driving."
"Usually men are idiots, James," Elizabeth said dryly. "Shut up."
"It was probably the fact that your car was easier to drive out, wasn't it?" James wondered. He liked not being one of the usual idiots.
"Even if you want to drive, I'm not going to let you," she warned him, full of determination against male chauvinism.
He snickered that she took him seriously. "I know that. Your first note made that abundantly clear already."
Elizabeth looked smug. "And you replied, so you obviously agreed."
"Agreed? Darling, don't count your blessings just yet," he mocked. "I might have replied to cure you."
"And you're so good at it that you still haven't succeeded."
"Well, I'm still deciding on a strategy. You're not really co-operating."
"Tell me why I should!"
James did not know that either. "Er…I'm not going to speak to you for a day if you're not nice to me."
Elizabeth looked aside. "Well, then I'm not going to speak to you either!" She was not sure he would be able to keep it up.
"I'm really better at persuading you with notes anyway."
"Do try that, yes. I doubt that you'll succeed," she said sweetly.
James doubted that too, since he did not have anything he wanted to succeed at, but he only snickered. "So it's just the talking that is out. The rest is still on."
"Umm…" Elizabeth began. "You can kiss me by writing down a little x." She was curious to what extent he would go along with this.
"I'd rather not kiss you at all if an x is the way you want it."
"Did you want to cure me or make me unhappy?" she pouted.
She had got him there. James sighed. "Alright, I'll write an x." It had been his own idea, so he could not wriggle out of it now.
"Just one?"
"As many as you like," he glared.
A small smile played across Elizabeth's lips as she parked her car. "Before the silent period is to begin, we're going to have to refresh our memory as to what an x stands for exactly. If it's fresh in our minds, it's more likely to have the intended effect, don't you agree?" she asked when she had turned off the engine.
James agreed. He walked around the car and waited for her to lock it. "So when exactly does the silent period begin?"
Elizabeth looked at her watch. "At midnight? That's in twenty minutes."
"That's going to be a twenty-minute kiss," James said tentatively. He would not have any problems with that, but he did not know whether she had been hinting that they should kiss for twenty minutes.
"So?"
"You might get cold here outside."
"If you're concerned, we could start the period now and you can write me x's," Elizabeth leaned against the car challengingly.
"For twenty minutes?" James was not going to do that. He would rather kiss. "I bet that at midnight you'll have changed your mind about the x's," he said just as challengingly.
"Why? Because you've been talking so much that you haven't got around to the real thing yet?" she teased.
"Oh!" That called for some action.
Part Seventy-Eight
Wednesday Morning
When James looked at his watch again to check the time it was a quarter past midnight. He had been occupied for a bit longer than he expected. "Are you cold?" he asked, forgetting he was not going to speak to her.
Elizabeth still remembered it and she placed a finger across his lips. She was indeed cold and they had better go inside.
When they were in bed, which they had managed without speaking, James wanted to say something. "Elizabeth!" he whispered. "Do you want me to turn on the light so I can write you a note?"
She groaned and reached for the light.
James began to scribble on a notepad and then held it under her nose. When are we getting a double bed? Half the time he still slept in the other bedroom, because two in one bed was a bit of a squeeze. He could not even write properly.
Why?
That makes it more real.
This isn't real?
I can't even write properly.
Beds weren't meant for that activity, I think.
But we, who earn our money by writing, …*g*
What's that *g*?
Something you can't see BECAUSE we don't have a double bed.
" "
What does that mean?
"I repeat what I asked above."
*G*
" "
*G*
" "
*G*
" "
What time do you have to get up in the morning?
Early. Do you want to come with me?
No. (( -> ( is lovely.
??
I'll have the bed to myself for a while.
You could have that right now if you went to the other room.
I'm not a demanding type of person. It's enough for me to have it to myself for half an hour in the morning. x
Why do you want a double bed?
All boys over 21 have a double bed.
WHAT???
They do! Honest.
I've never heard of that.
All boys in my family do. Ask Damian. He doesn't, because he's only 19. You'll see, in 2 years time he'll get a double bed.
Why 21?
Because then we're grown up.
Ha?! You don't really think so?! But seriously, what has that got to do with the size of the bed? (Girls get a double bed when they need one, even if they're already 30.)
Darling, you need one.
But you like it like this.
Not every night. I'm not getting any sleep.
I'm not stopping you.
Yes, you are. You're writing me messages.
And this wouldn't happen in a double bed? You keep putting your hand on areas that will only increase in fascination…what makes you think you'll be able to stay away if the bed is larger?
Sarcasm is really tough to handle in the middle of the night : ) You have a good point about that increase in fascination, but allow me to make an equally good point about the increase in size.
Are you afraid a pregnant woman will need an entire bed?
I just know it.
Elizabeth groaned and stuffed a pillow under her night shirt. Not true! See?
James made a show of dropping off the edge of the bed behind her. "Ouch!"
"James!" she exclaimed, rolling over, which was hard with the pillow, to look at him.
"See?" he asked, looking up at her pathetically. Elizabeth extracted the pillow and hit him with it.
"And you're hitting me with the baby too!"
"I'm hitting the baby with a pillow," she corrected. "I disagree with that age of twenty-one. Shouldn't it be thirty-one?"
"Well, if you want to exclude yourself from the adult category…" James pulled her off the bed and she landed on top of him. "Why can't we reach the light now?" he wondered, wanting to switch it off.
"Because I don't usually lie on the floor."
"You're not lying on the floor. You're lying on top of me."
"But you are lying on the floor."
"And it's quite hard."
"I like it."
"I'm sure you do. Feel free to resume this position after we've returned to the bed."
"What? You want to return to that blasted single bed? James!" Elizabeth mocked.
He tickled her. "I do."
She squealed. "I'm too tired to move. Besides, you pulled me out."
"You pushed me out."
"You fell."
"No, it was your stomach."
"And you didn't have anything to do with its size."
"If I did, it was because you threw yourself at me like you're doing now."
"Ha!"
"You refuse to get off me, so what is a man to do?"
"Be strong and lift me up into the bed?" Elizabeth suggested.
"We're talking," James noticed all of a sudden. He laughed at himself for not noticing until now.
"I love quick men."
"I still don't like sarcasm in the middle of the night," he grinned, rolling over to free himself from Elizabeth and then jumping into the bed. He pulled the covers around himself tightly so she could not get in. "If you promise to be nice to me, you can join me."
She sat on the floor and shook her head pityingly. "I think thirty-one was still too young."
Part Seventy-Nine
Wednesday Morning
"I think," said James, opening one eye to glance at the clock, "that you forgot to set the alarm." He did not only think this, he knew this as well, because there was no little red dot on the digital display.
"No, I didn't." Elizabeth appeared to be unaffected by his remark. She did not seem to care about the implication that she had overslept.
"You didn't?" James opened his eye again. He had seen the time correctly, he thought, but he was just checking. Yes, he had been right. It was late and there was no red dot. "It didn't go off, though, because it wasn't turned on."
"But I didn't forget to set it," Elizabeth maintained. She did not need to look at the alarm to know. She was too safe and comfortable as she was to move her head.
"Oh. How then…"
"I switched it off," she explained.
"You did? Why? You didn't want to go to work?"
She giggled. Who would prefer work over James? But she could not say that, because it would give him ideas. "We went to bed too late for me to get up at the usual time."
"Well, whose idea was it to kiss for twenty minutes?"
"You could have stopped after twenty minutes if you didn't like it," she teased him back. "But instead you carried on for about forty."
"Me?" James asked innocently. "Every time I tried to pull away, you pulled me back!"
"Poor boy!" The phone rang and Elizabeth tried to raise her head a little. "That's mine."
"Yes, I turn mine off when I go to bed," James answered. He did not know why she kept hers switched on. It was annoying to be called in the middle of the night.
"Could you answer it? I can't move." She could not tell which limbs belonged to her and which to James. "It's probably the office wanting to know if I'm ill."
James answered the phone and he chuckled when he heard Elizabeth's guess had been right. "No, she's not ill. We're still in bed." He felt Elizabeth cringe and patted her with his free hand.
"What do they want?" she asked. Had she forgotten some appointment?
"What do you want?" James asked the person at the other end. "Oh, you have appointments with people later today and they want to know if those are still on."
"Yes."
"She says yes and do remember that I have a matinee, Marie. I can't spend all day in bed either," James told her with a grin. He switched off the phone and put it away. "What time is your first appointment?"
Elizabeth was hurrying through the kitchen a bit nervously and James watched it amusement. "Honestly, darling. Marie was already under the assumption that we were doing God knows what even if we weren't, so the best thing to do was to actually do it, don't you think?"
"I'll be late," she said, frowning when she could not find her coffee cup. She had just put it down somewhere, but where? The skirts of her long dress flowed around her when she turned around a few times.
"I love that dress," said James, who was watching it in fascination. He wondered what she was looking for.
"You have a strange obsession with my clothes." And she still could not see her coffee cup. "You can't borrow it."
"Not even if my next role should be a transvestite?" he inquired. He only had a strange obsession with her, no matter what she was wearing. "Sit down and drink your coffee!"
"But I can't find it!"
James glanced at the cup that had been standing on the table right in front of him all the time and raised his eyebrows. "Maybe you should start out by looking in the most logical place."
"Where is that?" Elizabeth looked around herself.
"For normal people that would be on the table," he said in amusement.
She stared at the table. "How long has it been there?"
"Ever since you put it there."
"Really? I can't remember at all."
"I forgive you. You were thinking of me," James said teasingly. Elizabeth's phone rang again and he was the first to answer it. "Yes?" Then he laughed out loud at something that was said at the other end. "Oh no. She would kill me if I told you." He handed the phone to Elizabeth. "It's your father."
He finished his breakfast while she spoke to her father, enjoying the blush that had spread over her face. He told himself he was not mean, because he would react the same way if one of his parents called. Luckily they had better things to do in the morning and of course they were not busy arranging his wedding. He whistled.
Elizabeth lowered the phone. "Dancing or no dancing?" she asked him.
"I have no idea what you're talking about, but my answer would always be the same: no dancing."
She grinned. "No dancing," she told her father. "But he agreed to come to that ball with me, though I suppose we don't actually have to dance there."
"No. They're bound to have some quiet and dark corners there," James shrugged.
She placed her hand over the phone in shock. "He heard that! He's going to wonder what you want to do there!"
James thought William could guess that very well. "Observe the rest of the guests, of course, without being seen. Does your father ever dance at a ball?"
"The opening dance, not more."
"Ha," said James as if he had proved some point.
Elizabeth spoke into the phone again. "No, James wondered if you ever danced. He would prefer to observe the other guests."
"Which is a lot more innocent than what you were thinking of, Elizabeth," James said rather loudly and then grinned when he saw her face.
"Oh, get stuffed. You talk to him," she said, pressing the phone into his hands and walking away.
"Your coffee is on the table, in case you were going to look for it again," James called after her. "Good morning," he said to his father-in-law. "Elizabeth is a bit absentminded this morning."
And you are suspiciously hyperactive, young man, said William sternly.
"Really?"
But never mind. We all have that from time to time.
James wondered about that. William must be drawing the wrong conclusions, because he could not imagine William being hyperactive.
Before you decide on a location for your wedding, you first have to decide what you want to do.
"Er…get married?"
I mean the secondary activities.
"What is that? The wedding night?"
William sighed audibly. That falls outside the scope of the organisation. You could arrange that yourself any night or morning you like. I meant a reception, a ball or a dinner. Or something else you'd like. If you'd like a ball, we'd have to get you a location with a ballroom.
"Ahh," said James. "I see your point now. Well, I'm not really fond of balls. I am, however, fond of dinners, but I suppose any location would have a dining room. It would only depend on the number of guests, wouldn't it?"
You can email your guest list to Emma.
"Email?"
Do you know how to use email?
"Yes!" James said quickly. "But I didn't know Emma was up to date with that sort of thing…"
Do you know how frustrating self-centred youngsters can be? William asked in exasperation.
"No, but I'm sure you find us very irritating."
To some extent, yes.
"I don't have her email address."
It's william44@hotmail.com.
James thought he could remember that, even if it made no sense. "So she doesn't have her own address and I can reach you there as well?"
No, I just told you that is Emma's address.
"But it's William 44."
That's right.
"And that's Emma's address?"
Yes.
James frowned. "I'm really curious about your address now."
William chuckled. I'm sure you can guess. I'll be looking forward to your email. Have a nice day. And then he broke the connection.
Part Eighty
Wednesday Morning
"Why," James asked when Elizabeth returned, "does your mother have a Hotmail address?" He had been wondering about that all the time, but he had not been able to come up with a satisfying answer.
"Does she?" Elizabeth never emailed her mother.
"Yes. Why would that be?"
"I suppose the officials didn't make an official address for her because they assumed she didn't need one." She shrugged. That was the way things worked. She did not have an official address either.
"So your father does have an official address?" For some reason James had been thinking it was emma44@hotmail.com. That was what William had been implying. He had said James could guess and this was the only thing James could come up with.
"Yes, but I don't use it unless I really have to. About forty people have easy access to it. It isn't exactly private."
"Forty?"
"Secretaries, undersecretaries, advisors, administrative personnel…or did you think my father read his own mail?"
"Er…yes."
That seemed to amuse Elizabeth. "No. Well, the address started out as being private, but somehow people got wind of it and my father's receiving far too many emails to read personally. Horrible, isn't it? I don't know why all these people want to email him. They don't even know him, but they all want him to solve their problems." She looked at him curiously. "Why are you asking?"
"Your father gave me your mother's email address for us to send the guest list to."
Elizabeth screwed up her face. "One, what would my mother do with the guest list? Two, she can use computers?"
"Under your father's guidance, I suspect, because her address is william44@hotmail.com," said James. He thought William more capable of finding free email addresses on the internet. Older women were generally not online.
"I really hate to agree with you in this case, James," Elizabeth said after a moment. "Because I would kill anyone who suggested that you set up my email accounts just because you're a man."
James saw her point and began to look naughty. "Are you about to call me a male chauvinist again?"
Elizabeth would have liked to, but he was also irresistible when he looked mischievous. "I would have done that had I not known my mother."
"So call me a male chauvinist," James said with a grin. "You obviously don't know her well." He began to put the breakfast things away. "You have an appointment soon."
"I know," she said regretfully. "I'm not really looking forward to it."
"Yes, you are," he encouraged her. "It's really unwise to stay here with me all morning. I'd irritate you sooner or later. I'll work on my part of that guest list until I go to the theatre. Tell you what, I'll even read that wedding thing your father gave us." He glanced at her. "Is your appointment male?"
"James!"
"So he is."
"Yes, but -- you're not coming with me to scare him off." Really, he did not have to fear other men. She was not going to like anyone else.
"No. I was only remembering when I went to your office for the first time. Is your appointment a client?"
"Yes, of course."
"You probably don't know you can charge your male clients outrageous prices for your translations and that they would all go along with it?" James thought they would all be so impressed as to lose their sense of reality. He thought this was a helpful hint.
"Er…?" Elizabeth looked puzzled. "What do you mean?"
"Well, I would have paid anything you had asked."
"James, please…" she began to laugh.
"What is it?" He supposed rich women did not need helpful hints. They already had money enough. Stupid of him.
"One, you would have had to borrow money from me. Two, not every man falls for me, you know. Three, even if he did fall, not every man would let it interfere with his common sense. Four…" She paused and grinned. "I sometimes don't have enough common sense myself to think about such things, notably when I have interesting clients that make my head spin."
"How often do you have those?"
"I think Mr Stanton was the last one."
James grinned. "Oh, he won't return anymore. He was rather shocked by the level of informality in your office and the incompetence of the boss, who had to crawl under her desk to find leaflets and who was generally unable to give any kind of coherent information."
Elizabeth smiled. "Was his fault, not hers."
"Hers."
"His."
"Hers. He had come well prepared, but he had never expected to find that."
"Find what?" She was genuinely surprised.
"Her."
"What was wrong with her?" she exclaimed. "If there was anything wrong with her, it was him."
"Him?" James cried. "He hadn't done anything yet. He had only come in."
"No? If he comes in just when you're defending yourself from speculations that you've been seeing blokes over the weekend…any strange behaviour on her side is always his fault."
"So they were both to blame for this…this…wonderfully smooth scene," James concluded sarcastically. He could now laugh at his own behaviour.
"If you'd been smooth, nothing would have happened."
"I might write about it," he said pensively. "It would be funny." It would mean he had to start a new project, because he would not be able to fit it into his current piece of writing. He should take care not to start too many things at once.
"Have you been writing anything lately?" Elizabeth wondered. She had not seen him do that. Perhaps she was claiming too much of his time and he was doing her dishes too. He did not have to do that, she thought guiltily, if he had better things to do.
"Not much. Practically nothing, but that doesn't matter. I've been busy. Maybe I'll do a bit when you're at work." He would not have much time, but he was used to doing small bits in between other activities.
She looked at her watch. "I'd better go." She should not forget that she had a job, even though that was very easy at the moment. There was work to be done. She could stay at work till late today, however, because James would be at the theatre tonight and he would not be at home anyway. "I'll see you tonight."
Part Eighty-One
Wednesday Evening
Elizabeth had decided to see James' play again straight after work without telling him. The only thing was that she had to make sure she told him about it before he left the theatre, or she would have to take the bus home. By the looks of it, she was the only person who had come by herself, but that did not bother her. The first time she had come alone as well, although she did not think anyone would remember.
She was wrong. "Alone again?" asked the young man behind the sweets counter after the play when everyone was lingering before leaving. "You must love this play. Doesn't anyone want to go with you?"
Elizabeth looked surprised. How did he know her? And how much could she tell him? "Er…well…my boyfriend's in it."
"Who's he?" he asked interestedly.
She hesitated. James had better not told everyone about his girlfriend. "James. Do you know him?"
"I know who he is. He doesn't come into the bar often, so I can't say I really know him. Is he not allowed to know you watched?" he asked.
"Oh, he is. Why?"
"Because you're here and not with him."
"He doesn't know I'm here. I was just thinking…" Suddenly she got an idea. "Don't tell him I was here if you see him. I'll find him in the parking garage." She hurried there to reach it before he did and found his car in the usual spot. Leaning against the car she tried to come up with something to write, but she was disturbed by a car slowing down.
"Are you leaving?" a man called. He obviously wanted her parking space.
It was Wednesday evening. The garage should either be empty or emptying, but not full. Elizabeth stared at him. She did not see why he wanted this spot in particular. There had to be plenty of room on the upper levels. "No, I'm not leaving. This space is reserved anyway!"
"Hey, it's you!" the man called as if something clicked in his brain. "Your husband's space, right? Your husband doesn't even have a wife!"
Elizabeth remembered that there had been a man who knew James who had wanted this space another time. "Who am I then?" He should not call people husbands if he believed they had no wives.
"You're not his wife! He doesn't have one."
"But he's still got a parking space!" she countered.
The man rolled up his window and drove on. Elizabeth felt very pleased with herself. She had done that very well. She watched in amazement as two men appeared from behind a car not far away. She was more amazed than frightened, fortunately. They did not look dangerous, but they looked very odd indeed.
"Did you get married to Mr Stanton?" asked one with an old leather jacket after they had come closer.
She stared at him in wonder. "I beg your pardon?" Who were they and why were they interested?
"Did you get married to Mr Stanton?" he repeated.
"Married?"
They had expected a denial and they were now at a loss for words for a moment. "Yes, married. Did you?"
"Today?"
"Not today in particular. Any day."
"I work all day. He works all night. We do we have time to get married?"
"During the weekend?" the leather coat suggested.
"As if I don't have things to do during the weekend," Elizabeth said indignantly. "Who are you and why do you want to know if we got married?"
"Do you know Mr Stanton?"
That question baffled Elizabeth. "You've just asked me if I had married him, but you forgot to ask me if I actually knew who he was? What if I said yes, I married him, but no, I don't know him?"
"Well, you could have woken up next to him one morning and found out you were married."
"Is that the way you got married?" she asked with a disgusted expression on her face. She tried to imitate the look her mother always reserved for tasteless behaviour, but she saw James approach and began to smile.
He looked at leather coat and his companion warily. "Do you want more of that Shakespeare stuff, gentlemen?" he called out, recognising them from the occasion they had been arrested for stalking. "Are you bothering her?"
"We were only asking her some questions."
"And now you've finished," James decided. If he had been surprised to find Elizabeth there, he did not show it. He unlocked the car and got in. Elizabeth was quick to follow him. He started the engine and drove out. As he waited for the barrier to go up at the exit of the garage, he looked beside him and saw Elizabeth had been observing him all the time. This startled him so that he forgot to drive ahead and the barrier went down again.
She laughed affectionately. "Idiot."
James looked embarrassed and inserted his card again for another try. "Why were you looking at me?" he asked and then managed to drop the card. "What!"
Elizabeth laughed when he fumbled with his seatbelt to retrieve the card. It would not go that far. She shook her head. "I'll drive. Get out."
James obeyed and did not dare to glance at the car behind them. He passed Elizabeth right behind his car. She stopped him. "Kiss me."
"That car is really going to like that." James usually liked it, but not in front of an impatient car.
"I don't care if that car likes it. I'm not asking you to kiss the car. Don't talk so much. That car would like you to get it over with so I could drive out." He did it and she continued, retrieving the card and driving the car out of the parking garage.
Part Eighty-Two
Wednesday Evening
"We should get married soon," Elizabeth said as she drove home. "And then we'll be rid of such idiots. Nobody cares about married people." They would become boring and uninteresting.
"I've got twenty-four people on my guest list so far," James announced. "All relatives. I haven't decided yet which colleagues and friends to invite, but if you say nobody cares about married people, maybe we don't need any."
"I meant -- bah, you know what I meant. Very good of you to work on it, though. I still haven't got anyone on my list." She had spent the day at work actually doing work and not thinking about weddings.
"How about your parents and sisters? That's six already. Plus mine, makes thirty. And then you might have grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins. I think I might get to forty. Let's say one hundred for the both of us and then friends and indispensable others. Two or three hundred?"
"Yuck, a mass affair." Elizabeth thought of all the hands she would have to shake, most of which would be too limp or too crushing. And she would have to keep smiling too.
"You only have to suffer it once," James said, looking at the bright side. "I only want to marry you one time." Something occurred to him all of a sudden. "Why are you here? You're supposed to be home." He had been surprised to see Elizabeth in the parking garage, but since two men had been bothering her, he had forgotten all about that surprise.
"That's quick," she laughed. "I pick you up and you don't even realise I'm not supposed to pick you up at all until we're nearly home. I went to see the play."
"Why?"
"Why not? I had nothing else to do."
"Darling, if you go to see someone's play, you shouldn't tell him it was because you had nothing else to do," James said reproachfully. He grinned.
"What should I say?"
"That you went to see it because it was great."
"Oh, sorry." Elizabeth giggled. "It was so great, I had to see it again."
"That's better," James said smugly.
"And afterwards I picked up my boyfriend because he's also great." Because she was driving a dark car she could not stare at him in mock adoration. That was a pity.
"No need to overdo it."
"I mean it!" she protested.
"I meant your sarcasm."
"You love sarcasm. I've just been listening to ninety minutes of it. What's your next project going to be?"
"The guest list," James replied.
"Not many opportunities to be sarcastic with the guest list, are there? Maybe you could write a little thingy for the guests about how expertly we…er…proceeded towards matrimony. You do realise, I hope, that if we don't televise it, we'll have a lot of uninvited guests?"
"My wedding shall not be televised," James declared. "Can we be normal, please?" He realised that this was a rhetorical question, for the answer would be a unanimous no.
"Your normal or my normal? Most weddings I attended were public. I admit that it's a different thing if it concerns my own. I mean, I wouldn't be anonymous."
James had a lively imagination. "And do you, James etcetera, take this anonymous woman to be your wife?" he spoke theatrically.
"Would you?"
"No, I'd rather have a woman with a name."
"There is such a thing as a woman with too many names," Elizabeth commented.
"Which is why only a man with too many names will have her."
"James Etcetera? That isn't much."
"Too much for me to name."
"Not more than that, is it? There isn't some hideous second hyphen who's involved in costume design or something? What with Stanton doing the acting and Henley doing the writing…" Elizabeth knew that Stanton-Henley was his last name, but one could never be certain.
James laughed at that. "No, you've met us all. Which one do you like best?"
"The nicest. I'm not telling which one, so all of them will be nice to me."
"You tease."
"Make us dinner, Jamie," Elizabeth said with a charming smile when she had turned into her street. "I haven't eaten yet."
"You haven't?" James would not be able to survive this long without dinner and he sounded appalled.
"I went to the theatre. I bought a snack there, but that's all." She wanted to park in the short drive next to her house, but it was already full. "Huh? I thought I only had one car."
James peered at the number plate. "Oh. It's my mother's." He wondered what she was doing here. She had not announced the visit, something she usually did to make sure her sons were home.
Elizabeth reversed and parked in the street. "It's a bit late for a social call."
"Well, if she needs dinner, she's right on time." He got out of the car to greet his mother.
Elizabeth followed closely behind. "Hi Lucy."
"Hello dears." Lucy kissed and hugged them. "Could I stay here for the night? I had a meeting that ran rather late and I have another one early in the morning. And I confess that I can't afford a hotel in this town."
"Of course you can stay," Elizabeth smiled at James. "James was just about to make us something to eat."
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