Lindsey Kelk - Always the Bridesmaid

Sarah, on the other hand, did not look giddy. She looked downright miserable.

‘She’s always so insistent,’ she said, tightening her ever-present topknot. Sarah had a look. Sarah always wore her hair up. Sarah always wore perfectly applied black eyeliner and Sarah always wore shirts buttoned up to the throat. And yet, against all odds, Sarah always looks amazing. But regardless, I hated that topknot. I wanted to lop it off with garden shears. But I didn’t, because I’m a Good Friend. ‘Nothing is ever optional with her. I really didn’t want to be out tonight − I just wanted to go home.’

‘I’m not sure what you’re trying to tell me,’ I replied, ‘but I’ve got this weird feeling you’re not especially in the mood for dinner.’

She scowled. I smiled.

‘Well, your make-up looks nice,’ I said, threading my arm through her elbow whether she liked it or not. ‘So that’s something.’

‘Whatever.’

When in doubt, always compliment a woman’s eyeliner application.

Sarah let go of my arm to avoid a pack of terrifying pre-teens hurtling down the middle of the street. ‘I just don’t want to be out all night,’ she said, dodging the kids like a pro. ‘I’m not in the mood. Who wants to be out in London on a Thursday night? No one. It’s full of wankers.’

I caught a glimpse of my overexcited expression in a blacked-out shop window and tried to suppress it before she looked up and slapped it off my face. Wankers and me! If someone wanted to be a full Grumpasaurus Rex, that was up to her. I wasn’t going to let it ruin my evening. Probably.

‘There you are!’

Lauren was squeezed into a tiny space at the busy bar when we arrived, Tweedleglee and Tweedleglum. Sarah allowed herself to be hugged briefly before ordering a double gin and tonic, while I took on the squeezing of a lifetime. Lauren is deceptively strong. Lauren goes to the gym. I believe these two factors are related but have done no research of my own to back that theory up.

‘What’s going on?’ I asked, dancing around from foot to foot and combing my hands wildly through my hair. It had looked fine when I left the office, well, brown and clean but now, surrounded by so many pretty people, not to mention my two blonde best friends, I was certain it was tangled and greasy and needed to be shaved bald. Or possibly tied back in a ponytail. Definitely, one or the other.

‘I’m not telling you until we’ve sat down,’ Lauren said, shaking her very good hair out of her face and into mine. ‘I’ve got a table, and I’ve ordered champagne − you don’t need to get a drink, Sarah.’

Sarah gave her a dark look, slapped a five-pound note on the bar and necked her G&T in two gulps.

‘Champagne?’ I said. ‘What are we celebrating?’

‘God, Maddie.’ Lauren’s eyes sparkled. It actually looked as though someone had already been on the champs. ‘Wait, like, ten seconds.’

Despite Sarah’s less than chipper attitude, Lauren was still smiling when we got to the table. To her face, we always joked that she was so much better put together than we were because she was American, and behind her back (in a nice way, of course), we reassured ourselves that it was because she’d never had a proper job in her life, but tonight she looked extra shiny.

‘So, how are you guys doing?’ she asked, allowing the waiter to pull out her seat. ‘It’s been forever since I saw you.’

‘Standard,’ I replied. Why hadn’t I done something with my hair? Lauren’s blonde mane always curled delicately at the bottom, like a fairy had come along and kissed it. ‘Shona got called in for a mammogram, but she’d heard they hurt so she made me go and get one first.’

‘Your boss made you go for a mammogram?’ Sarah’s eyes widened into saucers.

‘How does someone make you get a mammogram?’ Lauren asked, poking me in the left boob. ‘Jesus, Maddie.’

‘I don’t know,’ I said, slapping her hand away. ‘It was in my diary − I didn’t really think about it until afterwards. I thought everyone was doing it. And don’t poke my boobs in public.’

‘As if that’s even the worst thing she’s done,’ Sarah said, tapping her fingers on the table and watching like a hawk as the waiter peeled the foil off the champagne cork. ‘I think providing hospice care for her incontinent dog was more of an ask.’

I considered this for a moment.

‘He was a lovely dog when he wasn’t shitting everywhere,’ I replied.

‘But he was always shitting everywhere,’ Sarah countered.

‘Did it hurt?’ Lauren asked, wrinkling her little nose at the dog-shit banter. ‘The mammogram?’

I wrapped my hands around my chest and nodded. ‘Even thinking about it hurts. But, you know, they’re important.’

‘They are,’ Sarah agreed. ‘When you need them. You’re a thirty-one-year-old woman with no family history of breast cancer who spent the afternoon with her tit in a vice to appease her boss. That’s different. Is she at least going to get one now?’

‘I’ve scheduled her in for an MRI,’ I said in the kind of quiet voice an embarrassed mouse might use. ‘She didn’t fancy it after she read my report.’

Sarah gave me the look.

‘I don’t know why you don’t just quit,’ Lauren cut in before Sarah could explode. ‘You’ve been her assistant for, like, ten years, Maddie. You could be an assistant anywhere. Wait, don’t open that yet,’ she ordered the waiter as he gripped the champagne cork. ‘I want to make a toast.’

‘Jesus, in that case can I have a Hendrick’s and tonic, please?’ Sarah asked. ‘A double.’

‘Me too,’ I said, raising my hand. ‘Thank you.’

‘You guys …’ Lauren’s voice had a tendency to get a bit whiny when she wasn’t getting her own way. Oddly enough, that didn’t happen often. ‘I don’t want you to get wasted.’

‘We won’t get wasted,’ I promised. ‘Just delightfully tipsy. And you know it’s not as easy as walking out of the door and into another job. Things are difficult everywhere right now.’

‘There are quite a lot of event assistant jobs,’ Sarah pointed out. ‘Have you even looked?’

‘I’m not going to leave one shitty job for another shitty job, am I? And, you know, it’s not always awful,’ I said, preparing to launch into my well-rehearsed ‘Why I Don’t Leave My Horrible Job’ speech. ‘I only tell you the worst parts. It’s interesting. I get to do a lot of different stuff, the rest of the company is nice, it’s only Shona who can be difficult. And I get to meet a lot of people—’

‘Difficult? Can you even hear yourself?’ Sarah replied, unconvinced. ‘Next you’ll be turning up with a black eye and telling us “she only hits me because she loves me”. You stay because you’re scared to leave. I’ve known you too long, Mads. You’ve lived in the same flat for ten years, you’ve had the same job for ten years—’

‘I’ve had the same best friends for ten years,’ I broke in with what I hoped she would take as a threat. ‘Maybe I should make some changes.’

‘I guess you do get to go to a bunch of awesome parties,’ Lauren offered. Lovely, peace-making Lauren. ‘And you always get a ton of free cake.’

‘I do always get free cake,’ I said, looking pointedly at Sarah, who had so often been the grateful recipient. ‘Thank you, Lauren.’

‘But,’ she continued with one of her sweet smiles, ‘if you left, you might be happier. And we might actually get to see you more often.’

Lauren, the two-faced, backstabbing cow.

‘How are you, Sarah?’ she asked, ignoring the look on my face. ‘What’s going on with you?’

‘Nothing,’ Sarah replied as her G&T was set down in front of her. ‘Busy, tired, whatever.’