Amanda's Wedding Read Online Free PDF Page B

some magazines – who knew, he may be some time. I was just considering buying some shampoo and washing my hair when it hit me.
    He’d phoned at nine o’clock. From New York. At4 a.m. his time. And now it was twenty past eleven. Half past six in the morning? He probably hadn’t even gone to bed, never mind got up, packed, swallowed his hangover, got to the airport, checked in for two hours, got on the plane, watched a couple of films, got drunk again and got here. Yes, it appeared I might well have time to wash my hair.
    I was back in the Land of Alex; the place that made me go completely out of my fucking head.
    ARRRGGGH. I was the skeggiest creature in the universe. No one in the world could ever have been such a twat before. I counted it up on my fingers. The earliest he could possibly be here would be 6 p.m. I twisted about in an agony of indecision. A part of me wanted to wait, right here. A part of me wanted to get on a plane and jump out and meet him halfway. NONE of me wanted to go back to the office with my tail between my legs. What I really wanted was to turn back time and have none of this ever happen. Simultaneously clenching my buttocks and hopping up and down, I wondered what the hell to do.
    Of course, when in doubt, one should always phone one’s closest confidante for their deep love and support.
    â€˜I would say the best thing to do now is break into airport security where they keep all the confiscated firearms, confiscate one and hit him with a sniper bullet before he can make it to baggage control.’
    â€˜Frraaannn! I’ve got to wait all day and I don’t know what to do!’
    â€˜Grow up? Sort your life out? Start making some conscious decisions about yourself?’
    â€˜I thought I’d read some women’s magazines,’ I mumbled.
    â€˜Oh, now there’s a good idea for someone as sad as you. They’re full of articles on “How to keep that pathetic cheating low-down pigdog in your life happy”.’
    I snuffled. As pathetic as I was, it made sense to play up to it.
    â€˜Don’t try that snuffle bollocks on me. I refuse to be sympathetic because you’re welcoming back into your life a man who is only going to cause you pain – and you are entirely to blame.’
    I said ‘bye’ and wandered back into the terminal feeling utterly lonely and unloved. That was a feeling I found was helped by being surrounded by young couples fleeing into each other’s arms and long-lost family members kissing, hugging and crying all around me.
    But when he got off that plane …
    I decided to take in the entire airport experience, make it a positive thing. I went and had my hair done – not cut, just done, which made me feel like a TV weathergirl. I quite liked pretending to be the kind of person who had their hair done, however it may have clashed with the ladder in the inside leg of my tights (you could hardly see it). There isn’t that much you can do with a heavy scrunch of unshiny brown curly stuff, but they tried their best and made lots of interested-sounding noises when I mentioned Iwas here to pick up my boyfriend from the airport as he’d been in America.
    I kept getting flashbacks. That time he walked into my office at eleven o’clock in the morning, straight past the vulture brigade, into the office, pulled down the blind, and gave me one right there. The time we got absolutely rollocksed and tried to break into St Paul’s Cathedral. That time the central heating broke down and we both refused to get up and get any food and stayed in bed for fifteen hours and we both peed out of the window … That time he ‘went to comfort an old friend’ for three days and I never found out who, or where … That time I met his mum and dad – oh no, I never did.
    I blocked out the bad thoughts from my head, and decided that this time there were definitely going to be ground rules. If he wanted to