‘YOU AND JAMES SHOULD GET MARRIED!’ bellows Josie from across the dance floor. She is teetering on skyscraper heels, in the same oyster hue and with the same satin sheen as her micro dress, clutching a bottle of Moët in her left hand. ‘BEING A WIFEY IS AMAAAAAAZING!’
Maya looks at the bright colours and rich fabrics swirling around them, relieved that James isn’t within earshot. It takes a lot of noise to drown Josie out, but the twelve dashing men banging out bhangra beats on kettle drums have spared Maya this time around. Maya doesn’t have to flush a shade of awkward and James doesn’t need to smile uncomfortably and change the subject.
It started three days ago at the mehndi ceremony, when Josie first started asking Maya why James hadn’t proposed yet – and if she thought he might. Maya was relieved to be easily able to change the focus of conversation onto Priyanka and her friends, and to lose Josie in the intricacies of floral and geometric henna.
The cringe factor was upped two days ago, after the cricket match that turned into a black-tie dinner. Josie was so giddy that the gang were back together that she had a bit too much fizz and started crying when she tried to explain how happy she was and that marriage really was the best thing she and Dominic had ever done.
On day three of the festivities – a boating trip followed by lunch at a palace on the lake – a tipsy Josie stood up on the sunset boat back across Lake Pichola and started twerking to ‘Put A Ring On It’, a backing track of which she played on her phone. She even straddled James for part of her routine, shoving her ring finger at him and pointing it in his face. James was not amused. The bride’s grandparents were not amused. Dominic was mortified and pulled Josie back into her seat before she capsized the boat and drowned everyone in it.
This morning, over breakfast of kachori and roti, in the palatial gardens that hugged the still lake, Josie was offering up her Italian wedding villa venue for Maya and James to wed in, even though it wasn’t hers to loan out.
‘Oh, wouldn’t it be lovely to go back, Dom?’ she mused through faraway eyes.
‘Easy, Joze,’ replied Dominic, rubbing his droopy brown eyes, sensing the change in the atmosphere, while James scrolled through the photos on his digital SLR and Maya thought make it stop.
But it didn’t… Earlier, during the flower-filled Hindu ceremony, Josie had squeezed Maya’s arm as Jeremy and Priyanka took their seven steps around the fire, leaned in and whispered to Maya and James, ‘Oh gawd, you have to do this at your wedding.’
Now, surrounded by handsome men in jewel-encrusted kurtas and turbans, and women in saris and Chopard bindis, Josie is still banging on about it, and Maya is relieved that James is somewhere else.
What’s the obsession with getting married anyway?
Is it because Maya is turning thirty this year?
I don’t mind.
Is it all the ‘proposal opportunities’ Clara and Nena made a big deal of? What’s with all the pressure? Why can’t people just let them enjoy themselves? Why can’t they just… be?
‘HAVING A HUSBAND IS AMAAAAAZING!’
Oh fuck off.
Maya feels irked but keeps dancing in her sweeping Erdem dress: black, grey and purple florals sway down to her gunmetal heels.
Maya hadn’t been sure what to pack for four days and nights of luxe wedding celebrations, ahead of a year’s backpacking. First there was the white Bianca Jagger-inspired suit for the cricket match; then the black beaded cocktail dress for the dinner afterwards. For boating and lunch at the lake palace, she wore a brown dress with large cream polka dots. For the official ceremony, she wore a sari Nena had loaned her (which weighed a ton) from when she was in the ensemble in Bombay Dreams.
And what do you wear for a party where the groom is going to arrive on a white steed ahead of camels and elephants and the bride is carried on a gondola throne made of velvet?
Anything, reasoned Maya. No one will be looking at me anyway.
But she did want to look nice for James, to get into the wedding spirit. She was more worried about shipping the wedding week clothes back to England, but Josie kindly brought an extra suitcase. Sequined saris and stoles wouldn’t be much use on a beach in Thailand.
I don’t want to be anyone’s wifey anyway, Maya tells herself.
To distract herself from the disquiet in her stomach, Maya decides to play a round of ‘short, shorter, shortest’. It’s a game she silently plays to amuse herself when Josie is being annoying or when she feels alone and misses James, so she looks around the room, trying to find someone in a shorter dress than Josie’s. Double win if their heels are higher too. Maya is usually ninety-eight per cent certain that she won’t find anyone in a shorter dress than Josie’s, whichever bar, restaurant or wedding they’re attending. Except perhaps for Josie’s own wedding in Tuscany, when her dress was decidedly demure. That was until the evening, when she whipped off the bottom half and exposed her petite, dainty legs. Maya thought she might dress the same if her legs were so tiny and shiny, although not here. Only Josie would wear such a dress to a Hindu wedding. In which case, Maya is one hundred per cent certain that none of the five hundred guests will be wearing a dress as short as Josie’s, and feeling bad for Josie’s cultural faux pas, she softens a little.
‘Just being here is amazing!’ Maya shouts back as she lets an old man with a long grey beard twirl her around. She and Josie laugh, until Josie gets her heel caught in the chiffon overlay of Maya’s dress...
Gah!
*
With booming momentum, the kettle drums crescendo as fire-eaters hail the entrance of the bride and groom in the ballroom, for the final part of the party. Jeremy, uncharacteristically sheepish and smitten, leads his bride in. Gone is his cream and gold brocade frock coat and matching turban from earlier and now he stands with ravaged red stubble and an Armani tux. With a proud face and a sweaty hand, he leads Priyanka onto the dance floor in her four thousandth outfit of the celebrations: a bronze and gold Elie Saab gown that hugs her cartoon-character curves and fans out into a fishtail. Maya thought Priyanka’s pink ceremony sari couldn’t be beaten – at every costume change Maya has gasped and thought Wow. That the last incarnation of Priyanka couldn’t possibly be topped. Now, as guests gawp at the happy couple, beyond the men roaring out flames, Maya thinks Priyanka might just be the most beautiful woman in the whole world.
Her beauty makes Maya think of Nena, and she wonders how big Ava is, yearns for the smell of her skin, wonders what she’s doing right now. Is she curled in her mother’s neck or bouncing in her vibrating chair and letting out a gurgle? She feels a stab in her stomach, right at the point Josie falls into her, and puts the blow down to the impact.
‘SORRY!’ Josie bellows in Maya’s ear, as she regains her balance and returns to whooping and dancing, flitting between a twerk and the Bollywood-worthy moves Priyanka’s friends busted out earlier.
Champagne overspills from her bottle onto Maya and the grand ballroom’s dance floor.
Not the Erdem! You’re battering the Erdem!
Maya looks down at her dress, relieved that the dark florals hide a multitude of Moët, further relieved to see people clearing the dance floor at the behest of staff in colourful kurtas, politely asking guests to make way for the bride and groom’s first dance.
It’s a timely opportunity to move Josie along.
‘Come on, lovely, they’re about to do their thing,’ Maya says, slipping a hand around Josie’s waist and guiding her off the starlight-flecked floor.
Josie teeters, as Maya leads her to the side to watch and props her up, not sure how Josie can stand up in those heels, let alone do the running man in them. Dominic approaches, to take over, and rolls his eyes at Maya with affection.
A DJ in a white tux and black bow tie fiddles with his laptop. Men in colourful sherwani frock coats and matching trousers raise their beaters in the air above the kettle drums and pause.
Maya looks around. It is as if the room has frozen in time as she studies her surroundings to see everyone pausing for this pivotal moment. Jeremy Laws, London’s biggest advertising cheese and serial shagger, is finally settling down, deigning to marry the most beautiful woman in the world.
At last.
The lights go down. The room still holding its breath. Paused, but for the couple in the middle. Sweeping strings and the warm sound of Etta James rise while Jeremy takes Priyanka in his arms and five hundred hearts swell across the ballroom as the guests all come back to life.
Maya feels that sharpness in her stomach again, and looks up. Beyond Jeremy and Priyanka she sees the figure of James in the shadows, standing across the dance floor, as he takes the last reportage shots of the night. Despite not knowing anyone at the wedding other than James, Dominic and Josie, Maya hadn’t wanted to get in James’ way while he worked, so she had ensured that while he was tailing Jeremy and Priyanka around dressing rooms, boats, elephants and palaces, she kept a respectful distance. She chatted to ancient ammus, exchanged pastry and pudding tips with chefs in the kitchen (gulab jamun was definitely going into her repertoire) and met many interesting people, who had flown in, from London to Lahore, New York to New Delhi, Manchester to Mumbai. If Maya felt nervous or alone, all she needed to do was look around, to find Jeremy and Priyanka, and there she would see James. Studious and beautiful, his tongue sticking out of the corner of his mouth while he concentrated on getting his shots. His camera his shield and his comfort blanket, glad that no one would be looking at him. Except perhaps Maya. Her glances and supportive smiles had powered James on to the point at which they could start their trip properly. Knowing that when Jeremy and Priyanka’s first dance finishes, when the diva stops singing, that James can clock off and they can just be.
*
Through a gap in the newlyweds, James’ lens lands on Maya. His heart swells to see the woman he loves, clapping and clasping her hands as she looks on at the happy couple. He looks through the lens, to truly see her, but the star lights and dry ice obscure his shot, so he focuses on Jeremy and Priyanka again, getting the final pictures he hopes no one else can.
As the last note fades and the guests erupt into cheers and applause, James lowers his camera and loosens the thick silk of his black bow tie. Maya locks eyes with him across the dance floor and smiles as he strides over to her, shattered and relieved.
‘At last,’ he whispers, as he holds Maya’s cheeks in his palms and kisses her. They press their foreheads against each other’s.
‘Baby, you did a brilliant job,’ Maya says, trying to stay on her tiptoes.
‘I hope so.’
‘I know so. Now let’s enjoy the rest of the night. Have a drink. Drink to the year ahead.’ Maya peels her forehead away from his and places a kiss on his lips.
‘Great idea,’ James answers, unbuttoning the stifling collar on his white shirt. ‘You know it’s not going to be like this forever…?’
Maya furrows her brow. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Palatial bedrooms, boat trips on the lake, feasting like royalty, free bar, endless chana…’
James looks a little serious for a second. Maya shrugs.
‘What are you on about? It’s going to be even better. You. Me. Peace and quiet. Incredible India. It’ll be amazing, just the two of us…’
Around them, colourful cloth fabrics rise and swirl, dancers twirl, and Maya and James follow the parade of guests out to the terraces for the firework finale, to see in the New Year over the lake.