The Morning After

29 Sept 2007

The 8.30am, alarm call woke us after barely four hours of sleep. We lay in the four-poster, surveying through the drapes, the Victorian opulence of our suite.
“I could make a habit of this,” I said to Dan.
“Getting married?” he replied.
“No! Living in luxury,” I said. “If this was the nineteenth century, I could pull the bell cord and a maid would appear to help me get out of bed, wash me and dress me.”
“Well it’s the twenty-first century and the tea making things are over there.”

Sipping our tea, still lying in bed, we went over all the old clichés about how wonderful the wedding had been, laughing and recalling, the jokes, the speeches, Black Elvis, the dancing, and singing in the bar until 4.00.

Dressed and showered, without the assistance of servants, we went down to the breakfast room for a full English. The air was cool and the autumn sun shone weakly through the heavily curtained bays, on the faces of guests as they filtered in. Barely recognisable as the people who’d partied all night, they made their way to the tables. With white faces, dark circled eyes, and dishevelled hair, they ordered breakfast in horse croaky voices.

The best men, the bridesmaids and the bride and groom, appeared, to the accompaniment of rousing cheers, just before 10.00 at the final breakfast call, looking pale but happy, basking in the success of their wedding.
“One of the main attractions of this place,” Kathryn said laughing, “was the bedrooms. That’s what finally decided us, the Presidential suite with that massive four poster.”
“Yes,” said Aaron, “But we only spent two hours in it.”
“You can’t drive back to London today,” I said. “You’ll fall asleep at the wheel.”
“We’ll come back to yours and sleep for four and five hours and then travel down.”

Many of the guests, who had travelled from the south, were spending the day and night in the old Roman town of Chester before their return. With kisses, hugs, and we’ll see you at the christening (said out of earshot of the newly weds, and with blatant optimism on my part) we waved them goodbye.

Sat in the bay of her bedroom window, Kathryn waved like the lady of the manor, to her departing guests. Then, hanging out of the window, she whistled and shouted like a fish wife a final goodbye.

Kathryn and Aaron drove down to London that night and left for their honeymoon in Africa the following day, ten days on Safari (photographic) in Kenya, and ten days on the Spice Island, Zanzibar.

Copyright © 2007 BarbaraAttwood