does it say?’ Mum asked, the same smile on my face spreading across hers.
‘It’s just a bit from a book,’ I replied, keeping the card safely in my hand. ‘They’re beautiful, aren’t they?’
‘Gorgeous,’ she affirmed. ‘Whoever he is, I already like him better than the last one.’
I fluffed out one of the sunburnt orange blooms and said nothing.
‘I love dahlias. Grace, honesty, kindness, commitment and positive change,’ Mum said, pulling the language of flowers from some corner of her brain that hadn’t been corrupted with the names of all the different Instagram filters. ‘Your dad used to send me dahlias when we were first courting.’
‘And what do foxgloves mean?’ I asked, combing through the other flowers in the arrangement and wondering how much research Patrick had done when he was choosing the bouquet. Had he known all that or were these just the nicest bunch? Maybe they’d been on offer. Maybe it was the first bouquet he saw. Or maybe I could stop trying to ruin this for myself and just revel in the fact that Patrick had sent me flowers.
‘Mostly that foxes are snazzy dressers.’ She settled down on the arm of my tiny sofa and cast an eye across the room, taking in the pile of shoes, the dirty clothes next to the wash bin and the dishes in the sink. In my defence, I’d been very busy shagging all weekend and domestic tasks hadn’t been my top priority. Or any sort of priority. But I would have to tackle the washing soon or I’d be out of knickers and forced into a lunchtime trip to Primark. The worst of fates.
‘Foxgloves are complicated. Some people think they’re good luck, some people think they’re bad but they’re often associated with honesty and magic.’
‘Miracles, more like,’ I mumbled as I tore into the pack of flower food and sprinkled it into the bottom of the vase.
‘Perhaps we should have dahlias at the renewal ceremony,’ Mum said. ‘If they’re in season now, I’m sure they’ll still be available in a couple of weeks.’
‘A couple of weeks?’
Mum and Dad’s wedding anniversary was on the ninth of August, which was … in a couple of weeks. Well, bugger me. Time flies when you’re living in a shed.
‘It’s on a Saturday so your father and I thought it rather makes sense to have it on the day than wait any longer. I was hoping you might pop to the shops with me over the weekend. We’re both going to need new frocks, don’t you think?’
I hadn’t been clothes shopping with my mum since I was fifteen and she made me try on bras over my clothes in M&S and Caroline Beaumont, Shari Singh and Thomas McCall from the lower sixth all saw me and took photos and stuck them up all over the sixth-form common room. There was a reason I hadn’t lost my virginity until university.
‘I don’t need anything,’ I said automatically even though I very much did. ‘But I’ll come and help you find an outfit.’
‘Don’t laugh but I thought it would be nice if you and Jo wore the same thing,’ Mum said, busily rearranging my flowers. ‘Since you’re going to be my bridesmaids.’
Oh god, I’d forgotten. An adult bridesmaid wearing the same dress as my gorgeous younger sister, for my mid-sexual-renaissance, sixty-year-old mother. Maybe Patrick hadn’t sent the flowers, maybe the universe sent them as a preemptive apology. Jo was not going to like this at all.
‘Does Saturday work?’ I asked, staring at my dahlias and channelling their grace.
‘Saturday is wonderful,’ she hopped up to her feet. ‘I’ll see if I can book us a table somewhere nice for lunch, we can make a day of it.’
‘Perfect,’ I said, pulling the covers back up over my face. ‘Is Jo coming?’
‘I think Jo might be too busy to come back from Cambridge for the day,’ Mum said, not-so-discreetly running a fingertip along the windowsill. ‘So you get the deciding vote on your dresses. And I did think it might be nice if you wanted to help us plan the actual shindig, I haven’t organized a party since you were nine.’
A sudden flashback to my dad accidentally waterboarding Adrian when we were supposed to be bobbing for apples.
‘I’d love to, Mum,’ I told her. ‘It’ll be perfect, I promise.’
‘And you never know,’ she gave my flowers a knowing look. ‘Could be good practice for your own wedding.’
‘All right, enough’s enough,’ I said, waving her out the door. Not that I hadn’t already