“What’s your sister doing these days?” I asked Daniel as we waited for them again to try out a different step combination. I think step, slide was winning over step, step, pause.
“Fuck knows. Would you believe, Dumpy’s chosen to live westside! I mean, she chose that.”
“So, she’s not in real estate?”
“God no. She doesn’t have the looks for it.”
“Is she coming to the wedding?”
“Apparently. She’s here already and will be at the dinner, no doubt embarrassing Mum and Dad, as usual.”
“How so?” I had memories of Davina following Daniel and me around when we were younger. She was always quiet and had few friends of her own.
“If she lost a few pounds, she might be alright, but jeez, let’s just say Dumpy is still an appropriate name for her. Mum’s put her in the cabins out the back so she shouldn’t be too annoying.”
The women had made it to the front of the chapel and the celebrant went on with the rehearsal. Fuck. I realised as the celebrant was running through the vows with the happy couple that my neighbour was indeed Davina.
No wonder she had been rude to me. She remembered the Scott who would follow Daniel around and who never cared that she hated the nickname her family had given her. Glancing over at the groom I could see that he was no pillar of healthy living. Like his father, he had a beer-belly and more than one chin. Poor Davina.
“There you are, dear Scott.” Once again Danielle had cornered me as the rehearsal finished. “Once again, I’m so sorry for the mix-up with the rooms. We hadn’t counted on Daniel and Debbie wanting separate rooms the night before the wedding. So romantic they want to be apart.”
Whatever Danielle thought. The way Dan had ogled Christine had not escaped my attention. There was often talk that David got his way in real estate sleeping around, and I simply ignored any suggestions that Dan’s mates made at school to tease him.
I reiterated that the cottage was perfect, and I was happy to be staying there. Thank heavens I wasn’t going to be on the same floor as Christine.
Over drinks I met Debbie’s parents and tried to make small talk. David attempted to convince me of the joys of real estate and how much I was missing out on, but I wasn’t feeling it. I kept looking out for Davina and wanted to apologise for anything she thought I’d thought or done.
A few minutes before we were due in the small restaurant attached to the cellar door, I saw her attempt to slink in unnoticed. Excusing myself from an excruciatingly boring conversation with Debbie’s father, I made my way over to the bar where she had found a red wine.
“Davina, I’m so sorry I didn’t recognise you before. That dress is just, well, beautiful, and I love how it brings out the amber in your eyes.” Geez. Was I trying to be a poet now?
“Thanks, Scott. Don’t let my mother see you talking to me–you’ll never hear the end of it.” Davina could not look at me and simply glanced at her feet or at her wine glass.
“Your mother can take a long walk off a short pier. I’m getting the impression I’m not the only one who doesn’t want to be here this weekend?”
Davina looked at me with surprise. “I’m not sure what my brother’s put you up to this time, Scott, but I doubt anything could surprise me at this wedding.”
“There you are, Dumpy. Glad you could join us. Not sure about wearing such a figure-hugging dress. Come through, dinner’s about to start.”
Danielle ushered her daughter away, and I felt an unease I was not thrilled with. I wondered if this was the way Davina had been treated by her family for years. I knew Dan and I used to tease her, but I never thought I did it with any form of malice.
Fortunately, Davina was sitting opposite me at the dinner with Debbie’s brother and sister-in-law on her other side. I tried to engage her in conversation, but she was quiet, and it was clear she was here to slide into the background.
“Friends,” Dan was tapping the side of his wine glass with a spoon. “Time for a bit of fun. Debbie and I have been having fun recreating some of our family photos from when we were growing up and have put together a bit of a slideshow for you.”
We turned to face the screen and saw photos from Daniel and Debbie’s childhood flash across the screen, interspersed with modern interpretations. Debbie’s brother had got in on the act along with her parents and some of the pictures were quite clever. Daniel’s photos were less creative. I couldn’t help but notice that any with Davina had been removed as if she never existed in his childhood.
“See, it’s always been in the genes!” Daniel laughed at a photo of him standing as a toddler in front of a Sold sign outside a nice-looking house. This was followed by a more recent photo, this time with Dan wearing lemon shorts and a mint t-shirt as in the original photos. “Finally, Scotty, remember this?” A photo appeared of Daniel, Davina, and me in the bath together. She would have been no more than about three years old and Dan and I would have been about five. “It’s ok, ladies and gents, don’t sweat, there’s no way we’d subject you to Davina’s tits all these years later, and we couldn’t find a bathtub big enough!”
The whole table erupted in laughter. All except for Davina and me. That Daniel thought this was amusing, let alone that Davina would be happy to be the brunt of jokes about how she looked showed he didn’t know her very well. Hell, from my brief conversations with her and seeing how her mother addressed her, I could see she had insecurities with her body, and I knew I wasn’t the most insightful of men to begin with.
When I turned my seat back to the table after the presentation, Davina had left, and it was clear no one, apart from me, had noticed this.
~*~*~*~*~
Davina
I shouldn’t have been horrified, in fact, I should have expected it. The dinner was worse than I had even dreamt possible. Scott started it all by pretending to be nice. At least I escaped before he could reveal what plan he and Dan had made. I was seated next to Debbie’s brother–hell, I can’t even remember his name–who droned on and on about how to write off wedding costs on your tax return if you were clever. I noted never to use his accountancy firm with any of my dealings.
The sexiness I felt in the shop that morning when I tried on the dress I wore to the dinner soon evaporated as my mother told me it was too figure-hugging as if that was the worst thing in the world. I’d snapped a photo in the cottage and sent it to Sabs and Marnie and they both told me how gorgeous I looked.
Getting back to the cottage, I beelined for the kitchenette, grateful a cheese platter had been left for me. Not wanting to disturb anyone else, I put in my headphones, and pressed play on the Lizzo album I knew word for word. That probably wasn’t true. I didn’t give a fuck if I disturbed my neighbour, but no doubt he’d tell Dan what I’d been listening to, or worse still, work it into one of the speeches at the wedding.
A bottle of red sat in the corner, compliments of the owners, the card read. I twisted the top and wondered when I’d last had to use a corkscrew. Laughing, I remembered the time Sabine had purchased a bottle of French red for us to drink, and we had to look up instructional videos on how to open it. I could still taste flecks of cork from when we stuffed it up pretty badly.