Gypsy Wedding (22 page)

‘I thought that if you were going to all the trouble of making the bridesmaids’ dresses I ought to do something for us too.’

Vicky ran her hand over the footboard of the bed, feeling the silky smooth wood under her fingers, gently touching the wings of a red admiral and then a peacock butterfly. ‘This is so special, Liam. It’ll make our wedding night special, too.’

Liam blushed at the thought of sharing the bed with his fiancée. ‘I am so glad you like it.’

‘Like it? I love it. Was this what I caught you making back in the summer?’

Liam nodded. ‘I’ve been bricking it that you’d find out or guess before I’d finished it.’

‘No, I never imagined …’ Vicky stopped. ‘I mean I know you’re skilled but this is
really
beautiful.’

‘I’m not just a chippy. I want to do more of this sort of stuff.’

‘Furniture making?’

Liam nodded. ‘I know it’s a crazy dream but I have this idea I could do it properly.’

‘A business?’

‘Yeah.’ He gave an embarrassed laugh. ‘But what would I know about business? I can hardly even write my name.’

‘But I could help. I can do maths and everything.’

Liam shook his head. ‘But it wouldn’t be right now, would it? Isn’t it my job to bring home the bacon? If you helped me run the business, tongues would wag, you know that, don’t you?’

‘But it’s my role to look after you. What would be wrong about me doing something other than cleaning and cooking? Wouldn’t
me
making sure
you
were getting the right price for your work be a help? I could work out how much your materials cost and what your time is worth and then add in a profit. What would be wrong with that?’

Liam looked troubled. Vicky’s argument made complete sense but generations of built-in tradition tore him against the logic.

‘Well, as I said, it’s just a dream.’

‘No, Liam, it isn’t
just a dream
. It really,
really
, could be a reality.’

‘But what if the reality was too much for you? Knowing how to add up isn’t the same as knowing how to run a business. If you’ve got kids to look after and a home to run and you’re sorting out stuff for me – well …’ He shook his head. ‘It might get too much for you. I know how talented and clever you are but … I don’t want you to end up being ground down by stuff you shouldn’t have been dealing with in the first place.’

Vicky sighed. Why couldn’t he trust her to do something hundreds of other women did every day? If she was given a chance she was sure she could do it. And she was sure that Jordan wouldn’t have worried about her coping.

God, why was Jordan getting into her thoughts again? What was it with her that she kept comparing Liam to Jordan? Racked with guilt she turned to leave.

‘Vicky, don’t go! I didn’t mean it like that. Really, I didn’t.’ He caught her hand. ‘I truly didn’t. Honest. Forgive me Vicky, please.’

She nodded. Vicky could tell that Liam was distraught. She knew he hadn’t meant to hurt her feelings it was just that the thought that she might want to do something other than the norm had upset him. ‘Oh, Liam, I know you didn’t. You’re right: I know nothing about running a business. Let’s face it, I only know about making a home.’

‘And making dresses.’

She nodded. ‘And that.’

Perhaps this was the moment to kiss him properly. They’d had a tiff and made up, they were on their own … She leaned into him. ‘Liam,’ she whispered.

The door to the trailer banged open.

‘Only me,’ said Biddy, hauling herself up the step. ‘Oh,’ she said, seeing Vicky. ‘You’re here.’

Vicky sighed. The moment was gone.

‘You look tired, darlin’,’ said Mary-Rose over supper the next evening.

‘I’m fine.’

‘She’s frying her brain with all that college work,’ said Shania, unhelpfully.

‘Am not,’ snapped back Vicky. ‘At least I’ve got a brain to fry.’

‘Girls, stop it,’ said Johnnie. ‘I won’t have you bickering.’

Vicky was tempted to snipe that Shania had started it, as usual, but was too knackered to argue. She’d hardly slept the night before and had spent most of her time in bed going over and over events of the previous day.

Could she really face having another run-in with Chloe? Could she risk ever being alone with Jordan again? Did she really love Liam or was she marrying him because it was what was expected of her? Was she going to be happy after her wedding day? And what if she wasn’t, what then?

She’d lain there, in the dark, listening to Shania’s quiet, peaceful breathing, wishing that she was without a care in the world like her sister, as the problems circled round her brain like vultures over a corpse.

If she didn’t like her lot, what was the alternative? Run away from home? And go where? If she ran away she’d have to leave the caravan site and then what? Go to Kelly’s? Sleep rough? She’d never even had a sleepover in another trailer. The prospect of moving in with Liam was scary enough, and that was hardly a leap into the unknown.

If only she had someone to talk to. Kelly was no good. She loved her best friend to bits, of course she did, but Kelly couldn’t see the problems from her point of view. Kelly would simply tell her to get out and get a job. Vicky was sure that Kelly thought that being a traveller was some sort of lifestyle choice, like whether or not to dye your hair. Kelly just didn’t get that it went deeper than that, that it was a part of her, like skin colour. She couldn’t talk to her sister or her parents; they’d just tell her she had cold feet about getting wed. Liam wouldn’t understand. He’d take it as a personal slight that she might want to work. Which left … effectively no one.

So what if she just lit out? If she ran away from her roots, would she be an outcast for ever? Would she be seen as betraying everything that her family believed in?

Vicky had tossed and turned, unable to get comfortable, unable to stop the thoughts batting around, unable to find peace, until she’d heard the alarm clock go off in her mother’s room. It had been with relief she staggered out of bed to face the day. At least being busy at college would stop her problems going round and round in her head – which it had. But now she was facing another night and she was no nearer to solving anything.

After supper, Vicky and Shania got on with clearing up the supper things, wiping down the kitchen till it shone and making up the bunks for the boys. Their mam and Johnnie had gone off to Bridget and Jimmy Connelly’s trailer next door to share a few drinks, leaving their eldest girls to settle the children.

‘Are you going to get Kylie bathed or am I?’ said Shania.

‘Would you be a love,’ said Vicky. ‘I’m so tired – didn’t get a wink of sleep last night.’

‘As I said, you’re messing with your brain.’

Wearily, Vicky shook her head. ‘It’s nothing like that.’

‘Then get Paulette to make the last of the dresses. God knows we could do with getting shot of them. There’s little enough spare space in this place without all those frocks cluttering up the cupboards.’

‘There’s only two here. I’ve stored the rest at Liam’s.’

‘Well, it seems like more,’ grumbled Shania. ‘I just don’t get why you have to be different.’

‘Neither do I,’ admitted Vicky.

‘What is it you’re trying to prove?’

Vicky shrugged.

Shania folded a tea towel and hung it neatly over the rail. ‘You know, people round here are talking about you. About you going to college and everything. They think you’re setting yourself up to be better than everyone else, just because you’ve got GCSEs. They think you’re turning your back on your roots and they don’t like it. They don’t say anything to your face but it’s what they’re saying behind your back.’

‘But I’m not. Just because I like textiles doesn’t mean I want to be something I’m not.’ Vicky was stung by the accusation. For fuck’s sake, she was hated at college for being pikey and now she was hated at home for being a gorgio. This was so unfair.

‘Just saying,’ said Shania. ‘Give it up, sack it.’ She shrugged. ‘It isn’t as if you can stay on to get the A level, Liam won’t let you, so what’s the point?’

‘Can I have a word, Mrs Mead?’ Vicky had been standing outside the staffroom for ten minutes hoping to catch her tutor.

‘Here?’ Mrs Mead asked. The corridor outside the staffroom was always busy with students wanting to see tutors or visiting one of the cloakrooms nearby.

‘We could go to the foyer.’

Mrs Mead nodded and followed Vicky into the huge space. There was always room there to find a quiet spot.

‘I’ve decided to give up the course,’ she said bleakly.

Mrs Mead looked poleaxed. ‘No, you can’t possibly. I won’t allow it.’

‘You can’t stop me. I’m over sixteen, I don’t have to be here.’

‘But why?’

‘It’s not working out.’

‘Don’t be daft, you’re doing splendidly.’

‘It’s not working out because there’s no point in me carrying on.’

Mrs Mead perched on a nearby window ledge. ‘Now you listen to me, you have endless talent, you can’t waste it.’

‘Why? It isn’t as if I can go to fashion college, like you want.’

‘Why can’t you? I really don’t understand this. Why can’t you postpone your wedding for a few years, what would be so bad about that? Really, Vicky, before the year is out you’ll be eighteen and an adult and you can do as you please.’

Vicky could see that Mrs Mead was close to losing her temper. ‘I’m sorry but that’s how it is.’

‘Then at least stay till May and take the exam. It’s only a few weeks, Vicky. You won’t get this chance again with your education, not if everything you’ve told me is true.’

‘But I just don’t see the point.’

‘Maybe, when your parents see your grade, they’ll think again.’

Vicky snorted. ‘They won’t care. What matters for them is that I know how to look after my husband properly.’

Mrs Mead sighed. ‘Surely that can’t be the sole direction your life is going to take.’

It was Vicky’s turn to sigh. ‘Look, miss, I know you mean well but you’re like my mate Kelly. You don’t understand what it’s like so you shouldn’t judge.’

Mrs Mead put her hands up in surrender. ‘Okay, Vicky, have it your way, leave. Leave before you take your exam, leave before you find out that I’m not the only person who thinks you have an extraordinary talent. Leave before you’ve got any chance of convincing your family and friends that maybe, just maybe, you could go places. But if you do, I just hope you never regret it.’ She stood up and stamped back towards the staffroom.

Vicky felt completely bewildered. Couldn’t she do anything right? If she stayed on at college she’d get it in the neck from her friends and family and if she left Mrs Mead was going to hate her. She was sure that whatever she decided it was going to be wrong. What was she supposed to do now?

‘There,’ Vicky said, biting off a thread and giving a small sigh of satisfaction coupled with relief, ‘that’s them all made.’ She’d made all the dresses, she’d almost done her end-of-year exams, she’d got through everything and she felt she had every right to feel pretty satisfied with herself.

‘All of them? Give us a hug, darlin’,’ said her mother. ‘You’re a clever girl and no mistake. All done and a month to go. And I don’t see that you had to be at college to do this. When I think of all those other lovely dresses you’ve made you didn’t need no extra learning. And all of that time you wasted being taught sewing when you already know how to do it perfectly well.’

‘It wasn’t just sewing, Mammy.’

‘No?’ Her mother raised an eyebrow.

Vicky gave up. It wasn’t worth arguing. Her mother thought that art was nothing more than pencil sketching and textiles was just dressmaking. And it was the knowledge that studying textiles wasn’t the same as just being able to sew that had kept her at college just a few weeks longer. What Mrs Mead had said to her had hit home and had made her think hard about the rest of her life. With years of being a housewife ahead of her she’d decided that maybe it was worth trying to juggle living in two worlds for just a few more weeks before giving it all up. Whether or not her year of studying textiles would ever do her any good she couldn’t tell, but she didn’t think that, on balance, it could do her any harm. And she could put up with a few harsh words from the likes of Chloe just like she could ignore a few jibes on the trailer park for the next couple of months because in a few years’ time who the hell would remember?

Vicky shook out the dark green skirt and then found a stout wooden hanger to hang it on. Carefully she pinned a label to it with the name ‘Shania’ on it. With each dress made-to-measure she didn’t want them to get mixed up.

‘I’ll take it over to Liam’s trailer in a little while.’

‘Just as well you’ve got that place standing mostly empty. Lord knows where we’d put that lot if you didn’t.’ Even the one dress hanging off a cupboard door seemed to take up a lot of space.

‘Wait till I get going on the underskirts. And with all that I’ve already got stored in Liam’s trailer, there won’t be room for those.’