CHAPTER 95
So it was, two weeks later, as I struggled to zip up the skirt of the slate-grey suit I had chosen for the ceremony. Low heels to match, and of all things Eric had insisted I wear a bloody hat, some stupid thing of stiff net and dangles.

I have absolutely no doubt in my mind what I am, I am female through and through, but there are times when I despair, and the one word that comes out is ‘why?’

Anyway, tarted and primped, Eric in his best suit, we ended up taking a cab to the Registry Office as the bikes would have been a little silly. Den was waiting outside, in his own best rig, and he looked even more gorgeous than he had when we had first met. I suppose there was an element there, for me, of ‘last chance to ravish’ before he was officially off the market, and whether it was me or my elevated hormones, it was certainly putting thoughts into my mind.

“Hiya, glad to see you here. Kirsty’s with her Mam and Dad, we’ve got about twenty minutes”

Eric nodded. “I’ve got my camera, if you haven’t…you haven’t, have you? All very quick, mate!”

“Well, when something needs doing, it needs doing sharpish, aye? I’ll take you in and make the introductions”

Kirsty’s dad Roger was now away with his daughter, but her mother left me in no doubt as to whence Kirsty had arrived. Scottish, about five foot two and even more formidably upholstered than her daughter, Katriona Ellis had all of the presence of the younger woman.

“So, you’re that Annie she’s always on about? And Eric? Hi, thank you for doing this at short notice, we can see that Kirst has true friends”

I took her hand. “Thank you, just all a bit quick, aye? I was looking forward to the big day out, all the frills and stuff, give me ideas for our own”

That brought a sharp look from Katriona. “Aye, our wee girl told us you were a bit…unusual, Annie, but I’ll be honest, you are not what we expected”

“Oh yes?”

She gave just a hint of a blush. “Aye, we were expecting…well…”

“A bloke in a dress? Size thirteen feet and stubble?”

She winced a little, the blush deepening. “Er, yes”

“Well, even if I was, I would still be me, still be Annie. I’ve just been a bit lucky in my genetics, aye? Now, let’s get ourselves set for this blushing bride, aye? I’ve spent a while getting ready for today, let’s make it a good ‘un”

Den took up his station at the registrar’s dais and Eric and I took up a position to the left as Katriona did to the right, just before Roger, a surprisingly tall and slim man, entered with his daughter on his arm. She looked absolutely beautiful, as is a bride’s right, in a simple cream silk suit and another frothy device of no practical use at all pinned to her hair. Den looked round, and grinned, and my heart lurched.

The words were said, and the replies were given, and the pronunciation made, and the newlyweds kissed. And that was that, a wedding over, a box ticked. I was left feeling a little unsatisfied, as if I had eaten one of those weight loss meals where you realise that the way they cut calories is largely by cutting portion size. We signed the forms and took the pictures, and then we had a private lunch at a nearby hotel, and that was it. I collared Kirsty in the ladies’, and I could see that she was putting a brave face on things, but just like the rest of us she clearly felt it hadn’t been her day, not the way it should have been.

“What is it the Jews say, Ruthy? This time next year, Jerusalem?”

She smiled, ruefully. “Yeah, and I’ll have a sprog to look after, not really a honeymoon accessory, yeah?”

I hugged her. “A good man, that’s all a bride really needs. You’ve got one, aye? Don’t come much better, do they? If you’ve got cold feet, I can always take him off your hands!”

“You are a dirty bitch, Sergeant Price! Who would have thought it?”

That brought a sharper look from her. “All that time, I should have known what you were. You hid it well, you know. It’s just now, like, I can hardly remember the old Sarge. You are so large a personality, you fill the screen sort of thing. No, no, sorry, not saying you’re fat, yeah? Just, THERE in 3D. And, well, thanks”

“Thanks for inviting us”

“Not what I meant, Annie. Look, I had a bit of a rep, yeah, station bike sort of thing, the one with the tits, margarine legs, all of that stuff. You never went along with that, you just treated me as a copper and a mate, and you did the same with Den, after all that shit he went through."

“What do you mean, Ruthy?”

“Look, my Den, yeah, he’s a grass, that’s fact. Doesn’t matter who he grassed up, doesn’t matter why, to some twats he’s a grass, and that’s all that matters. You took him on as a colleague, and then a mate, and you do know you’re his best mate, don’t you? He’s got fuck-all left from home, they all dropped him after the trials”

I should really have guessed. “The same shit at the station here, now?”

She sighed, checking her face in the mirror for the twentieth time. “Some, yeah, not as much now, but there’s still a bit, still some fucking dinosaurs around. Den sorted a bit, and I’ve sorted a few more”

“Would this ‘sorting’ involve the odd slap, Constable Ellis?”

“That’s Constable Armstrong now, and yes, it might have. I think it’s sorted now, mostly, but that’s by my Den just being, well, Den. How could anyone hate him, Annie?”

“All I am concerned about, what I am happy about, is that two of my best mates be happy together, aye? Any more shit, you come to me, or Jim, or Sam, they are there to do the arse kicking. Come on, we have people waiting, including a new husband, aye?”

“Annie…”

“Yes?”

“I know it’s cheeky, yeah, but when you get married, you and Eric, can I do the matron of honour bit?”

How many noses to put out of joint? No, Kirsty would be the obvious choice. My mind made itself up as I kissed her ‘yes’ and tugged her back to the table. Happy thoughts, let there be happy thoughts.

Work was steady for a few weeks after that, and as Eric continued his preparations with Geoff for the next year’s French silliness, Stephanie spent many nights in the spare room. It was odd how we both felt the same way about empty houses, but then we did have rather a lot of history in common, and we spoke. How we spoke, about fear, and validation, about love and pain. She was smiling as she told me, over a glass or two, of how she had met her husband.

“So there’s this bloke, all gorgeous and edible, and I’m suddenly feeling myself go all heterosexual for the first time in my life, and the bastard’s married! It was like that old song, yeah?”

“Do tell…”

“She won’t but her sister will. Bloody good job he had a brother, is what I say”

“Aye, a bit harder in my case, Eric knowing Adam so many years. Took a bit of working out before we sort of got there. Same with me, though, it was somebody else I fancied first”

“Den?”

“Oooooooooh yes!”

“How is the new wife?”

I filled her in on the nastiness that preyed on Kirsty’s mind, the ‘traditional values’ that some small-minded people still clung to as opposed to any concept of justice and fairness, the sort of attitude that led to the hell that Chantelle had endured, that Darren had survived only by chance. Steph was nodding.

“Funny, we don’t seem to have that sort of thing. I mean, we had that bastard who was being paid for letting coke in, but when he got arrested everyone just said ‘bloody good job’, and then there was that rapist, nobody had any time for him at all. If they could have grassed him up, they would have done it like a shot. Is it just coppers, Annie?”

“No, I think it’s common culture. We are on the street, so we see more of daily life’s shit than you do, aye? It’s everywhere, schools, work, it pisses me off. Rapist?”

“Yeah, one of my colleagues. Picked up ten years after by DNA. ‘I am such a stud, any girl would pay to shag me. Bleeding? Course she was, I’m hung like an elephant, the girls love it!’ That was his defence, the bastard”

“That’s what pisses me off, aye? Forgetting what rape is all about for a minute, it’s that no matter what the crime is, there’s always somebody there to whine about grassing, as if telling the law about a crime is worse than the actual offence they’re reporting, aye?”

Steph hugged me, as we sat slumped on the settee. “This shit about Den has really got under your skin, hasn’t it?”

“It has. I mean, that should have been a really good day, it should have had all of their friends there, a dinner, dancing, all the usual silliness, aye? And what we get is six of us and a registrar”

“Then we have a plan, love. We make bloody sure that next June we give them the best of everything, from hen night to honeymoon”

“What about the stag night, aye?”

Steph raised an eyebrow, trying to look serious.

“We sort of resigned from that club a while ago, Annie. It’s a members’ club, and…”