Peacock Emporium by Jojo Moyes

tones were emollient; a wave of her hand suggested she would like the conversation closed.
    ‘Who says we’re settling down?’
    ‘Don’t be obtuse, dear. You know what I mean.’
    ‘No, I don’t. Douglas and I have no intention of settling down, do we, darling?’ Douglas felt her cool hand on the back of his neck. ‘Not if it means ending up like you.’
    ‘I’m not going to talk to you, Athene, if you’re going to be deliberately rude.’
    ‘I’m not being deliberately rude, Mother. Not as rude as you were evidently being about me in my absence.’
    ‘Very silly girl,’ muttered her father.
    Douglas was feeling extremely uncomfortable. ‘I think you’re being rather unfair on Athene,’ he ventured.
    ‘Douglas, dear, well-meaning as you are, you have no conception of what Athene has put us through.’
    Athene leant down and picked up his brandy, as if unconcernedly to examine its contents, then swallowed the amber liquid in one gulp. ‘Oh, Douglas, don’t listen to them,’ she said, replacing the glass and pulling at his arm. ‘They’re such bores. This is our day, after all.’
    Within minutes of their being on the dance floor he had almost forgotten the exchange, lost in his own private appreciation of her silk-clad curves, the scent of her hair, the light feel of her hands on his back. When she looked up at him, her eyes were deliquescent, glittering with tears.
    ‘We don’t have to see them now we’re married.’ It wasn’t a question, but she appeared to demand some kind of reassurance. ‘We don’t have to spend half our time as stuffed shirts, sitting in horrid old family gatherings.’
    ‘We can do whatever we want, my darling,’ he whispered into her neck. ‘It’s just us now. We can do whatever we want.’ He enjoyed the sound of his own voice, the authority and comfort it promised.
    She had held him tighter then, a surprisingly strong grasp, her face buried in his shoulder. Over the sound of the music, he had been unable to make out her reply.
    ‘Won’t be a minute,’ said the girl in the cloakroom. ‘Some of the tickets have got separated from the coats. We’ll just need a minute to sort them all out.’
    ‘Fine,’ said Vivi, her foot tapping with impatience to be gone. The sounds of the reception were dulled now, muffled by the expanse of carpet that lined the hallways and stairs. Past her, elderly dowagers were helped to powder rooms, and small shoeless children skidded up and down under the quietly outraged gaze of rigid, uniformed staff. She wouldn’t return home until Christmas. It was likely that Douglas and that woman – she still could not bring herself to say her name, worse still to describe her as ‘his wife’ – would be away for Christmas. His family had always been big on skiing, after all.
    It might be easier, now that it was clear her mother understood. And if her longing for her parents became too much, she could always invite them up to London, persuade her father to make a weekend of it. She could show them the antiques market behind Lisson Grove, take them to the zoo, hail a taxi to the Viennese tea rooms in St John’s Wood and feed them frothy coffee and spiced pastries. By then she might not think about Douglas at all. She might feel nothing like a physical pain.
    Her coat was taking an age. Beside her, she noticed, two men were smoking, deep in conversation, their own tickets held loosely in their hands.
    ‘And Alfie made the point that he’ll be away for Wimbledon. Still, you’ve got to admit, he’s done all right for himself. I mean, if you’re going to get marched down the aisle by anyone . . .’
    She didn’t even flinch now. Vivi pretended to be absorbed by a carved engraving on the wall, wondering again how much longer it would be before this outward stillness was echoed internally.
    Almost twenty minutes later, her mother stood in front of her, in her good wool bouclé suit, her clutch bag held in front of her like a shield. ‘I