Girl Meets Boy - Ali Smith [35]
What I mean is. There, under the trees, on a fresh spring day by the banks of the River Ness, that fast black backbone of a Scottish northern town; there, flanked by presbyterian church after presbyterian church, we gave our hands in marriage under the blossom, gave each other and took each other for better, for worse, in sickness or health, to love, comfort, honour, cherish, protect, and to have and to hold each other from that day forward, for as long as we both should live till death us would part.
Ness I said Ness I will Ness.
Into thin air, to the nothing that was there, with the river our witness, we said yes. We said we did. We said we would.
We’d thought we were alone, Robin and I. We’d thought it was just us, under the trees outside the cathedral. But as soon as we’d made our vows there was a great whoop of joy behind us, and when we turned round we saw all the people, there must have been hundreds, they were clapping and cheering, they were throwing confetti, they waved and they roared celebration.
My sister was there at the front with her other half, Paul. She was happy. She smiled. Paul looked happy. He was growing his hair. My sister gestured to me like she couldn’t believe it, at a couple standing not far from her – look! – was it them? – sure enough, it was them, our father and our mother, both, and they were standing together and they weren’t arguing, they were talking to each other very civilly, they clinked their glasses as I watched.
They’re discussing the unsuitability of the wedding, Midge said.
I nodded. First time they’ve agreed on anything in years, I said.
All the people from the rest of the tale were there too; Becky from Reception; the two work experience girls, Chantelle and her friend Lorraine; Brian, who was going out with Chantelle; and Chantelle’s mum, who wasn’t in the story as such but who’d clearly also taken a shine to Brian; a whole gaggle of Pure people, including the security men who first arrested Robin; they waved and smiled. Not Norman or Dominic, were those their names? they’d been promoted to Base Camp, so they weren’t there, at least not that I saw, and not the boss of bosses, Keith, I don’t remember seeing him either. But the whole of the Provost’s office came, and some officials from other places we’d written on; the theatre, the shopping mall, the Castle. A male-voice choir from the Inverness Police Force attended, they sang a beautiful arrangement of songs from Gilbert and Sullivan. Then the Inverness Constabulary female-voice choir sang an equally beautiful choral arrangement of Don’t Cha (Wish Your Girlfriend Was Hot Like Me). Then the Provost made an eloquent speech. Inverness, she said, once famed for its faith in unexpected ancient creatures of the deep, had now become famous for something new: for fairness, for art, and for the art of fairness. Inverness, now world-renowned for its humane and galvanising public works of art, had quadrupled its tourist intake. Thousands more people were coming especially to view the public exhibits. And not just Antiques Roadshow, but Songs of Praise, Question Time, Newsnight Review and several other tv programmes had all petitioned the council, keen to record themselves in front of the famous sloganned walls. The Inverness art may have spawned copycat art in other cities and towns, she said, but none so good as in the city whose new defining motto, inscribed on all the signposts at all the entrypoints to the city, would be from this day forth A Hundred Thousand Welcomes And When You See A Wrong, Write It! Ceud Mile Failte! Còir! Sgriobh!
Really terrible slogan, I said privately to Robin.
Your sister thought it up, Robin said. Definitely in line for a job as Council Creative.
Which is your