Piglet

by Lottie Hazell

there was a slice of fresh baguette that felt steamy to the touch, and a curl of butter imported from Isigny-sur-Mer at Cecelia’s instruction, accompanied by a wooden bowl of fleur de sel.

Yum

Piglet let herself sink into the food. Bourguignon would not let you down like a lover. Confit garlic would not abandon you like a friend.

“Never seen a woman eat before, Fran?” Piglet asked and felt herself wink before immediate regret shrouded her like a cloak, her neck prickling with shame. She had not meant to hurt her sister, to lash out at Franny when she had done nothing wrong, but Piglet felt so dangerously close to the destruction of herself, of her marriage, it seemed that anyone who came too close to her would also suffer the flying shrapnel of her discontent. Franny recoiled, looking down, her hands clasped together at the front of her dress, miniature moons flashing as they caught the light. “I didn’t mean that,” Piglet said, the mushroom in her mouth turned to rubber. “OK,” Franny said, not lifting her head.

there was a part of her that needed to feel better than her sister, standing before her, collarbones at angles beneath her dress.

“Are you OK?” Toni mouthed. “Do you want me to…?” Toni gestured towards her. Piglet shook her head and watched as Toni nodded, raising a clenched fist to her chest. What did she want to do?

Cecelia turned from the crowd, and the smile dropped from her face. Without it, she was slack-jawed, and looked like Kit had done on that night, when he had leaned over her in bed.

“Darling,” Cecelia said, “John and Linda are just very sweetly saying thank you.” “Oh, no need,” Richard said, smiling, eyes unfocused. He placed a hand on her father’s shoulder, swaying slightly. “Only the best for our kids, right?” he slurred, and her father shuffled. Cecelia pulled Piglet closer. “And sweet of you,” she addressed Piglet’s parents, “to have bought the dress.” “We wanted to make a contribution,” her father nodded, not looking at his daughter. Piglet stood up straighter, pulling her shoulders down, shrugging off her mother-in-law. Cecelia nodded, her nose wrinkled with a smile. “Sweet of you,” Cecelia said again. “Have you tried the oysters?”

Borrowed

Ooo i follow. Blue next?

She had been picturing this day: this moment. Adulation for her efforts; heaping glory; witness after witness to her success.

A man with a torso wasted by age, a spine curved with rheumatism, was shaking his head—“Gout”—as the woman next to him pushed her glass forward. “Just a small one.” Mrs. Edwards watched as the waitress leaned over, liquid like deoxygenated blood filling the glass.

Omg

Children, impatient and unimpressed by the oysters, the girolles, had started to run across the marquee, miniature tailoring bunching at their shoulders, flower arrangements toppling in their wake. They had found her croquembouche and sunk their tiny fingers into the choux. Mrs. Edwards watched as custard oozed along their arms, onto the tablecloth, dripping onto the floor below, and her heart was a profiterole, crushed.

No kids srsly

Mrs. Edwards had not meant to interrupt her husband. But she was standing, her body rising, arms extended, asking for the microphone. “Can I borrow it for a moment?”

He did not offer her the microphone, and in the end she had to take it from him, the thunk and shuffle of changing hands echoing over the speakers. The guests had stopped laughing, their jaws now loose with discomfort, disbelief, and she felt the happily soused mood in the room shift.

"Horrified looks from everyone in the room"

She tried to listen for their reaction as she told them what he had done, her voice echoing, but blood was pounding in her ears, and the bones of her dress creaked and groaned across the speakers, as if in reproach. She was raising a toast—“To us”—lifting her glass higher and higher, when she felt her dress give, a sick ripping snagging through the speakers. It was the seams, not even the buttons, she thought,

She did not see the wide eyes of the guests as she dropped the microphone, their covered mouths as they eyed the fringe of her lingerie, cream silk cutting into white flesh. Mrs. Edwards’s eyes were cast down, her right hand twisting at the ring on her left.

Blue

!!!!!!!!!

“It’s a shame about the dress, Duck,” her mother said from behind them, running a finger along the split seam, her fingernail grazing Piglet’s rib cage. “I don’t think she’s going to be using it again, Mum,” Franny said, pulling away from her sister. Her mother shook her head, opening a mossy clutch bag, and withdrew three folded notes. “Here,” she said. “In case it helps.” Franny did the same, opening her bag, offering Piglet her phone back. She took it, seeing Margot’s name.

she had married Kit; she had told her father; her family were not the people she wanted them to be; she was not the daughter that her in-laws desired.

Kit; the creeping realisation that really, really, they had made their vows in the pursuit of living

Margot nodded, shifting in her seat as Piglet spoke, popping two powdery ibuprofen tablets from their blister pack. Piglet tried to finish speaking, to ask how she was, if she was in pain, but she could not stop. She sounded like a child, her breath coming in jagged gasps, tears falling down her face, cutting tracks through thick wedding makeup, and it was not lost on her that, in this moment, she was asking Margot to mother her too.

“The bride and groom are supposed to smash it,” she said, breaking off a piece of caramel, crushing it between her fingers. “I assume we’re not inviting Kit over to do the smashing?” Margot asked. “No, but I couldn’t leave it. Before I made them this morning, I was so proud of it all. I couldn’t wait to smash them. I could imagine the photos.” “You can still smash it, you know?” “What?” “Yeah.” Margot smiled. “Go and smash it. Do it in the garden. Why not?”

Since he had told her, revealed how he had indulged his pleasures, she had decided to follow her own.

“Really?” she said, and her heart broke at the size of Margot’s.

ones—and dried whole wheat spaghetti. She had walked to the next aisle before she turned back, replacing the spaghetti with a pale-yellow linguine, imagining its starchy flatness on her tongue.

“Some horsey-faced girl—Sophie, I think her name was—started spouting off her theories about you, about us, and he told her, he told her to—” Her mother drew her fingers across sealed lips.

“I’m sorry,” she said, her voice a whisper. He extended a hand to hers, and she let him hold her for a moment, savouring the feeling of being with someone. “Why didn’t you tell me before?” he asked. “Why didn’t you?” He was quiet.

She looked up and saw him in their doorway, her doorway, a doorway. There were tears in his eyes, she noticed, his chin dimpled, his lips pressed together. “See you, Pippa,” he said, his voice low. He nodded, he walked out, he closed the door behind him. She sat, for a moment, breathless.

Eeeek

The linguine was salty on her tongue, gratifyingly hot, and pleasurable in its heft as she swallowed. Her lips turned red as she looked out of her kitchen window, the fog starting to clear. A second magpie had joined the first, the pair on the garden fence, and she watched the birds, their tails dipping, and ate until she was satisfied.

Claire

Always look for one in the acknowledgements