Wedding

Despite living in San Antonio, Texas, I encounter other English people with some frequency. They tend to divide into two types - those with which I have only the geography in common and whom I probably would have crossed the road to avoid back in the old country, and people I like. Sadly there seem to be more in the first category than in the second, which I suppose is simply the law of averages. Chris, who once shared office space with my wife, belongs in the second category and is getting married. I've been looking forward to the wedding because it means I'll get to meet Chris's family, who are not only from England but are from a bit of England to which I delivered mail back when I was a postman; and Chris's dad is apparently a Millwall supporter, which I find oddly exciting.

My wife and I drive downtown, to one of the big hotels. We leave the car in a parking garage opposite the hotel, and share an elevator with a young guy wearing a Stetson. Bess gives me a look but I'm thinking, wouldn't it be funny if he were here for the wedding?

He follows us into the hotel, and then out to the courtyard because yes, he's here for the wedding, having spent at least some time in the same office space as both Chris and my wife. Alex, Tristram and others from the same company are also present, which is nice because I vaguely know them by some definition. Alex was the first ever person to have bought an oil painting from me.

Chairs are arranged around the courtyard and a sort of mobile bar is being set up. A photographer wanders around taking light readings and guests drift in. We try to guess which side of the proposed family they represent. An older man in a suit arrives and I think, that's a south-east London haircut if ever I've seen one. His hair is silver, short on top and spiky like Joe Brown. It has to be Chris's dad.

Soon the chairs are all occupied, and we're watching Chris and Tessa get hitched. The vows include a line about honouring who you are rather than who I think you should be, or words to that effect, which Bess and I both consider a nice touch.

Chris and Tessa are pronounced man and wife, the bar opens, and I have a beer.

'You should go and talk to Chris's dad,' Bess says.

'Not yet,' I say. I have two more beers. It's been a while since I socialised and particularly with people I don't really know, and it's taken me a while to remember that I was never that sociable.

Eventually the time seems right, so I wander over.

'You must be Chris's dad,' I say.

'Stepdad,' he corrects me, but he seems pleasantly surprised to hear an English accent. His own is clearly south-east London.

'I think I used to deliver your mail,' I tell him. 'I was a postman in Catford back in the nineties.'

'My wife's from Catford!' he says, and I notice that he has introduced himself as Chris's stepdad.

'John and Jane,' he announces, 'although I don't expect you'll remember.' He now turns to his wife. 'He's from Catford!'

'I worked there,' I say. 'I used to live in Lewisham though. Chris told me you lived in—I'm trying to remember the road. Was it Springbank Road? Meadowbank? Summink like that?'

I'm thinking of Hither Green Lane, to which Ryecroft Road was conjoined. Ryecroft Road was the first place I lived in London, so Hither Green Lane stayed in my memory and was apparently where Chris grew up - except I can't remember the name right now.

'Crantock Road,' she tells me.

I manage to keep myself from saying holy shit in front of strangers, although I think it. I haven't thought of Crantock Road in probably two decades.

Inchmery, Sandhurst, Arngask, Crantock…

The sorting comes back to me from all those mornings stood at the frame slotting letters into alcoves, although the order is probably somewhat jumbled through disuse. 'Ernie Gough was probably your postman, I should think.'

Ernie was fucking great, so I remember him fairly well.

'Ernie,' Jane says, although I can't tell whether it's because she knows who I'm talking about or not, and I'm finding this a little disorientating.

'I hear you're a Millwall man,' I say.

'No. No,' says John. 'I used to go and see Charlton though.'

I recall Chris telling me about his dad singing hits from the Millwall terraces following a number of cold, refreshing drinks; and I realise that I didn't even realise his mother had remarried, and that I don't actually know anything about this man aside from what I'm learning right here and now. I wish Chris had told me some of this, then recall that most of it has, in any case, been information passed on through my wife; so it would probably be churlish to resent the inaccuracy of details he hadn't actually told me in the first place.

We talk for fifteen or twenty minutes, although it becomes confusing in part. I'm also aware that I possibly sound drunk due to my silently wrestling with narrative conflict, but regardless, it's great to have met these people, and to talk about the Bromley Road, and London, and how there was once a Robinson's Jam factory opposite the bus garage. It's strange that we're talking about this in San Antonio, Texas.

Inevitably they ask how I met Bess, and we talk about international travel and Covid restrictions.

Then we depart for different tables in the restaurant.

Speeches are delivered.

Food is eaten.

I regard the table to which they've exiled all the teenagers, allowing them to play with their phones and compare tattoos without interruption, and I marvel that I'm no longer among them; and that I barely even recognise their general kind. I'm not sure how that happened. Truthfully I don't know how any of it has happened.