The New Bride

(For Katie, who knows all)

" Do it yourself," I said when my aunt asked me to re-pin the flowers in the buttonhole of her jacket. I could see my mother's startled look. Though she disliked my aunt and knew I was difficult to control at times, she had thought that on Aunt Kitty's wedding day, which at last looked like passing off without too many recriminations, I might have behaved myself. But I had been awkward at the church, difficult at the meal and had refused to dance with the groom's brother afterwards. The groom was in his sixties, pale and ill-looking after my aunt had nearly danced him off his feet to the guitar, bass guitar and saxophone trio hired for the evening. My father had originally refused to accept the idea of this marriage, because of the groom's advanced age. Only relentless pestering by my mother had caused him to submit and turn up to give his sister away. As her eighteen-year-old bridesmaid, I was being much too obvious about being angry with my aunt Kitty and the funny thing was that I wasn't quite sure why I was angry now.

I had been sent down from Dublin a couple of days early to help my aunt get ready. It was hot Indian Summer weather nearing the end of August and we were sitting on deck-chairs in the garden of her cottage just two days before the wedding. I was wearing shorts and a light top and Kitty had on the old print dress she used for working in the garden.

She was a short, stocky woman with a rather masculine face, a square jaw and strong, straw-coloured hair. She must have been nearly forty and I didn't see her as particularly feminine or attractive. I had never stayed with her on my own before and normally my sister Jennifer would be there too, and Kitty ruled us strictly and made us mind our manners. I felt maybe in the last few days she and I were a bit closer that we had been before. That particular day we had been to Dublin in her car, visiting an expensive lingerie shop called "Madame Claire's" although I had been made wait outside while Kitty made her purchases.

"You've never been a bridesmaid before," she said now, "but I'm sure you know the procedure."

I nodded wisely.

"The bridesmaid has to do everything the bride wants. It's not lucky otherwise."

"Of course," I said. "That's what I'm here for."

"Good," Kitty said, smiling and patting my knee. She had strong but quite pretty hands with short, square-cut nails.

The sun was still high enough and she took up her straw hat from the grass and put it on, casting her face in heavy shadow.

"I'll want you to help me dress, of course, on the big day," she said.

"I'd love to do that, Kitty," I said.

I was dying to see her new outfit. Because of her age she wasn't having a white wedding and would be getting married in a jacket and skirt she had already shown me in her bedroom wardrobe.

"I never showed you the stuff I got today," she remarked. " Some of it's for the honeymoon, of course, but I need to check nothing shows through the suit."

"Yes, I know," I said, pretending I had a certain amount of experience in these matters.

In her bedroom she opened the expensive blue and purple bags from the lingerie shop, pouring out on the bed four stunningly beautiful white bras, two black ones and a couple more that were still in their boxes. She then produced half a dozen packets of expensive stockings and a blue silk garter. There were also a dozen pairs of panties, both plain and lace and a sort of light corset or basque in an exquisite black lace. "I put on a couple of pounds since I bought my suit," she said, "that's why I think I'm going to need this."

She held up the garment by the narrow shoulder-straps. It had high-cut legs and four dainty elastic and lace garter straps with delicate pink lace roses where the garters snapped shut.

"It's called a merry widow," she said and laughed, "Maybe that's what I'll be soon - he'll probably have a heart attack when he sees it.""

I couldn't imagine Aunt Kitty in these pretty things, but I said, "They're so,...adorable."

"I knew you'd love them," she said,"Mmmmmm" bending down and kissing me on the cheek. She'd never done that before and, without thinking, I gave her an answering peck on the side of her rough, tanned face.

"Before I try everything on," she said. "I'm going to get in the bath for a good soak."

"Okay," I said.

" Like to give me a hand?"

"What?" I gulped.

"Help to soap me?"

"No, Aunt Kitty, I couldn't," I said.

"You ARE my bridesmaid," she said. "wouldn't you like to wash me completely from head to toe?"

I was stunned.

"Please, Aunt Kitty," I said, "I'm VERY grateful to you for asking me, really I am..."

She reached out to me, smiling.

"Come on then."

"No," I said, panicking, "I mean, grateful to be your bridesmaid, but..."

Call it my background, if you like. Nuns had educated me. I had never seen a naked adult before, and I hoped I wasn't going to start now. I sometimes had fantasies about my brother and had spied on him a few times and he didn't know I'd seen him masturbating naked once. Sometimes, in my most secret thoughts, I'd thought I'd like to see my friend Edna naked, or Siobhan, the Head Girl we'd all had a pash on at school, but NOT Kitty.

Kitty looked a bit annoyed as if I was stupid or something, but she made a face and just grinned.

"All right, come back to me in half an hour," she said, pulling a towelling robe from the wardrobe. "I want you to check my seams for me and also that my hem is right at the back."

She collected some cream and a shampoo from her dressing-table and went out to check the water was hot enough in the tank in the airing cupboard.

For a few moments I fingered the exquisite undergarments, feeling a surge of envy that Kitty, normally a wearer of dowdy dresses and the cotton Aertex "unmentionables" I'd seen on the washing line, would wear these next to her skin. For half an hour I dozed in the armchair, watching the wisps of steam flick out thorough the half-open bathroom window. Last time I had been here on a day like this was in May and the Mayfly had been hatching on the lake half a mile away. They only lived for one day, mated and died, Kitty told me - the males anyway. That day they'd clung to the walls of the house in a black mass of wings and spidery legs and sometimes they lay in the yard where we crushed them accidentally underfoot. I remembered the strong, fishy smell they gave off, particularly because Kitty had said it was like the smell of sex. Kitty generally maintained the prudish demeanour of women of our culture, but I had begun to guess there was a more earthly side to her. I could hear her singing now in the bathroom. She had a good, rather masculine voice.

"Whiskey you're the divil,

You're leadin me astray,

Over hills and mountains

And to Americay"

Then I heard her calling me.

She was in the bedroom when I stepped into the dark kitchen, almost blinded after the sun.

"You're stronger, sweeter decenter,

You're spunkier than tay.....

Suddenly I was feeling happier than I had for months. I fancied myself as having a sweet voice and I joined in, an octave above Kitty's rough contralto.

"Oh, Whiskey you're my darlin'...." We warbled together and I walked into the bedroom.

"Drunk or so...oo.. ber," I faltered. Her stocky white body, in the blinding sunlight through the window, was stark naked except for a tiny pair of black lace panties. I bolted.

"Kitty, please," I begged, my voice trembling as I stood leaning against the dining-room table. I was shocked and could hardly catch my breath. But it was not simply at having seen her almost naked. I now knew beyond a doubt that I would have given anything to have been able to stare unashamedly at her, but I knew I would only dare to do so in anonymity or from a place of hiding. I felt I could not face the frank, challenging eyes of a naked woman, and I knew that Kitty's look WOULD be frank and challenging. I could only dare to ogle her in secret and desperately hoped I could retain the vision of magnificence I had seen.. All beautiful bodies were slender and tall, I had thought. I had a promising figure myself and had often studied it for ages in my mirror at home. I was slender, with tiny breasts and long straight limbs. But compared to Kitty I was a completely anonymous stick figure. She had stocky, short legs and I thought of de Maupassant's description of one of his solidly-built Normandy prostitutes, lifting up her skirt to show her "sturdy Norman legs." Kitty's waist was uncompromisingly thick with a gourd-like swelling of the belly and a heavily indented muscular area around the navel. I was aching to enter the room again and gaze on the extraordinary sweetness and heavenly femininity of her large white breasts with their swollen nipples and dimpled, purple-pink surrounding areas and her heavy thighs, solid as a man's but with those matchless feminine curves. In retrospect I was furiously angry with myself. I had been invited to pamper and minister to that magnificent body and had declined.

"This thing is murder" I heard her cursing from the bedroom and then the sound of her staggering against the rickety old wardrobe. Then things got calmer and I heard the crackle of a stocking packet being opened.

"Can I come in now, Auntie?" I called, in an agony of frustration.

I heard the creak of the bedsprings as she sat down and the clatter of her new shoes as she dropped them on the floor and I could imagine her pulling on and gartering her stockings.

"Auntie," I called, "please!"

She didn't answer me, kept me waiting. Was she punishing me? Kitty had a vindictive side, I knew that. I was ready to cry with frustration.

"I'm decent," Kitty sang out.

Perhaps it had been an illusion, I thought. Mind you, for a short, stocky woman, she still looked wonderful in the suit, with black stockings and those expensive Italian shoes. She usually wore heavy, masculine footwear, but these black T-strapped shoes with four inch heels set off to perfection her long, narrow, elegant feet which in turn made her legs look voluptuously longer. But, still, now that the white, fleshly vision had gone, was she not just a small expensively-dressed woman in a black suit? No, she would never be entirely dressed for me again - the stunning sight of her nakedness, the sheer arrogance with which she stood there, waiting for me, would never leave me. But what a surprise she was either way!

She sat down at her dressing table and touched up her lips. I had never seen her wearing lipstick before. Then she stood up and turned to face me. My heart nearly turned over when she extended one knee daintily, so that I could see her kneecap glow faintly through the dark nylon, then she flipped up the hem of her skirt and began to adjust her garter strap and stocking, her hands turned demurely under the hem so that there was no vulgar display of thigh above the stocking-top

"It doesn't matter now," she said, "but, on the big day you'll have to check my seams for me."

"I'll do it now, Auntie," I said desperately.

"No need," she said dismissively, "Well, just a quick look."

She turned and I admired her shapely calves and the incredibly seductive shadows at the creases at the backs of her knees. I thought I was going mad. I had never felt this way before. What was she doing to me?

"Well?" she demanded.

"What?" I asked stupidly.

"Have you gone asleep. My seams - are they straight.?"

"They...they're both a little to...towards the outside of your..your" I faltered.

I felt I couldn't mention anything to do with her body - that my voice would betray me.

"My what?" she snapped

"Your...your legs," I stammered

"Damned garters," she grumbled, bending down and massaging her seams inwards over her calves

"I'll be helping you to dress, won't I, auntie?" I said.

"Hmmm," she said, looking at me quizzically and, no doubt, seeing the confusion in my eyes.

She stood, one foot in front of her, elegantly, hands on hips.

"Do you think it fits all right here."

"Y..yes, beautifully, Auntie."

"At the waist?"

"Yes, Auntie."

"Say it."

"It fits ...beautifully at the waist."

"And the other places?"

"Where, Auntie?" I prevaricated.

"Where else is there?" she snapped, irritated. "Well?"

"The b...bust and the hips, Auntie," I stammered.

I was in agony. What did I want to do? What the hell WERE the bridesmaid's duties anyway? Maybe dressing the bride WAS acceptable behaviour? I guessed I'd have to ask Edna later.

We were climbing at dusk through the larches and pines. Edna was older than me and a Protestant. With her I had visited her little church under the rook-infested trees at the edge of the village and gazed at the brass eagle on the lectern, the tattered regimental flags on the wall and the ancient pews, some reserved for the members of long dead gentry families. It seemed empty and desolate, lacking the welcoming red sanctuary lamp I was accustomed to. In those days we Catholics weren't supposed to visit Protestant churches but I was rebellious and listened to nobody. This was the last day of the moon, the Lugnasa festival. In our church they had condemned it again last week at the mass in Gaelic "Se an scleap sin obair an deabhail." But Edna had sworn I should see it, the old Pagan Celtic Festival that still survived in isolated pockets of the country.

In the last shaving of the moon the sparks were rising from the fire. Some of the dancers were masked. A fiddle and an accordeon were playing, the squeeze-box making an eerie sound, gulping and gasping for air. The straw woman ran and jumped over the fire, landing in a shower of sparks.

I had seen the straw man with the wren-boys that visited homes with a dead wren hanging from a branch, singing

"The wren, the wren

the king of all birds"

on the day after Christmas. Edna told me that, in the few places where the Festival of Lugnasa was still celebrated, there was a straw man, but here it was still the original straw woman. There were bottles being passed around and Edna told me it was poteen, a colourless spirit made illegally that could blind you. Many of the people around the fire, cavorting, were beyond middle age, but in the ditches and under the trees young couples were entwined and even in the open I saw a woman in the flickering light, lying on top of a man having intercourse with him. The straw woman jumped the fire again and the fire whooshed and sparked skywards.

"A few years ago," Edna said, "the straw woman went on fire. Two other women had to piss on her to put her out. Luckily they'd had plenty to drink."

Edna's church took no position on this festival. Our church had always either take pagan festivals over for their own, like Saturnalia for Christmas, or else condemned them like they did this one. The work of the Devil, they called it.

"Your Aunt Kitty was the straw woman once," Edna said .

Somehow this didn't surprise me. Someone gave me a drink. It was cold and clear and a bit like vodka. Then we linked arms and danced around the fire. I saw a boy called Peter I'd seen at the Protestant dances I went to with Edna. He'd never taken any notice of me, but tonight he came up to me and said hello and smiled and put his hand on my cheek. He looked beautiful. I'd never been happier. I don't know what came over me, but I stepped forward and put my arms around his waist. We kissed and I began to feel aroused. Twenty minutes later I was being pressed against a hollowed out oak tree, you could smell the charred interior where lightning had struck it, and, though I still had my panties on, my dress was up around my waist and I could feel his erect penis pressing between my legs. The music was louder, the fiddle faster and the fire reached higher shooting its sparks towards the night sky. This was the first time I'd ever let a boy go this far with me and I told myself that if I managed to keep my panties on I'd be all right but suddenly he shuddered and I could feel the wetness between my legs and I knew it wasn't only me that had made it wet there. His tongue filled my mouth and my head was pressing painfully against the bark of the tree and, on the backs of my hands, grasped around him, I could feel, faintly, the heat of the fire. My womb stirred and melted and I knew I would have given myself completely.

Five minutes later I was being marched down the hill by a furious Aunt Kitty. The boy had looked ridiculous, pushed to the ground, with his shocked pale face, his limp penis dangling between his legs. Kitty was shrieking at him that she'd cut it of if he went near me again. Edna ran over and put her arms around me. I was trembling, but Kitty turned back and pushed Edna away.

"Slut," she screamed, "take your hands off her. What did you bring her here for?"

"I...I'm just trying to comfort her," Edna stammered.

"I'll comfort her - if it's not too late for that," Kitty cried dramatically. The music had faltered for a moment, but picked up again. I was horrified to find my dress was still up around my waist and hoped that, in the flickering light nobody could see the shame between my legs.

"Cover yourself up," Kitty hissed, pulling me roughly against her as I adjusted my clothes. I had on only a light cardigan over my dress and I was beginning to shiver, but I knew it was mainly with fright.

"Oh God, I hope there hasn't been permanent damage done tonight," Kitty moaned as she pulled me down along the path, the lights of the village winking below, my wrist gripped painfully in her powerful grasp, making me stumble as I couldn't keep my balance with one arm imprisoned. Edna was scurrying behind us, begging Kitty to listen to her.

"Leave us alone," Kitty bellowed, then growled to me, "I told you to stay away from that Protestant bitch."

At the road, where the lane ended at a broken stone wall, a man and a woman loomed out of the darkness.

"Oh, you found her, then, Kitty," the man said and the woman piped up "I knew you were very worried there, Kitty," her voice full of spiteful inquisitiveness.

"Ah no, she only went up to have a quick look at that ould nonsense up there," Kitty boomed in her most domineering voice.

"Queer goings on, I'll be bound," the woman quavered excitedly.

"Ah, sure it's nothing these days," Kitty said dismissively.

Edna caught up with me.

"Gotta go," she said. "I love you." She kissed me on the cheek.

"And listen," she added, flicking her red hair back, her face pale and spiteful, "if Kitty gives you a hard time, just remember she's been ridden by half the men in the parish."

"You're crazy," I said. "Then why was she never...?"

Edna smiled sarcastically.

"The married half," she said. "Bye..."

It was incredible, to look at Kitty in her old gabardine raincoat with the greasy collar, her dress with the fallen hem and the men's socks and shoes, the straw coloured hair all over the place. I tried to imagine her in a context that would do her justice, say nineteenth century Moscow, in a great house with troikas pulling up in the snow outside, seeing her in a low cut evening dress, her hair up, her powdered breasts catching the ballroom lights, signalling with her fan, glancing sideways at a lover. Because I could see her like this in my mind I knew I had been given a tremendous gift when it was just too late, that I was perhaps the one person that had been able to see her truly for the goddess she was. If it was true she had had many men, had they ever really seen her body? Or were they just sordid couplings, with Kitty on her back with her skirt up in a field after a dance, or in a barn somewhere?, Surely anyone with eyes in his head, who had possessed her with full carnal knowledge, could not have given her up?

But then my own troubles engulfed me again.