Maid of Honour's log, still day six. Of course it's still day six. This day is never – going – to – end. The living room is still carnage. Stomach grumbling, laptop getting low on power. Headache now probably due to a lack of caffeine this morning. The groom has texted to check in because he's not heard from Kim. Have ignored him.

Right now, Kim's taking a nap. Or at least, that's what she told Lucy and Addison. I think it's pretty convenient timing, given that I'm just taking my lunch break. But – in fairness, I wouldn't be surprised if she is just exhausted.

It's been a long week, for all of us.

(Have I mentioned that yet? I don't feel like I've mentioned it enough.)

Addison takes the opportunity to go out on the balcony for a little privacy to call her mom, now it's late enough over here for America to have started waking up. Lucy asks if I want her to plug in my laptop to charge, and then folds herself into the corner of the sofa to quietly go back to reading something on her iPad.

I fix myself a quick sandwich, looking at the dwindling supplies in the fridge and the growing pile of rubbish in the bin. We're definitely going to need to send Jeremy on another food shop run, if we've got three days left to go of lockdown.

If we're allowed to even mention Jeremy's name in this flat anymore...

Maybe I'll get Lucy to sort it out. Her brother lives in this building somewhere, too. Jeremy might need to drop some extra food off for him and his girlfriend, while he's helping us out.

I take my sandwich into the living room, eating as I go, and survey the damage.

I should've known the prosecco was a terrible idea last night. We'd all been getting a little stir-crazy, and some drinks, a noughties pop playlist, and finishing putting together the centrepieces for the wedding had seemed like a great distraction...

***

Which it had been, until we were on the third and final bottle and Addison had the not-so-bright idea of suggesting the Artic Monkeys song playing I'd just put on should make the wedding playlist, which obviously got Kim talking about the wedding playlist and the dorky dance Jeremy and his three groomsmen were planning.

She complained about it vehemently... but she still bounced up from the floor and dragged Lucy to her feet, getting her to join in recreating the dance since they'd both seen the guys practicing, giggling over the whole thing.

She flipped like that. So quick none of us saw it coming.

At first, we all thought she was just in hysterics... then we realised she wasn't laughing anymore, but crying. She collapsed in a flood of tears, lamenting the wedding playlist and then saying, "But what if the band cancel on us? Because of all this?"

"You can get another band," Lucy said, crouching next to her and rubbing her back.

"That's even if it all still goes ahead at all."

I knew I shouldn't have said it as soon as the words were out of my mouth, but it was too late, and the prosecco had loosened my tongue, and... Lucy looked at me with her eyes wide, and Addison clutched both hands to her hair, which was still wet and tied back in two French braids, her face mortified. She shook her head slowly at me, and I got the message.

"Well, I'm just saying," I went on, trying to backpedal, "with everything going on, I wouldn't be surprised if the whole thing got postponed. You guys have seen the news, everything they're saying about how this might go. It could be next year before you get to walk down the aisle."

Kim stared at me, stricken, the tears drying on her pale face. "Next year?" she rasped, clutching at her throat. Behind her, Addison made slashing gestures across her throat, her eyes bugging.

"Well, yeah, you know. I guess it wouldn't be the end of the world. They've been cancelling flights, sports... Hey, at least Jeremy will probably get all the money back for the stag do, in Budapest! Although we probably will need to re-do all the gift bags..." I looked around the carefully packed boxes from the weekend, containing all the immaculate little chiffon bags of dried rose petals and chocolates, the little packets of Love Hearts sweets, each one tied together with a lavender-coloured silk ribbon. We'd gotten the sweets and chocolate on sale from a manufacturer Lucy knew, and the dates on them would be up by Christmas. If the wedding got pushed to next year, we'd have to replace them.

Kim was still looking at me, completely aghast, so I explained all of that to her. Addison groaned, burying her face in her hands and pacing to the other end of the room before turning, her arms crossed, chewing on her lip as she watched me dig myself into a deeper and deeper hole.

"Oh, sure!" Kim cried suddenly, shooting to her feet and almost knocking Lucy over. She stormed towards the nearest box of wedding favours, snatching a handful out and tearing at them. The chiffon packets were dirt cheap, and tore easily. Sweets and petals and tiny purple foil-wrapped chocolates spilled onto the floor at her feet. She threw the scraps in her hand down after them, grabbing more.

"Sure!" she barrelled on, the tears flowing again now. "Let's just eat all the wedding favours! Hmm? Why not? The wedding's obviously ruined now anyway! If it even ever goes ahead! All that planning, all the work, all the waiting, and now – now we were – it was so close, it was –" She hiccoughed, gasping for breath. "His grandparents won't be able to fly over from Spain! The honeymoon! The Amalfi coast! Everything is going to be ruined! Who cares about stupid little wedding favours?"

More chocolates hit the ground, clattering noisily. Kim left the wedding favours, marching towards the pile of carefully cut and arranged fake flowers and twigs we'd all just been working on, the ones we'd been trimming to precise sizes and pairing up so carefully, per Kim's Pinterest DIY wedding board. She kicked them and Lucy gasped, hands flying to cover her mouth, looking unsure whether she should let Kim get this out of her system or stop her.

"Kim, sweetie," Addison tried, stepping forwards.

"Who needs centrepieces!" she screamed. "When at this rate, there won't even be a wedding to need them!"

She deliberately stomped over the pile, snatching up the prosecco bottle and draining the last little bit we'd left in there, tipping it right into her mouth. Her cheeks were flushed by now, blotchy and an angry shade of pink. Even her ears were bright pink.

I felt my own temper rising fast, now. Instead of diffusing the situation like I had a thousand times before, I yelled right back at her.

"Do you mind not trashing my flat?"

"Do you mind not ruining my wedding?" she shot back.

"Why do you always have to be such a bitch? Not everything's about you!"

"Just because you can't hang on to a relationship for more than a month! You've always been jealous of me and Jere, just admit it! I don't know why I ever thought I could –"

"Oh, what, so now I'm sabotaging your wedding? Excuse me, but some of us are pretty happy being single and not letting our entire lives revolve around some guy."

"He's my soulmate. You're just bitter because you know even if you did find someone who could put up with you for longer than a couple of weeks, it wouldn't matter, because you still haven't come out to your parents!"

"Knew iiiiiiit," Addison sang quietly from the back of the room.

"Oh, my God," Lucy sighed, grimacing as she looked between us.

It wasn't like I cared if Addison found out I was gay; I was pretty sure Lucy already did. But it was a low fucking blow, and – and who did she think she was kidding, anyway, talking about 'soulmates'? She'd only dated one guy before Jeremy, and that was when we were fifteen! This was nothing to do with me, or my failed relationships, or me not coming out yet to my family – and the fact that she even went there had my blood boiling. I could hear a ringing in my ears, and my hands balled into fists.

"You know what? I hope the wedding does get cancelled!"

"Oh, you'd love that, wouldn't you? You've wanted this to fail since the beginning! Do you think I don't hear you, gossiping to my parents, or Jeremy, when you think I can't hear? Saying I'm a bridezilla?"

"Uh, hello? Have you taken a look in the fucking mirror lately, Bridezilla?"

***

I really don't think she meant to smash the prosecco bottle like that. She did look pretty bloody surprised when it smashed against the wall like that.

I set the rest of my sandwich down and start to go around the room, collecting the little purple chocolates. I stack them up near the TV, then collect the broken bags, the scraps of netting. I take them out to the bin in the kitchen; by the time I get back, Addison's in from the balcony and she and Lucy are going around the living room to clean up, too. Addison collects the centrepieces while Lucy gathers all the dried rose petals. I take care of the Love Hearts.

"Sorry we didn't sort this out earlier," Addison mumbles to me, shrugging one shoulder and giving me a small, sincere smile. "I was a little scared it'd cause another breakdown."

"How's she been?"

"Not so good," Lucy told her. "She's just been really quiet all morning. Sulking, I guess, you know?"

"You think she's going to ever talk to me again?" I ask, biting my lip. It's not like Kim and I have never fought in all the years we've been friends, but last night got... pretty nasty, to say the least.

"You ask me," Addison scoffed, "she's the one who should be saying sorry."

"But you didn't say that," I joke, remembering our conversation this morning in the kitchen.

"Damn straight. Or, like... not."

I raise my eyebrows at her.

"Well. Damn straight, if it's your parents asking," she adds, muttering under her breath, pulling a cheeky, wide-eyed face with her lips pursed.

I roll my eyes, but once I start laughing, a giggle sputters out of Lucy, and then Addison's laughing too, and I don't actually think I've laughed so hard all week. We all seem to remember Kim, napping (or maybe not), and fall quiet at the same time – but as soon as we're trying not to laugh, of course it's all the more difficult not to, and I'm still wheezing with laughter, a stitch in my side, by the time I vanish back out onto the balcony with my computer and sandwich.