Free The Wedding Speech by Isabelle Broom

Ed waited until all the eyes in the room were on him before he began. He took a deep breath, inhaling as he did so the sweet scent from the lilies, which were arranged
extravagantly in front of him. ‘Ladies and gents, I promise to try and keep this short and sweet. If you don’t believe I can, just ask the chief bridesmaid over there –
she’ll confirm it.’
    There was a smattering of laughter. Ed was gratified to get a small smirk from Amber, who, as the bride’s lifelong best friend, had been the only choice for the coveted role.
    ‘When Billy asked me to be his Best Man, I was over the moon,’ he went on. ‘But then I realised that I’d have to do this. Stand up here, in front of all of you, and do
him justice – not be the dickhead I usually am. So then, well . . . then I got so terrified that I had the trots.’
    Billy’s grandfather, who had combed his last remaining wisps of white hair into a fairly alarming quiff for the occasion, let out a bellow of mirth and slapped his bony thigh with
pleasure.
    ‘Billy made me promise,’ Ed went on. ‘He said to me, he said, “Ed, swear to me that you’ll be there on the day. I need you there. I don’t think I can do it
without you.”’
    There was a pause. Billy’s mum, Patricia, discreetly flicked a stray tear off her cheek.
    ‘Come on now, Pat,’ Ed exclaimed. ‘At least wait until I get to the slushy bit before you start all that!’
    Patricia nodded and gave him a wide smile. The hat she was wearing had a tiny little veil attached, Ed noticed. And she was wearing gloves. Not wool gloves, but a smart, dressy pair to match her
outfit. In fact, everyone looking up at him had really made an effort today. Ed felt a swell of pride in his chest.
    ‘I’m going to tell you all a secret now,’ he told them. ‘When I first met Amelia, I was an absolute arse to her. You’re all looking shocked now, but it’s
true. I was all like, “Who’s this bird that’s come out of nowhere and pinched my best mate?” Pathetic, I know, but there you have it. Of course, I was bloody jealous, too.
How Billy Big Ears ever managed to pull a bona-fide babe like Ames, I will never know.’
    There was more laughter. Ed looked over to where Amelia’s mum and dad, Sandra and Brian, were sitting. Brian gave him a ghost of a wink as he squeezed his wife’s hand. They were both
smiling. Beside them, Billy’s dad, Sid, was running his thumb and first finger over his thick black moustache, and Ed wondered fleetingly if such a thing required special wax. He made a
mental note to ask Sid about it later.
    ‘So, as many of you will know and a few of you may not, Billy and me became mates when we were at infant school, so we went through all the big life stuff together. He was there when my
voice broke, when I had my first shave, when I lost my virginity . . .’
    ‘Last week, then?’
    Ed laughed as Billy’s grandfather rocked back in his seat with a cackle, clearly delighted to have caused what Ed could tell was a flush of red on both his cheeks.
    ‘Anyway, as I saying, before you all had a good laugh at the poor state of my sex life – Billy and me go back a long way, and up until the day he met Amelia, no girl had ever made
him laugh quite as hard as I could. He was dead casual about her in the beginning, of course. We were watching the footie down the pub one Saturday, and he just dropped her name into the
conversation, all cool and stuff: “I met this girl, Amelia, she’s all right.” He gave me the whole ‘whatever’ shrug, but I knew. I knew before he knew that he’d
fallen for this one. One time, he turned up late for a lads’ night out because he’d been with her. He denied it, of course, but his shirt was all done up wrong, and his hair was
sticking up at the back. Then, when we hit the dance floor later on, a pair of red knickers fell out the bottom of his jeans!’
    Amelia’s mum, Sandra, audibly gasped and slapped a hand over her mouth. Ed