Spare

In fact we wanted to elope. Barefoot in Botswana, with maybe a friend officiating, that was our dream. But we were expected to share this moment with other people. It wasn’t up to us.

38.

I turned back to the Palace. Any progress on a date? A venue?

Nope, was the reply.

How about March?

Alas, March was all booked.

How about June?

Sorry. Garter Day.

At last they came to us with a date: May 2018.

And they accepted our request for the location: St. George’s Chapel.

That settled, we made our first public outing with Willy and Kate.

The Royal Foundation Forum. February 2018.

All four of us sat on a stage while a woman asked us softball questions before a fairly good-sized audience. The Foundation was nearing ten years of existence, and we spoke about its past while looking to its future with us four at the helm. The audience was keen, all four of us were having fun, the whole atmosphere was hugely positive.

Afterwards, one journalist dubbed us the Fab Four.

Here we go, I thought hopefully.

Days later, controversy. Something about Meg showing support for #metoo, and Kate not showing support—via their outfits? I think that was the gist, though who can say? It wasn’t real. But I think it had Kate on edge, while putting her and everyone else on notice that she was now going to be compared to, and forced to compete with, Meg.

All this came on the heels of an awkward moment backstage. Meg asked to borrow Kate’s lip gloss. An American thing. Meg forgot hers, worried she needed some, and turned to Kate for help. Kate, taken aback, went into her handbag and reluctantly pulled out a small tube. Meg squeezed some onto her finger and applied it to her lips. Kate grimaced. Small clash of styles, maybe? Something we should’ve been able to laugh about soon after. But it left a little mark. And then the press sensed something was up and tried to turn it into something bigger.

Here we go, I thought sorrowfully.

39.

Granny formally approved the marriage in March 2018.

By royal decree.

Meanwhile, Meg and I were already a growing family. We brought home a new puppy—a sibling for little Guy. He’d been needing one, poor thing. So when a friend in Norfolk told me his black Labrador had a litter, and offered me a gorgeous amber-eyed female, I couldn’t say no.

Meg and I named her Pula. The Setswana word for rain.

And good fortune.

Many mornings I’d wake to find myself surrounded by beings I loved, who loved me, and depended on me, and I thought I simply had no right to this much good fortune. Work challenges aside, this was happiness. Life was good.

And following along a predestined track, seemingly. The decree about the wedding coincided uncannily with the airing of Meg’s farewell season of Suits, in which her character, Rachel, was also preparing to get married. Art and life, imitating each other.

Decent of Suits, I thought, marrying Meg off the show, instead of pushing her down a lift shaft. There were enough people in real life trying to do that.

That spring, however, the press was quieter. Keener about breaking news of wedding details than inventing new libels. Each day there was another “world exclusive” about the flowers, the music, the food, the cake. No detail too small, not even the Portaloos. It was reported that we’d be providing the poshest Portaloos on earth—porcelain basins, gold-plated seats—after being inspired by the ones at Pippa Middleton’s wedding. In reality, we didn’t notice anything different about how or where people went pee or poo at Pippa’s, and we had nothing to do with choosing the Portaloos for ours. But we sincerely hoped that everyone would be able to do their thing in comfort and peace.

Above all, we hoped the royal correspondents would continue to write about poo instead of trying to stir it up.

So when the Palace encouraged us to feed more wedding details to those correspondents, known as the Royal Rota, we obeyed. At the same time, I told the Palace that on the Big Day, the happiest day of our lives, I didn’t want to see one single royal correspondent inside that chapel, unless Murdoch himself apologized for phone hacking.

The Palace scoffed. It would be all-out war, the courtiers warned, to bar the Royal Rota from the wedding.

Then let’s go to war.

I’d had it with the Royal Rota, both the individuals and the system, which was more outdated than the horse and cart. It had been devised some forty years earlier, to give British print and broadcast reporters first crack at the Royal Family, and it stank to high heaven. It discouraged fair competition, engendered cronyism, encouraged a small mob of hacks to feel entitled.

After weeks of wrangling, it was agreed: The Royal Rota wouldn’t be allowed in the chapel, but they could gather outside.

A small win, which I hugely celebrated.

40.

Pa wanted to help choose the music for the ceremony so he invited us one night to Clarence House, for dinner and…a concert.