He's Cancelled

by Sophie Ranald

Genres: Family Life; Humor & Satire; Women's Fiction; Romance; Clean & Wholesome Romance; Contemporary Romance; Romantic Comedy

Synopsis

When he proposed, I had to pinch myself. Up until then, his most romantic gesture was buying me a 128-piece tool kit.
When recently engaged Nat flips through a bridal magazine, she spots a quiz on page 111 about being ready for marriage. After failing it, she's determined to prove it wrong. If only it was that easy…Getting married to Archie, whose smile makes her insides go funny, should be a dream come true. So why is it a total nightmare? Examples include:
1) A mother-in-law who insists on a pre-wedding diet and portions that Nat needs a microscope for.
2) A bridesmaid-zilla sister-in-law who forces her old wedding dress on her, featuring satin bows, far too much tulle and a bodice that Nat, the kind of girl who wears Converse and Snoopy-print underwear, doesn't even have the boobs for.
3) A best man who stinks of whisky and tries to kiss her before she knees him in the crotch.
4) A wedding planner who insists on peacocks, doves and pink flamingos at the ceremony.
All of this would be bearable if her fiancé was by her side. But when he refuses to help her deal with his diva family, and goes AWOL on the stag do, she starts to doubt the whole thing. Archie was meant to be the one. But what if her one true love is actually gin and tonic, the only thing getting her through this?
A totally addictive romantic comedy for anyone who has a phobia of bridezillas and who makes the happiest memories during Happy Hour.

Release date: June 23, 2021

Publisher: Bookouture

Print pages: 350

Sample

Archie had been my boyfriend for just over a year, which was more than long enough for me to have learned that – although he was a wonderful person and my ideal man in almost all ways – romance was not his strong point.

I got my first hint of this the first time I slept over at his. I’m no diva and it’s not like I was expecting him to serve me breakfast in bed, featuring smoked salmon and vintage champagne with freshly squeezed orange juice served on a silver tray, rosebud in a vase optional. But he woke me up by bringing me a cup of tea, brewed for so long the spoon was practically standing up in it, and a bowl of soggy cornflakes – which I wouldn’t have minded a bit, except he tripped over my shoes and sent a tidal wave of cold cereal all over the duvet, the pillows and me.

Our first anniversary – well, technically the anniversary of our first date – passed unmarked because Archie’s sister Poppy had just announced that she was having a baby and I was working late. A couple of days later, Archie said, ‘Blimey, Nat, you know we’ve been together more than a year?’ and I said, ‘You’d better watch your step or this is going to start getting serious.’

And when it did get serious – serious enough for me to move into Archie’s flat, anyway, which in today’s world is about as much of a commitment as signing your names in your commingled blood on the front page of the family bible – Archie marked the occasion by giving me a cordless battery-powered screwdriver. And when I suggested opening a bottle of fizz to celebrate, he said he’d be right there just as soon as he’d finished assembling our Ikea chest of drawers with said screwdriver, which had clearly been a gift for himself more than for me.

So, one Saturday in early November, a bleak, drizzly day with a cutting wind blowing hard enough to take the skin off your face, Archie’s suggestion for how we might spend the afternoon took me entirely by surprise.

‘Fancy watching some telly, Nat?’ he asked.

I looked up from my phone, to which I’d been glued following the latest developments in the high-profile spat between the wives of two footballers, and said, ‘Sure. Do you want to want to watch the MasterChef final?’

‘Nah,’ Archie said. ‘I thought we might watch Love Actually.’

‘Really?’ I heard my voice rise incredulously and managed not to ask who the hell he was and what he’d done with my boyfriend.

‘Yeah, why not?’ he said. ‘And I could make some hot chocolate with Baileys in it.’

‘Hot…? Okay. Sure. Sounds great.’

I flicked the button on the remote control and shifted up on the sofa, but I wasn’t looking at the screen. I was watching Archie as he frothed milk in a pan, grated actual chocolate into it, warmed two tall glass mugs in the microwave, added generous glugs of cream liqueur and arranged some posh shortbread – which I couldn’t recall either of us buying – on a plate.

I was thinking, This is the kind of shit guys do when they’re softening you up to break bad news. Had Archie shrunk yet another of my jumpers by putting it on a boil wash, and was he about to fess up and beg forgiveness? Was Craft Fever, the artisan beer shop Archie had opened on the high street a year before, about to go bust, bringing his life’s dream crashing to the ground, sending a hefty loan from the local council and an even heftier one from his mum and dad down the tubes, and leaving us in debt we’d have to sell the flat to repay? Had he invited his family to spend Christmas at ours?

But Archie carried the tray over to the coffee table quite calmly, put it down and handed me my drink.

‘Here,’ he said, ‘put your feet on my lap and I’ll tickle your ankles.’

I’m a physiotherapist and I give a killer massage, but nothing in the whole world was as relaxing as Archie’s ankle tickles. He had me right there. I kicked off my trainers and put my feet up, not caring that I was wearing silly socks with purple dinosaurs on them. I leaned my head back against the sofa cushions and sipped my creamy, boozy hot chocolate, half-focusing on the television as Archie flicked through the menus until he found Love Actually, and half-listening to the rain swishing against the windows.

It was already almost dark outside, and the flicker of the telly and the glow of the lamp over our heads, as well as the feel of Archie’s warm hands and the warmth spreading inside me from the sweet, mildly alcoholic drink, made me feel pleasantly drowsy.

‘Just as well we don’t have to go outside,’ I said. ‘It’s grim out there.’

‘But it’s the fireworks display in the park tonight.’ Archie sounded almost alarmed. ‘We said we’d go, remember? And then chilli at the Ginger Cat after.’

‘Yeah, but…’ I weighed up the options in my mind. Standing outside, being battered by wind and rain, mud soaking into my socks, versus staying warm and dry in our living room? A fireworks display, however spectacular, versus the fireworks there’d be on screen in the five episodes of First Dates we still had left to watch?

‘You could wear your new coat,’ Archie said.

‘True.’ The balance in my mind shifted a bit. The coat had been a gift from Archie a few days before – he’d clearly noticed me eyeing it longingly every time we walked past the new boutique on the high street and surprised me with it. It was bright yellow with a silvery-grey faux-fur collar and cuffs, and although it hadn’t really been cold enough to wear it yet, it certainly was tonight.

‘And I’ll run you a hot bath, with that geranium oil stuff in.’

‘Okay,’ I said, slightly amazed that Archie even knew essential oils existed, never mind that I had a bottle of the stuff in our bathroom cabinet. ‘We’ll go. So long as you promise not to interrupt my bath to cut your toenails over the loo, like you did last time.’

And so, three hours later, Archie and I joined the throng of people snaking steadily up the hill towards the park, the sparkling lights of London gradually appearing over the horizon, shrouded in misty drizzle. In spite of the mud sucking at my shoes, my reluctance was forgotten, and I felt almost as eager as the little kids in front of me, who were waving sparklers and dashing ahead of their parents in their welly boots. Progress was slow in the crowd, but at last we made it through the gates and followed the path upwards.

‘Shall we stop here?’ I asked.

‘Let’s go a bit further.’ Archie’s hand was clasped around mine, and I could feel the warmth of his fingers through my woollen mittens. He led me further up the hill. ‘We’ll get a better view from here.’

His enthusiasm was infectious, and I was beginning to feel excited too, surrounded by the eager crowd and cosy in my jeans, jumper and new coat.

Archie took his hip flask out of his coat pocket. The flask was pewter and had his initials stamped on it. It had been a twenty-first birthday present from his uncle Ray, and Archie basically lived for occasions when he could use it, which were few and far between. The coat was a vintage tweed thing he’d found in a charity shop and put on whenever he wanted to look like the kind of person who wore tweed coats, which was a bit more frequently. He offered it to me.

‘Rum?’

‘Sloe gin. I know it’s your favourite so I got some in especially.’

I took a sip and felt the fiery liquid make its way from my mouth to my stomach and then up to my cheeks. With it came another little tingle of alarm. Archie was lovely – more than lovely; I wouldn’t have been with him otherwise – but this level of attentiveness, on a day that wasn’t even my birthday or anything, was unheard of.

Live in the moment, Nat, I told myself. Enjoy it.

But my introspection was cut short by a bang and a fusillade of crackling pops as the first firework lit up the sky. Everyone around me gasped, and I heard Archie’s gasp and my own along with them. His hand squeezed mine, and when I turned to smile at him I could see his face illuminated by the violet sparks, his ginger beard and brown eyes and infectious grin transformed from familiarity into a handsomeness that almost took my breath away.

Then another firework filled the black sky and I looked away from Archie and lost myself in the display, watching as fountains of red, green, gold and silver light shot up into the night and then showered back down again, disappearing into nothing before the next bang and explosion of light.

There were fireworks that looked like ferns, fireworks that looked like smiley faces, fireworks that looked like love hearts, and one that looked vaguely like the logo of our local council, which made everyone laugh as well as gasp. But mostly there were just cascades of brilliant colour, each more spectacular than the last, filling the sky and filling my eyes until I lost track of everything except the spectacle and the feel of Archie’s hand in mine.

I lost track of time too. I suppose the display must have gone on for half an hour or so, but it felt both like an eternity and only a few seconds. At last, an extra-big, extra-high burst of brilliance, like opening a magnum of champagne made of light, shot upwards and then drifted down into sudden silence, which lasted a few seconds until everyone broke into applause, laughter and chat.

Archie and I met each other’s eyes, smiling, and then he bent his head and kissed me, his warm lips on my cold, damp skin sending a thrill of happiness and pleasure right through my body. When the kiss ended, he looked at me for a long moment, his face serious and questioning, as if there was something important he wanted to ask.

But he only said, ‘Come on. We’d best get our skates on if we’re going to be able to nab a table at the Ginger Cat. It’s always rammed on Bonfire Night.’

I thought of the Ginger Cat’s hot, crisp-skinned jacket potato, cooked over the coals on the barbecue and served with the pub’s secret-recipe chilli con carne, deep brick-red and spicy enough to leave your lips stinging, and suddenly I realised the posh shortbread had been a long time ago. But the throng of people was moving slowly, the little children tired and cranky or super-hyped and uncooperative now that the excitement was over. Groups of teenagers were cracking open cans of cider and showing each other the videos they’d made of the display as they meandered back down the hill.

‘We can only go as fast as the slowest people,’ I pointed out. ‘We’ll have to take our chances.’

‘No we won’t,’ Archie objected. ‘We’ve got inside knowledge. Come on.’

And, still clasping my hand, he veered off the path and headed down the grassy slope towards the side gate to the park. The ground was uneven under my feet, muddy and slippery from the heavy rain, but I was wearing lace-up boots with grippy rubber soles and had spent enough time hillwalking when I was a student not to care.

‘All right,’ I said. ‘Race you to the bottom.’

‘Seriously?’ Archie’s face lit up in a grin.

‘Nah,’ I said. ‘I’d win for sure. We’ll go together.’

I gripped his hand more firmly and set off down the hill, at a gentle jog at first. But gravity and hunger spurred me on, and soon I was running, my strides growing longer and longer as my feet found their natural holds on the uneven ground. I glanced around at Archie and he flashed a grin at me, then turned away.

He’s not looking where he’s going, I thought, but then my attention returned to where I was putting my feet. The wind was icy against my face and the sky, empty now of flashes and sparks, whizzed above me in dizzying blackness. The grass was impossibly bright green in the darkness, and I could see the glimmering lights of the street growing closer and closer.

Then I heard Archie cry out, ‘Woah!’ and his hand slipped out of mine.

I skidded to a halt and turned around. He was on his bum on the grass, his coat rucked up around his chest, his arms and legs splayed out, divots of muddy grass pushed out around his boots.

‘Shit. Are you okay?’

I could see what looked like tears on his face, but might only have been rain. Then I realised he was laughing.

‘Oh my God. What a dick. I’m fine, just got half the park on my arse.’

I stretched out a hand and helped him to his feet. He took it and I tried to pull him up, only my feet slipped out from under me and I ended up on my bum on the soaking grass next to him, both of us laughing helplessly.

‘Sure you’re okay?’ I asked, once I was able to speak again. ‘Can you move your ankles? Any pain in your spine?’

‘Chill with the Rescue 911 stuff. I’m definitely expected to live.’

‘Oh God, look, your hip flask fell out of your pocket. Have you got your keys?’

‘Yeah, they’re in my jeans pocket. But my phone…’

I took out my own phone and switched on the torch, getting up onto my now-muddy knees and swinging its light over the expanse of sodden grass.

‘Got it. But wait – what’s this?’

The brilliant beam from my mobile caught a glimmer of brightness deep in the mud, and I reached for it, feeling the wet ground soaking through my jeans.

‘Here, give that to me,’ Archie said.

‘No, hold on. It’s a ring. Someone must have dropped it. We’ll have to take it to the police or something.’

‘Nat, shut up for just a second.’

Archie crawled over to me and our hands met, sharing the circle of bright metal. I could see a diamond sparkling against my grubby glove, its brilliance undimmed by the darkness and mud.

‘It’s lovely,’ I breathed. ‘Someone will be really glad we found this.’

‘Oh, for fuck’s…’ Archie began, and then he stopped and said, ‘Nat. It’s yours, if you want it. I bought it for you. I was going to ask you to marry me tonight. I was working myself up for a proper proposal when the fireworks were going off, but I bottled it. But since I’m on my knees anyway… Nat, I love you. You’re the most incredible woman I’ve ever met and – well, will you?’

Like I said, Archie wasn’t the most romantic of men. It didn’t bother me, same as having soggy cornflakes chucked all over me hadn’t. But in that second, with both of us on all fours in the mud, it was like the fireworks that had danced in the sky that night like a billion stars were all going off again in my heart.

‘I’d better say yes before you change your mind,’ I said.

Of course I was absolutely itching to tell someone about Archie’s proposal. But I didn’t ring my mum, because I was meeting her in a couple of days’ time, as I did every Tuesday, and I wanted to see her face when she heard the news.

I didn’t ring Lara, who was my best mate from university and now worked with me in the physiotherapy team at Queen Charlotte’s, because she was on a Tinder date: if it was going badly, I’d feel like I was rubbing her nose in it, and if it was going well I might interrupt the flow. I couldn’t text Precious, my other friend at work, because Lara would be hurt if Precious found out first.

So, in the end, the first person I broke the news to was my hairdresser. To be fair, my relationship with Tilly was pretty close, given we’d seen each other once a month for the past three years. I wasn’t at all high-maintenance in most ways – I rarely painted my nails and hardly ever bothered with more than five minutes’ worth of make-up – but my hair had become a Thing.

When I first moved to south-east London after getting the job at the hospital, I’d booked an appointment for a cut and blow-dry and, totally on a whim, had said the fateful words, Actually, I fancy something different. Tilly had got a glint in her eye, flexed her scissors and started cutting. The result was a haircut that – for the first time in my life – actually suited me: a blunt, choppy bob with a heavy fringe, tinted the colour of black coffee. It was a bit 1920s flapper and a bit Demi Lovato, and totally fabulous. The only problem was, its window of fabulousness was a short one. Any more than a few weeks and my natural mousy-brown roots would begin to emerge, the fringe would go straggly and the ends start to stick out sideways no matter how much I rolled a hot brush round them, and Demi Lovato would morph into Sideshow Bob.

So I spent a huge amount of time and money sitting at Tilly’s station in It’s a Snip, and although my mind sometimes boggled a bit at the excessiveness of it, it was worth it to have really great hair. And, over the course of our client–stylist relationship, I’d come to quite look forward to those ninety minutes on a Sunday morning when all I had to do was sit there, listening to Tilly chat away about her nan’s colostomy and her boyfriend’s unsuccessful DIY projects and the ongoing feud between her two cats, occasionally contributing a snippet of news of my own.

And this Sunday, as soon as I’d walked through the glass door, had a gown draped round my shoulders and been shown to a chair, I heard myself blurting out that I’d just got engaged.

‘No way! Nat, that’s amazing! Best news ever. You can tell me all about it while I put your colour on. And look at your ring! That’s a proper rock, that is.’

I turned my hand so the diamond caught the light, throwing rainbows onto the ceiling of the salon and bouncing it off the mirror. The stone was big – maybe bigger than I’d have chosen myself, standing proud of the slender platinum band that embraced my finger. I wondered whether Archie’s father had been involved in its purchase and realised that, of course, he must have been – Archie could never have afforded such a thing on his own.

But I pushed aside the flicker of unease that realisation brought and related the events of the night before, bigging up our headlong dash down the hill and Archie’s tobogganing on the seat of his jeans for comic effect while she carefully brushed colour onto the roots of my hair.

When she was done, Tilly didn’t ask me as she normally did whether I wanted a magazine to read (‘Fashion or gossip today, Nat?’), but instead returned, unprompted, with a pile of wedding magazines.

‘You’ll want to have a flip through these then,’ she said, and I discovered that, actually, I did.

I’d never given weddings much thought before. Of course I’d assumed that eventually, at some point quite far off in the future, marriage would be the logical next step. But Archie and I hadn’t even been together that long, and although for almost all that time I’d lived with him in the flat his parents had helped him to buy, in my head it was still a newish relationship – still in the honeymoon phase, which surely meant it was way too soon to think about actual honeymoons.

But now I found myself irresistibly drawn to the glossy covers of the magazines. Each of them had a beautiful girl in a white dress on the cover. Each one enticed the reader to pick it up and discover the latest trends in veils, canapés, classic cars and pageboys’ suits. I fanned them out on my lap, wondering which one to open first.

And then a cover line caught my eye.

All set to settle down? How to know if you’re ready to level up your relationship.

Almost without thinking, I put the other magazines aside and opened that one. Inspired Bride, it was called. The first few pages were all adverts – double-page spreads, many in arty black and white, showing radiant women in designer dresses and handsome men in what I supposed must be cravats. There were ads for perfume and jewellery – extravagant circles of diamonds and simple solitaires, none of which, I thought smugly, were as pretty as the ring sparkling on the third finger of my own left hand.

But I flicked quickly through until I found the contents page, which told me the article I was looking for was on page 111.

Except it wasn’t an article – it was a quiz.

He’s gone down on one knee – and he makes you go weak at the knees. But are you truly ready to say I do? I read.

‘Right, that’s you cooked,’ Tilly said. ‘Come over to the basin and we’ll take your colour off and give you a nice head massage, then do your cut.’

‘Great, thanks.’ Reluctantly, I set the magazine aside, then put my handbag down on top of it, just to stake a claim. What if some other newly engaged girl nabbed it and I never got to find out my score? It would, obviously, be high – I’d always been pretty good at passing tests – but still. For some reason I wanted quite badly to know.

After all, a year wasn’t that long a time. Not at all. Archie’s and my relationship had pretty much gone from nought to a hundred in just a few weeks, and now the pace of it was accelerating even further. But what if it was too fast, too soon? I knew I loved Archie and he loved me – I had no doubt about that at all. But what if I’d said yes to his proposal just because I’d been caught up in the excitement and surprise of the moment? What if I wasn’t ready for marriage after all? I knew it was just a stupid quiz in a stupid magazine, but still I craved its reassurance.

I barely registered Tilly’s questions as she washed my hair. Had we decided on a venue yet? Had we a date in mind? Was I going to have a hen do? The answer to all of them was that I really didn’t have a clue, because it was too early to have thought about any of that stuff.

‘We’re having lunch with Archie’s sister and her wife right after this,’ I said. ‘I expect she’ll have lots of ideas.’

‘Ah, lovely,’ Tilly said. ‘So nice to get both families involved in all the planning.’

Is it? Uninvited, a picture of Archie’s mother giving me one of the sideways glances she specialised in, which always made me wonder if I had spinach stuck in my teeth or was wearing odd socks, appeared in my mind. Is it really?

Tilly swathed my head in a towel and led me back to my seat, and I was relieved to see the magazine was still there. Peeping out from underneath my bag, I could just read the words ‘his family’.

There was no way I could start the quiz now, not while Tilly was snipping away at my fringe and telling me the story of her cousin’s wedding, which had ended in a massive punch-up between the best man and the photographer. Apparently, when the father of the bride tried to intervene, he’d tripped over a tripod and landed face first in the cake. But there was no way I couldn’t have just a little look, either.

I slid the magazine out from under my bag and glanced down at the page. There were well over a dozen questions, all with four options for answers. Standard stuff – and absolute rubbish of course, probably written by the work-experience girl in between checking her TikTok. But still…

You’re dreaming of your big day, certain that you’ve found The One, and preparing to make a life-long commitment. But first, test your wedding-readiness with our quiz.

A drop of water from my hair fell onto the page, wrinkling the paper and smudging the print.

‘Just tip your head back for me, please,’ Tilly said, ‘and uncross your legs. That’s lovely. Yes, so it all ended with Jason going off to A&E in an ambulance and Tommy being carted off by the peelers. Talk about a day to remember! That won’t happen to you, of course.’

‘I really hope not. I expect we’ll only have a small wedding anyway. We don’t have much money and all these things…’ I gestured down at the glossy magazine covers, with their promises of fairy tales come to life, ‘look super-expensive.’

‘Oh my word, you won’t believe it. One of my other clients – I won’t name any names, but she comes in here regular, same as you – she told me her wedding cost forty thousand pounds. Forty thousand!’

‘That’s a deposit on a house!’ I squeaked.

‘It did include the honeymoon, which was two weeks in a five-star resort in the Maldives. But still. Just look straight ahead for me.’

Tilly moved in front of me and pulled the ends of my hair down, checking that the left and right sides matched. Evidently they did, because she nodded in satisfaction and unhooked her hairdryer from under the counter. There was no talking after that, the roar of its motor drowning out the possibility of conversation. Soon she was done, whisking a big brush over my neck to get rid of stray hairs, smoothing serum over my hair and snipping off the odd strand that had escaped her scissors first time round.

‘Fabulous,’ I said, smiling at my reflection. ‘It looks great, as always. Thank you so much.’

‘Don’t mention it. Chloe at the front desk will book you in for next time, and I’ll see you in a few weeks.’

She bustled off and I stood up slowly, putting on my coat and tucking my phone back into my handbag. Then, surreptitiously, I tore pages 111 and 112 out of the magazine, folded the sheet of paper into quarters and put it in my bag too.

Tilly might have let me have the whole magazine if I’d asked, but I couldn’t have been sure. I was fairly confident no one would miss the page I’d ripped out, and if they did Tilly wouldn’t be blamed for it – but I tipped her an extra tenner, just in case.

You’re starting to share your big news with friends and family. What’s their reaction?

A. No one’s even slightly surprised – it would be quite nice if they were, actually! But I guess it’s obvious we were meant to be together.

B. It’s not news, exactly, because we’ve been talking about it for a while now; the engagement is just a formality.

C. They’re happy for us, of course. But I do sometimes wonder if they think we could be rushing it a bit.

D. Um… there may have been some raised eyebrows. But haters gonna hate, and I’ve got a ring on my finger, so…!

‘Honestly, I couldn’t be happier for you two,’ Archie’s sister Poppy said, digging her fork into a Yorkshire pudding almost as big as her head. ‘God, this place is such a gem, you are lucky to have it right on your doorstep. Our local’s dead depressing, isn’t it, Freya?’

‘Grim,’ her wife agreed, carefully removing a pea that had dropped onto their son Linus’s head. ‘It’s all beige food that comes in catering packs and gets shoved in the deep-fat fryer until it’s basically a heart attack on a plate.’

‘Like the Ginger Cat used to be, before Alice took over,’ Archie said. ‘But you’re right, it’s great now. We could even have our wedding reception here, you know, Nat. They do private parties now.’

‘And we could have the ceremony at the town hall,’ I agreed. ‘You know, keep it all really low-key and local. That would be amazing.’

‘You’ll be lucky, knowing our family,’ Poppy said. ‘If I were you, I’d get on a plane to Vegas, get married there and not tell anyone, like we did.’

‘I still haven’t forgiven you for that,’ Archie teased. ‘Seriously, my own sister, depriving me of the opportunity to see Elvis conducting a wedding ceremony.’

‘You saw the video, though,’ Freya argued.

‘Not. The. Same.’

‘Yeah, I know,’ said Poppy. ‘I do feel kind of bad about it, although it was totally amazing. But we knew that if we let Mum and Dad get involved, we’d have been up to our eyeballs in floral centrepieces and favours and crap like that before the ink was dry on the invitations.’

‘And we’d have had to invite about a million of your parents’ friends,’ agreed Freya. ‘I mean, I’m sure they’re perfectly nice and everything, but…’

‘But I had absolutely zero interest in sharing my special day with Trevor and Karen from the golf club.’

‘Poor Trevor and Karen,’ Archie said. ‘You know how they love a good knees-up.’

‘You’re not serious, are you?’ I asked. ‘I know Archie’s parents will be excited for us and everything, but they won’t really want to invite their friends and stuff. Will they?’

‘Just you wait,’ Poppy said, pouring more gravy over her roast beef and taking a gulp of red wine. ‘I love Mum and Dad to pieces, and Daisy too obviously,. . .