There doesn’t seem to be any way that I can get down there without everyone seeing me, and that would mean conversations and explanations I am bound to just confess everything to on the spot. Shock and horror would follow, I’d be thrown out of the competition, Forrest would never talk to me again, there’d be tabloid news stories, a documentary on Netflix, followed by the slow demise of civilisation. Fine, it might not be exactly that bad, but I still don’t want to go down those stairs.
Then I get the strongest feeling that someone is standing right behind me. Turning sharply, I see no one there. But I do see the faintest slivers of a blue glow that seems to be coming from behind a wall on the landing. Curious, I approach the light slowly,trying to make sense of it. There’s a loud click and an invisible doorway, hidden in the wall, opens. Just a crack at first and then it slowly swings open. For a moment the blue light flares and then recedes as I approach, illuminating a hidden back stairway.
“Wow,” I whisper. “Either this is a really cool shortcut or the way I die. Hey ho!”
Pulling the panel shut after me, I feel my way carefully down the dark staircase, until I reach the bottom. For a moment I think I might be stuck at a dead end, destined to be trapped here until I die, until one day they find my skeleton and wonder what happened to me. My ghost will be known as The Ginger Lady. Pull yourself together, Ava. The trouble is all I can feel is panelled wood ahead of me, that is, until one corner of the panel gives way under my fingertips and the door clicks open.
Breathing a sigh of relief, I step out into the house just outside the entrance to the orangery, where my beloved lab is glowing softly and gently purring like a sleeping cat. My heels softly click against the tiled floor as I walk quietly past it. I let myself out and into the garden. I might even be on time.
The night is warm and clear. The light of the full moon is bright and alluring, turning the paving stone to silver. Maybe it’s nerves, maybe it’s the romance of the hidden staircase, but I find myself hopping from square to square like a little girl. When I turn the corner, I can see that the terrace is empty and I don’t want to be first. I know Hal will be exactly on time, so that means I must somehow have a few spare moments to enjoy the quiet beauty of the night.
My friends the cedar trees are whispering in the dark, and just beyond them, yes, there is that faint blueish glow, casting an ethereal light against the bark of the oldest of the trees. Could it be the Blue Lady again? She showed me the secret staircase. What else might she want me to see? Without glancing back to check that the terrace is still empty, I head towards the light, treading softly as I am enveloped by the velvet shadows. The light hovers behind the great trunk of the cedar. Softly, softly I draw nearer, holding my breath in case I scare her away.
And then...
I bump into Forrest, I mean I literally charge right into him. He’s standing at the foot of one of the trees looking at his phone. That was the blueish light I thought I saw. He drops the phone, and I hear a female voice softly laughing.
“Forrest, what are you doing out here?” I pick up the phone, and there’s a photograph of a laughing woman with blue hair who looks a lot like Artie.
“Oh, it’s Gemma,” I say, smiling at her. “She’s so beautiful, Forrest. You must miss her.”
“I always will.” Forrest takes the phone back. “I hope she understands.”
“Understands what?” I ask, a little hesitant to find out.
“That I think I might be falling for someone.”
“Oh?” I say, glancing over my shoulder. The urge to run away is strong, but so is the desire to stay.
Yet Hal is waiting on the corner of the terrace now, looking up at the moon, waiting for me. I should be hurrying over to Hal, but that magical first kiss moment I was intent on re-creating doesn’t seem that urgent anymore, at least not to my feet that stay firmly put.
“I wondered,” Forrest says, “how you might feel about that?”
“I... I er, I think it’s the right thing to do, Forrest. I can tell that you and Gem loved each other a lot. But you owe it to Artie and to yourself to live your life as happily as you can. So, you should explore those feelings.” I take a step back. My courage waivers. “Anyway, I better be going...”
I turn away to leave, but he lightly catches my hand. I stand perfectly still, waiting for something that I’m sure can’t be possible, can it?
“Ava”—Forrest says my name as softly as the moonlight—“I know you are starting something with Hal, and I know I probably shouldn’t say this, but I have to, for my own selfish sake.”
“Say what?” I turn towards him, find his dark eyes fixed on mine.
“It’s you I’m falling for. You know it’s you, don’t you?” he says, drawing me a little closer to him. “Even before we danced together tonight, even before I knew how miraculous holding you in my arms would feel. I don’t know if it’s your brilliance, your courage, your beauty, or all three, but I can’t get you out of my head. I just want to know you. I just want to be near you.”
“Really?” My genuinely surprised tone breaks the moment, and he laughs.
“Why would you think otherwise?” he asks. “Don’t you realise how special you are?”
“I know my worth,” I tell him. “I suppose I never thought it was the kind of worth someone like you would put value in.” I pause. “At least the man I thought you were.”
“What kind of man did you think I was?” he asks, taking a step closer to me.
“Oh, you know, it’s just that you are so handsome and dashing and artistic.” I breathe out the last word as I take a step closerto him. One more half a step each and our bodies would touch. “And I’m so... not. It never occurred to me that someone like you would see someone like me.”
“But I do,” Forrest says, his breath a whisper. Tentatively, his eyes on mine, he reaches for my waist, his hand fitting neatly into its curve. Slowly I move towards him, two or three inches more until our bodies are almost touching. “I see you, Ava.”
He bends his head closer towards mine, his hand travelling to the small of my back, cinching my breasts against his chest. “And there is nothing I want more in this world than to kiss you right now.”
Suddenly everything else, my rational thought processes, the knowledge that Hal is waiting for me, fades away almost to nothing. There’s no thinking, no stars in the sky, no ground under my feet, just this long languorous float towards him as if we were always meant to be here together in this moment. Our bodies melt into one another, our lips a hair’s breadth apart.
