‘How sad and angry I was?’ Ash finished for him. ‘I…never really thought about it that way I guess. That makes me feel a bit shitty.’
‘Don’t feel too bad.’ He bit his lip. ‘I’ve just realised that a lot of what I assumed about how my maman feels about my papa is utterly wrong. Teenagers are not designed to understand the adults in their lives, I don’t think.’
‘I suppose not.’ She’d felt so stuck in her situation for so long, she hadn’t really taken the time to reconsider things. Maybe Nan hadn’t resented having her there as much as she thought?
She touched his sleeve again. ‘Anyway, aside from the childhood memories, I also find it really relaxing. It’s so chilled.’ And of course, at that moment a toddler started shrieking over by the little rock pool where you could touch the starfish and anemones. She laughed. ‘Well, some of the time it’s chilled.’
He laughed too, his eyes so warm, it made her breath catch.
‘The lights remind me of the bar we were in the other night.’ He looked up at the ceiling as she led him over to the big tank.
‘This is Brighton – the more opportunities for rainbow colours the better.’
‘Definitely.’ He nodded. ‘I must try to bring that into the display, somehow.’
She crouched down at the stingray tank and he immediately joined her. ‘I could sit here watching them all day,’ she admitted, her gaze following the animals as they swam through the water, moving smoothly and gracefully.
Quiet descended between them and the ambient backing track, all flutey and mystical, filled the space. She pressed her hand to the tank and a ray swam over, probably thinking it was going to get fed. She caught Olivier watching her and he smiled. ‘They look like they’re flying.’
‘Exactly! That’s what I’ve always thought. Like underwater birds. And they’ve got such cute smiley faces.’
‘They do. I’ve never noticed before.’
‘C’mon, let’s go do the tunnel.’ She reached out for his hand as she stood without thinking and he took it, fingers curling loosely around hers, as though he felt she might change her mind and want to break away. But she didn’t want to change her mind. They’d held hands at ice-skating, but that had been for practical reasons, with two pairs of gloves between them. Having his warm, strong fingers closed around hers…shewas the one who felt like she was flying.
They unbuttoned their coats as they moved through the uncomfortable warmth of all the terrariums with the small turtles and lizards and snakes. At the end, was a set of double doors and the slope down to the glass tunnel.
‘Oh, this is very cool,’ he said as an enormous turtle swam over their heads.
‘See?’ She grinned. The ripples of the water reflected over them and his eyes glowed green as he looked up. They kept to one side, allowing other people to walk through. The sharks were fast, sliding their bellies over the tunnel and twisting away quickly. The turtles moved slowly and Olivier pointed out that one was trailing something rather disgusting behind him, but they laughed and watched again. Ash couldn’t help but be filled with that sense of awe she always had when the big manta ray glided across.
‘They’re not actually quite as big as they appear,’ she murmured. ‘The Perspex and the water magnify them.’
‘Well, the optical illusion doesn’t stop them from being beautiful – it just highlights it.’
‘But isn’t part of the beauty in the size? They make you feel small don’t they?’
‘If you have it in you to feel in awe of nature, you’ll feel it whether it’s a tiny ladybug or a mountain.’ He shrugged. ‘I think anyway.’
Ash watched the bright, wavy lines wobbling over his face and smiled. Of course he felt that way, but what surprised her was that she recognised the sentiment in herself. The world was a beautiful place, full of beautiful things, big and small.
And Olivier Demont was one of them.
