AllFreeNovel
Share Us
‘I don’t need to be duelled over, thank you, and you’re too late anyway,’ I say, ‘I walked out.’
‘You walked out? What about your job?’
‘I’ll find another one, one that doesn’t involve selling my soul or being with the wrong person,’ I shrug.
Almost before I’ve finished speaking, Ted takes me in his arms and kisses me, and every particle of my body melts into joyful jelly. After an irresponsible amount of time spent kissing in the path of oncoming traffic, I apologise to the red-haired woman for holding her up, and Ted and I climb into his cab, grinning at each other.
‘I need to shower when we get home, I must look ridiculous with so much make-up and all this hairspray,’ I say, reaching up to scrunch the bouffant blonde helmet of hair.
‘Home?’ Ted says, a grin stretching from ear to ear.
‘Well, you know, the fisherman’s cottage – home for now.’
Ted pulls the car into gear and starts driving up the hill, away from St Ouen’s.
‘Where are we going?’ I ask, turning to look at the road behind us.
‘I thought you wanted a grand gesture?’ says Ted.
‘I thought storming into the interview was going to be the grand gesture?’
He shakes his head and reaches out a hand to hold mine.
‘Nope.’
Ted drives us back to Plémont, to the place where the hotel used to be, where my parents spent that first summer falling in love.
‘Ted, what are we doing here?’ I ask, looking at the deserted headland.
He runs around and gets a box from the boot and then, with his hands full, beckons me with a sideways nod of the head.
‘OK, I don’t have a lot of experience with grand gestures, so I might have got this completely wrong,’ he says. ‘Will you just close your eyes while I set something up?’
I smile at how nervous he is. I’m not sure the grandest of romantic gestures start with someone being told to close their eyes so close to a cliff edge, but I go with it. If he asks me to walk anywhere with my eyes closed, I might have to voice my safety concerns.
Then music starts to play from a sound system – ‘One More Night’ by Phil Collins.
I open my eyes, and Ted is holding out an arm, beckoning me over. He takes my hand, and we walk up the path together. My face aches from smiling.
‘I thought you hated Phil Collins.’
‘I do,’ he says. ‘But if you love him, I’ll allow my ears to be assaulted once in a while.’
On the flat plateau of grass, he’s marked a large rectangle out on the ground with silver tape.
‘This is where the old dance hall used to be; I looked up the plans.’
‘You didn’t!’
Then he draws me into his arms, and we dance cheek to cheek on the clifftop to one of my favourite songs and the air is pure magic. How did I not realise earlier – that it was Ted all along?
‘So how did I do?’ he says quietly in my ear. ‘Grand enough?’
‘Perfect,’ I reply. ‘Just the right amount of effort, without being over the top.’
‘A live band would have been too much, then?’
‘Yeah, that would have been too much,’ I say, tilting my face to look up into his eyes.
