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Chapter One
Elodie
Andrew is making a hash of proposing.
My wonderful boyfriend is the envy of all my friends: tall, handsome, and the kind of man for whom God created Armani. In the world of finance, he is ruthlessly successful. His only downfall is communication skills; he goes around in circles, and beats about so many bushes that he gets lost. I want to tell him to just get down on one knee and hand me the ring without words, but I don’t want to make him feel worse. Clearly, he has been building this up as a big surprise, so I will pretend to be surprised even though I’ve felt this coming for weeks.
Last month, I overheard him on the phone booking a romantic getaway to Mombasa. He’s been obsessed with Kenya ever since I made him watchThe Crown. The only thing he actually liked was the episode in season one where Elizabeth and Philip go on safari.
So, I know he’s booked a luxury lodge in the Masai Mara. A champagne and oysters’ dinner on the terrace watching the sunset and his secret trip to a Hatton Garden Jeweller. Then he started dropping hints every now and again, asking seemingly random questions.
“Where do you see… I mean…well, what are your plans for the new year?”
Nothing, aside from the trip to Kenya in January that I’m not supposed to know about.
“Are you happy with…with things?”
Of course.
“Do you sometimes feel bored?”
Bored?
“Oh…you know, things. Anything. The flat here.” He waves a hand at the furniture.
Andrew doesn’t like myhobochic, as he calls it, and whenever I buy a painting or a colourful throw, he wrinkles his nose and asks if I got it from a car-boot sale. Last year, he bought James and Barbara a ceramic pot fromGuarda La Lucefor £499. If I had wanted to score points, I might have told him it was identical to the one he made me throw away because I found it in a charity shop.
Some things matter to him, and I understand that. I want to make him happy, so today I’d been planning a visit to the Beautiful Homes Exhibition after work. Then he called to say he was coming home early, and we should have dinner together. Considering how he’s been working late every night and most weekends, lately, he must have made a point of taking the evening off for this dinner.
Something special?
Obviously.
So, I’ve left his favourite curry in the pot, covered to stay warm, and come to sit at the table to wait for him to get the words out.
“The thing is, we are both young and we have …” He pats his pocket. There is something there, but he doesn’t take it out yet. “We are not as young as we were four years ago.”
I smile to encourage him.
“There comes a time when we have to make a decision about the future.”
Here it comes.
“I know it’s your birthday soon, and you’ll be thirty.”
That’s true, my birthday is on December 28th, halfway between Christmas and New year, the season of gifts as Mum used to call it. Except it usually meant I had half as many presents because my family took the easy route and gave me a joint Christmas and birthday one. And now it looks like it’ll be a joint Christmas, birthday, and engagement gift too. I don’t mind. Engagement is gift enough.
“The thing is…” He shoves a hand into his pocket then takes it out again, empty, and covers his nerves by shoving a hand through his hair, messing it. “If we’re not moving forward, then we’re just going backwards.”
That’s not strictly true, I’ve never agreed with that idea, but now is not the time to say so.
“So, we have to move on,” he says.
His words give me a cold prickle, but I ignore it.
“I’m sure you feel the same.” He finally meets my eyes but he’s not smiling. “We’ve been going backwards.”
“We have?” It’s the first thing I have said since he started talking.
