“I need to shower when we get home, I must look ridiculous with so much makeup and all this hairspray,” I say, reaching up to scrunch the bouffant blond 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 he 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 trunk 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 cliff top to one of my favorite songs, and the air is pure magic. How did I not realize 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.
“Do you think your own kids will be on this cliff top in thirty years’ time, dancing to Phil Collins, trying to replicate the most romantic night of their mother’s life?”
“You’re backing yourself then, if you think this is the most romantic night of my life,” I say, pressing my tongue into my cheek.
“Damn, I knew I should have gone for the band,” he says, and I swallow a laugh as I lean my head against his shoulder.
“Seriously, though, I think I’ve learned not to hold on to other people’s love stories too tightly,” I say. “That it’s not the story that’s important.”
Ted holds me tighter, an electric charge coursing between us, and I tilt my head, allowing my lips to find his.
* * *
*
Back at L’étacq, Ted’s house is empty, so we walk down to the fisherman’s cottage. Ted has brought food to cook us, Jersey Royals and lobster from the fishery at the north end of the bay. Scamp bounds across the wall and jumps up at Ted.
“Hey, Scamp,” Ted says, picking him up and nuzzling his face into the top of the dog’s head.
“You made it then?” Sandy calls over the wall, a delighted grin on her ruddy round face.
“He did,” I say, but we can’t stop for small talk now. Ted puts Scamp down, and I pull him inside, the bag of food left on the side, then drag him over to the bed.
“We’re going to do this now, are we? I’m not going to wine and dine you first?” he asks, his voice low, his firm hands clasped around my waist.
“Oh, I think the Phil Collins cliff-top move is all the wining and dining you’ll ever need to do, Ted Palmerston,” and then I let out an involuntary squeal as I feel his hand caress the skin on my back.
“Do you want me to stop?” he asks, his face creasing with concern.
“No, no, I definitely don’t want you to stop—that was a good squeal, sorry.”