There is nothing out of the ordinary as far as I can see when we pull up on the drive to our house. I don’t notice Zoe sneaking out of the back gate in the dark as we arrive. She will smile, pleased with herself, when I tell her this. She will tell me that luckily she was free when Daniel phoned her from the hospital, and so she was able to use her spare key to go into our house, go into the cupboard in the kitchen as instructed by Daniel, light what seemed like thousands of candles in the hall and lounge, leave a small square box on the coffee table, then leave just as she saw us pull up.
I press my hands to my mouth as I walk through the glittering miniature flames to the blue velvet box that sits on the table in the centre of the living room. It’s dark outside now, and the room reflects back on us in the curtainless window, as though ours is the only scene in the world.
‘Erica,’ Daniel says, reaching for the box. ‘I know I’ve joked about this a lot. I know when we met you didn’t believe in marriage. And you still might not believe in it. But I don’t want it to be a joke anymore.’
‘Daniel, I—’ I try to interrupt, but he is like a steam train, marching around the room as he speaks so that affection for him, for his way of almost never being still, washes over me and makes me quiet.
‘I have to do this,’ he says. ‘I always told myself that I wouldn’t, that I would respect how you felt and never even ask you. But this accident changed everything. Even though soon all the candles will burn out and you won’t even be able to see the ring I chose for you, and even though if you do say yes, you will have to wear it on your right hand because your left is in a cast, I have to do it right now. Since the minute I thought I might have lost you, I haven’t been able to think of anything else. I know you don’t want a big wedding where everyone looks at you, and you don’t really even want a wedding at all because you’re frightened you might disappear and miss bits of it, and you don’t want a marriage either because you might miss bits of that and it might end badly. But a marriage to you, even if you are only there half the time, will be better than anything I ever thought I could have. And if you say yes, and tonight is the night we decide we are going to do it, then I won’t go to sleep and I won’t leave your side because I don’t want you to disappear and miss even a second of it.’
He is finally still, and kneels down in front of me. The ring slides on perfectly, glinting blue and yellow and white.
‘Tonight is the night,’ I say.
***
And so this, I think, is the start, the beginning of the real us. I feel lucky for once, to be different, to be able to feel this moment more than other people would be able to. I know what it is like in a world that was so nearly mine. I am acutely aware of what else could have been, or could not have been. Being so close to the other me as she kissed Mike, the accident, the knowledge that I could so easily have missed out on Daniel, has shifted how I feel. It’s frightening having so much to lose, but whether I get married to him or not, I am high enough to fall anyway. Daniel has changed me, the accident has changed me, and I am willing to face my fear.
I am wise, all-knowing.
But really, I know nothing. Not yet.