I’M LIGHT-HEADED, and the room is shifting alarmingly at the thought of what he’s just asked me and what it means. He smiles, his beautiful Oliver smile that’s playful and sexy and could be specifically designed to make me fall harder, although there’s nowhere left for me to fall. I love him completely, bone-deeply, irrevocably.
But...
I grasp his fingers for fear of my legs giving way. This is off. Wrong. Perhaps some sort of sick joke, for which I’ll seriously never forgive him.
My stomach rolls over with adrenaline. A few days ago I could only dream of this scenario. For a moment it makes me feel that, just maybe—the insanity of his timing and the motivation behind his proposal aside—this, us as a couple, could actually work. Haven’t I always dreamed of being more to him than a friend, more than a friend he has sex with? Of being everything to him, the way he is everything to me?
But not like this—rushed, a rebound because of some negative press. I don’t want to be a sticking plaster over the wound left by Slay. I want Oliver, but I don’t want to be a relationship experiment. Whatever impulse or panic has him in its grip, he’s clearly not ready for commitment. This is not the way I envisaged this fairy-tale moment.
I squeeze his fingers. ‘Oliver, this is—’
‘Don’t say crazy,’ he interrupts. ‘Because it makes sense. We make sense.’ He stands and grips both of my hands. ‘You want to settle down, to find someone, but you won’t find what you’re looking for on a dating app.’ His words are urgent, impassioned. ‘I know. I used to be one of those guys using apps to hook up with women. But now we’ve broken down this barrier we used to keep our friendship intact. We’re amazing together and we’re still best friends.’
His words, wonderful words, would have thrilled me a week ago. But it feels like this proposal has more to do with Slay than us. If he’d simply asked for a relationship I would have said yes. Because we can’t go back after everything we’ve shared. I’ll never be content to meet him for coffee or go to a movie and say goodbye as if this week hasn’t happened.
But neither can we rush this. We can’t jump several dating steps just because we know all there is to know about each other. I have to make him understand, to salvage this.
‘Why don’t we try dating when we get home?’ I say, my voice almost desperate. ‘There’s no need to rush.’ Despite the temptation to say yes, to have the fairy-tale moment just this once. To be the first choice of the man of my dreams, a man I thought I’d have to give up soon. But I don’t want to be temporary. I haven’t waited nine years to be his commitment guinea pig, only to be cast aside when he discovers he’s not ready to abandon his single life after all.
He’s never had a fling that lasts longer than a week. Women come and go. Beautiful women, some he has lots in common with, some clearly keen for more than what’s on offer. And the end has nothing to do with his father, as he’d claim, and everything to do with him. To do with his belief that somehow he’s no good at relationships because of his role model, or that he doesn’t deserve one because of his wild youth, or that he’ll only get hurt again the way Jane hurt him.
But what if I surrendered to my weak inner voice, the one telling me that this is what I’ve craved all along?
No. It’s a guarantee of the heartbreak I fear. He’ll soon grow bored of trying to outrun those demons which, if his turmoil over Slay’s latest antics is any proof, are still very much alive and kicking. He’ll decide he was premature and still wants to play the field, something that helps him keep at bay feeling too deeply.
He’s nothing like his father, but nor is he ready to commit or to be a husband.
And what then for me? I already know I want all of him, to be all to him.
No, I have to be strong.
I suck in a shuddering breath. I can’t risk saying yes just to know how that feels before I’m flung back to reality. A reality without my lover or my best friend. Worse off than when I came to these islands. Because losing one means losing both. If I loved him less fiercely, maybe I could go along for the ride with this impromptu proposal.
Oliver steps closer and grips my face, his animated eyes holding mine. ‘We’ve known each other a long time. Now that we’ve made the leap into lovers, this is just one more leap. I know I don’t deserve you, but I can try.’
‘Of course you deserve me. That’s part of the issue.’
He’s not hearing me and his touch, his palms on my skin, so familiar, so good, now feels too cloying.
‘If you’re worried about the ceremony here being legally binding, we can make it official as soon as we get back to London,’ he says. ‘Then I’ll issue a press release. Announce our marriage.’
‘What? Why would you do that?’ I ask, dumbfounded. He’s thought this all the way through, while I’ve been blissfully ignorant, simply celebrating our deepening connection and imagining that perhaps we could have something real. That perhaps he really has changed and is ready to settle down. But this feels like a circus act, exactly the kind of scene he says he hates and usually attributes to Slay.
‘Because, if we make us official,’ he says, taking both my hands and squeezing, ‘they’ll have nothing more to print about you the next time they print a story about Slay. Because that will stop my father coming between us.’
And there it is, his motivation for this rash proposal. Nothing to do with love or feelings for me. Not a reflection of the growing closeness I’ve experienced this week. Just another show of one-upmanship with his father, a way to ensure history doesn’t repeat itself and a ruthless guarding of his emotions, just like the Oliver I first met.
My heart clenches so violently, I feel my pulse to the tips of my toes. And I know, with a certainty that leaves me hollow, that my fairy-tale romance with Oliver is over.