The food was exquisite, but not in a scientific, planned feast for all senses kind of way. It was much more in a very humble, flavoursome, simply evocative kind of way. The starter had been wedges of fresh white bread accompanied by individual pots of a rich duck terrine. It was hearty, ideal winter food and a bottle of red wine had complemented it perfectly. Next was succulent chicken in a sauce that Ethan could taste each and every individual flavour of – onion, mushroom, garlic, a touch of bay leaf, the flavoursome stock holding it all together. It took him right back to one of the first meals he had shared with the Durand family.
‘Silvie made this dish for us once, but with rabbit,’ Ethan told Keeley as he paused in his eating. ‘Silvie is a terrible cook by the way and she will be the first to admit it.’
Keeley smiled, nodding as she wiped her mouth with her napkin. ‘The recipe is supposed to be with rabbit but, with the petting zoo barn, we didn’t think it was appropriate.’
‘We,’ Ethan said. ‘You are sounding like someone who is invested in the future of the hotels.’
‘Oh,’ Keeley said. ‘Well, I really meant Silvie and Louis. They have been making all the decisions. She asked me… Silvie asked me to continue with what you started and…’
‘Keeley,’ Ethan whispered. ‘Why are you seeming to censor everything you say?’
‘I’m not. I…’ She paused and took a sip of her red wine before her eyes met his again. ‘Tell me what you were going to say before the food arrived.’
Ethan put down his knife and fork and wiped his lips with his napkin. He sighed, holding her gaze and drinking her in. She was so beautiful, so gentle, just the thought of her made him smile a hundred times a day…
‘I want to say that I am sorry,’ Ethan finally said. ‘I was a coward. A complete coward. I should have come to meet you at Passage Jouffroy. I should have kept my head and faced you but…’
‘But?’ Keeley asked.
‘But… the noise was too loud.’ He swallowed.
Why had he said that? It straightaway brought back every bad experience he had ever had. All the darkest memories from the orphanage and the loss he felt after Ferne.
‘It means, in my head, everything was suddenly too much all at once. It was a cymbal… and a bass drum and… a high-pitched trumpet playing complicated jazz. And I did not know how to make it stop. Not at first.’
‘I understand,’ Keeley responded.
‘No,’ Ethan said. ‘Do not understand. Do not be nice to me. I do not deserve it. I was stupid to hide away. I mean… I am twenty-eight years old. There is only so much hiding away from life you can do before it becomes more about how long you have before you die rather than embracing the living part.’
*
Keeley empathised absolutely. ‘I know.’
She completely knew in relation to how her own life had been going and because of Bea and Erica.
‘My friend Erica… the one we took a photo for…’ Keeley started.
‘I remember,’ Ethan said. ‘We got my best side.’
She forced a smile. ‘Well… she passed away.’ A knot of despair caught in her throat and it was taking everything not to let the tears drop.
‘Oh, Keeley.’
She picked up her napkin at the very same moment he reached for her hand. She dabbed at her eyes and he retracted.
‘We… knew it was going to happen. We met in the hospital during her treatment after all, but it just brings it home that… no one knows what’s around the corner. Erica didn’t. I didn’t with my accident and losing Bea.’ She took another breath. ‘And neither did Ferne.’
Keeley watched Ethan look to the wood-burning stove then get to his feet. ‘I think the fire requires another log.’
‘It doesn’t,’ Keeley told him. ‘Not yet.’
He stopped still, right by her chair now.
‘Ethan, I’m only alive now because of Ferne and I can’t apologise for that.’
‘I know,’ he answered. ‘And, of course, why should you? As I have said, it is I who should be apologising.’
‘I have to take tablets every day for the rest of my life,’ Keeley continued. ‘I have to check in with doctors all the time. I have to watch what I eat and drink and I should be exercising far more than I am. There is no guarantee that Ferne’s kidney is going to be with me forever.’ She sighed. ‘There is going to come a time when I am going to need another transplant, maybe two. And each one is going to come at an enormous risk. Close matches aren’t easy to find. My mum can’t donate and my dad wasn’t the best match so, if things got bad… the outcome might be quite different a second time around.’
‘What are you trying to tell me?’ Ethan asked, his eyes meeting hers.
‘I’m trying to say that my life isn’t as straightforward as it could be for you… with someone else.’
‘Keeley,’ he whispered. ‘I—’
‘No, don’t say anything else yet. Let me finish.’ She got to her feet too, moving over the matting to the gorgeous, thick and fluffy rug she had sourced for the room. Slipping off her shoes, she buried her stockinged feet into its depth, the heat from the stove warming right the way through her body. ‘I have been tip-toeing though. Partly because my mother worries I am going to teleport to heaven if I eat more than the recommended daily fat intake of… I don’t know… Bo-Bo.’ She sighed. ‘And also because I’ve been cautious. Too cautious. I’ve been the one marking time instead of making time. I don’t want to do that anymore, Ethan. I want to live my life. Really live it.’
Her heart was thudding now. He was so close to her that if she reached out she could touch him. And she so wanted to touch him, more than anything else. But he had to want it too. He had to be sure. Because he knew everything now. Who she was. What her life had been like. Hopefully, what it could be.
‘You think my life is straightforward?’ Ethan asked, stepping away from her and heading to the basket of logs.
‘No, of course not,’ she answered. ‘I didn’t say it was.’
‘I have a child living with me, Keeley. Me! Ethan Bouchard… has a child!’ He quickly opened up the stove and threw another log into the flames. ‘You know, people, they have sex without contraception and they ask themselves what happened when pregnancy occurs. Me, I find a girl taking chocolate from a Christmas tree and she moves in… with her dog! I do not even know her real name or how old she is! Am I completely mad?’
‘Yes,’ Keeley answered. ‘But not when it comes to Jeanne.’
‘Am I even the right person to be guiding her?’
‘Ethan, she has been living on the streets for a reason. I suspect not just because there is no one else, but because she has never met anyone else who immediately cared like you did.’
Ethan turned around to face her, brushing his hands together. ‘I barely know how to look after myself. Two days ago I ate something from the back of the fridge I could not even distinguish.’
‘But you’ve been making meals for Jeanne and leaving them in boxes with her name on,’ Keeley replied.
Ethan sighed. ‘She told you that?’
‘She has been worried about you. She cares about you almost as much as she cares for Bo-Bo.’
‘I am surprised she has any care left the amount she gives to that chien.’ He shook his head. ‘I do not know what the future holds. I have never really known. Some of the very first things I do remember involve not knowing if I was going to survive the day. When you have felt like that it is hard to start doing any kind of planning but…’
‘But?’
He sighed. ‘Ma crevette.’
It was that name again. The name of the person Ethan had talked about before. Who was she?
‘Ferne,’ he said. ‘I called her “my shrimp”. I have never known anyone be able to eat shrimp like she did.’
Keeley closed her eyes and shook her head. So much misunderstanding had gone on from the very beginning. But there was one thing she really needed to know if they were going to try to resolve things.
‘I… care about you, Ethan,’ she admitted. ‘I haven’t ever felt for anyone what I feel for you.’ She swallowed, feeling exposed by that admission. ‘But I know how my connection with Ferne might have made you feel.’
‘Keeley…’
‘No, I know it feels weird and it is weird I suppose. But I need to know that, when you look at me now, you still see the woman you met outside the hotel who chased a penguin down the street with you. That I’m still to you the woman who went running in her dad’s darts jumper and whispered to an almost-dying dog, who somehow rose again, and laughed at the clowns at the circus and played very bad petanque and—’
The rest of her words never made it past her lips as her mouth was captured by Ethan’s in a kiss that pulled her off her feet and into his embrace. It was as passionate as it was magical and it left her in no doubt that he had listened to every word she’d said. When Ethan broke off Keeley was out of breath and he was looking at her, gazing in wonder as if she were something precious that might evaporate if he took his eyes away.
‘I only see you, Keeley,’ he told her. ‘I promise, I will always only see you.’ He ran a thumb gently down her cheek to the curve of her lips. ‘You are my “comfortable”.’
This time it was Keeley who joined their lips together again. And as they kissed, she knew, whatever life had in store for them, she was going to be all in. Every time.