by Lovell, Dani
He pauses for a moment. “Um… cool?”
“Wait…” I turn to face him fully, confused. “You’re being… serious?”
“Clare! Yes!”
“Oh…” What? What’s happening here? He’s actually in love with me? In real life? What? “You love me?”
“A lot.”
“Is this something you just decided?”
He chuckles and looks down, shaking his head. “Darling, no. I have loved you for a very long time. I knew well before I met Stacy that I was in love with you.”
I pause, frowning, totally confused and a little lost. “So… okay. That’s… nice.”
“Nice? Can’t you just pretend you’re in love with me, too?”
“Um… okay… I love you, too.”
“‘In love’ love?”
“Yeah, ‘in love’ love.”
“Are you pretending?”
I look around briefly. Are there cameras somewhere? Is this a joke? Oh who cares if it is, I’m saying it. “Nope, I’m actually not. I’m drunk though, so you know I’m going to regret saying this tomorrow. I fell in love with you when I was seventeen. You broke my heart over and over again by never noticing me and continually dating those super skinny, pretty girls. Then, I managed to get over it after a few years and concentrated on finding Mr. Right. But actually, I’m not sure I ever really did get over it, I always compare men to you. You’re the one I think is perfect.” I say, particularly nonchalantly, like it’s totally normal.
He takes a deep breath and his mouth falls open. “Whoa. I did not know any of that.”
“Yep, sad but true. Still love me after that?” I ask, casually, and he laughs.
“You know, I never knew, at all. I thought you were gorgeous when we first met, had I thought you’d be likely to say yes or felt appropriate dating my younger sister’s friend as a teenager, I would have asked you out in an instant.”
“Really?” I ask, shocked.
“Definitely! I used to… um… use thoughts of you for my own private purposes all the time… Wow, there’s a big bad secret of my own.”
I burst out laughing. “What? You… you…” I look around me to see if anyone can hear me, “you ‘masturbated’ over thoughts of me? Teenage me?”
“Oh yeah. All the time. And not just teenage you, either, this continued. Never really ended…” he says, pulling his mouth into an awkward stretch.
“You still do it?” I ask, flabbergasted.
“Well… yes and no. Now I try to do something about it in person.”
Suddenly I’m immensely turned on. My body? He’s been attracted to my body? “Oh my god, Oliver. This is weird. Tonight is weird. What’s happening?”
“Well… I think we’re finally admitting that there is more to us than just amazing friendship.”
“Is this because we’re drunk? Is this going to ruin everything?” I ask, very nonchalantly, considering all that’s happening.
“I hope not. But I’m not joking. I love you… like Daniel loves Bea. I love you like Luke loves Tilly. I want you to love me like that, too. You’re the girl I want to marry.”
My chest constricts. Butterflies go crazy, though that could be the alcohol churning, I’m not really getting definitive understanding of my emotional state right now, to be honest. Marriage? Marriage?! “Oh, Oliver. You have no idea. I want to get married more than you know. I’ve wanted it forever. That and a baby. Watching my friends do it is so wonderful, but really quite difficult for me, too - neither of them ever wanted it as much as I have - and they’re getting it all. Don’t get me wrong, I’m over-joyed for them. But, Oliver, please don’t say things like that, I would marry a man like you in an instant, given the chance. You’d make an amazing husband and dad.”
“So marry me, then,” he says, as if we’re talking about having another drink.
“What? Are you mad?”
“No! We’re a match made in heaven, we’ve been best friends for so long, we know we’ll get along like a house on fire… you want a baby, I’m ready for all that shit… you think I’d be a good dad - you’d make one hell of an amazing mum… let’s just do it. Why wait?”
“Are you fucking crazy, Oliver?” I cry, “What the hell has gotten into you?”
“Life! Getting rid of Stacy and being able to have you after so long… spending this time with you on a different level - I want you. I want you walking around, being married to me. Come on - let’s just do it. We’re in Las Vegas! We can do it right now! Let’s start the life we both want. I want to wake up next to you every day for the rest of my life.”
Tears well in my eyes as I gaze at him, not quite believing all this. I know he hasn’t proposed to me in the traditional way… but what he just said is all I want. I don’t care about the huge engagement ring or the parties and planning. I’ve always dreamed about getting married, but more for the wonderful life beyond that day - than the day itself, which is where so many girls go wrong.
“You know I can’t lose you if this goes wrong, Oliver.”
“Okay. let me prove it won’t go wrong - and marry me. It’s easier to walk away from a relationship than it is a marriage. If it gets difficult, we’ll work hard to get through it because we’re married. I don’t intend on getting divorced in my lifetime.”
It all seems so logical. Maybe because I’ve had a drink or ten, but it all just seems so… logical. “I’m utterly shocked by everything that has just happened, Oliver, and I’m really quite overwhelmed that you would actually consider spending your life with me… and yes - I would do it right now, if I thought it was wise… but the truth is, we’re both drunk. Very drunk. This seems like a grand idea, but when we wake up in the morning, married - things could be very different.”
“I hear what you’re saying, and as much as I disagree about tomorrow - I do agree that right now probably isn’t the best time in the world… I don’t want you to start your married life with a drunk man. Let’s spend the night together and when we wake up, I’ll ask you again. If you still think you’d like to marry me and don’t mind it being just the two of us - let me spend my life making you happy, starting by getting married in the morning, before we leave. I want to arrive home with Clare as my wife.”
“This is fucking crazy. Pardon my French.” I say with my hands covering my mouth.
“It is… so let’s celebrate! Cheers!” he says, holding his drink up. I simply giggle and clink before taking a sip and then kissing him, hard.
CHAPTER EIGHT
TUESDAY 18TH JUNE
We stay at the bar and make friends with lots of drunk American people and tell everyone we’re getting married in the morning like a pair of crazies. We all dance the night away and end up texting the car to take us back to the hotel at a ridiculous hour of the morning.
We stumble into my room and undress each other, laughing hysterically the whole time, but when we fall into the bed, things become less hilarious, and much more amorous.
“I can’t wait,” Oliver says, kissing my neck and sliding his hands down my body as I arch back in acceptance, “until tomorrow.”
“Mmm…” I moan, loving the feel of him touching me, “me too. Do you really… mmm, that’s so good… do you really want to marry me, Oliver?”
“Oh god, more than anything. Those other girls I’ve been seeing were nothing… I’ve always known you were there perfect woman… just with all that talk about ‘not spoiling our friendship’ and ‘we can’t do this, we can’t do that’… I always thought you’d never want anything else from me than the odd ‘frustration reliever’.”
“On the contrary, Oliver. I’ve always wanted marriage but no one ever came close to what I need. Because no one was you.”
He slips his fingers inside me, making me cry out loud, my nipples harden and my skin ripples with goose bumps. “Holy… oh… it’s so good.”
“You’re so hot, gorgeous girl, my god… but I … I don’t think we should…”
“Should what?” I a
sk, quickly, please don’t let him stop…
“Sex… we shouldn’t do the sex thing… I want you so much…”
“No, why?” I ask, very upset about this.
“I want you to want me tomorrow. I want you to marry me, I want to wait until afterwards when you’re all mine and no one else’s… I want to devour you, make love to you… have you as mine and only mine forever.”
“That’s so romantic, Oliver,” I say with a giant swoon… “However… I’m really horny and I really want sex right now…”
He pushes his fingers deeper inside me, making my cry out loud, “Oh god!”
“You’re so beautiful, baby… I want to watch you come like this. We don’t need sex tonight… I want you so much I could burst, which will only make tomorrow so much sweeter… if you’ll let me wait.”
“Anything… anything…” I say, my feet curling, my fingers grabbing the bed sheets as he twists and turns inside me, taking me there so quickly.”
“I love you…” he whispers, and it's a first. We’ve never said anything like that whilst… being naughty, before. He kisses my throat as a lump rises and he continues to whisper, “You’re what I want, what I need; your beautiful skin, your perfect soul…”
“Oh, Oliver,” I whisper, tears falling down my cheeks as I begin to fall apart. I moan and arch back as it pushes through me, his strong fingers keeping it alive. “Yes…”
He allows me to come down gradually, kissing my skin over and over, my hands wrapped around the back of his neck. I pull his head up to mine to kiss me, my eyes closed to try to hide the tears.
“Open your eyes,” he mumbles against my lips, “I want to see you, don’t hide. Don’t be embarrassed. It’s me.”
Something about everything he says makes me feel so comfortable in his presence, so at home and welcome. I can trust him so surely, everything that happens between us is ‘us’. No one else comes in to anything. So I do open my eyes, I let him see the emotion and vulnerability; he’s the only person in the world who’d be able to soothe that for me.
“Don’t feel like you need to hide tears from me, darling. I want to know if you’re sad.”
“I’m not sad, Oliver. At all. What you said…” I begin to cry softly again, “…it’s beautiful to me. No one has ever made me feel so… so important or special. No one else would have been given the chance to. You’re the one I want to do that.”
“And I always will. I’ve wanted to be that person, Clare. Where we’ve always tried to protect our friendship, I think we’ve only been keeping something else from developing between us. I don’t want to go down the traditional route, I don’t want to date you and then get engaged a year or two down the line, then get married after that, then have a baby later… I want you now. I feel like I’ve been ready for this with you for years and now I have the chance… I want it.”
“Are you sure about this? You don’t think we’ll regret it?”
“No, I really don’t. The distance Stacy put between us was enough to tell me quite certainly that I can’t live without you in my life. I wanted you with me, twenty-four-seven. When I saw you with Emily… I wanted to see you… with my baby.” Oh god, yes. Yes, I want that.
“You want a baby, now?” I ask, not sure if I’m really taking all of this in.
“Maybe not right this second, but I want one soon, definitely. I know you do, but if this is all too fast, then we’ll do whatever feels right.”
On one hand, yes; it feels ridiculously fast - yesterday I wanted a boyfriend, today I may be marrying Oliver and getting pregnant whenever I want. But on the other hand - I never wanted that traditional wait - I like sudden, I like different, I like doing something totally outside of the norm. I suppose I’ve always been like that - just look at my very conservative family - I’m the ugly duckling… or black sheep… or whatever.
I wonder what my family would think of all this… not much, they’d probably just say, ‘Oh heavens, congratulations, Dear. Never one to do things by the book - our Clare’. “I think we should do it.”
Oliver wraps his arms around me and holds me tightly. “I think we’re on to something. This is going to be perfect.”
We both drift off, occasionally waking to snuggle or mumble something about marriage. The alarm wakes me after nowhere near enough sleep; we can’t have stumbled into bed more than about three hours ago.
“Ugh…” Oliver groans. “Too early.”
“Uh huh… let’s go back to sleep.” I slur, my eyes still closed.
“Mmm… but we need to leave this morning, darling,” he says, tightening his arms around my waist and kissing my back. “I need water…”
“Me too…” I’m parched.
Oliver slowly unwraps his arms from my body and stumbles out of the bed in search of the minibar. When he finally finds it in his semiconscious state, he pulls out a bottle of water and begins to pour it into the glasses provided. I can tell all of this just by listening, I haven’t been able to open my eyes yet. Oh so tired…
The next thing I know, he’s stroking my forearm and whispering my name. When I finally open my eyes, he’s resting on his haunches on the floor beside the bed, holding the glass of water for me.
“Have some water, darling.”
I smile and take it from him, leaning up on my elbow and taking a few refreshing gulps. “Mmm, thank you.”
“You’re welcome. You look beautiful…” he says, running his forefinger down one side of my face as I rest it back on the pillow.
I smile and look at his handsome face. “So do you.”
“Clare, you only went to sleep a couple of hours ago, but do you remember anything?”
Oh no, what’s coming? I nod, suspiciously. Is he going to regret?
“Good… so how do you feel about it now? Would you still like to marry me this morning?”
I grin and close my eyes, resting my hand on top of his, and I nod. “Very much so.”
He kisses my cheek. “Phew, because I’m still one hundred percent into it.” His voice is deep and sexy, a combination of tiredness, hangover and… something else.
“You look so peaceful and relaxed, darling…” he whispers, stroking my hair, “…but we’ll have to get up now. I read up on it while you were sleeping, and there are a couple of things we need to do.”
“Hmm?” I ask, tiredly. “I thought you fell asleep with me?”
“I did, baby, but then I woke up thinking about it and wanted to check it was definitely doable.”
I smile and open my eyes to find his cheek and I stroke it. “You’re lovely…” I say, sleepily, dozing back off.
“Hey, no sleeping,” he whispers, “wake up and marry me, gorgeous.”
Honestly, could anyone say no to that?
After helping me out of bed, he turns on the shower and makes sure I get it okay. When I ask about his cautiousness, he says he doesn’t want anything to happen that might stop this morning going ahead. Which is super cute and really quite unbelievable. Is this actually happening? Am I dreaming this whole thing up?
While I’m in the shower, he runs to his room to collect some clean clothes and returns in record breaking time, before I’ve even finished washing my hair, popping his head around the door as he returns. “Honey, I’m home… my god, you look hot. Could you maybe hurry it up a bit before I forget that I’m waiting until afterwards to make love to you?”
I laugh, rinsing the conditioner from my hair. “If you keep saying ‘make love to you’ like that, I’m going to force you to do it before we even leave.”
“Ooh, that does it for you? I can’t wait to ‘make love to you’ my beautiful, hot, fiancée.”
I swallow hard. “Wow… fiancée… that’s something I’ve never been called before…”
“Well you kind of are… I did ask you to marry me, and we aren’t married yet… so that makes you my fiancée, doesn’t it?”
“I suppose so…” I say, turning the tap off and stepping out of the shower, grabbin
g the towel on the way.
He steps over to me and kisses me softly. “I’m going to have a shower now,” he says, locking his eyes with mine, “you go and do whatever you do, get yourself ready and we’ll leave in half an hour. Okay?”
“Okay. Looking forward to it. It’s just us, right? I mean, no one else knows about this, no one is going to be there?”
“No. We’ll do that when the time is right, it’s just us. This is about you and me. No one else. We can share it when we’re ready.”
I take a deep breath and smile, nervously. “Okay, this is… this is scary.”
He frowns and tugs on my hand to sit down on the side of the bath next to him. “I don’t want it to be scary, I don’t want you to do anything if it doesn’t feel right for you.”
“Oh, it feels right, Oliver, it really does. It’s just… I’ve never done this before and I haven’t even told anyone about it… it’s just… different.”
“But you’re sure you want to?”
“Absolutely. If you do.”
“Oh, I do. I can’t wait. We’ll decide when to tell everybody later, but in the meantime, this is between you and I. It’s us. We’ll be ‘us’.”
“And that sounds so perfect. It’s… it’s so romantic.”
We share another soft, slow kiss on the side of the bath before separating to get ready. I’ve been thinking about a dress I bought in Nordstrom in LA; I think it will be the most perfect dress to wear this morning. It’s a beautiful, ivory dress with a strapless panel inside and a full lace outer. The skirt is above the knee and full, and a ribbon ties around the waist. The neckline is edged with the intricate pattern of the lace, as are the capped sleeves.
I haven’t worn it yet but I think my own wedding would be the perfect place to debut it. My new earrings are a wonderful match, and I have a pair of cream, satin ballet shoes that I brought with me but haven’t yet worn. I know they’ll only be good for one use because they’ll get filthy so quickly, but I think today is the day. They’ll match my dress perfectly.
I do my make-up in my usual sort-of-sixties style with a thick black line on my lids and spiky black lashes, and I decide that I should have my signature hairdo for my special morning. The flick pony tail with slight bouffant and cream bow looks perfect with the make-up and my dress, and as I pour myself a glass of juice, I pray that Oliver is going to like my choices.
