Chapter 47 Flynn
I can’t find Amy. One moment one of the elderly guests was telling me about his accountancy job while I had half an eye on Amy and her game, and the next Tanya was clutching her head, Jay was checking she was alright, the game had been called off and Amy had disappeared.
Ignoring everything else, I rush to the steps to the hotel, worry biting at me. What happened? Why has she gone? She isn’t in the bar, the billiards room or the orangery, and the waiters preparing the dining room stare at me as I burst in, hair askew, searching for her. She isn’t in our bedroom.
Has she left? Has she walked out? Would she do that to me? What happened with her and Tanya?
I have to fix things. I need to remind Amy that I love her. That we love each other, that none of this stuff should split us up. Panicking, I move around the side of the hotel, gravel crunching underfoot, the sky streaked now with purples and blues.
My eyes scan the lawn, the perfectly mown grass that becomes a motionless lake, the island almost shrouded in darkness. Were we there only last night? It feels like forever ago. Everything is changing, upending. It’s in that moment that I spot the solitary figure silhouetted in the bandstand.
She’s hunched over, head hanging, and I’m struck again by how mad this is, to be watching myself, staring at my own slumped body. This weekend has spun off its axis. We need to remind ourselves we can do this, together. I think of her bowing at me in our room, laughing at my rigid attempts to copy her dance moves. I think of our hands intertwining in the mirror.
Then I think of Laura’s words earlier, the suggestion that Amy might not see a future with me.
The thought hits me straight away and I race back up to our room, panting as I grab what I need and head back down the stairs. For a second I think I can hear someone call Amy’s name but I keep going, knowing what I can do to rescue this situation, to remind Amy that we love each other, that we can get through anything together. I just need time, I think desperately, I have to buy us time.
She is still there, desolate and alone as I approach across the lawn, the lake glinting in the distance, the soft evening light turning the water pink. Crickets make sleepy music and the fairy lights wink at me as I approach her.
‘Ames …’
She doesn’t reply, simply staring out at the lake, lost in thought.
‘Amy,’ I say more gently.
She doesn’t even look at me, just closes her eyes, her voice weary, ‘Don’t, Flynn.’
I trip up the steps to the dusty wooden floor, the air filled with the scent of the roses that are twisted around the pillars of the bandstand.
‘Flynn. I don’t want to talk to you.’
‘We have to talk to each other. We’re in this together.’
‘Is Tanya OK?’
I wave a hand, ‘Fine. She’s fine.’
Amy still stares ahead, her whole body drooping, tennis whites crumpled.
There is a pause. In my mind she turns, nodding her head in agreement as she sees me, standing there as her. As she remembers it is us. Amy and Flynn. The couple their friends shout at to get a room, the couple who laugh at the same stuff (toddlers who swear in public, the fallout over the new John Lewis Christmas advert, YouTube videos of people slipping on stuff), the couple who go on last-minute breaks to Paris, North Wales, Norfolk and always have a good time because they only really need each other.
‘We’re not in anything together any more,’ she says simply, and that sentence strikes real fear into me. All the images of us together dissolve in a second, replaced by Amy accusing me of not listening to her, her nerves that it might be too soon to move in, the things she doesn’t find funny, her questions I brush off, swerve, Laura’s words.
‘Amy.’
‘I thought I knew you,’ she says suddenly, turning on her seat. ‘I mean, sometimes I feel like I don’t get you, that you misunderstand me, but I knew we hadn’t been together that long, that we would work these things out, but I thought I could trust you at least …’
‘You can trust me,’ I say, stepping towards her.
She twists round to face me fully, my big body almost making the tiny stool she’s perched on buckle. ‘I can’t though, can I? What have you not told me? About Tanya?’ She tilts her head to one side.
My voice hardens as I remember Eddie’s warning in the loos. ‘I don’t know what she’s said, but there is nothing to tell you about Tanya. The past is in the past and I don’t see why it needs to affect us …’
‘That’s the trouble, Flynn, we’re different. I want to know, want to share the past with you, to grow closer.’
‘We’re already close!’ I insist. The talk of the future, the panic about the past fuels my next move.
‘I love you, Amy, so very, very much.’
She lets out a tiny sigh. I don’t want her slumped over and questioning everything, I need to do something big.
‘And …’ I do it without a second’s hesitation; I need her to see, really see, how serious I am about her.
I bend down on a shaky knee in front of her, my pale blue skirt rucked up. She is frozen on the stool above me, her eyes round as she stares at me on the dusty wooden floorboards, looking up at her solemnly.
‘Flynn …’
‘… Amy, I know this is fucked up and we are literally in each other’s bodies, but I still want to be with you forever. Even if we can’t fix this thing, I need to know you’ll stay with me, and we’ll face things together.’
Amy looks shocked; her whole body stills and her arms drop to her side. She slithers off the stool and then takes a step backwards, bumping into the pillar of the bandstand.
I know things haven’t exactly been working out as I planned but I thought doing this big gesture would jolt Amy to remember what’s important, show her how serious I am. She hasn’t said yes, but then her mouth is just working up and down, up and down, so I hope it might be on its way.
She puts both her hands up to her face; I see the scar I got on my left knuckle flash in the light. ‘I don’t believe this,’ she says.
‘I know,’ I say, my smile widening. ‘I know it’s crazy and unexpected, but I want to marry you, Amy. I love you. I need us to move in, to move forward. It’s always felt right with you. I love everything about you. Even when you’re … me.’
‘I literally don’t believe this,’ she repeats, her face pale beneath the stubble.
This isn’t the reaction I’d prayed for. The yes is definitely taking longer to come than I’d hoped. Anxiety bites at me. This is my last move, I know this. Since asking to move in I’ve felt her slipping away. This is the only way I can think of to stop her leaving.
‘It’s true,’ I say, holding up the ring a little higher so she can see the diamond, the flash of platinum studded with tiny stones, know that it is real.
‘I can’t believe you would choose this moment to do this. After today, after all this,’ she waves a hand around the place, ‘you decide this is the best thing to do. Oh my god, Flynn.’ She buries her face in her hands.
I’m still balancing on one knee; my leg has begun to ache, my smile falters.
I’ve had a lifetime of being told this is all women want. Commitment. I thought this was the only way to rescue things.
‘Even if I wasn’t … ACTUALLY YOU, even if the answer might be yes,’ she stresses, ‘you really thought, after everything I’ve told you about this weekend, that this would have been a good weekend to do this?’
‘I … I love you,’ I say, desperately searching. ‘I love you and want to marry you, Amy. Start a family. It’s always a good time to say that, surely?’
She opens her mouth to say something else and then freezes, her eyes drawn to something behind me. And her mouth opens wider, her eyebrows lifting.
‘Oh my god,’ she says.
And I look around. And I see three slack-jawed faces staring at us from the entrance to the bandstand.