If I Were You

Chapter 71 Amy

As I listen to the words, the emotions choke me. I thought it would hurt more, but it’s better this way. This means I get to listen to the words Jay and Laura selected, watch their expressions as Flynn reads them out, stand next to Mum as she passes me another tissue (‘I like to see a man in touch with his feelings.’)

The reading is perfect. Actually, it’s about a million times posher than I’d make it sound. It seems to have taken about forty-eight hours for Flynn to almost completely lose my Bristolian twang. As he licks his lips and looks around, I realize how nervous he was to get it right and my heart expands for him.

The words resonate in me, shame me a little too. I’m all too often pointing out Flynn’s flaws, holding up a mirror to the things that bug me most. I overlook all the many brilliant things about him: his ability to shoulder stress, to allow me to moan about my day and vent, without mentioning his own worries. His ability to look on the bright side, seek solutions and not just mope.

When he joins me in the row, the reading folded carefully in his hand, he reaches for me and I take his hand, not finding it peculiar, simply glad to be holding onto him, so grateful to have him by my side, my body instinctively wanting to be close to him. I miss our touches, the frisson I get when our skin meets, how he makes me breathless with a kiss that flutters and teases, my stomach dipping with desire.

The service is perfect, the setting filling everyone with a blissful calm; even Reggie behaves in his squiffy bow tie, happily nestled at Flynn’s feet.

Mum reads a piece from Winnie the Pooh which sets me off again. Geoffrey envelops her in a hug when she gets back to our row. As she shuts her eyes and lets him hold her, I am so glad she found him after Dad. I’ve taken him for granted up to now. He’s been there for Mum, bending to what she wants, fitting in around her family. I’m glad she has him.

It’s the signing of the register and I shift as the band look in my direction. Frowning, I watch in amazement as Flynn nods beside me and stands up. I almost stop him, ask him where he’s going. Then Laura brings her hands together and smiles happily as he sweeps past her, chiffon skirt blowing in the breeze.

What is he doing?

Flynn stands beneath the arch, glances at the band and then tilts his chin up in that determined way I recognize.

Is he seriously doing what I think he’s about to do?

‘Laurs,’ I hiss.

‘Hush,’ she says, twisting round and holding a hand up. I realize this is what they had been whispering about; Laura is in on it.

The familiar notes start, the keyboard plays the opening bars. And I can’t help my eyes widening as Flynn opens his mouth and begins to sing. The first line soars, the music floating across the lake, amazingly confident and in tune. I stuff a hand in my mouth as a delighted gasp escapes my lips.

‘When the rain is blowing in your face …’

Oh my god.

Laura grins at me as she takes Jay’s hand and moves across to the table to sign the registry, Patty clutching her hat in two hands as a gust of wind threatens to carry it over the lake.

I can’t keep my eyes from Flynn, my hair braided, my make-up neat, my posture assured.

It’s perfect. I think back to all those evenings in the flat, Flynn standing in the doorway of the kitchen, head resting against the frame. Every time I realized he was listening I’d stop, swatting away any compliments. It was Flynn being nice, he’s my boyfriend. And he’s tone deaf, he doesn’t really know.

He’s singing it now, steady, simple, and I am crying again, really crying, because I can hear that I do have a voice, I’ve just been too frightened to use it. Dad loved Adele, first took me to watch her when she played in Bristol’s Colston Hall and told me I could do it too. This incredible artist, sat on a stool in a simple spotlight, sharing her pain and loss with the audience. She’d inspired the single I’d written and recorded. The songs I’d wanted to make into an album. I’d let my music die with Dad too. And he would never have wanted that.

‘She’s got such a beautiful voice,’ Mum whispers, wiping her own eyes underneath the lime-green glasses with her sleeve because I whipped the last of the tissues. ‘Her dad always said so.’

As Flynn comes to the end of the song I glance around at the congregation, so many people dabbing at their faces, mascara long gone, heads tipped onto shoulders, mesmerized as they watch him, silhouetted by the silvery lake behind. Even when Reggie escapes his lead and starts howling along to the last verse people can’t stop weeping. Although that causes Flynn to dissolve into a heap of laughter, bending down to nuzzle his fur.

‘I thought Amy was scared of dogs?’ Jay says to Laura.

‘Amy’s made some changes,’ Laura whispers back and I am almost able to laugh again.

I will make changes. I will. Flynn’s given me back my voice.