Chapter Fifty
JESS
‘You’re insane!’ I tell Luke as he slows to drive down a narrow road between two low chalk cliffs, then pulls to a stop on a tarmacked promenade. A crescent of sand is spread before us, silvery in the moonlight. ‘You drove us all the way to Dumpton Gap?’ It’s taken more than an hour to get here.
‘You wanted cool water,’ he says, mock-affronted. ‘And I can’t think of any place better than this. You’ve got the whole of the English Channel to cool your fevered brow here!’
‘But we could have stopped at Whitstable or Herne Bay!’
He shakes his head. ‘Stony beaches. Only the best for you, my sweet. Soft golden sand all the way. Come on … ’ He opens the car door and gets out. Laughing softly, I do the same.
He jumps off the promenade onto the sand and waits for me.
I kick my sandals off, and when I join him, he grabs me by the hand and starts running right down to where the frothy surf meets the sand.
And then he doesn’t stop running. The cold sea water is a shock to my system but a delicious one. However, Luke keeps going.
‘Luke! My dress is getting soaked!’ I scream, trying to pull him back onto dry land.
He resists at first, but then suddenly gives in. I’m pulling so hard that we both stumble back onto the wet sand and fall over. The next wave rushes in, crashing over my legs and drenching me up past my hips.
He just laughs. ‘Then take it off … ’
I scrabble out of the surf onto the hard, compacted sand, not sure if I’m choking on sea water or merely laughing. ‘But we rushed out the house so fast I didn’t even think to bring my cossie with me!’
He drags himself up the sand and starts peeling the spaghetti strap of my dress off one shoulder. ‘And this is a problem … why?’
I gasp and smack his hand away. ‘Oh, my God! This was your plan all along!’
His answering grin seals his guilt.
‘But people will see us!’
He glances up at the headland. Although entrance of the beach is in a quiet residential area just north of Ramsgate, the low cliffs obscure the beach from most of the surrounding houses, except for a handful of buildings on the headland at one end of the small bay and what looks like a New England mansion on the other.
‘Who’s going to see?’
He’s right. Not a light is twinkling in any of them, and the long rows of beach huts lining the promenade and the small café near the entrance road are in complete darkness.
I chuckle. ‘So this is why you didn’t turn off for Broadstairs? Too many buildings overlooking the beach there.’
‘Exactly. Now, are you going to remove those things or am I going to have to do it for you?’
I lie back on the sand. ‘I think you’re going to have to do it for me.’
Luke gets serious then. Taking his time, he eases my arms from one dress strap and then the other, then peels it down my body and throws the half-sodden garment onto the sand above our heads.
My bra is next, and he stops to kiss the skin he exposes, causing a dart of need to shoot right through me.
The contrast of the cool water lapping at my legs and his warm hands on my flesh is heavenly.
I grab for his open shirt and easily tear it from him and send it flying to meet my dress.
He eases my knickers down my legs, stopping to stroke and tease, until I close my eyes, throw my head back and dig my fingers into the gritty sand. And then it’s my turn. I stand up to meet him, waves bubbling around our feet and remove his shorts to find he isn’t wearing anything underneath them.
We stare at each other, smiling, and then he takes me by the hand and leads me into the waves.
This time I don’t resist; I just trust him, let him lead me deeper, and then the sand falls away beneath our feet and we’re swimming.
There’s something about almost icy water flowing round my body that makes every nerve ending fizz.
We stay in the water for maybe ten minutes, hardly a word said between us because we don’t need them. We seem to know when we want to lift our feet and swim, circling round each other, and when we want to pull each other close and touch, explore.
Luke plants his feet in the sand and I wrap my legs around him, pull him close and start nibbling at his collarbone, just the way he likes it, when I hear a noise. I freeze. ‘What was that?’ I whisper into his ear and it sounds loud enough to carry all the way to France.
Luke also goes still. ‘Dunno.’
We stay like that, locked together, only our heads and shoulders above the water, eyes wide, and then a swinging beam of light catches my eye. I prod Luke on the shoulder and point. He swears. ‘Who bloody walks their dog on the beach at two-thirty in the morning?’
I shake my head and make a face. ‘Insomniac with a really ugly mutt?’
Luke’s shoulders begin to shake, and then I have to clamp my lips closed to stop myself from laughing too. ‘What do we do now?’ I whisper, when I’m able to do so without guffawing.
He shrugs his shoulders. ‘Stay still and hope they don’t notice us?’
We don’t really have any other choice, so we cling onto each other, failing miserably to stop ourselves from snorting softly with laughter occasionally, and pretend we’re invisible.
Thankfully, while the dog runs a short way onto the sand, it comes nowhere near our clothes, and the owner keeps to the concrete promenade, which carries all the way round past the headland into the next bay.
We hold our breath for a few moments after the torch beam disappears from view and then let out the hilarity we’ve been holding back as quietly as possible. I smack Luke playfully on the shoulder, making a splash. ‘You and your bright ideas! We could have ended up getting arrested!’
‘But we didn’t.’ He leans in to continue kissing my neck, but I place my hands on his shoulders and push him backwards.
‘I’m not risking getting caught a second time! Let’s escape while we can.’
Dawn is close by the time we make it back home.
We shower, together, and then finish what we started on the beach.
Afterwards, Luke succumbs to sleep easily, but I lie with his arm heavy across my torso, staring at the ceiling.
This was the perfect way to spend our anniversary.
Doing something crazy and romantic and fun. I wish it could go on forever.
Tomorrow is the big one. Our tenth anniversary. If my life was a game of roulette, and the old version was black and this new one where Luke and I are happy, tonight, was red, I’d put it all on red. But that doesn’t mean I’m not nervous.
But then something strikes me and my eyes widen. Technically, it’s already tomorrow. And while I’ve stayed up past midnight on a few of our previous anniversaries, I’ve never been awake just as dawn is breaking, as it is now.
Could I beat it by staying awake? Could I keep myself in May the fifteenth instead of catapulting forward to our next anniversary?
Oh, wow. And if I could, maybe I could stay here for the whole year.
That would be three hundred and sixty-five days to build on what’s happened today.
I’d make that sacrifice, I’d live this whole year again, if I could be sure our next anniversary could be the polar opposite of the last.
Hope surges through me. I’m as close to being one hundred per cent sure I’ve succeeded in saving my marriage as I’ve ever come. It has to work; it has to.
I reach my thumb across the palm of my left hand to stroke my eternity ring, wanting the reassurance of its power to take me to the finishing line, but when the pad touches warm, smooth metal, I frown. And then I almost jump out of bed.
The ring is gone. Great-Great-Grannie Millicent’s engagement ring is no longer on my finger!
Did I lose it at the beach? Please, no! I can’t have.
It has to be in the house somewhere. I took both it and my engagement ring off when I had my first shower of the day – after I got home from seeing Mum – but I honestly have no memory if I was wearing it or either of my rings when Luke and I took the second one.
I ease myself out of bed, grab my robe from the back of the door and then creep onto the landing, shutting the bedroom door softly behind me, and then I turn the house upside down.
I open every drawer in the kitchen, empty the bin, just in case, and then have to put all the gooey mess back in again.
My muscles are heavy, and my eyes are drooping, but I can’t stop now.
I have to find this ring before I’m tempted to fall asleep.
I try the desk, every available surface, nook and cranny, downstairs.
I pull the cushions off the armchairs and sofa in the living room, ramming my fingers down the crevices but only find fluff and one of the old fifty-pence pieces.
After shoving the sofa cushions haphazardly back into place, I collapse down on top of them.
It’s 4 a.m. I’ve got at least a few hours, probably more, before Luke gets up.
I’ll find it before that, right? I make a mental list of all the places I haven’t looked where it still could be.
What about the car? Or could I have taken it off at the physio practice and not realized I’d left it there?
In the version of reality I’ve been experiencing, I’ve only been wearing it for four days, hardly enough time for something to feel off if I forgot to put it on.
I suddenly realize my eyelids are closed. I force them open again.
Could it be in the dish in the hallway where we leave our keys? And I haven’t had a chance to look around our bedroom yet, either. I’ll go and check there next. I just need a few more seconds to gather a bit more energy …
But I never look there, because I slide into sleep sprawled out on the sofa, and I’m not even aware when it happens.