Epilogue
Ten months later
There was something magic about coming back to a place that changed you. All the adventures I had explored last summer and now I was back where it felt like it had all started.
We were here – together - exactly one year later.
Back in Nice. Back where it all began.
The cicadas hummed in the warm night air, and the soft breeze off the coast lifted the hem of my new dress—the one I’d bought from her boutique again.
Isabelle, the same woman who sold me that sea-glass blue sundress last year, had smiled knowingly the moment I walked in.
This time, Theo hadn’t even pretended to be casual about it.
He’d insisted we go. Said it was tradition now.
Said it would be wrong not to start our anniversary evening with a little French silk and some unnecessary flirting in the mirror.
So, I’d tried on dresses while he sat in the corner chair, ankle resting over his knee, watching me like I was something worth staring at.
I’d chosen a deep mossy green one, soft and fluttering at the hem, with a delicate tie at the nape of my neck.
He hadn’t said anything at first. Just stood, walked over, and kissed my shoulder before whispering, “We’re getting that one. ”
And now we were here—on a blanket under the stars in a hidden garden that Theo had somehow remembered from last summer, tucked just beyond the stretch of beach we’d wandered aimlessly when everything between us was still unsaid.
This time, everything was different.
And still, somehow, everything felt just the same.
I was writing again—properly, freely, with a rhythm I’d never had before. And it was because of him.
The blog had started as a little side project, something he gently encouraged me to do when we got back to England. I hadn’t even picked a name for it before he bought me a domain and told me I didn’t have to be anything other than myself. That people would love me for the way I saw the world.
He was right.
Now I had readers from all over.
Some days, I posted recipes I’d tested late at night, trying not to wake him as I clanged pans and taste-tested things straight from the spoon. Other days, I wrote about our travels—where we’d stayed, what we’d seen, the stories tucked into quiet places.
And the beautiful thing was... I could do it from anywhere. Anywhere in the world.
We’d talked about that a lot lately—where we might live, what life might look like once the house was finished .
Theo was still working with Nate, but he’d stepped back a little.
A few fewer hours. A few more mornings spent measuring timber or sketching plans for what he called our “forever home.” He’d shown me the designs last month—the kind of Pinterest-worthy dream that had French shutters and a deep kitchen window for herb pots and summer light.
He’d pointed to one of the upstairs rooms and said, “This one’s yours. For writing. Big desk, big view.”
I’d cried.
Tonight, we were just… here.
We’d said we wanted to spend our first anniversary somewhere special. There’d been no question where that would be.
Nice was more than a setting. It was our beginning.
I tucked my notebook away and leaned into him, resting my head against his chest. His arm slipped around my waist, his other hand gently stroking the bare skin above my knee.
“Do you ever think about last year?” I asked quietly.
“Every day,” he murmured. “Especially the night I couldn’t stop thinking about kissing you, even when I wasn’t supposed to.”
I smiled into his shirt. “You did kiss me.”
“And you kissed me back.”
He kissed the top of my head. “You changed my life, Celia.”
I tilted my head up to look at him. “You gave me mine. ”
His eyes crinkled at the corners, warm and familiar, and everything inside me stirred. I still got butterflies—ridiculous, soaring ones. Even now. Especially now.
I leaned back just enough to see the stars. The sky was inky and velvet-soft, scattered with speckles of light.
Then, as if summoned by the universe itself, a shooting star streaked across the sky. I sat up on my knees in excitement and felt him move behind me.
“There,” I said, pointing quickly. “Did you see that?”
I turned to him to check he had also seen the falling star and noticed he had something in his hand now.
A piece of paper – no, a postcard. The postcard.
The black and white picture of the square where we spent the morning after our first time together.
The shop that was full of souls who had left little notes on the backs of postcards and stuck them to the wall.
I had loved that shop the moment Theo had taken me there.
“Is that what I think it is?” I asked.
He smiled and handed it to me.
“I thought you said it was a secret, that it wouldn’t come true if you told me?” I questioned him, my fingers grazed the edges as the card slipped between my fingers.
“I’m kind of hoping you could help me out with this,” he replied.
I looked at him quizzically and then turned the postcard over to reveal his wish, except it wasn’t a wish at all, it was a question and my heart stopped right there and then in my chest .
Scrawled across the back in his curvy handwriting were six words.
Cecilia Hart, will you marry me?
My heart stumbled as I read and then reread the words over and over again in the span of thirty seconds. The realisation hit that he had written this last year. Last year.
My eyes flicked to him then and I watched as he moved, positioning himself so he was kneeling. One knee pressed into the grass. I was still kneeling, bringing us practically eye level, although even on the ground, he was still taller than me.
And then he looked at me, and I felt my heart finally beat.
“I had a million ways to propose to you,” Theo said softly, his voice thick with emotion and certainty. “But the star... it felt like fate.”
My breath caught completely.
“I’ve been carrying this ring around for the last five months,” he continued, reaching into his pocket. “Waiting for the right moment. Waiting for the one that felt like us I have always known it was you, Celia.”
His eyes drifted to the postcard in my hand and then he opened the box, and my free hand flew to my mouth.
It was beautiful. Not flashy. Not loud. But perfect.
The band was gold—warm and brushed—and in the centre was a delicate, slightly oval stone. A soft, sage-green sapphire, wrapped in tiny diamonds that caught the light like morning dew.
Green. My favourite colour. Of course, he remembered .
“I’ve changed my wish,” Theo said. “I wish for you. For us. For spending a lifetime with my best friend. Because I am completely, overwhelmingly in love with you.”
My knees gave out and I dropped in front of him, tears springing to my eyes.
“Cecilia Hart,” he said, “will you do me the absolute honour of granting my wish and marrying me?”
I laughed and cried all at once. “Yes. Yes, of course I will.”
He slipped the ring onto my finger, and I stared at it like I’d never seen anything more beautiful in my life.
Then his hands cupped my face, and he kissed me.
It wasn’t rushed or frantic—it was everything else. The kind of kiss that promised a thousand more.
I melted into him, fingers in his hair, his arms pulling me closer, and when we finally broke apart, my whole body was humming.
“I can’t believe I’m going to be Mrs Finch,” I whispered, laughing through the tears.
Theo’s grin was crooked and smug. “Me either.” He kissed the tip of my nose. “I’ve wanted you to be my wife since I met you.”
I shook my head, disbelieving. “You’re impossible.”
He kissed me again. “And you’re mine.”
We lay back on the blanket, my ring catching the moonlight, our fingers entwined.
I couldn’t believe I was engaged to my best friend, the greatest man I ever knew. The one person, who new me better than anyone, who accepted every part of me – good and bad.
He brushed his finger over the ring and smiled at the sight. I matched his smile with my own.
“So,” he said eventually, “how do we celebrate?”
“I’d love to go back to Greece and visit some more of the islands. What do you think?” I suggested.
He glanced at me. “Greece?”
I nodded. “We can go island hopping, plus Siena’s there at the moment and all the pictures she’s sent me are beautiful!”
His brows lifted. “Nate’s in Greece too.”
We looked at each other. Both realising that his older brother and my best friend were in the same country together again. If the two of them collided, we’d likely hear the resounding war from wherever we were.
“Weird,” we said at the same time.
“I wonder if they’ll run into each other,” he said, barely hiding the grin.
“I wonder,” I said, smirking. “I don’t really mind where we go, as long as we’re together. We could ever just stay in Nice for another week.”
He rolled on top of me, his body warm and solid and mine. “Whatever you want baby, we can do.”
“God, I love you,” I whispered.
“I love you more,” he murmured, voice rough with feeling.
“I can’t believe we’re together and now we’re engaged!” I said, the excitement radiating off me.
“This might be my favourite day yet.”
He kissed me then with the ring on my finger and the stars twinkling brightly above us and I’d never been more grateful for this man and the life that we had begun building together.
And no matter what came next, I knew we’d never have six summers apart again.