Chapter Thirty-Four #3
‘You say in your letter that you love me, and I want to love you, maybe I already do, I think I do, but I want to love myself too,’ Tess told Gabe, her voice catching.
‘Not just want, I need to love myself. I need to do that more than anything. Because until I love myself, I’ll always be doubtful and second-guessing whether I deserve to be loved by someone else. ’
Tess was done. She’d said all the words. And she wished that she hadn’t but at least Ayn Rand would be proud of her.
‘I hear you,’ Gabe said at last, bringing them to a halt under the graceful branches of one of the birch trees that lined the path they’d trodden. ‘I want you to love yourself. I understand why that has to be your priority.’
Then they were on the move again, heading towards the marquee where the sound of laughter and the second verse of ‘Last Christmas’ even though it was August leaked out of the tent. Clearly the evening’s festivities were drawing to a close.
‘I don’t think I’m ready. It’s not the right time for me,’ Tess said unsteadily as they entered the tent. ‘It’s not the right time for us.’
‘I could wait for you, if you’ll let me,’ Gabe said quickly, frantically. ‘Because if I could give you some advice … would that be all right?’
Tess nodded because she’d already refused him so much.
Gabe stopped walking and stood in front of her so he could take her hand and place it over his heart. ‘When I gave in to the inevitable, I discovered that loving you, loving Tess Hardy, is the easiest thing in the world.’
She blinked back the tears which were suddenly about to spill.
‘Look, I’m trying to think about this rationally and all this raw emotion, it’s making things very difficult,’ Tess said as sternly as she could as she steered them towards the dancefloor, where the DJ had just announced the last song.
‘Also, this role reversal, it’s kind of freaking me out. ’
As people began to sing ‘Auld Lang Syne’, Tess reached up to clasp her hands on either side of Gabe’s beautiful face.
‘I might never be able to love myself as much as I love you,’ she told him. ‘But as an expert in romantic stories …’
‘You are the expert, I’m just an enthusiastic amateur,’ Gabe said, and he was trying to make his words sound light, but he had a stricken expression, like he was mentally preparing himself for Tess to let him down gently and she was trying to do just that, but …
but … But I do understand what you’re saying.
And I do know that sometimes reason has to be more important than passion. ’
‘Exactly.’ Tess nodded.
‘Exactly,’ Gabe echoed sadly.
‘However, even an enthusiastic amateur of romantic stories knows that there needs to be a second act break-up: for all hope to be gone, because then when hope reappears, it makes the happy ever after even happier,’ Tess said.
‘But even in the third act, you can still have a plot twist, a little heart-stopping suggestion that maybe the happy ever after isn’t coming after all. ’
‘I don’t think I’m a big fan of plot twists,’ Gabe sighed, his brow furrowing in that familiar way. Then he processed what Tess had just said. ‘Do you mean … What exactly do you mean?’
‘You know what I’m like, Gabe. You know it better than I do.
Once I’m in, I’m all in.” At her words, hope flared in Gabe’s eyes again.
‘And to paraphrase another really wise woman, I’ve been waiting all my life for you and now that you’ve turned up, I want the rest of my life, the life with you in it, to start as soon as possible. ’
Then neither of them said anything but just stood there, a point of mutual stillness in a hectic world, looking at each other.
Both of them were big talkers but now their silence spoke for them.
Well, for a good minute and fifteen seconds.
‘Do you mean Nora Ephron and is that a yes?’ Gabe asked, his voice a mere whisper.
‘Of course it’s Nora Ephron and of course it’s a yes. Yes! Oh, yes!’ Tess sighed before she took his hands in hers and held them tight like she’d never let them go. ‘Fuck reason! Fuck rationality! Long live love!’
In the background ‘Auld Lang Syne’ was still going strong and so were they. Tess hoped they always would.
Gabe smiled at her, his eyes dazed like he was going to have to take his glasses off quite soon and polish them furiously.
‘I have to tell you something else. Something really important,’ he said urgently, so Tess knew a moment of fear, of panic, that maybe Gabe, like Rochester, already had a wife or at least a live-in girlfriend stashed somewhere.
‘Don’t hate me, but sometimes I think I like Nora Ephron even more than I like Jane Austen. ’
Who was this man? ‘Oh God, I think I’ve broken you.’
‘You haven’t. Quite the opposite. You complete me,’ he said, completely straight-faced.
‘Are you really quoting Jerry Maguire?’ Tess asked with a laugh because she’d created a monster.
Gabe shook his head. ‘Who’s Jerry Maguire?’ He looked around at the shiny, happy, still-singing, people. ‘Is he a friend of yours? I’m actually quoting Socrates, who believed that …’
Tess really didn’t care to hear at that moment what Socrates believed. Not when Gabe could put his mouth to better use.
‘Kiss me,’ she said, quoting only herself.
‘I thought you’d never ask,’ he said.