Page 50 of A Cornish Love Story
‘I made her drink water, eat some toast, then waited for Mum to get home.’
‘You told her?’
‘Yeah.’ He frowned. ‘I wasn’t about to handle that one by myself. What if she’d passed out and been sick? Mum’s looking after her, but I was already too late to get to the awards ceremony. I’m so sorry, Georgie. I wish I’d seen you.’
I flung my arms around his neck. ‘I’m so glad you told your mum. You shouldn’t have to deal with it by yourself.’
He pressed his hands against my back, flattening the label inside my dress. ‘I don’t know why we can’t get her to see sense.’ He puffed out a breath. ‘Tell me about your speech. What did you say?’
‘I got “cornucopia” and “fucksticks” into it.’
He pulled back. ‘You did not.’
‘I did.’ He smiled, the sadness banished from his eyes for a moment. ‘I wish you’d seen it.’
‘You could recreate it for me?’
I shook my head. ‘No.’ His face fell, and I added, ‘I will if you want, what I can remember, but not right now.’
‘What do you want to do, then?’
I looked at the final, burnished streak of red on the horizon, the cliffs rising above us on either side of the bay, the silhouette of S. E. Artemis’s abandoned house and the stars starting to twinkle overhead.
‘Dance with me.’ I pulled my iPod touch out of my bag, my eighteenth birthday present from Mum, and handed him one earphone. I put the other in my ear and scrolled through to the song I loved right then, that I’d been playing on repeat for weeks.
There were those first, perfect guitar strums, then the opening line of ‘Hey, Soul Sister’ by Train filled my right ear, and Ethan grinned.
He put his arms around my waist, and I snaked mine around his neck, careful to avoid the earphone wire. We swayed on the sand, Ethan taller than he usually was because he still had his shoes on and I didn’t. I pressed my cheek to his chest, relishing his warmth and the cold sand slipping between my toes. We sang along, moving in time together as the final slice of sun dipped and winked out, letting the night sky take centre stage.
The song ended, and Ethan bent his head to mine and kissed me.
‘Thank you for coming to find me,’ I said.
‘Don’t thank me. You deserved more from me tonight.’
‘I’ve got you now. You and my blanket of stars.’
His smile was sad, and I was relieved when he turned away. We looked up as an impossible numberof stars shone above us, almost as if they were turning on one by one just for us, a natural glitter ball for our sandy dance floor, right there in the middle of Alperwick Bay.
Chapter Twenty
Now
‘This sound-system is crazy good,’ I said, as ‘Hey, Soul Sister’ came to an end. It was an upbeat song, but somehow, halfway through, we’d stopped with our swaying, disjointed dad dancing and gravitated towards each other, until Ethan’s hand was loosely against my hip, and mine was around his waist. We’d kept our touches featherlight, as if we knew that any more pressure would turn up the heat between us, would send things back to how they’d been in the bathroom. But for me, it didn’t really feel any different.
Touching Ethan took me back to being eighteen, to being completely, head-over-heels in love with him, how I’d fizzled and ached for him even when he was only holding my hand, and I’d felt like I was in physical withdrawal once it was over, university not enough ofa distraction. That imprint was still there, the echo of the unrivalled satisfaction of our bodies connecting, but I was pretending to be nonchalant while we listened to a song that increased the nostalgia fix tenfold.
‘We employed sound technicians,’ he said. ‘There are speakers in the walls, spaced throughout the house to give the best coverage.’
‘It’s like an auditorium, just with cosier seating,’ I said, and he laughed. ‘I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about Spence earlier.’
‘Why should you have? You don’t owe me anything. I wasn’t even sure I’d see you today.’
‘You’ve managed a bit more thanseeingme.’
He stiffened. ‘That kiss, I didn’t—’
‘I meant being trapped with me.’ Talking about the kiss felt too dangerous, and I peeled away from him. ‘What’s next?’
