Thirteen Months Before I Do
Audrey didn’t know how much time had passed before she noticed Josh standing over her. Panic attacks tended to distort her sense of time. She was still sitting in the courtyard at Priah, looking up at the Ibizan night sky, when Josh found her.
‘Here you are,’ he said, calmly. ‘Can I join you?’
She nodded silently, gearing herself up to explain something that she couldn’t.
‘I... Josh I’m sorry, I... I had a panic attack.’
‘You don’t need to explain,’ he said gently. ‘Can I do anything?’ Audrey shook her head. He sat down beside her. ‘If you need to sit and look at the sky, you can sit for as long as you need to. I just hope that sometimes, you will let me come and sit beside you.’ He reached for her hand and squeezed it. Being able to sit with someone, and not have all the answers, that was love.
By the time they left the courtyard, their table had been given to someone else. They bought chips from a roadside stall and walked down to an empty beach to eat them.
‘I’m sorry about the restaurant,’ Audrey said.
‘It’s fine. I think these chips are just as good as the kohlrabi scallops and squid risotto. Maybe better, more potatoey.’ She smiled at this, at his unwavering ability to see the best in every situation. He put his hand over hers. ‘Do you want to talk about it?’ She shook her head. She didn’t. ‘I hope it’s nothing I said?’
‘No, God no. Just something in the restaurant reminded me of someone and... my brain makes these silly, irrational connections.’
‘My brain does that too sometimes,’ he said.
‘It does?’ Audrey asked in surprise.
‘Yes. Like when I see Chipsticks in the supermarket, it makes me smile because I think of you. I can’t walk past a coffee bar menu now without wondering which weird fruit-based coffee you would order if you were with me. Whenever I see stars, I want to know what constellations you would be pointing out. My mind has been Audreyed.’
Audrey felt something melt inside her.
‘That’s the most romantic thing anyone’s ever said to me.’ She leaned over to kiss him.
‘Really? With all those romantic films you watch, I feel like there’s a high bar for romantic declarations – I’ve been led to believe all the great love stories must end with a dance routine on a Greek island. I wasn’t sure musings about Chipsticks was going to cut it.’
‘Well, your musings were definitely better than Andrew Lincoln holding up all those signs in Love Actually,’ she said with a smirk because she knew Josh hated that scene.
‘I don’t know who could find that amount of wasted paper romantic,’ Josh said, his tone completely serious.
‘Not me.’ Audrey bit back a grin.
Josh sighed, put an arm around her shoulder, and pulled her towards him. ‘I don’t think we need a dance number or a fancy meal to celebrate getting engaged. All I need is you, me, five euros for chips and the promise of a lifetime of this.’
It was right there, eating chips in the sand, that Audrey knew for sure, she had no doubts: she wanted to marry this man.