Page 28 of A Wedding in a Week

“It’s a cream tea.” He points out two tiny bowls. “Scones with jam and clotted cream, see? The images came out a bit too small.” He shrugs. “Like I said, I did it quickly.” It’s his turn to squint at the card. “I suppose they could look more professional.” He looks over his shoulder. “Shit. Maybe I shouldn’t have given them out to those wedding planners. Sorry.”

“You’re sorry? Don’t be. They’re amazing.”

“Yeah?”

“Yes.” I’m as firm as I can be given that, yet again, he gives another glimpse of how we share more than a physical connection. We’re on the same wavelength again, and it feels amazing. “Tell me what else you’d want.”

“Me?”

“You.” He’s the only person here that matters to me. “If you met your Mr. Right and he popped the question?”

“If I met…” He meets my eyes, colour climbing his throat like those roses climbed that walled alcove, so pink he’s rosy, only now I hope it’s not from embarrassment. He hasn’t got any reason to be, but now that his hair is dry, the pink clashes with the glints in his hair, each splotch on his skin looking fiery, and I wonder if that’s how they’d feel under my fingers.

I want to find out—need to—but not here where we’re surrounded.

There’s an arch in the wall behind him, leading to another alcove. “Yes, tell me what you’d want with him, but in here where it’s quieter, yeah? Come on.”

I guide him into a space that turns out not to be as peaceful as our first stop here this morning. In comparison, it’s as hectic as the colour staining his throat, the red-brick walls partially shattered as if a bomb once hit it, and that’s how I feel as Marc talks me through his wedding wish-list.

“I’d want these.” He points to the Cornish pasties and that plateful of scones on the business card he made for me—for us—for a business I don’t yet have the funds for. “And I’d want your mum to make the clotted cream for the cream teas.” He flashes a glance my way, and yes he’s still flushed, but there’s a smile in his eyes along with some more of that velvet. “Because that’s what I’d share, Stef, if I tied the knot with my Mr. Right. I’d rather split a cream tea with him over a slice of traditional wedding cake any day of the week.”

“You would?”

“Of course.” He scrubs a hand through his hair, embers glowing like he does as he continues. “I used to think about your mum scalding the cream on your stove when I was at home. Before then, I thought…”

He chuckles, some more of that rosiness climbing his throat.

“I dunno how I thought cream got into plastic pots in the supermarket until I saw your dad bring the cream in one summer. I watched him pour it out straight from the churn, and your mum strain and stir it. They worked together to make something that tasted a million times better than anything from the supermarket. And that was down to what they added to it together, wasn’t it?”

He doesn’t say the word love.

I still hear it.

“That’s what made it taste special, right?”

I must nod, but fuck me, I have no idea how I stay standing. Not when Marc tells me what he saw and how that shaped him. What still shapes him even today.

He asks, “You know where I came from?”

I do. I also know he doesn’t mean from London. Mum and Dad never harped on about why city kids arrived to stay with the Lawsons every summer. Marc was only one of many until Lukas and he bonded—until we all did with him.

Maybe Marc remembers those first summers. He looks away. “So anyway, I didn’t get to see a lot of that at home so it stood out to me here. It’s good Noah gets more of it.”

My heart clenches at him growing up without what I took for granted—at him witnessing a sibling getting a bigger share than can be fair.

Marc adds, “Getting to see it every summer meant it sank in, I suppose. What a partnership looked like, I mean. What two people can make from almost nothing. Something simple like cream.”

He rolls his shoulders and then straightens as if this next part needs defending.

“It’s not flashy or complicated. It was a simple two-person process when they did it and I watched them. They didn’t even talk.” He quickly backtracks. “I mean, your mum talked nonstop.” We both smile. “But the way they worked together without needing to give orders or take them.” He describes their common purpose, his tone quieter. I still hear more of his determination. “I think that’s worth including in a wedding.”

I can see it then—can see Marc dressed in a suit with one of the deep pink roses behind him in a buttonhole pinned to his lapel, standing on that headland where our land narrows. I can imagine the all-weather marquee I researched filled with friends and family sharing a wedding breakfast made of exactly what he’s described to me.

Cornish pasties. Homemade ones, because that shows the same commitment he’s just mentioned. Cream teas spread with jam and the same emotion.

“So including all of that on the business card seemed a no-brainer.” Then Marc drops a reminder as unexpected as a landmine. “I even included it as one of my dating questions, remember?” He pats his pocket as if about to pull out his phone. “I should probably contact him about dinner.”

Dinner?

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