Page 25 of Midnight in Paris

She was a different person with Tom, she realised, as they sat side by side on the bench, her sipping from a small can of red wine –the height of sophistication!they’d joked – and him simply watching her looking out over the Seine. It was as if she had tapped into a younger version of herself, for better or for worse. She was less confident in herself, more in awe of him. And this time, on the cusp of a final goodbye, sickeningly aware that time was always slipping past.

‘So, is everything set for the wedding?’ Tom asked her.

‘Do you really want to know?’

He shrugged. ‘Kind of,’ he admitted. ‘You know, Will and I always said we’d be best men for each other.’

‘I know. Will said that too. You could always come.’

She’d been joking, so was surprised to see his brow furrow, considering. ‘I don’t think I could make that work. Anyway, you need to concentrate on each other.’

She nodded. ‘Don’t want me to do a Ross fromFriendsand say the wrong name at my wedding!’ she quipped, trying to lighten the mood.

‘Will would literally kill me!’

‘You know that’s impossible, right? Anyway, as far as he’s concerned, you’re still his best friend.’

They were silent for a moment. Thinking.

‘It won’t be the same as our wedding,’ she told him. ‘I mean, it’s going to be nice, but not as… well, lavish as ours.’

‘Lavish?’

‘You know what I mean.’

Their wedding had been funded entirely by Tom’s father, who’d insisted they must have whatever they wanted. It had been an incredibly generous gesture, although looking back, she wondered whether she’d really have chosen the stately home with its cool, stone staircase and high-ceilinged dining hall if she hadn’t been thinking a little of her father-in-law’s preferences when she made her choices. Her dress had been a one-off, stitched especially for her. And in it she’d felt like – well, it was corny to say it, but she’d felt like a princess.

This time, she’d chosen off the rack – a dress made of satin that swung at her calves and nipped in at the waist. The venue was a converted barn in the Hertfordshire countryside, close to where Will’s parents lived. They were paying for it all themselves.

‘Is it enough?’ Will had asked her one night when they’d snuggled together in bed, talking into the darkness. ‘We could do more?’

‘It’s perfect,’ she’d told him. And she’d meant it, too. She hadn’t chosen the venue, the dress, the cheapest of the offered meals on the menu because it was the second time around for her. This would be just as much of a celebration as the first. It was more because she felt freer to choose what she wanted, without fearing judgement. And perhaps, although it was depressing to think it, because she was growing up. Fairy-tale weddings belonged in fairy-tale books. She wanted a marriage that was built for the real world – and this time, one with a happy ending.

Tom nodded. ‘I hope it’s good,’ he said.

‘You’re being very generous about it.’

He shrugged. ‘What else can I do? I can’t pretend I’m thrilled about how things turned out for us. Hardly the dream. But it is what it is. The more time passes since… you know… the more I’ve had to accept I can’t change anything.’

She gave him a small, sad smile.

‘And you deserve happiness, you know,’ he said softly.

She looked at him. ‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘It doesn’t always feel that way.’ She took a sip of her wine, felt it warm her throat.

‘Yes, well, you’ve always had a problem with that,’ he said. ‘Thinking you don’t deserve things. But after what I put you through, you must be due an enormous amount of good fortune.’

‘That’s ridiculous! It wasn’t your fault,’ she said, echoing his earlier words to her.

‘I know,’ he said. ‘But you still went through it, didn’t you?’

She nodded. ‘Yeah. I suppose we were both just unlucky. Especially you, obviously.’

‘Sometimes I think maybe I had it too good, you know? You were always saying it. Laughing at my upbringing. My privilege. To me, it was just how things were. I didn’t know what it was like to want anything I couldn’t have, to not be able to fix thingsby asking my parents for some cash. I took it all for granted and bam!’

‘Seriously? You think what happened was… what, some sort of divine counterbalance?’ she said, half laughing, half horrified. ‘Come on, Tom, that’s not like you.’

‘I don’t know. Sometimes I think you have a certain amount of luck – each of us do – and if you use it all up too early… Well, maybe you run out.’

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