Page 48 of The Wedding Pact
‘That was an act?’ she said into his chest.
‘Are you angry?’ Flynn asked. ‘I didn’t mean any of it, I just wanted you to forget your insecurities and go for it. I just said things that might make you a little pissed.’
‘It worked,’ she said, nodding. ‘You’re a good actor.’
‘Hardly, but thanks.’
August was still a little dazed, but that was okay, because it actually felt good to have her insecurities contested, to feel accountable for making her dreams happen. ‘I think I’ll do the audition, you know,’ she stepped back from Flynn but kept a hand on his arm. ‘I’m still a little surprised you knew which buttons to press to kick me into gear, but I appreciate it.’
‘You know I didn’t mean any of it, right? In actual fact, you’re the least cowardly person I know. And I know you can handle this audition.’
She spent a long time in the shower thinking about what just happened. And she just kept coming back around to two things: one, it felt good to surround yourself with people who challenged your own self-doubts. And two, a question more than a thing, really. Where did that near-kiss come from?
Chapter 31
Flynn
‘Does this feel a little over the top to you?’ Flynn called.
‘Whatever do you mean?’ August shouted back, trying to be heard over the howling wind, and the flapping of the hem of her dress.
Flynn rubbed the sand, that was swirling in mini tornados around them, out of his eye. They were stood on Weston-super-Mare beach at dawn, on a day which was both sunny and enjoying forty-mile-an-hour winds. Because this morning, pre-work, August and Flynn were getting married.
‘So what kind of photos do you want?’ Bel hollered to the happy couple, as she’d been roped in as the photographer.
‘Let’s just get a couple of us looking, um, coupley, here in front of the waves. Try not to get the pier or anything in the background. This has to look like it could be any beach in the UK.’ As August said this, another great gust caused her to nearly flash the lot of them.
She was wearing the only white dress she owned, a cotton sundress which didn’t quite fit any more so wasn’t done up all the way at the back. Flynn was in his work suit, and August had fashioned him a faux-pocket square out of a pair of her satin undies, which she’d made him promise he wouldn’t look at. They’d plucked a couple of flowers on the way down to the beach which were to go in his lapel but all the petals had blown off before they’d even made it onto the sand.
Bel got snapping, with Flynn and August grinning into the camera the best they could with the wind whipping at their cheeks, their arms around each other.
‘Do you want a kissing one?’ Bel called, in her most innocent, ‘whatever the client wants’ voice.
August gave her a look and shouted back, ‘No, that’s okay. Let’s just get one more with us looking lovingly at each other.’ She faced Flynn and added, ‘You need to look lovingly at me now.’
If Flynn stepped back for a minute and removed himself from this situation, if he let himself really think about what was going on, he’d notice how crazy this whole thing was. He was a grown up, why was he out here on a beach at the crack of dawn, taking make-believe wedding photos to fool their strict landlady, if she ever were to ask to see them?
August placed her arms around his neck and gazed up at him,lovingly, and that was why.
Bel took a couple of snaps and was just yelling ‘That’s a wrap!’ when a whoosh of mint fabric swooped past Flynn and August’s faces.
‘My knickers!’ August cried. Flynn’s makeshift pocket square had broken free and was dancing in the breeze above them. He reached a hand up but just missed, and they flew off into the waves.
August ran in after them, screaming at Flynn, ‘Get them! Catch them! No, don’t touch them! I’ve nearly … ’
Eventually she caught them on the crest of a wave, but by this point she was soaked, and in no state to be in any more wedding photos. Flynn, whose suit trousers were also soaked, wrapped his jacket around August.
And just for a moment, it was as if he was watching himself on an old home movie, a memory playing out before him as though it wasn’t happening in real time but was being treasured and tucked away and kept for ever. Splashed with salty water, wind whipping at their faces, August wrapped and laughing inside his jacket, he found himself imagining what it would be like if he really was marrying this girl today. In that moment, with tendrils of her hair catching the sun, his feet in the ocean, he couldn’t imagine being happier.
‘Do you think we got good pictures?’ Flynn asked, when they were all safely back in the car and could stop shouting.
Bel nodded, and handed her phone back to August while she started the car to drive them back into Bath. ‘Take a look.’
August leant forward, showing Flynn, who was in the passenger seat, the photos Bel had taken.
They were good – nice even! ‘We look very cute together,’ August joked to him, and Flynn couldn’t find a way to reply, the moment from the beach still on his mind, like a dream he was trying to cling to that was fading. And then she got to the final few pictures, where Bel had kept snapping, capturing the knickers in the air, August jumping through the waves, and Flynn walking a laughing August back up the beach, his jacket and his arms around her.
August peered at their faces in the photo. ‘I tell you what, it took every ounce of acting skill in me to play the adoring newlywed in all that wind and freezing seas. But you really got it there,’ she said, showing him. ‘This one is really good actually, you nailed the “looking lovingly” brief.’
