Page 51 of An Enchanted Moment on Ever After Street
‘Oh, trust me, they are.’ The laugh he lets out is bitter and hurting. ‘If you look different in any way, people think it gives them a right to comment. Try dying your hair pink or being overweight and you’ll see what I mean. If it’s not the direct questions, it’s the talk they think you can’t overhear. The way they turn to their friends and semi-whisper, “What do you think happened to that man?” like something that destroyed my life is for their personal entertainment.’
That’s the most he’s ever said, the most unguarded he’s ever been, and I want to pounce on it and question him, but I also don’t want him to feel like he can’t open up to me without being interrogated. ‘You don’t seem like someone who cares what people think of you…’
‘It’s not about that. It’s about what I think of myself. I don’t want to be reminded of why I’m like I am. I don’t want other people to know. If I’m dressed like this, no one knows that I look different to everyone else. They just think I’m a terrifying weirdo, which is fine by me.’
‘So chop up the people who have ever dared to comment.’ I hold the axe out again.
He laughs. ‘That sounds surprisingly murdery.’
‘Metaphorically, you idiot.’ I’m laughing too as he takes the axe and holds my gaze behind his glasses, our hands touching on the handle until he dips his head and looks away.
I’m breathing hard in a way that’s not entirely from overexertion with the axe, and my breath speeds up when he steps near again and drops an arm around my shoulder, tugging me into his side for the briefest one-armed hug.
‘Thank you. First time I’ve ever laughed about anything to do with my past.’
It doesn’t seem like a moment for serious and deep, so I go with the opposite. ‘First time I’ve ever been hugged by a man wielding an axe.’
It makes him laugh again and he drops his arm, but before he’s moved away, I nudge his side with my elbow. ‘Maybe between us, we can make sure it’s not the last.’
‘The laughing or the axe-wielding hug?’
It’s my turn to laugh. ‘Either. Both.’
I watch appreciatively as he stands in front of the bench and tests where the axe is going to hit. He’s clearly done this before because he brings it down in one swift move and the rest of the bench crumbles into a pile of wood on the ground and he cheers and turns around to give me a fist bump and I’m sure that he’s grinning at me.
He starts collecting up the pieces of bench and taking them to the incinerator drum outside his gate, and I do the same, gathering up armfuls of broken wood and carrying them away to be burnt, and it doesn’t feel like as final a goodbye as I expected. It feels like the right thing at the right moment. With the right person.
‘Are you helping me build this new bench?’ Darcy comes back brushing his hands together and the smell of bonfire fills the air. ‘Because I warn you, I’m terrible at flatpack furniture.It’ll come out looking like a one-legged giraffe if you leave me unsupervised.’
I laugh. ‘Only if you let me make us a cup of tea first.’
‘Wouldn’t have it any other way.’ He goes to wheel the box in from outside.
‘Darcy?’ I call after him and he turns back. ‘Thank you.’
‘What for?’
I think about it before answering. ‘Being the sunshine after a dark couple of years.’
‘I could say the same to you.’ He looks at me across the garden, a garden that looks so much different than it did five weeks ago, largely because of him and what he inspired in me.
Things had felt so dark for me that I never thought I’d bring light into anyone’s life again, and I don’t think he did either, but it feels like two broken people are starting to glue themselves back together again.
Especially when he takes his glasses off to read the instruction booklet and doesn’t put them back on, and it fills me with hope that one day it will be more than just the glasses.
When I get home with Mrs Potts that night, there’s an unexpected email in my inbox from [email protected].
Okay.
It’s my first time being on the verge of a heart attack, but this is definitely what it feels like.
Okay, what? You’ll come?
I’ll be there. Feel free to use my name. Publicise it however you want.
I scream and earn myself a kitty-daggers look from Mrs Potts.
What changed your mind?
