No, I don’t mean “get it over with.” Of course I don’t. It’s not a vaccination. It’s … Well, what is it? It’s a beginning. A first step. The pair of us embarking on a great adventure together. Because we want to take on life as a team. Because we can’t think of anyone else we’d rather share that journey with. Because I love him and he loves me.
I’m getting misty-eyed already. This is hopeless. I’ve been like this for days, ever since I realized what he was driving at.
He’s quite heavy-handed, Richard. I mean, in a good, lovable way. He’s direct and to the point and doesn’t play games. (Thank God.) Nor does he land massive surprises on you out of the blue. On my last birthday, he hinted for ages that his present was going to be a surprise trip, which was ideal because I knew to get down my overnight bag and pack a few things.
Although, in the end, he did catch me out, because it wasn’t a weekend away, as I’d predicted. It was a train ticket to Stroud, which he had biked to my desk with no warning, on my midweek birthday. It turned out he’d secretly arranged with my boss for me to have two days off, and when I finally arrived at Stroud, a car whisked me to the most adorable Cotswold cottage, where he was waiting with a fire burning and a sheepskin rug laid out in front of the flames. (Mmm. Let’s just say that sex in front of a roaring fire is the best thing ever. Except when that stupid spark flew out and burned my thigh. But never mind. Tiny detail.)
So this time, when he began dropping hints, again they weren’t exactly subtle indications. They were more like massive signposts plonked in the road: I will be proposing to you soon. First he set up this date and called it a “special lunch.” Then he referred to a “big question” he had to ask me and half-winked (to which I feigned ignorance, of course). Then he started teasing me by asking if I like his surname, Finch. (As it happens, I do like it. I don’t mean I won’t miss being Lottie Graveney, but I’ll be very happy to be Mrs. Lottie Finch.)
I almost wish he’d been more roundabout and this was going to be more of a surprise. But, there again, at least I knew to get a manicure.
“So, Lottie, have you decided yet?” Richard looks up at me with that warm smile of his, and my stomach swoops. Just for an instant I thought he was being super-clever and that was his proposal.
“Um …” I look down to hide my confusion.
Of course the answer will be “yes.” A big, joyful “yes.” I can still hardly believe we’ve arrived at this place. Marriage. I mean, marriage! In the three years Richard and I have been together, I’ve deliberately avoided the question of marriage, commitment, and all associated subjects (children, houses, sofas, herbs in pots). We sort of live together at his place, but I still have my own flat. We’re a couple, but at Christmas we go home to our own families. We’re in that place.
After about a year, I knew we were good together. I knew I loved him. I’d seen him at his best (the surprise birthday trip, tied with the time I drove over his foot by mistake and he didn’t shout at me) and his worst (obstinately refusing to ask for directions, all the way to Norfolk, with broken sat nav. It took six hours). And I still wanted to be with him. I got him. He’s not the show-offy kind, Richard. He’s measured and deliberate. Sometimes you think he’s not even listening—but then he’ll come to life so suddenly, you realize he was alert the whole time. Like a lion, half asleep under the tree but ready for the kill. Whereas I’m a bit more of a gazelle, leaping around. We complement each other. It’s Nature.
(Not in a food-chain sense, obviously. In a metaphorical sense.)
So I knew, after a year, he was The One. But I also knew what would happen if I put a foot wrong. In my experience, the word “marriage” is like an enzyme. It causes all kinds of reactions in a relationship, mostly of the breaking-down kind.
Look at what happened with Jamie, my first long-term boyfriend. We’d been happily together for four years and I just happened to mention that my parents got married at the same age we were (twenty-six and twenty-three). That was it. One mention. Whereupon he freaked out and said we had to take “a break.” A break from what? Until that moment we’d been fine. So clearly what he needed a break from was the risk of hearing the word “marriage” again. Clearly this was such a major worry that he couldn’t even face seeing me, for fear that my mouth might start to form the word again.
Before the “break” was over, he was with that red-haired girl. I didn’t mind, because by then I’d met Seamus. Seamus, with his sexy Irish lilting voice. And I don’t even know what went wrong with him. We were besotted for about a year—crazy all-night-sex nothing-else-in-life-matters besotted—until all of a sudden we were arguing every night instead. We went from exhilarating to exhausting in about twenty-four hours. It was toxic. Too many state-of-the-nation summits about “Where are we heading?” and “What do we want from this relationship?” and it wore us both out. We limped on for another year, and when I look back, it’s as though that second year is a big black miserable blot in my life.