Jessica Hart - Appointment at the Altar

‘You look beautiful,’ said Guy suddenly. ‘You shouldn’t be hiding out here. Come and dance.’

‘No, I…’ Lucy couldn’t bear to smile, to laugh, to pretend any more. She was going to have to say goodbye some time. Better to do it now, in the dark. ‘It’s so hot in those marquees,’ she said. ‘I’m enjoying the cool.’

‘OK,’ he said, his eyes never leaving her face. ‘Shall we walk for a bit?’

She nodded. Just say it , she told herself sternly. Say, It’s time we said goodbye, Guy. It won’t be so hard. But she couldn’t unlock her jaw to get the words out.

They walked around the gardens in silence for a while, Lucy desperately storing up memories of the way he moved, the way he turned his head, the tilt at the corner of his mouth.

‘Hal told me you rang,’ said Guy at last. ‘He said Meredith had come home.’

‘She did, yes, but that was another thing I got wrong,’ said Lucy bitterly. ‘It turns out that Richard isn’t in love with either of us. He’s more interested in that sneaky little nurse.’

She hugged her arms together, remembering her dismay when Meredith had told her what had happened at the hospital. ‘I thought I could make Meredith’s dream come true but it was all for nothing,’ she said sadly. ‘I shouldn’t have said anything. I should have waited until I was sure, instead of raising her hopes like that.’ Lucy bit her lip. ‘I keep thinking that I’ve learnt how to be responsible, but I keep getting things wrong.’

‘You can’t make your sister’s dreams come true,’ said Guy. ‘She has to do that for herself. We all have to do that.’

Lucy mustered a smile. ‘Well, I’m working on mine,’ she told him.

‘You are?’ He stopped and looked at her. ‘How?’

‘I’ve decided that I’m going to make a career for myself in events management,’ she told him brightly. ‘I’m going to set up my own company.’

There was a tiny pause. ‘Good for you,’ said Guy.

‘I’ve even picked up a client tonight, and several people have asked for my card.’

‘That’s great. No, I mean it,’ he said, as if hearing the flatness in his voice. ‘I think you’ll do brilliantly.’

‘So it looks as if it’s time to move on.’ Lucy was breathing very carefully. ‘It’s probably time we had that argument, in fact.’

‘What argument?’

‘The one that makes you realise that I’m the last woman you’d want to spend your life with, and makes me throw my non-existent ring back in your face.’

‘Oh, that argument.’ They had walked some way from the marquees, but the night air was alive with the sound of voices and laughter, a mocking counterpoint to the tension pooling around them. ‘If that’s what you want,’ said Guy in a hard voice.

‘Well…it’s what we agreed,’ she said, swallowing the lump in her throat.

His eyes looked into hers. ‘What are we going to argue about?’

‘I…I guess I could complain about the way you flirt with other women,’ she tried to joke, but he didn’t smile back.

‘I don’t.’

‘Or you could say that I’m too frivolous and silly for you.’

‘You’re not.’

‘Then perhaps we could just decide that we’re incompatible.’

‘Are we?’

Lucy made herself look away from his gaze. ‘I think so, Guy,’ she said painfully. ‘It’s not you, it’s me,’ she tried to explain. ‘You know who you are. You know what you want to do. I feel as if I need to find myself, do something for myself.’

She paused. ‘When I came to your office that time, you told me to finish organising this party. Finish something, you said, and I realised that I’d never done that before. This is the first project I’ve seen through to the end. I just drift along, never getting to grips with anything…I don’t really know who I am or what I can do,’ she told him. ‘I need to find that out on my own.’

Her voice was starting to wobble and she took a deep breath. ‘I want you to know, though, that the last few weeks have been some of the happiest I’ve ever had-and I’ve had lots of happy weeks. I’ve really enjoyed working for Dangerfield & Dunn, and I’m more grateful than I can say for the opportunities you’ve given me. And…and it’s going to break my heart to say goodbye,’ she finished in a rush.

‘Then why say it?’ asked Guy.

‘Because I need to know if what I feel for you is real,’ she said, meeting his eyes fully at last. ‘Or is it just like what I felt for Kevin? I could tell you that I loved you, Guy; how could you ever believe me, even if you wanted to hear it? How can I be sure of it myself? I want to find a way to prove it to myself. Can you understand that?’ she asked anxiously.

He sighed. ‘In a way,’ he said at last. ‘I understand that you need some time to work things out for yourself, anyway. So…’He took her hands and found a smile. ‘We’d better have that argument, then. You go first.’

Lucy’s smile wavered but she pressed her lips together to stop it falling apart. ‘Guy, you’re a horrible person,’ she said, her eyes on his.

‘And you’re no fun,’ he replied. His clasp was warm and steadying and it was as if they were having two completely separate conversations. Their mouths said one thing, their eyes the opposite.

‘Your jokes are terrible.’

‘You’re not that pretty, you know, Cinders,’ said Guy, drawing her closer.

Lucy’s throat was so tight by now that she could hardly speak. She didn’t think she could go on much longer. ‘I hate you,’ she whispered against his cheek.

‘I hate you, too,’ said Guy, and turned his head so that their lips could meet in a long, tender kiss of farewell.

Lucy let herself hold him one last time. Her arms slid around his back and she clung to him while she kissed him in a way that she hoped told him better than words ever could how much she loved him.

Her heart cracked when at last she made herself step back and out of his arms. Guy resisted for a moment, as if he didn’t want to let her go, but then his hands dropped and she was free.

‘Thank you, Guy,’ she said, her voice wobbling horribly. ‘Thank you for everything.’

And then she turned and walked away from him, as fast as she could, before she could change her mind.

‘Lucy!’ Imogen looked up in delighted surprise. ‘I wasn’t expecting to see you! Does this mean you’ve come back?’ she added hopefully.

‘No.’ Lucy felt terrible. She had only been back at Dangerfield & Dunn a matter of seconds and already three people had told her how pleased they were to see her back. ‘I’ve just come in to collect my stuff.’

‘Oh.’ Imogen’s face fell. ‘I was hoping you’d have changed your mind. It’s not the same here without you.’

‘I was only here for about a month!’

‘It felt like longer. We all miss you, and I’m sure Guy misses you, too,’ Imogen went on. ‘He hasn’t been the same since. I mean, he’s still lovely and he’s always friendly, but it’s like now he’s trying, and before he didn’t have to.’ She shook her head. ‘I couldn’t believe it when I heard you two had split up. You seemed so perfect for each other. What happened?’

‘We just agreed that it wasn’t going to work out,’ said Lucy after a moment.

‘That’s what Guy said.’ Imogen sounded dissatisfied. ‘No one can understand it, though. You were so obviously meant for each other!’

Lucy smiled painfully. ‘We weren’t really, Imogen. We might have looked OK together, but we’re very different people. I’m not the right girl for Guy.’

She had been reminding herself of that continually over the past three weeks. Guy was a serious person, and he needed a serious wife. Not someone who didn’t know how to laugh, but someone responsible, someone intelligent and steady who knew herself and knew Guy. A grown-up.