From Notting Hill with Love Actually

by Ali McNamara

  It was when he got right up to the outside of our car that an uneasy feeling started to spread over me.

  He grabbed the door handle just as I went to push the lock down and thrust the car door wide open.

  “You’re early,” he said, peering into the car. “The bridesmaids aren’t even here yet. I’m Max by the way, one of Graham’s ushers, we’ve not met before.” He held out his hand for me to shake.

  “I…I’m not the bride,” I hurriedly said, trying to grab the door again and pull it shut.

  “Don’t be daft, of course you are, Teresa—that’s just nerves. I didn’t know you were having a Blues Brothers theme?” he said, staring at Dermot and Finlay in the front seats. “But that’s cool—I like it. Now which one of you is Dad?”

  “I’m telling you I’m not the bride,” I said, managing to wrangle the door from his grasp. “I’m not Teresa. And this is definitely not my wedding!” and I slammed the door shut again.

  “Get us out of here, Dermot…please,” I implored him, as I recoiled from Max’s flattened face pressed up against the car’s rear window.

  “Our Lady of Blessed Acceleration, don’t fail me now!” Dermot called out as he thrust the car into gear.

  “It’s from the movie,” Finlay explained, breaking his silence for the first time. “He’s been waiting his whole life for an opportunity to say that line.”

  Luckily, just then a significant gap opened up in the traffic and Dermot was able to accelerate away from the church, leaving Max standing on the side of the road looking dazed.

  “Oh God,” I said, my head in my hands. “I should have known this would be a disaster. Everything I do always is.”

  “I think it’s only going to get worse, I’m afraid,” Dermot said, looking at the traffic backing up in front of us. “There’s no way we’re going to make it across London by midday.”

  Finlay turned and looked at me. “Can’t you phone him?” he asked sympathetically. “And let him know you’re on your way?”

  I looked up at him, surprised he had spoken again—I guessed he was usually a man of few words. Then I looked down at my dress, and held out my hands. “All I came away with was these,” I said, holding up the card and ticket. “I don’t have my phone with me, and I don’t remember his number to use someone else’s.”

  “Finlay, I think you’re missing the point,” Dermot said. “It wouldn’t be very romantic if Scarlett just called him up and said, ‘I’m on my way, but I’m stuck in traffic,’ now would it?”

  “It would save a lot of hassle though,” Finlay said matter-of-factly.

  “No,” Dermot continued. “She needs to race along the Embankment with only seconds to spare—hoping against hope she’ll make it on time—before her true love, in despair, gives up on her and disappears from her life forever.”

  Finlay and I both stared at Dermot.

  “You not only watch too many films, but you’ve been dressing up like characters from them for far too long,” Finlay said. “Let’s be realistic—Scarlett’s not going to make it there on time. This isn’t a movie script; this is real life, in real London traffic. I’m sorry, there’s just not going to be a happy ending this time.”

  “Right,” I said, my hand already on the door. “That’s it. I’m getting out. I’ll run there if I have to, even in this stupid dress. There is no way I’m not making it to the London Eye by midday. There will be a happy ending for me this time, just you wait and see.”

  I climbed out of the car. “Thank you both so much for getting me this far,” I said, smiling gratefully at them as Finlay rolled down his window. “Can I just ask you one more favor though?”

  “Sure, what’s that?” Dermot asked.

  “Could you lend me my tube fare?”

  ***

  I ran along the pavement as fast as I could in my awkward and now very uncomfortable wedding shoes until I found the nearest underground station, then descended into its depths and quickly bought myself a ticket.

  I tried to ignore the stares I got from commuters as I ran down escalators and along corridors to shouts of, “Late for the church, are we?” or, “Been jilted at the altar darlin’?” and a rousing chorus of “I’m Getting Married in the Morning” from a gang of Arsenal supporters on their way to a home game.

  It seemed an eternity as we trundled along on the Bakerloo line—every time the train stopped in the tunnel or at a station, I’d try and glance surreptitiously at someone’s watch to see the time. But eventually we arrived at Embankment and I emerged into the fresh air once more. I could see the London Eye, dwarfing everything around it as it stood elegantly by the side of the Thames. So, running as fast as I could manage, I crossed the Golden Jubilee Bridge, holding my white tulle skirts aloft like a lady of the bygone age in her crinolines. I glanced at Big Ben in the distance—it was two minutes to twelve.

  As I descended to the footpath that ran alongside the South Bank of the Thames, I managed to overtake tourists taking photos, children rollerblading, and even a couple of slow joggers. It was only as I ran past a coffee shop, with a few tables waiting hopefully outside in the early April sunshine, that I suddenly pulled myself to a halt.

  Slowly I reversed to the shop. Was that who I thought it was sitting at one of the tables toward the back of the outdoor seating area? I stopped and stared.

  And then slowly, as if he sensed me looking at him, although I wasn’t actually that inconspicuous, standing there in a full-length wedding dress with a tiara balanced precariously in my hair and my skirt pulled up around my knees, Hugh Grant turned around and stared back at me.

  He spoke quickly to the man sitting opposite him, and then they both turned to look at me. Hugh’s dining partner looked familiar too—he had whitish gray hair and spectacles. And then, as I stood there still staring, I realized that not only was I looking at Hugh Grant sitting having a cup of coffee in the middle of London on a sunny April day, but Richard Curtis too.

  I hovered there for a moment—these were two of my biggest movie heroes, sitting right there in front of me—I had to go over, I had to…then I heard the chimes of Big Ben signaling it was about to become midday and I snapped back to the real reason I was here.

  No, Scarlett, not this time, I told myself. Sean is more important than the cinema. “Put this in one of your movies!” I shouted to them both, as I hoisted up my dress once more and began to run the final few hundred meters along the footpath. Each chime of Big Ben brought me that little bit closer to the Eye, until I arrived by its side just as the last chime declared it was now officially midday.

  Breathlessly I stood at the bottom of the huge wheel and watched the glass capsules rotate slowly around. I looked up desperately to see if I could catch a glimpse of Sean in one of them, but most of the insides were not visible to me down on the ground.

  Then I saw the queue.

  It snaked around the turnstiles several times before ending a few feet in front of me. But people were joining it all the time—if I got in that queue I’d never spot Sean, and there was no way I’d ever make it to the wheel before he got off.

  “Excuse me,” I said, beginning to push my way up through the queue. “It’s an emergency—thank you,” I’d say, as I got a bit further. “Thank you—emergency—sorry; have to get through—emergency, see.”

  “Looks it, darlin’,” a man said as I passed by him. “Lost your groom, have you?”

  Finally I reached the front. “I’m so sorry to push in like this,” I said to the attendant on the gate. “It’s really important I get to the wheel—I’m supposed to be meeting someone there.”

  I expected there’d be an argument, or at least a look of “We get them all here, trying to push in—and look at this one, she’s even come in fancy dress!” But instead, the lady just smiled at me.

  “Are you Scarlett?” she asked.

  “Yes, yes, that’s me.”

  “We’ve been waiting for you to turn up all morning. He’s been going round on this thing since
9 a.m.”

  I looked up to where she was pointing and saw Sean coming into view at last. He was wearing a smart black suit and a crisp white shirt unbuttoned at the neck. He looked despondent as he rested his head dejectedly against the glass window of the capsule.

  But then he glanced down in our direction, and his expression immediately changed. A huge smile broke out over his face and then an even bigger grin as his capsule finally came down to ground level.

  “Quickly, miss,” the attendant said. “Be ready to board when the pod comes past. Otherwise you’ll miss it and have to wait another half an hour.”

  There was no way I was going to let that happen. I leaped up onto the area where people were boarding the capsules as they passed slowly by. There were about fifteen to twenty boarding each capsule at a time. But when Sean’s finally came into view, there was only him inside.

  “Hop on, miss,” another attendant said, helping me on board. “Safe ride.” He winked at Sean, who was standing up against the glass on the far side of the pod.

  Inside the capsule, there seemed to be flowers everywhere.

  Roses and lilies were arranged elegantly in a long glass vase. How did Sean know they were my two favorite flowers? Had I mentioned it to him in passing one day and he’d remembered?

  They stood on a small table next to an ice bucket, which held a bottle of champagne patiently waiting to be poured into two empty glasses. I looked down and saw more flowers—a sea of pink and red rose petals covered every inch of the floor. It was one of the most romantic settings I’d ever seen.

  “Oh, Sean, it’s just beautiful,” I said, walking toward him. “I’m so sorry it took me so long to get here. But it was the Blues Brothers, they didn’t arrive until today, and when they did finally arrive, as you can see”—I gestured at my dress—“I was already at the church. But oh, Sean, when they played that song to me, and said it was from you, I knew I just had to come here and find you. And then there was the painting, Sean, it’s just all so romantic, and so unexpected. How did you even know about that?”

  Sean didn’t speak—he just held up his hand to stop me coming any closer.

  “What? What’s wrong?” I asked.

  Sean reached down and picked up some large white pieces of card. He held the first one up in front of him, like a flash card. Then he proceeded to communicate silently with me in lines from the movies I knew and loved so well. Except they weren’t the exact lines spoken by the actors on the screen; Sean had cleverly changed them to fit in with our own story. It was just like the scene from Love Actually I’d told him about—only better.

  I say it best, when I say nothing at all.

  I grinned at him as he turned over the next card.

  In the spirit of Love Actually (The Bee Gees, and latterly Boyzone)

  I should like to tell you how I feel in Words, if I may?

  I nodded eagerly. Oh my God, I couldn’t believe he’d done all this for me.

  Firstly, don’t apologize for being late, because when you’re in love with someone, apparently you never have to say you’re sorry.

  First, how did he know I’d be late? And second, he was of course referring to the classic line from Love Story.

  Sean turned another card while I silently watched him.

  When I met you, frankly, Scarlett, I didn’t give a damn. And I wondered, of all the bookshops in all the towns in all the world, why you had to walk into mine.

  I laughed at the classic lines from Gone with the Wind and Casablanca as he turned over the next card.

  But then I thought, well, nobody’s perfect, & I should give you a chance because this could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

  The second part was obviously Casablanca again. I thought hard for a moment about the first before I realized it was from the Marilyn Monroe film Some Like It Hot. Wow, Sean really had done his homework.

  But I knew we were supposed to be together. I knew it from the very first time I held your hand, Scarlett. It felt just like…magic.

  “Oh, Sean,” I mouthed, silently knowing he was referring to the “magic” moment from Sleepless in Seattle.

  Sean dropped another card and it fell among the rose petals on the floor—while I tried to stop the tears that were springing to the corners of my eyes from escaping, pouring down my face and joining them. This was fast becoming more emotional than any “weepie” I’d ever sat through in the cinema.

  And even though I knew we’d always have Paris, I knew you wanted more; I knew you wanted the whole fairytale.

  I smiled again at another classic quote from Casablanca and his Pretty Woman fairytale reference.

  So I asked you to meet me here today like this on the London Eye, because when I realized I wanted to spend the rest of my life with you, I not only wanted the rest of my life to start as soon as possible, but in a way we would remember forever.

  I nodded in agreement, loving his twist on the classic quote from When Harry Met Sally.

  So Scarlett, I ask you to excuse the fact that I am just a bloke you met in a bookshop, standing in front of the most beautiful girl he’s ever laid eyes on, asking her to love him.

  A parody of the final bookshop scene in Notting Hill, of course…

  Because I love you, Scarlett, just the way you are. You complete me…and I hope I complete you too…

  Sean put down the final card—the classic Bridget Jones and Jerry Maguire quotes mismashed together to give yet another Sean-esque-style twist. And slowly he raised his head to look at me.

  I ran toward him. “Can I speak now?” I asked breathlessly.

  He nodded.

  “That was just the most romantic thing anyone has ever done for me, Sean. And I love you too—very much. I think I always have.”

  Sean had looked ever so slightly worried since I’d arrived in the capsule with him. Now relief, mixed with joy, replaced that look of concern as I spoke the words he so desperately wanted to hear.

  As I stood in front of him, I gently stroked his cheek with my hand. And he, in turn, equally gently took hold of my hand and tenderly kissed the palm.

  Then he pulled me closer to him and silently wrapped his arms around me until there was nothing between us but our love.

  Sean gazed into my eyes forever before he finally kissed me. But when he did, my heart only reinforced what it had told me earlier—by beating so fast that I think the entire Russian gymnast team must have been performing on it this time.

  When we could finally bear to be parted again I looked up at Sean while he held me in his arms.

  “There’s something I still don’t understand, Sean. You were the most unromantic person I’d ever met up until today. How on earth did you know all those lines from all those movies if you never watch them?”

  “I watched them for you,” Sean said, speaking for the first time since I’d arrived in the capsule. “I started when I went over to New York, and I’ve been watching them ever since.”

  I shook my head in disbelief as I continued to gaze up at him in amazement.

  “I wanted to prove to you just how much you meant to me, Scarlett. By doing this with the wheel and the cards, I knew it would mean so much to you if I was romantic. But I also knew I had to do something a bit more than just send you a few flowers. I would have got you the real painting if I could. But even my budget doesn’t quite extend that far.”

  I stood up on tiptoes and kissed him again. “I know you would. But you really didn’t have to, Sean; the cards and the flowers and everything. I love it, of course, but it wasn’t necessary.”

  “I think it was,” Sean insisted. “I had to make sure I was your Mr. Darcy and not just your Daniel Cleaver.”

  I smiled at him. “Oh, Sean, you’re better than either of those two. But you really didn’t have to go this far. And do you know why?”

  Sean shook his head.

  “Because after everything we’ve been through together over the last few weeks—and to part-borrow another quote from Jerr
y Maguire…” I smiled at him. “You had me at…Ronan Keating.”

  A smile twitched at the corners of Sean’s lips and then it broke free into one of the infectious grins that I knew and loved so well now.

  I grinned back at him and leaned forward to kiss him once more, but he stopped me, as the serious expression returned to his face again.

  “There’s something else, Scarlett. Something very important I need to tell you.”

  “OK,” I said, wondering what it could be.

  Sean cleared his throat and then, to my surprise, a voice sounding incredibly like Sean Connery’s came floating from his lips.

  “My name is Bond—Sean Bond,” he said with a completely straight face. “Scarlett, you’ve left me feeling shaken and stirred. I’ll be licensed to love you for the rest of your life, if you’ll have me.”

  I tried to keep a straight face as I answered him.

  “Sean, I’d go to Russia with love for you.”

  Sean thought about this for a moment. “How about from Notting Hill with love…actually?” he suggested, grinning.

  Then we could keep up the pretense no longer, and we fell into each other’s arms, laughing uncontrollably with happiness and love.

  So while the rest of the world went about its daily business below, Sean and I held each other tightly while we gazed down at the London skyline together. Knowing this time, as the credits rolled, we were the ones with the happy ending.

  More about Notting Hill…Actually!

  A visitor’s guide to Notting Hill

  You’ve seen the movie. You’ve read the book. Now visit the place itself!

  Alighting from Notting Hill Gate Tube station for the first time, just as Scarlett did in the novel, take a right turn onto Penbridge Road. Cross the street and follow the signs for Portobello Road. On your way, the eagle-eyed among you will spot to your right a plaque on the wall which marks the house where George Orwell once lived.