Royal Holiday

by Guillory, Jasmine

  Vivian woke up on New Year’s Eve and held back a sigh. It felt like Sunday night and the last night of summer vacation, all rolled into one. The next day, she would fly back to California, and this surprising, magical, unprecedented interlude would be over. She would be back to everyday Vivian, the one who didn’t get to wander around a city on a whim, the one who didn’t go to museums often, even when they interested her, the one who didn’t go out with men very much, even though she wanted to.

  She opened her eyes and looked at Malcolm. He was still sound asleep. She wanted to reach out and trace the smile lines around his mouth, and his slightly pouty bottom lip, but he looked so peaceful she didn’t want to wake him up.

  She was going to miss him. Yes, she would miss the England Vivian, who was carefree and had decided not to worry about her new job until she got home, who thought about having fun and not what was prudent or checked all the right boxes, who made snap decisions instead of weighing pros and cons. But she would also really miss Malcolm. She’d clicked with him in a way she hadn’t clicked with anyone in years—not just romantically, but as a person. They laughed at the same things, they cared about the same things, and when they had a conflict, one or the other of them would give the other a metaphorical shake, and they’d figure it out. How had they managed to figure out how to fight well together in less than two weeks?

  She shook her head, and a sigh finally escaped her. His eyes immediately popped open, and she laughed.

  “I thought you were still asleep,” she said.

  He put an arm around her and pulled her close. She leaned her head against his shoulder. They even agreed on the correct way to sleep—with just enough space between the two of them so they could sense the other one was there, but never enough to touch during the night. She loved being held by him and the way he touched her, and she was so glad he never did it while she was trying to sleep.

  “What do you want to do today, on our last full day?” he asked.

  She looked over at him—and marveled that his face was already so familiar to her. The creases around his lips when he smiled, those tiny freckles along his cheekbones, the cleft in his chin, the gray hairs in his morning stubble.

  “I just want to spend time with you,” she said.

  His smile dazzled her.

  “That’s exactly what I want to do, too.” He pursed his lips together, then held up a finger. “I have a tiny surprise in store for later, but if you want to know what it is . . .”

  She laughed. Of course he had.

  “Your first surprise was so good that now I have no choice but to say yes. You know that, right?”

  He brushed his finger against her cheek.

  “That’s so kind of you to say, but really, I’m happy to tell you if you want.”

  She shook her head. She had no idea what had gotten into her during this trip, but now she was actually looking forward to his surprise.

  “Nope. As long as it’s not going to some huge New Year’s Eve party, or standing outside to watch the London equivalent of the ball dropping, I’m okay.”

  He shuddered.

  “I promise you, it’s definitely neither of those things, nor anything like them, as a matter of fact.”

  She smiled and kissed his cheek.

  “Perfect.”

  He bent down to kiss her, and she pulled him closer.

  “Mmm, just one question,” she said after a few minutes. “Just so I’m clear—is this your surprise?”

  He ran his hand down her body and sucked her bottom lip into his mouth before answering. As it happened, when he did that, she no longer cared what his response might be.

  “This is just the first thing on the agenda,” he finally said. “Well, it might be the fourth thing, too, and possibly the eighth thing, and definitely the last thing, but not the only thing.”

  She laughed and kissed his shoulder.

  “Like I said, whatever your plan is, I’m in.”

  Malcolm went into the kitchen while Vivian finished getting dressed. He couldn’t wipe the smile from his face when he thought of what they’d already done that morning, and of spending the whole day with her today.

  And tomorrow, she would leave. That thought gave him a lump in the pit of his stomach. No, he couldn’t think about that right now; he was going to concentrate on today. He turned over the bacon in the pan and poured out their coffee, just as Vivian came out of the bedroom.

  “I made us a quick breakfast,” he said. “Just toast and coffee and bacon, but don’t worry, I have good ideas for food for later.”

  She picked up her coffee cup and grinned over it at him.

  “I wasn’t worried,” she said. She sat down at the table and took a sip of coffee.

  He brought the food and his coffee over to the table and joined her.

  “Traffic and parking are going to be a nightmare today, so I thought we’d take the tube everywhere.”

  She took a bite of toast and nodded.

  “Do you know what I haven’t done yet . . . ?” She shook her head and trailed off. “No, never mind, there’s a lot I haven’t done yet, and I only have one more day, so it doesn’t matter.”

  He put his coffee cup down.

  “What if you told me anyway, though?” This was slightly dangerous; suppose she brought up going to Windsor or Wimbledon or somewhere else that would take the whole day? But he still had to ask.

  She looked up at him, a sheepish smile on her face.

  “I haven’t ridden on the top of one of those red buses. I know, it’s so dorky, but I’ve seen pictures of them my whole life, and Maddie and I were going to do it, but we ran out of time . . .”

  Now this, he could manage.

  “That’s easy. And I haven’t done that in a while, either. It’ll be a treat for me, too.”

  The smile that spread across her face made him so happy, he knew he would have said yes, no matter what she’d asked for.

  Thirty minutes later, they were on the upper deck of a bus, with very few other people.

  Vivian looked around and grinned as they trundled through London.

  “I still can’t believe these are just the normal way people get around this city. They’re so cool.” She pulled her phone out of her pocket. “I don’t care if it makes us look like tourists; I’m going to make you take a selfie with me.”

  He groaned, but he couldn’t keep the smile from his face.

  “If we must. It is your last day, after all.”

  She handed him her phone.

  “Your arms are longer. You take it.”

  He put his arm around her shoulders and angled the camera to get some of London going by in the background. They both smiled into the phone for the photo, then—maybe because he’d been overcome by sentiment when he’d said, “last day,” he took her by surprise and kissed her on the cheek. She let out a giggle just as he took the picture.

  “There.” He handed the phone back to her. “Are you happy?”

  She nodded.

  “Very.” She looked at the photos and smiled up at him. “Are you?”

  He touched her cheek with his thumb.

  “Absolutely.” He gestured to her phone. “Send those to me, won’t you?” he asked her.

  She grinned and nodded.

  They decided to go to the Tate Modern, mostly because it was on this bus route. After a few hours of culture, they headed to Borough Market, an outdoor covered marketplace with tons of stalls selling different kinds of food. Vivian’s eyes widened as they walked inside, and he grinned. He knew she’d like it here.

  “I thought we’d have dinner at my apartment tonight, since anywhere we went would be a madhouse. We can eat lunch here, then pick up all sorts of supplies for tonight,” he said.

  “That sounds perfect,” she said.

  They wandered around the whole market and stopped at stalls that sold cheese, charcuterie, bread, jam, chocolates, oysters, and all sorts of meat pies, and bought all the above and then some. They ate
until they were bursting, and then bought cake for dessert.

  The tube ride back home was unusually boisterous. Most of the time, Londoners didn’t interact with one another on public transportation, but there were too many excited people on there for it to be a normal day. Okay, excited wasn’t quite the right word; most of them seemed half-drunk already, but in the happy, giggly way, which made both him and Vivian laugh, too.

  When they walked into his apartment, Vivian helped him put the food away, then threw herself on the couch.

  “I can’t bring myself to regret that last sausage roll,” she said, “even though it might kill me.”

  He lay down next to her. Thank goodness this couch was roomy.

  “My problem was the dumplings. They were delicious, but did I need all twelve?”

  They looked at each other and laughed.

  “Yes, obviously, you did,” she said.

  Later that afternoon, they took a sunset walk down to the Thames. Vivian would never get over how early sunset was here at this time of year. It was also very cold, but between how well she was bundled up and Malcolm’s warm hand in hers, she didn’t care.

  Despite how dark it was this early, she couldn’t remember the last time she’d been this happy. It obviously wasn’t just Malcolm, but he’d made this vacation such a dream—so relaxing, and fun, and interesting. And the way he looked at her sometimes . . . well, those parts had been an added delight.

  When they got back to his apartment, she immediately shed all of her outer layers, then paused and stared at her half-packed suitcase. Malcolm came out of the bathroom and saw her standing there.

  “Something wrong, V?” he asked.

  She liked the way he’d started to call her V. Her family called her Viv, which she hated from anyone outside of her family. But she liked V from him a lot.

  She shook her head at his question.

  “No, nothing wrong.”

  He came over to her.

  “Okay, but you’re looking indecisive about something. What is it?”

  Sometimes it was annoying that he was so perceptive.

  “It’s nothing bad . . . I was just wondering if . . .”

  She felt silly about this, but then, he hadn’t found any of her quirks silly yet.

  “Since it’s New Year’s Eve, should I change? Into something more fun, I mean.” She had no idea why she’d suddenly felt the need to change, but for some reason, she really wanted to.

  A wide smile spread across Malcolm’s face.

  “What a smashing idea. Absolutely, you should change. We should both change. Let’s do that, then open the first bottle of champagne.”

  She grinned at him, plucked a dress out of her suitcase, and disappeared into the bathroom. After twenty minutes, most of which was spent putting her hair in as fancy an updo as she could manage, and using that sparkly eye makeup Maddie had given her, she emerged.

  “Just warning you now; you’ve already seen this dress before,” she said as she stepped out of the bathroom.

  He turned around, midway through tying his bow tie.

  “I loved it on Christmas Eve, and I love it even more on New Year’s Eve,” he said. “You look incredible.” He bent down to kiss her, and she wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him back hard.

  “Let’s pop that first bottle of champagne.”

  She followed him into the kitchen. He pulled a bottle out of the fridge and carefully took down two champagne glasses from the cabinet. He paused before he opened the bottle and smiled at her.

  “Confession: I just bought these glasses a few days ago, once I realized you’d be here with me on New Year’s Eve. I haven’t had a reason to have champagne glasses in this apartment until now.”

  He unwound the wire around the cork and pulled the cork out with a gentle pop. After he’d filled their glasses, she lifted her glass to his.

  “To both of us having more reasons to drink champagne.”

  He grinned at her.

  “What a perfect toast.”

  They spent the next few hours sitting on the couch talking, drinking champagne, and looking out over London. After a while they both got hungry, so he got up and shucked the oysters they’d bought at the market. Later they got even hungrier, so she made them an enormous cheese plate with the many different kinds of cheese and charcuterie they’d bought earlier that day. And then, when they wanted something sweet, he served them slices of the chocolate cake they’d bought. And with everything, they drank more champagne.

  At one point, he reached over and took her hand.

  “I wish . . .” he said, and trailed away.

  She wasn’t sure his wish was exactly the same as hers—that they had more time together, that they lived in the same city, that they could suspend time for minutes or hours or days until they could get their fill of each other—but she recognized the look in his eyes as the same feeling in her heart.

  “I do, too,” she said.

  He sighed and pulled her closer to him.

  “I hoped you did,” he said.

  A few minutes before midnight, Malcolm brought a new bottle of champagne to the coffee table and popped the cork.

  “And the New Year is just seconds away,” he said, as he poured champagne into both of their glasses. He looked at his watch. “Ten . . . nine . . . eight . . . seven . . .”

  Vivian joined him in the countdown.

  “. . . three . . . two . . . one!” they said in unison. They turned to each other and smiled.

  “Happy New Year, Vivian,” he said.

  “Happy New Year, Malcolm,” she said.

  She started to clink her glass against his, but he shook his head.

  “You’re forgetting the most important thing about midnight at the New Year,” he said. “The kiss.”

  She was forgetting that, as a matter of fact. How many years had it been since she’d had someone to kiss on New Year’s Eve? She’d certainly kissed people on New Year’s Eve, but it had been quite a while since she was guaranteed a kiss on that night. And from a person she truly wanted to kiss.

  He took her glass from her and put it down onto the coffee table, then swept her into a kiss that left her breathless. When they finally parted, he brushed her hair back from her face and kissed her cheek.

  “Now we toast.” He handed her the champagne glass and picked up his own.

  She touched her glass to his.

  “Happy New Year. I hope this year ends as well as it began.”

  He lifted his glass to his lips.

  “Well, I can definitely toast to that.” A wide smile crossed his face. “And you said that without even seeing the one last surprise I had in store for you.”

  She narrowed her eyes at him. She’d forgotten about his last surprise. Did he think she was in any shape to leave his apartment again tonight, with all this champagne they’d had? Or had he bought her a present?

  He laughed out loud.

  “I see that look on your face; no need to be so suspicious. I can’t take credit for this, but I love it anyway. Look!” He gestured in front of them at the windows, and she turned to look at what he could be talking about. At first there was nothing, but then:

  Fireworks!

  They exploded right in front of her, it felt like. Huge white cartwheels of fireworks, bright red pinwheels, sparkling gold fizzy ones. She turned back to him with her eyes wide open.

  “Oh my goodness! I can’t believe you get this amazing show, right here on your couch!”

  He put his arm around her and pulled her close, as they both stared at the colors lighting up the night sky out the window.

  “Me neither, honestly. I didn’t even know I got this view until my first New Year’s Eve here. That was”—he shook his head—“a pretty lonely night, to be honest. I’d told myself I was going to go to bed early and not even bother with midnight or any of that, but I couldn’t sleep, so I wandered out into the kitchen to get a snack just before midnight, and when I turned around, this wa
s right outside the window. I sat down and stared in wonder.” She took his hand and squeezed it, and he leaned down to kiss her cheek. “It’s nice to share this view with someone.”

  She turned and smiled up at him.

  “I’m so happy I get to share it with you.”

  They watched the fireworks in silence for a while, then suddenly, Malcolm dropped his arm from her shoulder and turned to face her.

  “Okay, but seriously. What if we keep this up?”

  Vivian let her heart soar for a brief moment, before she forced herself back to earth. This had all felt like a miracle—a jewel of a week that would sparkle in her memory for years to come—but this wasn’t real life. She wasn’t some twenty-year-old in a movie who went to a foreign country and fell in love; people like her didn’t get swept up in fairy tales.

  “We’re a little too old for long-distance relationships, don’t you think?” she said.

  He laughed.

  “God yes, that seems way too complicated and difficult. I’m definitely far too old and conservative for something like that. Just . . . we’d visit each other occasionally and have a week like this, then both go back to our regular lives.”

  Oh. Of course that’s what he meant. That made sense.

  Vivian made herself laugh.

  “So you want a long-distance booty call? I’m definitely too old—and conservative—for that.”

  Malcolm dropped his eyes and put his champagne glass down.

  “I wouldn’t have phrased it in quite that way . . .”

  She patted him on the shoulder.

  “I know you wouldn’t have, but I did.”

  Plus—and she couldn’t tell him this part—she knew she’d gotten far too attached to Malcolm in the week and a half she’d known him. It would be fine; she knew she’d get over it after a while once she was at home and he wasn’t around. But also she knew herself well enough to know that if she and Malcolm stayed in contact in the way he’d suggested, her feelings would just grow stronger. And it would hurt more once it ended.

  She took his hand.

  “This was a perfect week, and I’m so grateful to you for it.”

  He picked up their joined hands and kissed hers, then put his other hand on her cheek.