Eight Perfect Hours: The hotly-anticipated love story everyone is falling for in 2021!

by Lia Louis

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Fate?’ he offers, but this time, there’s no teasing, piss-taking smile.

  ‘Yes,’ I say. ‘I like to think so. I mean I don’t even know what I believe, but I believed for a long time that it was fate that I met Ed, that it was fate that he stopped me getting in the car and then …’ I blow out a long breath into the air, the vapour from my lips, like blue smoke. ‘When Ed and I broke up, I thought, well, what was it all for then? Maybe it isn’t fate, maybe it’s choice. Maybe it’s always been choice. And then – I met you.’

  Sam looks up from his feet, at me, his gorgeous eyes lingering on mine. ‘And then I met you,’ he repeats.

  The band in the distance strike up with a new song and there are some cheers – wine and beer firmly in systems now, inhibitions thrown asunder, inaudible singing, shouty and out of tune.

  ‘Do you remember why you walked away? The reason you didn’t get in?’

  Sam nods, drops his gaze to his feet again. ‘The keychain.’ He looks up at me, from under his dark hair. ‘I noticed it wasn’t on my keys and I turned, for – a minute really, that’s all, to look for it on the ground.’

  ‘The heather? The one on my keys?’

  He nods. ‘I thought that’s where I dropped it. I mean – maybe I did, but I think––’

  ‘My keyring is yours.’

  Sam’s face breaks out in a shy, reluctant smile. ‘I mean – it feels stupid to argue with that at this point.’

  ‘It is,’ I say. ‘I know it is. And – the heather. It did protect you.’

  He laughs, drags a hand through his hair and gives a boyish shrug. ‘That’s my mom’s take, too.’

  Someone is saying something down a microphone now in the distance, and something spits from the sky in the dark. Rain. Sleet.

  ‘Did you – were you really on your way to the airport?’

  Sam gives a deep nod, his teeth grazing his lip. Sleet flurries down, the drops turning from falling to drifting, the longer we stand here. ‘I was. But I was going to swing by the college, pick up Bradley’s stuff and then – I don’t know, Noelle, I couldn’t face it, so I didn’t. I’ve never been able to face it, to say it out loud …’

  ‘And the camera. You were the one that called up asking for the camera.’

  Sam nods again. ‘There’s a photo of us on there. Bradley and me. I don’t have any pictures of us together, and Daisy gave it to him.’

  ‘The camera?’

  ‘Yep.’ He smiles, his eyes drifting as if watching the projection of a memory play out that I can’t see. ‘She’d already handed her envelope in, completely forgot she still had the camera in her hand. So she gave it to him to put in his. He didn’t want to put anything in his. Wasn’t his scene really. The party part was, though.’ Sam laughs to himself at those final words.

  ‘So you met her,’ I say, the realisation a warm hug. ‘You met Daisy.’

  ‘Yeah,’ says Sam with a smile, as if he worked this out long before I did. ‘She was – a firecracker, right? This ball of energy, shouting at me to smile, to cheer up, look at the camera, look hot.’

  I laugh – warm, belly laughter. Daisy met Sam. She died knowing who he was – the man I’m in love with. She met him before I had.

  And I am as sure as I have ever been of anything, as I look at him now, across this frosty, dark field, the college lit up behind us like a stage. I love him. I love Sam Attwood. I do.

  ‘I knew there was a reason I kept bumping into you,’ I say, tears sliding down my cheeks. ‘I know you didn’t. But I did. I think I knew deep down, all along.’

  Sam looks at me sadly. ‘I tried,’ he utters. ‘I mean, I kidded myself, I think. But I liked you from the second you got into my car. And then everywhere I turned, there you were, and when you weren’t, I couldn’t stop thinking about you and I – I tried. You were like this – I dunno, you lived in my head.’ Sam laughs, a hand at his straight jaw. ‘I couldn’t explain it. I can’t … how I feel when I’m with you, Noelle.’

  My heart feels like it’s ten times too big for my body, that it’s full of helium, full of air and I’m going to float up into the sky like a balloon. And I think of Jenna. I think of their anniversary and Steve and bloody Miranda – and the tears fall faster.

  ‘I love you,’ I say, croakily, letting my arms fall to my side. ‘I really do, Sam. I know that it’s too late, and it’s inappropriate probably, and I talk too much, but I don’t talk about what I feel and what I want because I feel like it doesn’t matter, but – it does. And I don’t expect you to say anything back. But I do. I love you, Sam. And you can know that and walk off with it, and – take it up bloody mountains with you.’

  Sam’s eyes shine under the moonlight, and he laughs, a flash of white teeth. He strides over, closing the gap between us on the dark, grassy field, and ducks his head. ‘Why would it be too late?’ he whispers.

  ‘Your – anniversary …’ I start to cry. ‘Steve and Miranda. The bridge. The …’

  Sam brings a hand to my cheek. ‘Noelle, I never went to the bridge. Well, the bridge that’s a therapist’s office actually.’ He laughs again. ‘Well, I mean I went. But to say it was over.’

  ‘Really? But you didn’t text or call or …’

  ‘But I wanted to give you and Ed space.’

  ‘Me and Ed? But you knew that was doomed, that he was engaged and––’

  ‘Noelle.’ Sam takes both of my hands in his, strong and warm. ‘At the hotel, we talked, and he asked me not to tell you what he told Dad and me. And I said I wouldn’t, on one condition – if he was serious about you. But if he had no intention of being with you properly, then he should walk away. Because you deserve to be happy. And God, of course, I did not want you to be happy with him, like a selfish asshole. I wanted it to be me. But I know how much he meant to you – I didn’t want to be that guy that stood in the way––’

  ‘He doesn’t,’ I say, shaking my head. ‘You mean everything to me. You do.’

  I hold his warm, handsome face in my cold hands, prickly, rough stubble beneath my fingertips. I have waited and waited for this. For him.

  ‘Ditto, Gallagher.’ He smiles down at me, then his warm lips are on mine, his hand cradling my face, fingertips in my hair, and our kiss is soft but urgent, as if it’s everything we’ve been wanting, finally realised. It’s a promise, this kiss, to the world, to the universe, to fate, that we are here. Finally.

  Sam draws back, looks deeply into my eyes.

  ‘I’ve gone my whole life without feeling the way I do when I’m with you,’ he says. ‘I don’t want to go another day.’

  ‘Then let’s not,’ I say.

  ‘Let’s not,’ says Sam, as familiar snowflakes start to drift from the sky.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  ‘This is some bullshit,’ puffs Charlie. ‘I’m fucking freezing.’

  ‘It’s not freezing, Char, it’s invigorating,’ I say. ‘Can’t you feel it? Smell it? Adventure. I thought adventure was on your authentic you list.’

  ‘Yes, adventure was on my authentic me list, Noelle – shit !’ Charlie slides on the leafy verge, grabs hold of Theo’s arm, ‘but dying on a hike with Captain America – was not. I booked glamping pods for my birthday. With heating. With a toilet.’

  ‘Ah, come on, Charlie,’ says Sam. ‘It’ll be worth it when we get to the other end.’

  ‘It will be once I get there and unleash the massive bottle of prosecco in my rucksack. Mum has the baby until the morning and I would very much like to be drunk by noon.’

  Sam smirks over at me, the winter sun on his skin, and my belly flips over. My boyfriend Sam. Sam, my actual boyfriend.

  ‘I’ve packed some lovely cordial,’ says Theo, sniffing deeply and looking out across the woods as if he is enjoying every tiny moment – taking it all in. ‘Elderflower. Homemade.’

  ‘Which will taste lovely added to my prosecco,’ says Charlie again.

  We all laugh, and I hold on to Sa
m’s hand as we tread uphill, wet leaves sliding under our feet. I bought walking boots and over trousers for this. And for the climb Sam is insisting we go on, in the spring, in Wales, not far from his work. ‘It’ll be a baby climb, I promise,’ he said, sitting on the edge of my bed on Christmas Eve, his eyes closed, and when I’d walked out in my plastic trousers and walking boots, I told him to open his eyes, threw a leg up on the bed and slapped my knee. ‘These shoes don’t do baby climbs,’ I’d laughed, and his eyes had widened.

  ‘Holy shit.’ He laughed, pulling me onto his lap.

  ‘Merry Christmas.’

  ‘It’s the sexiest thing I’ve ever fucking seen,’ he’d said against my mouth. ‘My baby climbs.’

  It’s been six weeks since the time capsule event, and they’ve passed in a total beautiful whirlwind blur. Sam went back to Snowdon for work, and I met up with Theo’s parents to talk to them about renting the coffee kiosk. And eventually, after one sleepless night, multiple chats with Mum and Ian, and a mad evening scrawling in my notebook, working out every eventuality, good and bad, I struck a pencil through it all, took a deep breath and said yes. I have a lot to set up – a ridiculous amount that feels like my very own icy baby mountain – but in eight weeks, I will be opening my own little florist kiosk. Me! Noelle Butterby. Aged thirty-two, almost three. I’ve said yes, and if I need to, I’ll panic (a lot) later.

  Charlie’s designing the sign and the logo. Theo said he’ll supply some truffles, for the opening, and Dilly is compiling a list of flower-related songs he wants to perform on his acoustic guitar on the day too (which I haven’t totally agreed to yet but he’s promised me The Storm won’t turn up with any sort of drum, and he’ll keep the set short). But today, we’re having a picnic, Sam and I – me and my boyfriend Sam, thanks very much – and Theo and Charlie. Charlie had put ‘be in nature more’ on her therapy list, and when I’d told Sam, his eyes had glinted and he’d said, ‘Let’s go on a hike. Call them, set up a date. I know this cool place, nearby,’ and I felt like I was going to burst as I dialled Charlie. ‘Tell them it’s punishment for booking us a goddamn glamping pod,’ he’d called out, and after, we’d sat talking. About camping again, just us two. (No tents.) About climbs, and holidays, and endless nights together. About long-haul flights. About hot air balloons.

  ‘Look,’ says Sam now, his strong hand gripping mine. ‘We’re almost there.’

  ‘You want us to climb up there?’ asks Charlie as if he’s just shown us the erupting volcano we have to scale.

  ‘It’s just a verge, but wait until you see the view.’

  ‘Prosecco,’ chants Charlie. ‘Think of the sodding prosecco.’

  It feels dangerous to be this happy, and I’m sure it will for a while. When you’re scared of something for so long, it has a way, as Frank said, of becoming part of your blueprint. You tell yourself it’s just not for you – that you don’t make the rules, but all those things everyone else seems to get, just aren’t open to you, aren’t available. But they are. Anything is, as Sam has made me see, as I have made me see. And who says you can’t draw another blueprint? Rub parts out over time, replace the lines and paths the more you tread them.

  Sam pulls me up, and I pull Charlie, to the top of the verge, and the view in front of us knocks the breath from my lungs.

  ‘Fucking hell,’ breathes Charlie. ‘Are we in Mordor or what?’

  ‘Close.’ Sam laughs. ‘We’re about fifteen minutes from your house. Look …’ Sam points, one hand protectively on my back. ‘Just over there is the church.’

  ‘Oh my God. Look at it. It looks like – I dunno, a Christmas village or something. Like something out of Postman sodding Pat.’

  ‘Beautiful,’ says Theo, and I look at Sam, who’s already looking at me.

  ‘Well. You definitely took us on a hike,’ says Charlie, and she puts her fist out to him. Sam bumps it with his, with a smirk, and Charlie leans over and kisses his cheek. ‘Thank you. I needed this, Cap.’ She looks out across the town. ‘I feel alive!’ she shouts. ‘I’m ALIVE!’

  ‘Our little town,’ says Theo, visibly moved, his proud little face sandwiched between a thick woolly hat and hand-knitted scarf Jet apparently made. Jet and his torso.

  ‘So, Sam,’ asks Charlie, breathlessly. ‘Do you think it could become your little town, too? What’s the plan?’

  ‘Charlie,’ I say, but I can’t help but melt into laughter into Sam’s shoulder. Charlie Wilde. Charlie fearless bloody Wilde. Sam and I haven’t talked about that yet. About what will happen – with his job in Wales, with me down here. We’re just dating, at the moment, I suppose, but it all feels so hopeful, so exciting, that I don’t care. I know we’re right where we need to be. I know we will always find a way. Those fifteen years apart showed me that.

  ‘Hey, Char,’ says Theo. ‘Help me set up this picnic, eh?’

  ‘Totes,’ she says, then she holds her arm out, like a Shakespearean actor. ‘Fill me to the tip with those tomatoes of yours, my love,’ she laughs. ‘Open my eager third eye.’

  ‘And this is before prosecco,’ I say to Sam and he laughs.

  Charlie and Theo wander off together, Charlie giggling at his side, to a flat piece of the grassy verge we stand on top of, and we watch as they fan out a purple picnic blanket on the cold, hard ground.

  ‘I’ve never had a winter picnic before,’ I say. ‘Outside. In a wood. On a hill.’

  ‘There’s never a bad day or a bad place to eat, if you ask me.’ Sam smiles and I lean in, kiss his gorgeous, soft lips.

  ‘Motorways,’ I say. ‘Balconies.’

  ‘Hire cars,’ adds Sam, and I lean my head on his shoulder, gaze out to the tiny model village – it looks like something you’d buy from a garden centre for Christmas, to put in the window, to play cheesy Christmas carols. ‘Can you see out there – the little church?’ Sam asks.

  I nod against his shoulder.

  ‘And then just over there – see, that’s Dad’s old apartment block.’

  ‘Uh huh.’

  ‘And there’s the park. And somewhere over there, a tiny microscopic speck, is his allotment patch.’

  I nod again.

  ‘That he gave to me,’ says Sam, turning, his mouth to my hair. ‘And I’d like to give it to you. If you want it. No pressure, no nothing, but you said you want somewhere to grow stuff and your garden at home with your mom is––’

  I lift my head up, meet his gaze. ‘Are you serious?’

  Sam smiles. ‘Yeah. It’s all yours. If you want it. From me to you. Well. From Frank to you, really. I’m just the middle-man.’

  I laugh, hold his face in my hands. Sometimes I hold his face and I want to squish it, kiss every inch of it, ‘eat it, sink my teeth into it’ as Charlie says about Theo’s. I never really got it. Thought it was yet another one of their ‘things’, like reiki, like Theo’s little cucumbers, like Charlie’s third eye opening post fruit consumption. But I do now. I get it totally.

  ‘Thank you,’ I say to Sam. ‘Oh my God. Seriously, thank you.’

  ‘I’ll give you the keys,’ he says. ‘Before I go back. Then you can go and explore your little patch of dirt.’

  ‘I love it already,’ I say. ‘My very own little patch of mud.’

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  ‘’Ere, check the fitty out,’ says Dilly, tuning his guitar.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Over there. Getting off the train. Fucking arse on it.’

  ‘Dilly.’

  ‘What?’ he gawps, twisting a knob on his guitar. ‘Look at him, the man’s made of marble or something.’

  ‘Will you just get on with tuning the bloody guitar and start – I don’t know, strumming away or something, sing, make yourself useful. God, where’s bloody Theo?’

  Dilly sighs, rakes a hand through his iced-gem of a hair do. ‘Stop being so nervous, Elle. The stall looks great. The flowers look great. And you – well, you’re dressed like curtains to be fair, but you look great too. So, chill,
yeah? Seriously.’

  Today is the day. The opening of Noelle’s, my own little florist shop in the train station. Mine. My own little shop. I can hardly believe I am saying those words. And Dilly’s right, it really does look great – just how I imagined it would. When opened wide, the wooden shutters have shelves on, full of beautiful in-bloom flowers, some made up into bouquets, some bunched loose, in sections, for bespoke requests. Charlie’s sign sits above my head, beautifully painted on driftwood, my name in tattoo-like calligraphy across it in white and orange, and entwined around the letters, the green stalk and the plump petals of a daisy. It’s tiny. It’s beautiful. It’s mine. A place to do what I love, in a place where people come and go and explore and have adventures out in the world and come home again. Or don’t.

  ‘What’s the time?’ I ask, nervously.

  ‘Half eight. Oh, look. Charlie and Theo.’ Dilly holds a hand in the air, does a big swoop of a wave, like someone trying to find their friend in a nightclub.

  Charlie trots down the platform, a huge flower-shaped helium balloon in her hand, her mouth wide, her hand in the air as if she’s at a concert. ‘My girl!’ she shouts. Morning commuters look up stiffly from their coffees. ‘My girl has done it. Fuck me, I’m going to cry. It looks amazing. Doesn’t it, Theo? A-mazing.’

  Charlie speeds towards me, throws her arms around me, and then wraps the balloon’s ribbon around my fingertips.

  ‘For you.’ She beams, tucking my hair behind my ears. ‘I’m so proud of you.’

  Theo glances up at the shop’s sign, then down at me. He lets go of the stroller where Petal is sitting, a huge croissant in her chubby hands, and presses the brake on. ‘Congratulations, Elle,’ he says, circling it, to hug me. ‘This is just how I saw it. I always knew.’

  ‘Visualised it,’ says Charlie with a wink. ‘In the sweat lodge.’

  ‘With Jet no doubt,’ I say.

  ‘Course,’ she giggles. ‘Post-cunnilingus class.’

  Charlie and I laugh loudly, our happiness echoing around the station, bouncing off the walls, and Theo takes our photos. I hold Petal and pose, and Charlie presses her face against my cheek, and Dilly shoves his head in the frame and makes a stupid face, and I feel full of it – to the brim. With happiness. With love.