Chapter 16

With the paperwork for the new apartment signed and a cheque handed over for the initial deposit, our new home was arranged. Arthur and I went for a walk by the river, hand in hand, and bought snacks from a food stand on the edge of a small park. It was such a nice area of the city—worlds away from where we lived now.

I expected the eight weeks until we could get the keys for the new place to drag. It seemed a long way off, and Arthur and I carried on with our lives and our usual routine of spending our evenings together. More often than not, we spent the nights together, too, snuggling in each other's arms in either my bed or his.

I didn't hear anything more from Paul, and it seemed he was being true to his word. He did his best to make amends and went back to his own life. I didn't use any of the money, except to pay for a bed Arthur and I chose together. I arranged for it to be delivered to our new home once we had a confirmed date for being given the keys. A week before we were due to move, I paid the rest of the deposit and we booked a moving company to collect our stuff from both of our apartments and take it all to the new place. We spent hours packing everything we wanted and getting rid of the things we didn't. We had both accumulated a lot of items we didn't want to keep.

Sophie thought I was crazy to be moving in with Arthur. She wished us well and told me she wanted me to be happy, and that she'd visit when we were settled in, but she didn't hide her worries too well. I knew she feared I would regret starting my life with Arthur, simply because she still thought he was a creep and didn't understand him.

Eventually, the moving day arrived. Two burly guys arrived at my door early in the morning, and filled the lift with boxes from my apartment, then from Arthur's. Everything fit in the large truck they had, including Arthur and me in the extra seats behind the driver's seat.

The journey across the city took about half an hour. Arthur's anxiety grew as we left our old homes behind. His knees bounced, he scrubbed at his face, and dragged his fingers through his hair. I took one of his hands and held it in both of mine.

"It's okay, Arthur. We'll soon be there," I said softly.

He nodded and stared out of the window. He didn't laugh, but he didn't relax either. The moment the truck stopped, he jumped out and began pacing around outside the gates of our new complex.

"What's with him?" one of the moving guys asked.

"Nothing, he's fine." I climbed out too, and keyed in the code on the panel beside the gates so they would open. The truck drove in, and we followed on foot. "Are you okay?" I asked.

"I will be." He ran a hand through his hair again.

I gave him one of the keys to our new home. "Why don't you go on up? I'll sort everything out."

"I can't let you do that," he protested.

"You can. I don't like you being upset. It's not as if I have to actually do anything, except tell them where to put stuff. If you sit in the bedroom, you won't even see them again. All the boxes and other bits will be going in the other rooms. We can put it all away later when they've gone."

"All right." He gave me a quick kiss. "Thank you, Audra." He disappeared into the building.

It didn't take the men too long to get everything unloaded and taken up in the lift. As soon as the boxes were all piled in the living room, they left. Arthur relaxed and started lugging items into the appropriate rooms. Considering how thin he was, he was surprisingly strong.

I began unpacking—hanging our clothes in the wardrobes, putting cutlery and crockery away in the kitchen, and arranging the few trinkets we had between us. Arthur found the picture-hanging kit I'd bought and began hammering in nails for the pictures. Anything we couldn't find a place for immediately, went into the pink bedroom to be dealt with later.

By the time we finished, we were exhausted, and I was starving. Arthur went out to collect Chinese food from a nearby restaurant, and we sat on our new-to-us sofa with plates on our laps, eating and watching TV. Arthur ate more than I'd seen him eat at one time in a while.

Later, we went to bed together for the first time in our new home. When we woke in each other's arms, I wished I'd arranged a few days off work. It would have been nice to spend more time settling in and being together. Arthur had to work too, and we travelled into the city together, our train journey now a little shorter than it had been from the other direction.

Arthur finished earlier than me after a gig at the children's hospital, and the last couple of hours of my workday dragged. I couldn't wait to get home to him. When I finally left the shelter, I hurried to the station, then sat impatiently fidgeting on the train until it pulled into the station closest to where we lived. I almost ran the rest of the way, my heart pounding with excitement. It was silly, almost as if it was a first date again, but somehow having our own home together, and getting back that first day, thrilled me.

When I got out of the lift, Arthur was waiting in the doorway of the apartment, a big smile on his face. I ran into his arms.

"It's been such a long day. I couldn't wait to see you." I tilted my head back to kiss him.

"I have a surprise for you." He pulled me inside and closed the door. "Will you go and wait in the bedroom, please?"

"Okay." Intrigued, I went into the bedroom and closed the door. I changed out of my work clothes and put on a light-yellow dress. I'd never had many dresses, but Arthur liked the few I had, and I'd added more to my wardrobe in the past couple of months.

I waited what seemed an interminable amount of time, while I listened to sounds coming from the kitchen that indicated he was making dinner.

Eventually, he opened the door. "You can come out now. I'm sorry I was so long."

I followed him into the living room, where our little table was set, with two plates of what looked like a chicken stew with rice, glasses of white wine, and a vase of red roses.

"I w-wanted to do something special." The slight stammer revealed his nervousness, and I slid my arms around him.

"It looks wonderful, Arthur. Thank you."

"I hope it's okay. I got a recipe book and made the meal. I've never cooked anything properly before." He ran a hand through his hair and laughed a little.

"I'm sure it'll be delicious. It smells good." I gave him a kiss and sat down at the table. "Wine, too. What a lovely surprise. And a romantic one." I touched one of the blooms in the vase.

Arthur flushed and laughed some more. He didn't look happy, only anxious. His laughter continued, and he put a hand over his mouth. "S-sorry."

"It's okay. Come and sit down."

When he joined me at the table, I took his hand and sipped my wine. "What's wrong, Arthur? You seem so nervous. This is all wonderful. Are you worried I won't like the food?" I speared a piece of chicken and put it in my mouth. Flavours exploded on my tongue—tomatoes and herbs, a spike of pepper, garlic. "It's mouth-watering. If this is your first try at cooking from a recipe book, you should definitely do it more often. Relax. Let's eat."

He picked at his food and drank his wine quickly. His knees bounced under the table, and his hands shook. I knew something was bothering him, but I couldn't figure it out. He had episodes of being very down—that was always going to happen—and sometimes the slightest thing would upset him, and he'd laugh hysterically. But tonight, he'd gone to all this trouble to make a romantic dinner for me, and he wasn't enjoying it. He looked ready to either burst out laughing again, or cry.

Suddenly, he put his knife and fork down and clenched his fists. "I can't do this anymore!" he blurted.

My heart plummeted, and I put my cutlery down, too. I struggled to swallow the food in my mouth and washed it down quickly with wine. "What? What do you mean?" A knot formed in my stomach as I waited for him to explain. Instead, he burst into hysterical laughter.

"Arthur?" I stared at him, terrified.

"I'm s-sorry," he said again. "I mean, I can't, I can't sit here and eat when I'm so n-nervous. Oh, God, Audra. I'm sorry." He reached across the table and grasped both of my hands. "I didn't mean it to sound like I don't want to be here with you. I love you so much. I'm just scared you'll say no."

"Say no?" I knew I was missing something important.

"Sorry. I'm doing this all wrong. You see? I'm useless. Why would you…?" He pulled his hands free and ran them through his hair. Then suddenly, he leapt out of his seat and threw himself to his knees on the floor. I stared, gradually catching on as he righted himself onto one knee and pulled a small box out of his pocket. By the time he turned his scarlet face up to look at me, the smile on my face was enormous. "Audra, will you marry me?" He spat out the words quickly as if to get it over with before he lost his nerve completely.

"Yes," I answered immediately. Any delay would only make things worse for him. "I'd love to marry you, Arthur. I love you."

"Oh! Good. I thought—" He coughed. "Never mind." He fumbled open the box and offered me a ring—a narrow gold band set with a small diamond. "It's not much. I don't have much money. I saved up and I got the best I could. I hope you like it. Sorry." He flushed more than ever and took the ring out of the box with trembling fingers.

"It's perfect, Arthur. It's beautiful." I held out my hand so he could slip it onto my finger. "It's the perfect size, too. Thank you." I cupped his face in my hands and bent to press my lips to his. "I'm sorry you were so worried. You had no reason to be. Don't you know how much I love you?"

"I do, I've just never done this before." He chuckled and returned to his chair. "I was rehearsing it before you got home. It went much better when you weren't here. I was so anxious, I forgot what I wanted to say."

"You said all that was needed. I can't wait to marry you, Arthur."

"Me too." He lifted my hand to his lips and kissed my finger.

"Let's finish this lovely dinner."

"I'm glad you like it. I'll make a special meal for you every week from now on. That recipe book I bought says it has a hundred meals in it to choose from."

"We'll have to work our way through it."

We finished the dinner and the wine, then Arthur went to wash the dishes and refused to let me lift one finger to help. I sat on the couch waiting for him, smiling and hugging myself. Who would have thought the person who had once followed me and whom I'd thought was a creep, would turn out to be the man I'd dreamed of meeting one day, and assumed I never would?

I wondered what our wedding day would be like. Neither of us had anyone worth inviting, other than Sophie and maybe a couple of my co-workers. A quiet affair with something like a picnic afterwards might be nice. Arthur would certainly like that—he wouldn't want a lot of fuss and drama and attention. I imagined myself as Mrs Audra Fleck, and my smile grew wider.

Arthur appeared and flopped onto the couch beside me. "What are you thinking about?"

"What do you think I'm thinking about?" I leaned closer and kissed him. "I was thinking about how happy I am."

"I am, too." He slid his arms around me and hugged me tight. "I've never been this happy. I still have bad days and that's not going to change. But you make me smile and it's real. I'm not just putting on a happy face. I love you."

"I love you, too." I pressed myself against him. He was everything I'd always wanted, and this was the first day of the rest of our lives.