Smile, Alice

  “Just wait a little longer.”

  We arrive at the hotel and even I admit, it’s fancy as fuck. I instruct her to wait by the elevators and put her earbuds in while I check in. I don’t want her figuring out where we are at the last hurdle.

  As soon as the key card is in my hand, I grab our cases and a huge grin appears on my face. She goes to pull out her earphones, but I put them back in.

  She plays along in the elevator, and gasps when she sees the suite I booked for us. “Can I take these out now?” she yells a little loudly and I nod.

  I hold my hand out and she walks over and lets me lead her to the window. In the distance is the Eiffel Tower, a big clue to our location.

  “We’re in Paris,” she whispers.

  “Joel told me about wanting to come here ever since he had a crush on a French exchange student at his school.”

  She laughs not able to peel her eyes away from the tower.

  “She was his first crush, he used to get so nervous around her, his mates would wind him up something crazy. It surprises me he would want to come here.”

  “Well, he did and we’re here. Let’s go and find somewhere to eat, I’m starving.”

  We leave our cases unpacked and head out. The streets are busy and I keep Alice close.

  “Everywhere we’ve been I could see Joel there, but I can’t picture him enjoying Paris. I mean, I think it’s beautiful and I’m happy to be here, but I think Joel would’ve been bored here,” she says, as we come to a stop outside a restaurant.

  “He must’ve had his reasons, he spoke about Paris a couple of times with me.”

  “Strange,” she murmurs.

  My stomach growls at me and I look around us. The restaurant we’re stood outside of looks good enough, I need to eat and soon.

  “Shall we eat here?”

  “As long as we don’t have to eat snails and such,” she smiles, scrunching her nose up.

  “I was thinking of a burger packed with everything I can think of.”

  “Sounds good.”

  There is a table available when we walk in and we’re seated and browsing the menu in no time.

  The place is picturesque and lit with candles on every table. A waiter takes our order and Alice goes quiet while we wait for our drinks.

  One thing I’ve learned about her, is she doesn’t fill the silences with pointless conversation. Sometimes she’s happy to sit and take in the world around her, and I’m happy enough to watch her.

  Sometimes though, she is quiet for too long. Like right now.

  “What’s going through your head?” I ask to break the silence.

  “I’m not going to ask what the itinerary is while we’re here, but I know at some point we’re going to scatter the last of Joel’s ashes and then he’ll be gone.”

  “The last was always bound to be the hardest, but I’ll be right by your side,” I promise her.

  Normally she gives me a smile when I promise soft shit to her, but not tonight. She’s sad and needs to get more off her chest before I’ll see her crack.

  It’s another thing I’ve learned about her, she bottles everything up until it drowns her but when she offloads, she swims back up to the surface.

  “After he passed, I had the funeral to focus on, then you whisked me around the world to set him free. I’ve never liked the unknown and while you’ve kept me distracted, the unknown is sneaking up on me again.”

  “What if you had a plan to work with?” I ask.

  “What kind of plan?”

  “I don’t know, something that will keep your mind busy.”

  “I would jump on it.”

  “While we’re here, we’ll think of something for you to do.”

  She seems happier now and I hold her hand across the table.

  “Do you have a plan for yourself when you return home?” she asks.

  I have many plans and she’s included in every single one.

  “Slate wants to catch me up on everything I’ve missed, and he’s been asking if I’ve still been writing. He’ll probably want us working on a new album. This is the longest we’ve had off and he’s probably freaking out,” I chuckle.

  I’ve been writing non-stop over the last six months, I probably have enough for two albums, not that I’m going to tell Slate that, he’ll push us until he’s squeezed out every lyric from us.

  Our food is brought out and I release her hand. Before I met Alice and Joel, my life consisted of looking out for myself. Life changed so fast in a matter of weeks and now six months on, I find myself putting her before me without noticing I’m doing it half of the time.

  After spending the day wondering around the streets of Paris and taking a tour of the famous catacombs, our day ends with a trip up the Eiffel Tower. If all goes to plan, this will be the most memorable night of our lives filled with bitter-sweet memories. When hardship breathes, light always has to be near by to get through. I pray I’m Alice’s light.

  Since this is the last spreading of Joel’s ashes, it was pointless carrying his urn around. Alice transferred the remainder into a small jar she found at a market this morning and her hands shake as she pulls it out of her purse.

  “Are we allowed to do this up here?” she asks, looking around us as we step out.

  “Just do it, no one can stop it once it’s done,” I shrug.

  She undoes the lid and I lean on the railings, enclosing her between my arms, giving her a little more privacy.

  “I don’t understand why you wanted to be scattered here, but here we are, little brother. You got what you wanted, I haven’t been home in six months and I haven’t cried…much. I miss you like mad, but I’m doing okay, and Damon is here with me just like you hoped he would be,” she pauses and takes a deep breath, “I don’t know where life is taking me next, but I know I’ll see you again one day, baby brother.”

  With one last deep inhale of breath, she reaches out and tips the jar, allowing his ashes to fly into the wind.

  “It’s weird, he’s been gone for six months, but it’s only now I can’t feel him around me.”

  “That’s your head doing the talking, listen to your heart and you know he’s everywhere.”

  She hasn’t shed a tear in two months, which doesn’t mean she hasn’t been sad, it just means, she hasn’t cried, but tonight, a heavy tear falls quickly followed by another.

  “Where do I go from here?” she asks, desperate for me to give her the answers.

  Instead, I dig my phone out of my back pocket and hand it to her.

  “Go to the gallery, there’s one last video for you to watch. I’m hoping you’ll know where to go when you’re done.”

  There’s only one video on my phone and when I hear Joel’s voice, I dig my hand into my pocket and I clasp my fingers around the most importantly ring of my life.

  I watch on with her and Joel is sitting up in bed in the hotel after getting out of the hospital. I remember every second of this clip.

  “I’m not stupid, I know something is going on with you and my sister,” he says.

  “Joel, I’m not taking advantage of her.”

  “I know that,” he laughs, “Alice doesn’t let anyone that close if she doesn’t want you near her. What do you think of her?”

  “She’s fucking beautiful, and strong, stubborn and caring and devoted. She’s wifey material.”

  “I’d say yes.”

  “Not that I’m proposing to her, but I am falling for her. She makes me think of this shit, she makes me think of my future. I’ve never known anyone like her.”

  “Since our dad isn’t around, I’ll give you my blessing, you know, for when the time comes. Oh, and she’d die if you did it in Paris. Make up some shit about me wanting to go there or something. I used to have the biggest crush on our French exchange student, use that.”

  “Well, that time is a long way off and she fights me on everything, but I’ll bear it in mind.”

  The video ends and I push away from the railings
and drop to one knee.

  “Why did you show me this?” she asks, hesitantly, keeping her back to me.

  “Turn around.”

  She doesn’t move.

  “Alice, turn around, darling.”

  As she moves, I hold the ring up and grin when her eyes widen to the point I think they could pop out.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Alice Butler…”

  “Shut your mouth, don’t say anything and get up.”

  “As my future wife, you’re going to have to learn when to shut your mouth and accept surprises, gifts, and everything else you can’t control. Are you gonna shut your mouth now?”

  She swallows heavily and nods reluctantly.

  “Alice Butler,” I begin, again, “I fell in love with you during a time I had no business expecting anything in return, and yet you still gave me more than I needed. Your ability to love as hard as you do is what I live for now, to be worthy of falling in love with every day. I’m sure I’m going to annoy the shit out of you a lot, but I vow I will always make it up to you and keep you smiling. I love you, Alice, and I can’t picture my future without you. Will you marry me?”

  She stands there and stares at me like she’s seeing an alien before her. Her reluctance to give me an answer starts to rattle me and now I’m nervous.

  “Babe? I kinda need an answer,” I urge her.

  Instead of giving any hint of an answer, she lowers herself down onto her knees before me and I’m not so sure of a positive outcome anymore.

  I’ve always been one to take risks, but most of them have been calculated to ensure the right outcome.

  “Are you sure you want to spend the rest of your life with me?”

  “I’ve never been so sure of anything in my life,” I assure her.

  “You want me every day of every year, forever?”

  “Forever,” I promise.

  “Forever is a long time…”

  “Alice,” I growl, “You’re killing me here, I’m promising you forever, nothing less and everything more.”

  She looks down at the ring and I don’t miss her slightly cringe at its large size, but I don’t take offence, her cringing at such an extravagant expense is who she is. Money has always been tight for her, having to make every penny stretch. If she knew how much this ring cost, she’d probably verbally slap me.

  “Yes, I’ll marry you,” she smiles, and pounces forward and kisses me.

  Thank fuck.

  I didn’t realise how tense I was leading up to this moment. It drifts away hearing her answer and I pull away from her. The sooner I get my ring on her, the better.

  Reaching for her hand, I slide the ring on her fourth finger and it’s a perfect fit.

  “It’s…big,” she grins, scrutinizing the diamond.

  “It’s not the first time you’ve said that,” I tease her.

  Her head falls back as she laughs, and I move closer to her.

  “Trust you to make a joke out of this.”

  “Hey, you’re the one who kept me waiting,” I retort.

  Her eyes sparkle under the lights above us and she places her hand on my cheek. For once, she is warm, and I soak her in.

  “I feel like I’m dreaming,” she says, quietly.

  “As long as I’m the one you always dream about, you can feel what you want.”

  “I love you, Damon.”

  “I love you too.”

  Spring has sprung in England but it’s still fucking cold. Inside Alice’s house, it’s even colder. Thick coats of dust have settled on her furniture and the place feels empty of all human trace. I fall onto the small couch and watch Alice run her finger along the dresser, holding frame after frame of photographs.

  “Are you doing okay?” I ask.

  “The day Joel and I were given this house, we only had the bare essentials. On the first night, we walked down to the fish and chip shop and brought back dinner, a large portion of chips to share and two fish cakes, we laid a blanket down on the floor and neither of us said a word while we ate. We finally had a home again.”

  “I can’t imagine what life must’ve been like back then for you.”

  “At the time, it was scary and hard, but when I look back now, it was the best time of my life.”

  And then she smiles.

  She wipes the dust of her finger and swirls around, forming a plan of action. I know this look on her, she’s thinking at a mile a minute.

  “Remember, you can keep as much as you want, you can ship it all if that’s what you want,” I remind her.

  “Joel didn’t have any love for the furniture,” she chuckles, “I just want the personal things.”

  Standing up, I build the boxes up and Alice wraps the photo frames in bubble wrap before packing them away.

  As soon as she said yes to my proposal, I was forming my own plans for the future. She has nothing to stay for in England and it didn’t take long to convince her to make the move to America.

  It doesn’t take long before she has everything packed that she wants to take with us and everything else is ready to be collected by a local charity she found in her area. I don’t know if it’s a blessing or sad it didn’t take much time, but when I catch her fighting against the wave of sadness that still catches her off guard, I know it’s a blessing.

  A fresh start is what she needs and for once, she isn’t shying away from it, she’s embracing it and I’ll be right at her side.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Damon

  We collapse on the bed as soon as we arrive at the house where it all began, and Alice curls up against me.

  “I never saw the inside of this room the last time we were here,” she murmurs, mid-yawn.

  “I wanted you in here from the moment I saw you in the hospital. I wasn’t expecting you at all, and then when you were here, you seemed to be wherever the guys were and not me. If you weren’t going off with Riv, you were standing half naked with Freddie.”

  She’s too tired to laugh but I feel her chest rapidly move up and down against me.

  “Seriously, we were just talking and that morning with Freddie was bad timing.”

  “I know, what I’m trying to say is, I’ve wanted you for a long time and now we’re for keeps.”

  She presses her lips to my chest, too tired to lean up and find my mouth.

  “You always know the right things to say.”

  With nothing left to be said, we fall asleep in each other arms.

  I’m alone when I wake. The room is in darkness and when I see the time is after midnight, I shoot out of bed. I’ve been asleep for over thirteen hours.

  After a quick shower, I slip into my jeans and plod downstairs. I hear River before I see anyone and find them out the back. Alice is tucked up under a blanket on a lounger and River is poking the dying flames in the fire pit.

  “Hey, look who’s awake,” he booms and walks over to me.

  I haven’t seen the guys in three months, only via video calls, and he throws his arms around me.

  “It’s good to have you home, man,” he cheers and releases me.

  I join Alice and slip behind her on the lounger.

  “Where’s Freddie and Baz?” I ask him.

  “Fred’s asleep upstairs and Baz is…somewhere,” he drifts off.

  “Where is somewhere?”

  He flicks his eyes at Alice and I know he’s hiding something from me. Sighing, he sits himself down on the lounger one over from ours and clasps his hands together.

  “We don’t know, he shows his face a couple of times a week and disappears again,” he tells me.

  “Why?”

  “He hasn’t been the same since…we came back from the funeral.”

  Alice tenses in my lap and I slide my hand around her waist. I’ve spoken to Baz as much as the others over the last six months and I haven’t noticed any difference in him.

  “Why didn’t any of you say anything?”

  “We’ve been looking out for him, w
e didn’t want to ruin your time away, you both deserved a break from everything.”

  “You should’ve said, I would’ve come back.”

  “And that’s why we didn’t. Plus, he didn’t want us telling you.”

  This hurts. I’ve known Baz since we were in Kindergarten and he hasn’t kept anything from me before.

  “When was he last here?” Alice asks.

  “Three nights ago.”

  “And you don’t know where he is now?” I ask next.

  He shakes his head.

  “We’ll go out in the morning if he doesn’t return tonight, I have an announcement to make and I want all my family here. Actually, we’re going to find him now.”

  River is relieved more than anything and I want to get to the bottom of Baz’s disappearances.

  “I’ll meet you in the car.”

  He leaves us alone and I notice Alice isn’t wearing her engagement ring. Lifting her left hand, I rub my thumb over her fourth finger, it feels wrong.

  “Why aren’t you wearing your ring?”

  “I thought you’d want to tell everyone, and I woke up a while ago and didn’t want to explain it on my own.”

  She pulls it out of her shorts pocket and slips it back on.

  “I kept it close,” she says.

  “Don’t take it off.”

  I’m surprised how much it was a punch to my gut not seeing her wearing it.

  “What are you going to do about Baz?”

  “I don’t know, but we’ve been gone for six months and he’s been here, and fuck knows what he’s been up to. You should try and get some more sleep, I’ll wake you when I get back.”

  “Okay.”

  I walk with her back up to our room and while she snuggles down under the sheets, I get dressed and throw on my hoodie and tie my hair back. Grabbing my sunglasses and a baseball cap, I lean across the bed and wish I was joining her. Instead, I place a soft kiss on her warm lips and tear myself away from her before I decide to hunt down Baz in the morning.

  “I’ll see you soon.”

  I make it halfway across the room before she says, “I hope he’s okay.”

  “So do I.”