Читать книгу One Summer Night - Emily Bold - Страница 5

Eight Months Before, on A Summer Night

The bonfire in front of the house was blazing high into the night sky. It was late, yet still too early to end the evening. This was an evening that no one wanted to end . . . The children had pulled the last of the marshmallows from their sticks, and their mouths were glistening with gooey sugar. Happy and with a full belly, four-year-old Alyssa was snuggled into her mother’s arms, her tired eyes closed. Her blonde curls framed a tender face, and Lauren felt as if she had never before witnessed anything so peaceful. Even thirteen-year-old Mia was tired. Lauren knew only too well that she had not been able to catch much sleep these past few nights. And she wasn’t the only one. When Lauren glanced around, she looked into many tired faces. Familiar faces – beloved faces. Her family and best friends had gathered here tonight to be happy and together one last time. To celebrate life and the gift of time that they had been given. But they had also gathered to say goodbye. A goodbye that none of them wanted – but one that was, after all, of her own choosing. A goodbye that felt right and reassuring but that was painful nonetheless.

‘You have no idea how much it means to me to be spending this night here at the lake house with all of you. It’s my favorite place in the entire world – the place I have chosen, and it makes me happy to have all of you around me one last time. You are the lifeblood of this house – my lifeblood.’

Lauren couldn’t help but smirk at her choice of words. Ordinarily, she wasn’t one for waxing poetic, but in this moment even the simplest of facts seemed to somehow exit her mouth wrapped in only weighty phrases.

‘Truth be told you are the best thing about me!’ she laughed and made a point of looking into every single face. They all returned her gaze, smiling – the way she had wanted. Somewhere between her best friend Rachel and her husband Tim she closed her eyes to fight down the tears she had expressively denied herself from having.

No tears today, she had asked. And up until this moment they had all managed to allow only positive thoughts. But the longer the night went on, the clearer it became to Lauren that everything they wanted to say needed to be said right now. Tim must have noticed the change in her mood from her voice, because he got up from his spot by the fire and walked over to her. Sitting down behind her on the bench, he wrapped his arms around her and Alyssa.

‘I love you,’ he whispered – but this was no secret. Lauren leaned against him. What a lovely moment this was!

‘There are moments in life that change everything all at once. Moments that pull the ground from under you and destroy everything you hold important,’ she mused, and her eyes rested on the twitching flames of the bonfire. ‘But there are also moments that seem completely inconspicuous at first glance, and yet they turn out to be the most important moments of your life.’ She gave Tim a smile. ‘We had such moments, Tim and I. Good, bad – a little bit of everything. And even if I always thought we would treasure them for the little treasures that they are, they’re now slipping away.’

She sounded defeated and grasped Tim’s hands, looking for comfort.

‘And yet . . . There is so much left that we cling to, because letting go would mean we have reached the end of the line. Do you remember how Tim and my story started? Fourteen years ago . . . ?’ she looked around, and pressed a gentle kiss on her husband’s chin. ‘Because that was that kind of moment.’