Page 79 of Counting Down To You

“What if it is?” It’s stupid, the way that makes my heart skip. “Need to change or anything first?”

“You want to go now?” I don’t know why I’m sounding so surprised at everything he says.

“Sure,” he says with a shrug. “Why not?”

And he’s right. Why the hell not?

That’s the spirit, Al.

“Okay. Let me just grab a jumper.” I head to my bedroom, though he doesn’t follow. “You can come in, you know,” I call back to the kitchen. It feels odd for him to loiter there, given what’s happened between us.

He comes to sit on the end of my bed while I open drawers to find a clean jumper. I try not to think about how natural it feels to have him in here—that kind of thinking is only going to make things difficult. I try, too, not to think of him in bed last night as I turn to face him, holding a blue jumper.

His mouth quirks up in the way I’m starting to love. “If you keep looking at me like that, we’re not going to get far on the lunch front.”

I cock my head. “Would that be so bad?”

In answer, he nods toward the calendar on my bedside table. “This it?”

I tense automatically as I pull the jumper over my head. He knows about it, obviously, but showing it to someone is different. “Yep,” I say, as casually as I can.

“What’s the latest challenge?” he asks.

“I haven’t opened today’s yet.”

I move toward the bed, sit down next to him. And although it makes me feel vulnerable, sharing the experience, I pull the calendar toward me and open the next square.

I read it then laugh, shaking my head.

“What is it?”

I show it to him and love how gently he takes the piece of paper, like it is something special.

Take a trip to Paris and climb the Eiffel Tower—because I cannot believe we never got around to doing it.

Leo looks at me. “You’ve never climbed the Eiffel Tower?”

“Nope. I’ve never been to Paris, believe it or not.” Robyn and I were going to take a trip there, but somehow never got round to it. I suppose we always thought there would be ample time to do all these things.

“So you’re supposed to go to Paris now?” Leo asks.

“Not right now,” I say. “Ideally I have to do it before Christmas, but I don’t know how she was expecting me to pull that off, so as long as I do it by next December that still counts.” But I feel a little sad, because apart from one challenge—call your brother—I’m on a winning streak. And I like to think I’ve been making Robyn proud, throwing myself into it like this.

“It’s just been nice, doing them as they come, that’s all,” I say out loud.

He nods thoughtfully. “Well, there’s no reason we couldn’t go to Paris.”

I frown. “Like, now?”

“Sure.”

I laugh. “You’re kidding, right?”

That shrug again. “Why not? We can get a flight from Geneva, which is about an hour and a half away. I need to check flights, but if we leave now I reckon we could be there in time for dinner.”

I stare at him. He’s serious. “But we can’t just…leave. We have work.”

He grins. “Good thing I’m the manager, then, isn’t it? And we’re off today anyway. We’ll be back by tomorrow evening.”