Molly was curled on her couch in a tense ball. Karli, at the other end of the couch, helped herself to more popcorn.
‘Don’t miss this, Karli. I cry every time. Look. He hears Big Ben, and he stops, and—’ Molly’s voice broke on a sob. ‘He turns.’ She hugged her knees. ‘See the look on his face?’
‘Ohhh …’ Karli let out a hushed breath. ‘You can see he really, really loves her.’
‘I know. It’s so beautiful.’ Molly reached for tissues as the gorgeous hero stood alone on the bridge, stricken-faced, shoulders squared, waiting for the woman in the long fur coat to turn back to him.
Karli grabbed a cushion and clutched it to her chest. ‘He’ll chase after her.’
‘No. It’s up to her now. If she doesn’t turn back, he knows she doesn’t love him.’
On the screen, a red double-decker London bus slowed to a stop and the movie’s heroine, in her ankle-length, glamorous coat, hurried to catch it.
‘No,’ Karli moaned as the bus took off with the woman on board, and the camera switched to another close-up of the hero’s grimly devastated face. ‘Don’t tell me it’s a sad ending.’
Molly pressed her lips together to stop herself from speaking. The camera tracked upwards to a bird’s eye view of London, showing the silvery River Thames curving below, and the Houses of Parliament, Big Ben … the solitary figure of the hero standing on Westminster Bridge … and the red bus driving away.
Karli was scowling. Molly hugged her knees tighter, gratified that her friend was hooked into the tension.
The camera climbed higher still, and the London bus was matchbox-size. The sounds of the city traffic were replaced by music—violins swelling with lush and aching beauty.
Molly had seen this movie more than a dozen times, but tears still rolled down her cheeks.
And then … at last …
At last …
The bus stopped.
The tiny figure of the heroine emerged …
The camera swooped down once more, zooming closer and closer as the lovers ran towards each other, arms outstretched, embracing at last.
The credits began to roll. Karli wrinkled her nose. ‘OK. I admit that wasn’t bad.’
‘Not bad?’ Molly sniffed. ‘I suppose that’s why you practically bit a piece out of my sofa cushion? Come on—admit it’s amazing. The look on Christian’s face when he thinks he’s lost Vanessa is the most emotional moment in cinematic history.’ She gave a dramatic sigh. ‘And London has to be the most romantic city in the world.’
Shrugging, Karli reached for more popcorn. ‘Isn’t Paris supposed to be the most romantic city?’
‘No way. Not for me. Paris is—Paris is … Oh, I don’t know.’ Molly gave a helpless flap of her hands. ‘Paris just … isn’t London.’
‘Admit it, Mozza. You have a thing for English guys. You’re convinced that London is full of perfect gentlemen.’
It was best to ignore her friend’s sarcasm. Molly wasn’t going to admit that it held a grain—OK, maybe even more than a grain—of truth. Her love affair with London was deeply personal.
Pressing the remote to turn the set off, she went to the window and looked out into the night. The moon was almost full and it silvered the tall pines on the headland and the smooth, sparkling surface of the Coral Sea.
‘One thing’s for sure,’ she said. ‘Nothing romantic like that is ever going to happen to me. Not on this island.’
‘Oh, I don’t know. Our island might not have Big Ben or Westminster Bridge, but the moonlight on Picnic Bay’s not bad. I wasn’t complaining when Jimbo proposed.’
Molly smiled as she turned from the window. ‘Sorry. I wasn’t counting you and Jimbo. You guys are as romantic as it gets—best friends since kindergarten. Everyone here knew you’d end up together.’
‘Well, to be honest, it’s not exactly romantic when your husband spends half his life away on a fishing trawler.’
‘I guess.’ Molly moved to the kitchen and reached for a saucepan to make hot chocolate. ‘I shouldn’t keep watching that movie. It always makes me restless—makes me want to take off and live in London.’
‘Does it have to be London? If you want to get off the island, why don’t you try Sydney or Brisbane? Even Cairns?’
Molly rolled her eyes. As if any Australian city could live up to her vision of England’s famous capital. For as long as she could remember, she’d been entranced by London—by its history, its buildings, its pageantry, its culture.
She loved all the names—like Portobello Road, the Serpentine, Piccadilly Circus and Battersea. For her they had a thrilling, magical ring. Like poetry.
Karli shrugged. ‘If I went overseas, I’d rather go to America. Jimbo’s going to take me to Las Vegas.’
‘Wow. When?’
‘One day. Ha-ha. If either of us ever gets a job with better pay.’
‘Money’s my problem, too. The mortgage on this place uses up most of my savings. And the rent in London’s horrendous. I’ve checked on the internet.’
‘But you might be able to manage it if you rented out this place.’
Molly shuddered. Renting this cottage would mean a series of strangers living here, and it wouldn’t seem right when it had been her gran’s home for more than fifty years.
‘Or,’ said Karli, ‘what about a house swap? That way you’d get to pick who lives here, and it would only be for a short time. My cousin in Cairns swapped with a couple from Denmark, and it worked out fine.’
‘A house swap?’ A tingling sensation danced down Molly’s spine. ‘How does that work?’
Patrick Knight glared at the towering pile of paperwork on his desk, and then he glared at his watch. Past eight already, and he would be here for hours yet.
Grimacing, he picked up his mobile phone and thumbed a hasty text message. Angela was not going to like this, but it couldn’t be helped.
Ange, so sorry. Snowed under at work. Will have to bow out of tonight. Can we make a date for Friday instead? P
Snapping the phone closed, Patrick reached for the next folder in the pile. His stomach growled, and along with his hunger pangs he felt a surge of frustration.
The past years of global financial crisis had seen his job in London’s banking world morph from an interesting and challenging career into a source of constant stress.
It was like working in a war zone. Too many of his colleagues had been fired, or had resigned. Some had even suffered nervous breakdowns. At times he’d felt like the last man standing.
Yes, it was true that he had saved a couple of major accounts, but he was doing the work of three people in his department, and the shower of commendations from his boss had rather lost their shine. He’d reached the point where he had to ask why he was slogging away, working ridiculous hours and giving everything he had to his job, when his life outside the office was—
Non-existent.
Truth was, he no longer had a life away from the bank. No time to enjoy the lovely house he’d bought in Chelsea, no time to go out with his latest girlfriend. How he’d managed to meet Angela in the first place was a miracle, but almost certainly she would give up on him soon—just as her predecessors had.
As for the crazy, crazy promise he’d once made to himself that he would balance his working life with writing