Living Out Loud (Austen, #3)(50)

I sucked in a breath, swinging around to face him. “Will, it’s perfect!”

And as I tugged him toward the blanket, he laughed, and it was the most beautiful sound.

A charcuterie board was stacked with freshly cut meats and cheeses, a basket stuffed with bread was at its side, and another little tray held tiny jars with sauces and spreads. Another board held crackers and more cheese—glorious cheese—and was broken up by bundles of grapes and stacks of apple slices. There were trays of tarts and chocolate-covered strawberries, blocks of white and dark chocolate. It was a bona fide feast, laid out on a navy-and-emerald tartan.

“How in the world did you manage all this?” I asked as I sat, wide-eyed, to one side of the spread.

Will sat opposite me, still looking absolutely delighted. And delightful. “Well, would you think I was an asshole if I said my cook put together the picnic?”

I laughed, a little shocked. He had a cook. Of course he had a cook.

“And then I had my assistant come set it all up and wait for us so no one jacked it.”

I raised my eyebrows, smirking as I stacked cheese and sausage on a cracker. “Your assistant?”

He flushed a little, rubbing the back of his neck, but he was smiling. “I know. It’s ridiculous.”

“Well, thank him for me. Or her?”

“Him.”

I felt a petty measure of relief that it wasn’t a woman. “It’s perfect. Today is perfect. Yesterday was perfect. Everything’s just…”

“Perfect?”

I laughed and popped the cracker in my mouth.

Perfect.

A few hours later, we were sitting in the back of a horse-drawn carriage, circling Central Park. The sun had set, and it had gotten colder, but I was warm, tucked into Will’s side under the heavy blanket.

He’d been the best sport, not teasing me when I broke out my camera a dozen times to note the moments. But I hadn’t told him about my list, which made it that much sweeter when he didn’t lose his patience or seem bored while I fooled with the charcuterie board or when I asked him to take a selfie with me. In fact, he’d asked me to take two so he could have one too.

I sighed, feeling lazy and happy and a little like I was dreaming as we ambled around the park. Neither of us had spoken for a while, the silence between us content, the time marked by the clop of the horse’s hooves and the gentle swaying of the carriage.

“You know,” I started, “when my dad died, I made this list of things I’d never done before.”

He pulled me a little closer but didn’t interrupt.

“We lost so much. Not just him, which was devastating on its own. Mama lost her legs, and we lost our home, our lives. And I wondered, How will we ever survive? How can we dust ourselves off and go on?” I took a slow breath that left me in a puff of smoke. “So, I started writing down all the things I’d never done, things I wanted to do. Ways to fill up my life and my heart. Because I didn’t want to live quietly anymore. I wanted to live loudly. I didn’t want to wait for life to come to me. I didn’t want to experience it through books and music alone; I wanted to do the things that inspired me.”

“Has it worked?” he asked quietly.

“It has. It’s given me hope when I thought hope was lost.”

Will didn’t say anything for a moment, and neither did I.

“So,” he said, breaking the silence, “what kinds of things are on your list?”

“Oh, lots of things—most of them silly, some of them not. Like, I wanted to eat a hot dog out of a cart and traverse the Brooklyn Bridge. There are some books I’ve always wanted to read. I want to eat ice cream when it’s snowing and dance on the beach in the moonlight. I want to live, and my list exists as a way to make that living tangible and achievable.”

Will didn’t speak for a moment, but when he did, his voice had a strange quality to it, velvety and wondrous.

Bright star, would I were stedfast as thou art—

Not in lone splendour hung aloft the night

And watching, with eternal lids apart,

Like nature’s patient, sleepless Eremite,

The moving waters at their priestlike task

Of pure ablution round earth’s human shores…

“I can never remember the—” he started.

And my throat tightened as I recited the rest.

Or gazing on the new soft-fallen mask

Of snow upon the mountains and the moors—

No—yet still stedfast, still unchangeable,

Pillow’d upon my fair love’s ripening breast,

To feel for ever its soft fall and swell,

Awake for ever in a sweet unrest,

Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath,

And so live ever—or else swoon to death.

“Keats,” I breathed. “I love that poem.”

“It describes you exactly, I think. You’re a wonder, Annie. I’ve never known anyone quite like you.”

I turned in his arms and looked into his eyes, emboldened by our connection. “Did you know that this entire date was on my list?”

He smiled. “Is it?”

I nodded, feeling a rush of anticipation zip through me when his gaze dropped to my lips.

“What else is on this list that I should know about?”