‘You have? Seriously?’ I can’t think of a single thing I could have taught him.
‘Yeah. Like… seize the day. You don’thaveto plan everything in advance. Neatness and tidiness and forward planning are not the be-all and end-all. You’re pretty amazing, and – at times – not in a bad way atall, occasionally a little bit chaotic. In a good way.’
‘Erm?’
‘It’s a compliment,’ he assures me. ‘Really. A big compliment. As in, being around you, I’ve been questioning the way I am. Like… maybe I could, I don’t know, almostlivea little more.’
‘Wow.’
‘And by the way,’ he continues, ‘I can’t think of any resolutions you could possiblyneedto make. I mean, I’m not saying you shouldn’t, obviously, and I’m sure they do help, and we could probably all tweak our exercise, diet or sleep for the better, but equally I do think you’re amazing and I wouldn’t change anything about you.’
‘Wow,’ I repeat. ‘Thank you. That’s lovely.’ I turn to face him. ‘I wouldn’t change anything about you either.’
‘Well, you see, I would change stuff about myself. I do think I should seize the day more.’
‘Do you really?’ I ask. ‘Because I’ve had a little idea.’ I feel like the conversation’s got a little too serious. I needfunthis evening. And Dominic has just effectively said that he would like to do more fun stuff.
‘Have you?’ Dominic asks cautiously, suddenly looking like no, he definitely doesn’t want to be seizing any days.
‘I’ve never ever skinny-dipped in my life,’ I tell him.
‘Right.’
‘And I’m thinking that if you’regoingto skinny-dip, here must be a great place for it.’
‘Right.’ Dominic looksveryunenthusiastic.
‘And it’s New Year’s Eve. In Cape Town. On the beach. I’m feeling like it would bewrongnot to do it.’
‘Right.’
‘Dominic Rock,’ I scold. ‘You sound like you’re going to object to a spontaneous, seize-the-day moment straight off, in the first minutes of the new year.’
‘But we don’t have swimming costumes and we’d get wet.’
‘Yes,’ I confirm. ‘The literal definition of skinny-dip.’
‘Erm.’
I look at him, and raise my eyebrows sternly.
And suddenly he laughs, and says, ‘Let’s do it.’
14
DOMINIC
Seize the day. Be spontaneous.Livelife.
Now that I’ve committed to this, I’m doing it. I unbutton my shirt, take it off and then fold it and place it several feet back from the edge of the water, on a rock, so that there should be no possibility of it getting wet.
Flavia lifts her eyebrows again, and I say, ‘Okay, no, I’m sorry, there’s seizing the day and there’s being stupid. I am not walking back to the hotel naked, so I want my clothes to be dry.’
‘You do actually make a fair point,’ she says thoughtfully, before reaching behind her to unbutton her dress. She wriggles out of it, before walking over to the rock in her underwear and placing the dress on top of my shirt.
She looks gorgeous. Better than gorgeous. Possibly the sexiest sight I’ve ever seen. And, oh my God, she’s unhooking her bra now and taking it off. And, yes, I’ve seen her naked. Obviously. Quite a lot today. We had a shower together earlier. But we werebusyat that point, having sex. This feels much more… intimate in a way. Then we were caught up in the heat of the moment and I didn’t have time to justlook, and appreciate. Now, she’s undressed in front of me in a way that indicates that she fully trusts me. I mean, very few people will undress in front of just anyone, and going by our conversation about strippers a couple of days ago, Flavia is not one of those people.
She places her bra on top of her dress and then stands and looks at me with her hands on her hips, her eyes narrowed.
