‘Sara Pearson… actually, what is your real name? Your maiden name?’
‘Lee.’
‘As in the gateau?’
‘Uh-huh.’
‘Sara Lee. You are an enigma to me.’
‘Ooh, this is rhyming,’ I said, giggling.
‘And from the first time I saw… thee, I thought she’s the kind of girl, I want to be… with.’
‘Ahhh, and it was going so well. I thought you might get ha, ha, ha, hee, hee, hee, in there somewhere.’
Henrik laughed. ‘I had to get you smiling somehow when you arrived.’
‘Well, it worked.’
‘Do I need to ask you to be my girlfriend then? Is this a permission thing? Shall I phone your dad and talk him through where we’re up to on the physical front?’
‘Er, no, that won’t be necessary, but feel free to ask me, officially.’
Henrik took my hand and looked at me very seriously. ‘Sara Lee, of the non-gateau Lees, will you make me the happiest man on earth and agree to be my girlfriend?’
I pretended to think about it, then took his other hand. ‘I will. And will you, Henrik Nilsen, of the Firefly Forest Nilsens, consider the position of my boyfriend? To have and to hold?’
‘I do… accept thee’s… proposal.’
‘Then it is done,’ I said, and kissed him.
‘Good. Can we have dessert now?’
There was a table full of cakes in the middle of the tipi and every single one had been made by a member of the family.Bløtkake– cream cake – cheesecake, chocolate cake, lemon cake, every flavour and shape and size imaginable was in there somewhere. And then there was the wedding cake. Thekransekake.An enormous cone of cake rings that got smaller as they reached the top.
‘What a beauty, eh?’ Henrik plucked out one of the decorative Norwegian flags and stuck it in my dessert.
‘In case I forget where I am?’
‘The flag just makes me think of you, now. It’s burnt into my brain.’
‘Funny that,’ I said, raising my eyebrows.
Greta and Jonas cut the cake, laughing as it nearly toppled over and the mustachio-men chopped it up and passed it round with more champagne. Everyone drank and talked and laughed until it was finally time for the first dance.
‘Remember the drill?’ Henrik asked, holding my hand.
I nodded. Greta and Jonas had asked the family to join them once the first dance was a few lines in. They didn’t want to be alone on the dance floor for more than twenty seconds.
Tore was doing well in his role as master of ceremonies, among all the other roles he was performing, as he announced the new Mr and Mrs Nilsen for the final time and invited them onto the dance floor.
Jonas twirled his way into the middle of the crowd and held out his hand to Greta. Her silver and gold dress sparkling in the candlelight; the train now bustled up at the back as she curled into Jonas’s chest and he put his arms around her. The violinists had been joined by two guitars and an accordion, and the whole room went quiet as they started to play, watching another Nilsen love story unfold in front of them. A moment in time that would never be repeated as the newly-weds stared into each other’s eyes, dreamy and lost. I was so touched that I totally missed our cue – not that the happy couple seemed to have any idea who was dancing and who wasn’t.
‘May I have this dance?’ Henrik asked, holding out his hand.
‘Yes you may.’
We joined Tore and Ethel, Fredrik and Ingrid and Bjorn and Nina in a slow dance, full of smiles as the music washed over us all.
