Page 42 of Italy and Forever

She was grinning beneath the camera body. ‘So some moments are perfect after all?’ she teased. With a final adjustment to the lens, she pressed the shutter release. Bringing the camera down from her eye, she turned it over in her hands, inspecting the housing. ‘It’s really strange that I can’t see the picture yet.’

‘Delayed gratification is a lesson young people need to learn.’

She poked him with her elbow and handed back the camera, fetching her phone from her pocket. Swiping at the screen, she held it up and snapped another photo.

‘Fifty thousand and one,’ she said lightly.

Rhys couldn’t resist. He raised the Minolta and filled the frame with her face. He ignored what he’d learned at college about framing close-ups. This shot wasn’t for an audience anyway. She looked up just as he pressed the button.

‘Thirty-five,’ he commented.

She surprised him by holding out her hand. ‘Can I have one more shot?’

He gave her the camera without hesitating. ‘Why?’

When she lifted it to her eye and pointed it straight at him, he froze. What would she see through the viewfinder? Would his fascination for her be obvious? Or perhaps the shadows that were the only thing he could identify in his own face.

Briefly adjusting the focus, she snapped a shot quickly. ‘I bet you don’t have many photos of yourself.’

It haunted him enough when he looked in the mirror.

‘There you go, thirty-six,’ she said with a quick smile. ‘You can develop that film now.’

17

After a plate of potatoes, cured meat and two fried eggs for a late lunch at the little chalet restaurant in the hills, they headed to the car for the drive back to the reception venue, a mediaeval castle in Bruneck. Rhys was quiet. Ginny assumed he’d used up today’s allowance of patience with her for the photography lesson. Or had it been a philosophy lesson?

He’d probably not intended it, but she was fairly certain he’d caused her existential crisis. Now she was thinking about happiness and the passage of time and how life was fleeting – and how perhaps that was what marriage was about, rather than love and sentiment. The thought was depressing.

The weather had turned while they ate and now a light drizzle sprinkled the valley with silver, a landscape of clouds constantly evolving above. Although the conditions had looked fine for Saturday the last time she’d looked about half an hour ago, it seemed foolish to trust the forecast. At least the gentle light and glistening moisture would suit the aesthetic of an autumn wedding, if they did get rain.

They passed a sign for a high-ropes adventure park and Rhys gestured to it. ‘How are your climbing lessons with Kira going?’

She’d assumed he’d been keeping tabs on her in the gym, but of course he hadn’t even noticed she was there. He’d been climbing himself – despite his accident, she thought with alarm.

‘I thought I made really good progress at first, but recently I don’t seem to be getting any better,’ she answered. ‘Do you still climb a lot? I can’t imagine it was easy to get back up there after your accident.’

He shrugged – typical. ‘I have to keep in practice. I use different types of lines when I’m taking photos, but I still need to be able to set ropes and get up there if necessary. I’ve built my career on it, although at the moment I don’t take as many climbing shots as before.’ He seemed about to say more, but nothing came.

‘Andreas is going with a group tomorrow, although the idea of rock climbing two days before a wedding gives me the willies,’ she commented.

A faint smile. ‘We’re just going to a sport climbing crag, not multi-pitch trad climbing.’ He glanced at her and quickly away again. ‘You should come along.’

‘Ha,’ was all she managed in response. ‘I don’t even know what multi-pitch trad climbing means.’

‘There are some easy routes,’ he continued unexpectedly, because Ginny couldn’t imagine why Rhys would want her to be there. ‘It would be good to push your skills from the gym.’

Why did he care about her skills? ‘I’m never going to be good.’

He took a breath as though he wanted to say something, but released it again. Ginny blinked, reminding herself that conversation between them was always this stilted, and the real mystery was why she kept forgetting that.

Thankful her stomach was full of hearty food, Ginny got back into the driver’s seat of the Fiat. After bouncing down the narrow road and then along the valley, she followed Rhys’s measured instructions to switch onto the main road.

She had a slight panic getting onto the autobahn, navigating two roundabouts and then merging between lorries, but she was quite proud of herself as she cruised along at speed among the black Audis.

Until the next on-ramp. A flashy, low sports car zoomed past her on the right and she had to brake. Then, all of a sudden, the lorry behind her appeared huge in the rear-view mirror and, with a surprisingly gentle clunk, the vehicle drove right into the Fiat’s tail.

‘Shit!’ Ginny cried as she was thrown forward, her foot slipping off the accelerator. Ahead was the sports car, behind, the lorry, and the Fiat seemed determined to make a run for freedom. Punching the button for the hazard lights, she gritted her teeth and wrestled the car straight again, just in time to see another vehicle ahead slip into the left lane and collide with the reckless sports car.