‘Are you wearing your locket?’ he asks suddenly, as we wait for the waiter to bring our bill.
‘Yes, of course,’ I reply, pulling it from underneath my top to show him. He smiles before reaching into his pocket.
‘I have a few more charms for you to add.’
My hands tremble slightly as I unwrap the small piece of tissue paper he places in front of me. My smile grows when I find a tiny Eiffel Tower charm inside.
‘You’re taking me to the Eiffel Tower?’ I’ve been to Paris many times and I’ve seen the tower from ground level, but I’ve never been up to the top. When I came with M, touristy things weren’t allowed. When I was older and came alone, it’s something I never wanted to do on my own.
‘Yes.’
‘Can we travel to the top?’ I can hear the excitement in my voice as I speak.
‘You better believe it,’ he says.
I give his hand a squeeze across the table. Removing the necklace from around my neck, I carefully open the glass locket and store the little tower inside with my cake, plane and love charms. Excitement ignites inside me, and all my insecurities seem to vanish.
‘Thank you,’ I say as my eyes meet his.
‘Before you close it, I have one more charm.’ This time he reaches into a different pocket.
I laugh when I see a tiny red high heel inside the tissue paper. ‘It’s so cute.’
‘Well, that’s not really a memory for you. It’s more for me,’ he says with a chuckle. ‘You were wearing those sexy red shoes the day we met. I fucking love those shoes.’
When we arrive at the base of the tower after dinner, we join the end of the long queue to ride the lift to the top. It looks like we’re in for a bit of a wait, but I’m okay with that. It will be worth it.
Ten minutes pass and the line hardly moves. I’m personally not bothered by this, but the way Brock keeps looking at his watch tells me he is.
A short time later, he says, ‘I’ll be back in a second.’ He doesn’t even give me the chance to ask him where he’s going.
When he returns, he reaches for my hand. ‘Come,’ he says, tugging gently on my arm.
‘Where are we going?’
‘Up to the top.’
‘But, the line—’
‘It’s all sorted.’
‘I’m not pushing in, Brock. These people have been waiting too.’ I pull on his hand, trying to stop him, but to no avail. He’s on a mission. Not only do we move to the front of the line, but it appears we’re riding up on our own.
‘They’re on their way up,’ I hear the staff member say into his handheld radio in French.
‘I feel awful for pushing in,’ I say when the doors close. ‘Did you pay them, or something?’
‘Or something,’ Brock replies.
I give him a sceptical look. Something fishy is going on here. Shoving his hands in his pockets, he finally looks at me. He doesn’t say a word, but his face says everything. He looks extremely anxious and that makes my stomach churn for some reason.
‘What’s going on, Brock?’ My arms reach for him as I take a step in his direction.
‘Just give me a second okay?’ he says. When he holds up his hand and retreats a step, I let my arms drop to my side.
‘Are you afraid of heights?’ That’s the only rational explanation for his sudden mood change.
‘No,’ he replies with a nervous chuckle. ‘I just didn’t think this would be so hard.’
‘Didn’t think what would be so hard?’ My brow furrows.
Before he gets a chance to reply, we’re interrupted by an announcement asking us to exit on the second floor before taking another lift to the top. The doors open and I give him a puzzled look as he places his hand on the small of my back.
‘Monsieur et madame, de cette manière s’il vous plaît,’ a man says, smiling pleasantly.
‘Why does he want us to follow him?’ I ask as my hand latches around Brock’s elbow.
‘He’s taking us to the lift that will take us up to the top of the tower.’
For a minute I thought—I don’t know what I thought, but whatever it was, it wasn’t good. I guess Brock weirding out on the way up has put me on edge. But I hope bungee jumping off the Eiffel Tower is illegal, that’s all I’m saying.
The moment we step into the other lift, Brock goes all weird again, pacing back and forth like a caged animal. It makes my stomach churn. He’s never acted this way with me before.
‘We don’t have to do this if you don’t want to,’ I whisper. I’m grasping at straws, trying to find out what’s going on inside his head, all the while hoping to God it has something to do with heights or confined spaces, and nothing to do with us or our relationship.