Me-Before-You-by-Jojo-Moyes

I walked to the window and pulled back the curtain, feeling the sudden breeze,
the abrupt drop in temperature. Out at sea a storm had exploded into life.
Dramatic flashes of forked lightning briefly illuminated the sky, and then, as if in
afterthought, the heavy drumbeat roll of a deluge hit the roof of our little
bungalow, so fierce that at first it drowned out sound.
‘I’d better close the shutters,’ I said.
‘No, don’t.’
I turned.
‘Throw the doors open.’ Will nodded towards the outside. ‘I want to see it.’
I hesitated, then slowly opened the glass doors out on to the terrace. The rain
hammered down on to the hotel complex, dripping from our roof, sending rivers
running away from our terrace and out towards the sea. I felt the moisture on my
face, the electricity in the air. The hairs on my arms stood bolt upright.
‘Can you feel it?’ he said, from behind me.
‘It’s like the end of the world.’
I stood there, letting the charge flow through me, the white flashes imprinting
themselves on my eyelids. It caused my breath to catch in my throat.
I turned back, and walked over to the bed, seating myself on its edge. As he
watched, I leant forwards and gently pulled his sun-browned neck towards me. I
knew just how to move him now, how I could make his weight, his solidity,
work with me. Holding him close to me, I leant across and placed a fat white
pillow behind his shoulders before releasing him back into its soft embrace. He
smelt of the sun, as if it had seeped deep into his skin, and I found myself
inhaling silently, as if he were something delicious.
Then, still a little damp, I climbed in beside him, so close that my legs touched
his, and together we gazed out at the blue-white scorch as the lightning hit the
waves, at the silvered stair rods of rain, the gently shifting mass of turquoise that
lay only a hundred feet away.
The world around us shrank, until it was just the sound of the storm, the
mauve blue-black sea, and the gently billowing gauze curtains. I smelt the lotus
flowers on the night breeze, heard the distant sounds of clinking glasses and
hastily drawn-back chairs, of music from some far-off celebration, felt the
charge of nature unleashed. I reached across for Will’s hand, and took it in my