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Imagine: While in high school, you and Edmund have your first date on Valentine's Day.
I'd been planning for this day for a long time. I knew from the minute that I met Edmund Pevensie in my English IV class that I was going to fall in love with him. He was intelligent, attractive, and compassionate in every single way. It had been February 9th when he'd officially asked me on a date. When he did, I said yes immediately.
He promised to pick me up at 6 pm and said where we were going was a surprise. I put on my best brown leather jacket and a frilly white dress undershirt. I'd kept my hair parted in the middle and had applied minimal makeup. As promised, he picked me up at 6 in his old 1976 Cadillac. The moment that I got into the car he smiled at me.
"You look beautiful." He smiled.
As we rode down the street, I could see him looking at me from the driver's seat, which just made me smile even more. We pulled up to this nice looking restaurant, where he got out, opened my door for me, and then led me into the restaurant.
"Hello and welcome to Reno's Italian Bistro. How can I help you?" The woman behind the counter asked.
"I have a reservation under Edmund Pevensie. Table for two." He replied.
"There's no reservation here, sir." The woman answered.
"What? I made a reservation five days ago." He explained.
"There's no reservation." She repeated, "Our wait time is currently two hours."
"Thank you." Edmund answered, "We'll be leaving."
Edmund took me back out to the car and we sat there for a moment. Then as if he had had a lightbulb moment, we sped off in his Cadillac. We drove through the hill country of Windsor and East Sussex. The sun began to sink below the horizon and Edmund pulled into a lookout spot where he parked the car and killed the ignition. I smiled at him and then noticed that he seemed down about something.
"I'm sorry about what happened at the Italian restaurant. I really wanted to do something romantic for our first date. If you want this to be our last date, I'll understand. You deserve someone who knows how to make a restaurant reservation." He sighed, making me laugh.
"Edmund," I smiled, "this is beyond perfect. All I wanted tonight was to just spend time with you. I just wanted to be with you."
"Really?" He asked.
"Really," I answered, "Now can you please tell me what we're doing in the hill country of England in your '76 Cadillac?"
"Yeah, sorry." He laughed, "We're going to be stargazing. I kind of figured the restaurant would be a bust because the lady on the other end of the phone seemed busy when I placed the reservation. So I brought a picnic in the trunk. I also stole a bottle of champagne from my father's cellar."
"You did not!" I laughed.
"I absolutely did." He answered.
"Okay, well show me!" I laughed and we went to the trunk where I found a beautifully woven picnic basket with gold foil glinting in the last rays of the February 14th sunset, "Oh my god...what if your Dad finds out?"
"He won't. My brother Peter told him he was getting some champagne for him and his fiancee tonight." Edmund smiled.
"You're too good," I answered.
"Only when it comes to you. The rest of the time I'm a complete idiot. Like that one time that I-" I stopped him with a quick kiss and he kissed back, "You don't like rambling?"
"I only like it when it's you who's doing the rambling." I grinned and he kissed me again.
That night we sat on the hood of his car with a red blanket underneath us. The stars seemed to be shining brighter the longer that Edmund and I took turns taking swigs from the champagne bottle and talking about our lives.
He talked about his sisters and his brother and his brother's fiancee and their relationship. He talked about how his mother was in a coma and how he missed her so much. I talked about my vinyl collection and how I always wanted someone to slow dance with. I talked about how my parents wanted to send me to private school and get me to marry Prince Harry. He laughed at that and said he was lucky to have me if that was the case.
The longer we talked, the more in love I was with him. He talked about his family fortune and how he sometimes wished it didn't exist because that's all people saw. He talked about his father and the vineyard that he owned in Windsor. He talked about how he liked driving and how he couldn't stop thinking about me.
I talked about how I was a debutante and hated the manners that I was supposed to possess. I talked about my idiotic ex-boyfriend who cheated on me with my best friend and then cheated on her with his tennis instructor. I talked about how I'd never loved anyone the way I loved Edmund.
And the more that we reminisced in all of our past pains and all of our worries, we realized just how badly we needed one another. As the hours of the morning began to dwindle away, Edmund said that we should probably find somewhere to crash for the night.
"My dad actually lives down the way." He explained, "I'm sure we could get away with spending the night there."
"Okay." I smiled.
When we arrived, it was three o'clock in the morning. The house had ivy growing up its walls and was completely silent. I slipped my fingers into Edmund's and he led me up the adobe stairs of the house. We got to the third story and found a bedroom with white curtains blowing in the cool wind of the evening.
We collapsed onto the bed and I curled into him. He smelled like timber and mahogany with a slight hint of cinnamon dashed in there. I had never wanted to be anywhere so badly in my entire life. As we lied there in the cool morning air of February 15th, I realized there were so many things I didn't understand or know. But I did know one thing, I loved Edmund Pevensie with my entire heart and this would be the first date of many.
