Where life leads us

Chapter 79

When we got back, everyone was still sitting at the living room table: "Finally. I finally want to unwrap presents!" Samuel was sometimes really stuck in his childhood, but admittedly I was also surprised how Lando reacted to my gift to him.

From Antonio, we got an invitation to London, from Nico and his fiancée a book with relationship advice and Samuel had got us a voucher for a candlelight dinner. Adriana had probably thought rather practically and gave us bed linen and tablecloths, of course in the name of her and Juan, but Juan had never had anything to do with the gifts to us.

"Young men never have enough bed suits, and they don't know tablecloths," funnily enough, my adoptive mother was even right. Lando had almost no bed linen and tablecloths, not a single one. But I wouldn't use a tablecloth either, because the things are too stupid and seem superfluous to me.

Nevertheless, we thanked her before we opened it from grandma: "I hope you can use it; I can bring it back." Lando opened it and a set of fresh cutlerys came out, which put a smile on my lips. The silver cutlery had a tradition in my family, which is why I was more than touched.

"Thank you, grandma," I firmly expressed to me, "With the silver cutlery, the head of the family expresses the blessing for a wedding to a couple. Since Grandma is the oldest in the family, she is considered the head." Now Lando also understood that it was much more than a silver cutlery and thanked my grandmother warmly.

She smiled at us: "You don't have to get married right away, but I thought it would be nice to let the tradition live on. If you don't want it, because the things don't have any value these days, I can bring it back."

"No, all good, grandma. This cutlery is worth more than any money in the world, after all, it came from you and has the most beautiful meaning in the world", since my parents had enough money, grandma sometimes felt that she had to give me equally expensive gifts. I found gifts with meaning much more beautiful than just expensive things.

Now that we had all the gifts opened and all ours had received, only our gifts to each other remained: "Should I first or you?" Questioningly, I looked at my boyfriend, who gave me the sign that I should first open his gift.

Carefully, I opened the paper wrapped around a box, which I opened. I could hardly believe my eyes, a large heart-shaped medallion came out of the box. For a moment I didn't understand anything anymore, because actually I thought that Seychelle would get this.

"You can open the heart," it came from Lando. Hesitantly I did what he said and could now see a photo of Lando and me grinning into the camera and walking hand in hand over the paddock. On the other side of the open heart was: 'Singapore 21.9.19 forever my Juliet.'

I looked at Lando with emotion: "It's beautiful." Without paying attention to my family, I kissed my boyfriend full of feelings, because I had never received anything so beautiful from a man who was not my father or other relative. Immediately, I was also afraid that Lando did not like my gift nearly as much as I loved his.

I noticed every movement from my boyfriend when he opened his gift, because I wanted to be sure that he liked it. Reverently, he took the Patek Philippe in his hand and took a closer look at it, probably noticing the engraving on the back.

"4.9.19 was the day we saw each other for the first time at the hotel in Monza", I explained the choice of date. Lando had probably known exactly what had been that day, what made him laugh. He still seemed to be amused by the memories of the first encounters, while I tried to forget them.

Unlike me, he was able to quickly change his own way before leaning over to me: "I could never forget that day or date, after all, that day made my life a better one."