THE BLUE BALLOON

The best-laid plans can go pop – but if you’re easy to spot, all’s not lost!

It’d be a boring world if everyone looked the same, wouldn’t it? And yes, my hair’s a little unusual, but I like it, so that’s OK.

I dyed it last year, just before Gary had his big idea for a birthday treat. We’d gone on this little seaside holiday and he bought all these balloons without me knowing from a shop on the seafront, and then, once I’d gone to bed, he organised it all. Every balloon had some little thing inside it and its own numbered label.

He passed the bunch to me while he visited the loo on the way to the bistro.

And then, this kiddiwink came along, wanting a balloon, so I gave him one. I couldn’t see any harm. Number twelve, a blue one – his mum’s favourite colour, apparently. He was happy as Larry.

“I like your hair,” he said.

After our mains, the restaurant staff brought me a cake with a sparkler in it and everyone sang Happy Birthday. Gary seemed to be having a great time. And then the fun started.

He said, “Here’s your birthday present,” and handed me a little box and I thought, Oh, wow!

But inside the box there was just a pin. A single, very ordinary pin.

Gary said, “Now you have to pop them all – in order.”

So I worked my way through them – hoping the other diners didn’t mind the noise and balloony bits falling all around – and the little present fell out of each one. There was a tiny jigsaw made from a picture of us, a pebble that said I love you, a heart-shaped keyring, two tickets for our local Valentine Ball, a handkerchief with our initials entwined in the corner – all these tiny, tiny things that related to us, all of them romantic and beautiful.

But, as we were getting towards the end, I noticed Gary looking worried. He seemed to be trying to count the remaining balloons without me noticing.

“There’s one missing,” he said quietly. Then he said it again, louder. A second later he was frantic, moving the balloons aside as though he might spot one that was hiding. He checked under the table and all around where we were sitting.

“It was a blue one. Where’s it gone? Did you let go of one? Oh no!” He put his head in his hands.

“It’s OK,” I said. “I gave one to a boy. I didn’t think you’d mind. He was a nice –”

“Aargh!” said Gary. Then he didn’t speak for several minutes. All he said then was, “Let’s go home.”

It wasn’t much of a birthday after that really. The mood was well and truly spoiled. I tried telling him I loved the other eleven presents, but he looked like he might cry, so I stopped talking.

“I never get anything right,” he said.

The rest of the holiday was a bit of a washout, to be honest. Gary never emerged from the doldrums. He’d be snappy with me, then apologise and I’d say, “No worries.” That was about it.

On the last morning we packed everything into the car and decided we’d have one final swim in the on-site leisure pool. The manager suggested I wear a cap, but I refused. No one else was, so why should I?

Maybe I should’ve though because almost straight away a woman started shouting and pointing at me.

“Look at her hair!” she was yelling to whoever would listen. She mustn’t get out much, I thought.

“Well spotted,” I said, “I’ve got hair!” and then I felt a bit guilty, because none of it was her fault. She gestured to someone who scooted off and two minutes later I saw this little lad – I wasn’t sure at first if it was the same one from earlier in the week, but then he reappeared blowing up a blue balloon and slotting a little box inside.

It was a different shade of blue, but that didn’t matter. Gary was suddenly whooping like a madman and the lifeguards were raising their whistles and pointing at him menacingly.

The boy’s mother, unfazed by my sarcasm, was telling me, “We’ve been carrying it round for days – we guessed you must be holidaymakers. Thought you wouldn’t be that hard to spot.”

She nodded in the direction of my head and I didn’t mind at all then. “Anyway, here it is.”

She didn’t give it to me, though. She gave it to Gary, who decided it would be a fun idea to get down on one knee. Yes, in the pool. So you can guess the rest.

No, he didn’t drown, the plonker. Inside the box, inside the balloon, was an engagement ring. A small, beautiful, solitaire engagement ring. So I gave him a hug, then the woman gave me a hug.

Gary ruffled the boy’s hair. Then the boy, getting cheeky, reached up and ruffled my hair. Then he looked at the purple streaks on his hand and laughed. In fact, everybody was laughing. Everyone, that is, except the pool attendants, who were fielding quite a few questions about the faint purply blush on the water…

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