February fourteenth.
I'd woken up this morning and made coffee and watched Haven nurse Ethan in the early light and felt nothing but good, and it wasn't until right now, sitting on the floor, that I realized I hadn't thought about it once today. Hadn't reached for the whiskey. Hadn't gone outside for the cigarette.
Eighteen years of keeping that appointment, and this year I'd just—forgotten.
I sat with that for a second.
Ethan, I thought. Ethan Nassar, twenty-two years old, who never got home. Who wrote four recipes in the back of a paperback and talked about food like it was the whole point of being alive.
I looked at my son.
Three months old, staring at a ceiling fan like it contained the secrets of the universe, named for a man he'd never meet.
He would've howled,I'd told Haven once.At the age gap, at all of it.
He would've. And then he would've looked at me across whatever table we were sitting at and saidbut she's good, right? She makes you happy?
Yeah, I would've said. She does.
Then what are you waiting for, man.
I reached into my shirt pocket and took out the ring.
Haven was still talking to Ethan. She hadn't noticed yet.
"Haven."
"Mm."
"Look at me."
She turned. Saw what was in my hand.
Her mouth opened. Closed.
Penny lifted her head.
Ethan grabbed Haven's finger and held on.
"My mother gave me this the night he was born," I said. "I've been carrying it since then, waiting for the right moment." I looked at her. "I just realized today what the right moment was."
Her eyes were bright. "Wyatt?—"
"You came around that corner just about one year ago on your birthday and asked me for a kiss," I said.
"And I've been trying to talk myself out of you ever since, and I can't, and I don't want to." I stopped. "You're the best thing that's ever happened to me. You and him. And I'd like to spend whatever time I've got left being worth that."
Haven looked at the ring.
Looked at me.
"Are you asking me," she said carefully, "or are you still giving the speech?”
"Marry me, Haven."
She laughed—real and full and just for me—and took the ring out of my hand. Held it up to the light. Ethan tracked it with his whole face.
"Yes," she said. "Obviously yes." She slid it on and looked at it. "I've been waiting for you to ask. Your mother told me you had it."
