“I never heard that expression before.” I laugh.
“It means you’re keen. Your birthday is in three months and you already have the next year figured out.”
No, darlin’, I have the rest of my life figured out.
“Just because it’s not my birthday yet doesn’t mean I haven’t been thinking about what I want in my life.”
“You don’t already have what you want?” A tinge of uncertainty coats her words.
“Oh, trust me. I have what I want. I’m just saying, I want more.”
“Would you be breaking with tradition if you told me before your birthday?”
“I don’t think Ma would’ve opposed. But why tell you when I can show you?”
She shoots me a suspicious side-glance. “Okay, I’ll bite.”
“You’ll find a clue in the song that’s playing,” I say.
Her eyes shoot to the ceiling just as Florida Georgia Line belches the bridge to‘H.O.L.Y.’.
I sing along.
Her eyes fix on mine. Her long dark eyelashes flutter like the wings of a butterfly.
I brush her long, dark, silky hair behind her shoulders. “I want you to be mine forever, Carina.”
“But I already am, Rhett.”
I shake my head. “Not fully. Not the way I want.”
Myriad emotions flash in the ocean of her blue eyes.
I break our embrace and drop to one knee.
Her eyes grow so wide, they could rival the size of the tires of a monster truck.
Randy fades the song to a low rumble before ending it all together.
Silence surrounds us.
You can only hear Carina’s breath hitch.
I take her hand in mine.
“I don’t mean to highjack your birthday, but I will.”
“Oh my God, Rhett.” Her voice is trembling.
The Callahans and our friends gather around us in a circle. Allison and Jenkins are on video duty. Miranda and April are my designated photographers.
Although this operation was planned in advance, it doesn’t stop Carina’s grandparents from snapping away. That’s all it takes for the rest of the family to follow suit.
God, I love these people.
“Mommy. Daddy.” One of Carina’s little nieces speaks up in the crowd. “What’s going on?”
Her parents shush her.
