Page 177 of Neap & Spring

“These past five years have been …” He pauses, and I feel him shake his head slightly. “God, Vivi. They’ve been everything. Watching you heal and pick up a knife again for the first time. Seeing you work your first full service. Building this restaurant into something neither of us could have imagined.”

Tears are already forming, blurring the ocean in front of me.

“Waking up next to you every morning,” he continues. “Sunday dinners with Dad where you fit in like you’ve always been there. Teaching you how to fish, and you being so terrible at it.”

“I’m not terrible at it!” I exclaim with a laugh.

“You’re extremely terrible. You’ve hooked me four times.” His free hand comes up, and I know without looking he’s touching the small scar on his forearm. “I have the scars to prove it.”

“That last one wasn’t my fault. The wind caught the line.”

“There was no wind that day, Vivi baby.”

“There was a light breeze.”

“There was not.”

His hand finds mine, his fingers lacing through, and I feel him take a deep breath.

“We’ve had neap tides,” he continues on. “So many of them. The quiet, ordinary days that make up most of life. Coming home to each other after service and being too tired to do anything but fall into bed. Morning coffee while you read the news and I pretend I’m not staring at you. Arguments about menu pricing that always end with you being right because you’re always right about the numbers.”

“I am always right about the numbers.”

“You are. And I love that about you.” He shifts again behind me and his voice drops an octave. “And we’ve had spring tides too. The extreme highs. The Michelin recognition that had you crying in the walk-in because you never thought you’d cook professionally again, yet here you were being recognized as one of the best. Roman and Frannie’s wedding where we both cried during the vows. The night that cottage finally fell into the ocean during that storm and you officially moved in with me.”

“That cottage was a death trap,” I manage, my voice thick with tears.

“It was the worst cottage in the history of coastal real estate.” I can hear the smile in his voice. He presses a kiss to my shoulder. “But it brought you to me. So I’ll always be grateful for that death trap.”

He’s quiet for a moment, and I can feel his heart hammering against my back and feel the slight tremor in his hands.

“Vivienne,” his voice is shaking. “Can you turn around? I need to see your face.”

I shift in his arms, turning carefully on the blanket until I’m facing him. The candlelight flickers across his face, catching in his eyes, illuminating the nervous hope written all over his features.

And he’s holding a ring.

A simple white-gold band with a single stone that catches the candlelight and throws it back in fractured rainbows. It’s beautiful and perfect and so unmistakably us — classic and understated and absolutely right.

“These five years have been the best of my life,” he says, his voice rough with emotion. “And I want every year after this. Every single one. Every neap tide and every spring tide. Every ordinary Tuesday and every extraordinary celebration. Every argument and every morning coffee and every sunset exactly like this one.”

He’s crying now, tears sliding down his cheeks, and I realize I am too.

“Vivienne Lane,” he says, holding the ring between us. “Will you marry me?”

I’m nodding before he even finishes the question, my hands coming up to frame his face.

“Yes,” I yell through the tears. “Yes, of course yes. Yes.”

His smile is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. His hands are shaking as he takes my left hand and slides the ring onto my finger with infinite care. It fits perfectly, settling into place like it was always meant to be there.

And then he’s pulling me into a kiss. I kiss him back with everything I have, my hands tangling in his hair, my whole body pressed against his.

When we finally break apart, we’re both crying and laughing and holding each other like we did that night in the bathroom during the storm — desperate and relieved and so full of love it feels like it might overflow.

“I love you,” I say against his mouth, the words tumbling out between kisses. “I love you so much. I never stopped. Not once.”

“I love you.” He kisses me again, softer this time. “Always have. Always will. Since Paris. Since before Paris, probably. In every lifetime before and after this one.”