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“What did you talk about with my brothers?” she asked.
“Nothing,” I said.
But it was her mother who proved to be the biggest obstacle after all. When Evie went to go pack, she cornered me in the kitchen.
“You didn’t treat her right,” she said in an even tone, which threw me.
“Pardon?”
“She worked for you and you were mean to her.”
Had Evie told her that? I wondered.
“Evie didn’t tell me, in case you’re wondering. I figured it out for myself. I know what it looks like when you get your heart broken.”
I could’ve pretended it wasn’t me, or come up with a story. But I didn’t.
“Yeah… that was… I’m not proud of that.”
She gave me a hard look.
“It took me a while to realize that I was losing the best thing that ever happened to me.”
Evie came into the kitchen. “What’s happening here? Mom?”
Her mother smiled and punched me on the shoulder, a little hard, come to think of it.
“Oh, nothin’. Just givin’ him some third degree.”
Evie looked uneasy but I smiled at her. These people cared about her, they really loved her and I could appreciate that.
We went up to a resort for a little holiday after that, just the two of us before Summer came back. I wanted to teach Evie to snowboard, maybe practice some new moves. I’d found us a luxury resort where we could have our own cabin and meals and didn’t have to rub shoulders with families or young guys come to get drunk and spoil everyone else’s time.
Maybe it was everything leading up to that point, the weird weekend with Joe and Matt and then getting grilled by Evie’s parents, all of it made me realize that I really wanted to be with her. In every way. Even the boring, uncomfortable ways that I never would have considered before. I wanted to be her plus one, her emergency contact, the person she called when she had a flat tire or had locked herself out of her place. Our place. I wanted us to live together and be a family. I wanted her to be Summer’s stepmother. But I didn’t know if she was up for that. I was going to have a conversation with her when that woman crashed into her on the ski slope, knocking Evie off her feet and giving all of us a bit of a fright.
Then, when we were laughing about it later, talking about the couple and how sweet they were, the words just tumbled out by themselves. There was no ring, I didn’t have a proper proposal worked out. I wasn’t even on my knees, looking my most handsome self. It was what I’d been thinking about, being together with her, forever.
She’d said yes, we kissed and then she said.
“What about kids?”
“If you want, we can have three,” I said.
“Not four?” she teased.
“Okay, four,” I conceded.
She looked surprised and I shrugged. “What? I’ve had a change of heart.”
“When?”
“I’ve got the money right, we can get a nanny for every one of them. If that is what you want.”
Evie said, “I don’t know what I want, though, right now, it definitely isn’t babies, but in ten years’ time? Who knows?”
“Then we take it as it comes,” I said. “Life is too short,” I said. “I don’t want to live in a world that doesn’t exist yet. I want to be here, in it, with you. Preferably with a ring on your finger that tells the world you’re mine.”
I took a bit of foil from the champagne bottle and twisted it into a ring.
