The Proposal(92)

Angie let out a relieved sigh.

“Oh good, that’s okay then.”

He dropped her off at her apartment, then drove the short distance to his house. His only plan on this Saturday night was to watch the Dodgers game from the couch. Whatever snack he ate along with it would have to be low in cholesterol, after what his doctor had said on Friday, but he could handle that.

He unlocked his front door and stepped inside.

What the hell?

There were blue and white streamers, Dodger pennants, and boxes of Cracker Jack everywhere. And standing directly across from him, wearing a blue and white baseball T-shirt and jeans, was Nik.

“Hi,” she said.

“Nik.” My God, it was so good to see her. He wanted to cross the room in one leap and embrace her. He wanted to tell her how much he’d missed her. He wanted to tell her how much he loved her, still. Wait, no, that’s what started all the problems in the first place. He dropped his keys on the table by the door and didn’t move. “Hi.”

“Hi,” she said again and smiled. “I, um. I got your email. I know you said I didn’t have to respond, but I have something to . . . I want to . . .” She shook her head. “Hold on.”

She pulled aside the blue tarp that had been covering his TV, and he looked at the brightly lit screen.

CARLOS

I LOVE YOU

NIK

“I wanted an actual JumboTron,” she said, “But it would have been really hard to get one of those inside your house, so I decided to work with what I had: a laptop hooked up to a TV and terrible graphic design skills.”

He took a step toward her. He kept looking from her to the screen and back to her.

“Is this for real?” he said.

She rolled her eyes at him.

“You know me too well to ask me that, come on. Would I, Nikole Paterson, do something like this as a joke?”

He shook his head and took another step toward her.

“You wouldn’t, but I had to make sure. And I wanted you to say it out loud.”

She looked straight into his eyes.

“Carlos. I love you. I’m in love with you. I realized it in the sour cream aisle at Vons last night. Isn’t that a ridiculous place to realize you’re in love with someone? Well, that’s how it happened to me. I saw the sour cream, and I laughed, and I thought about you, and I thought about how happy you make me and how much I missed you, and then I realized what all of those feelings meant, and then I felt like a fool for letting you go.” Tears were streaming down her face by that point. He wiped them away with his thumb. “So I thought I should tell you, and I’m sorry—I’m so sorry—that I didn’t realize it earlier, and that I was so skittish and scared when you said you loved me.”

He pulled her into his arms. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been this happy.

“Oh, Nik.”

She pulled back.

“Wait, wait, let me finish. I’ve spent so long being afraid of love, because the last time I was in love, the man I loved only loved one part of me, but not all of me, and I thought love meant having to sacrifice a part of yourself. But then I was with you, and you loved every part of me, even the parts I don’t like. And that scared me more, because I thought there must be some trick and that I couldn’t let myself believe it or I’d fall into the trap. But finally I realized it wasn’t a trap.”

He held her face in his hands and kissed her.

She kissed him back with so much joy and sincerity and love that he almost started crying. He pulled her down onto his couch and kept his arms around her.

“I missed you so much,” he said. “I kept wanting to call you, to say you were right and to just pretend I didn’t love you, just so I would have you in my life again, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it.”

She wiped her eyes.

“If you had, it probably would have crushed me. I would have pretended it hadn’t, gone along with it, and we would have done this same stupid thing for like another year or two before I finally admitted to myself how much I loved you. So it’s a good thing you didn’t.”

She kissed him again.

“How’s Eva?” she asked.

“Tiny. Beautiful. Perfect,” he said. “Jessie and Jon are exhausted but so happy and totally in love with their daughter. Thanks again for the cupcakes. Jessie really did tell me to say that; it wasn’t just an excuse to email you.”

She smiled.

“I wondered. And sort of hoped.” She took a deep breath. “Carlos, I’m still not sure if I know how to love someone, and I really don’t know if I know how to let myself be loved, so I hope you’ll be patient with me as I figure out how to do this. But I really love you so I hope you will be.”

“I will be as patient as you need me to, but I think you know how to love someone a lot better than you think,” he said.

She smiled at him and kissed him again.

“I really hope so,” she said. “I missed you so much, too. I kept trying to deny to myself how much I missed you, and how much a part of my life you’d become, and how important you were to me. And then when I realized it, it terrified me. I was so scared to feel this way. If we’re being honest, which I hope . . . ” she paused and closed her eyes for a moment. “Sorry, I just . . . ” He ran his fingers through her curls and waited for her to collect herself. She leaned her head on his shoulder for a second, sat up straight and started again. “If we’re being honest, which I hope we can always be to each other, I’m still scared to feel this way.” She laughed. “As if you hadn’t already noticed that.”