Chapter Text
Carlos lay on the ground for what felt like hours. He finally stopped crying but stayed downstairs, not wanting to get up to face the reality that the love of his life was leaving him. After another 10 minutes or so Carlos realized that the sounds from upstairs hadn’t stopped, the drawers kept opening, only to be slammed shut moments later, he knew there were not that many drawers in the bedroom and couldn’t understand why TK hadn’t come downstairs with a bag to leave yet. Carlos finally gathered his courage and made his way up the stairs to the bedroom, hoping he could talk to TK and find a way to fix their relationship.
As Carlos got to the top of the stairs his confusion grew, the top landing was trashed with clothes and towels, and the mess just got bigger and bigger as he walked towards the bedroom. He glanced around from the doorway shocked to see that instead of packing, TK had seemed to have emptied the contents of every drawer onto the floor. The dresser, the bathroom cabinet, the nightstands, all completely barren of anything that once lived in or on top of them. Carlos looked over at the bookshelf, also completely emptied and currently being used as a ladder, as TK had clearly climbed it in order to get to his current location of standing on the top in order to reach one of the wooden beams that decorated the ceilings of their house. “There it is!” TK exclaimed as he pulled something off the ledge of the beam and jumping down off the bookshelf.
TK stuffed the object into his pocket before he looked up to see Carlos standing in the doorway, staring around the room, eyes puffy and red, with the most heartbroken expression. At that moment TK clued into what Carlos must have thought when he had run away after his proposal.
“Babe… I’m so sorry, it’s not what you think, it’s the complete opposite of what you’re thinking.” TK tried to explain approaching Carlos and gently grabbing his face, forcing the taller man to look at him. “I… here, come sit and I’ll explain.”
Carlos stared and absently nodded his head, following TK’s guidance toward the bed where he sat down, still feeling the shock and not quite registering what TK was saying.
TK carefully thought about what he was going to say and waited a moment until Carlos started to focus on him. “I did not run away because you proposed.” TK stated firmly, “I mean, I did, but only because you proposed, not because I don’t want to marry you.”
“What are you talking about TK?” Carlos asked, unsure what TK's rambling meant.
“Dinner, tonight, I wanted to take you to dinner, and I wanted to make sure that we had the entire next day together without any interruptions because I planned on spending the day celebrating and enjoying each other. And I wanted to do that because I planned on asking you to marry at dinner.” TK explained.
“Ty…” Carlos started.
“No, let me talk now.” TK stated, cutting Carlos off before continuing, “I was going to propose to you at dinner, but then I couldn’t remember where I had hidden the ring, and then I was late, and we missed our reservation, and I knew that the perfect evening I had planned was gone and I just sort of shut down. But then you came upstairs, you made me dinner, you broke your no food in bed rule, and we watched TV in bed, which I remember being another rule you broke for me. You reminded me all over again why I wanted to marry you and reminded me that I didn’t need to have the perfect moment to ask you, so I went downstairs to wash the dishes and started planning to propose to you again, trying to remember that it didn’t have to be perfect, but that I should at least have the ring. I can’t believe I misplaced it.” TK chuckled at himself, shaking his head at himself. “I really want to marry you, but I wanted to be the one to propose, I had to be the one to propose. Our entire relationship you have been the one that has been able to express yourself and how you feel and I wanted to show you for once how committed I was to you, and while I know that it’s not a competition, when you beat me to it I couldn’t really think straight, I just kind of lost my head, annoyed that once again you were the one that was able to get your shit together first and ask me, and that’s not really a fair way of thinking, and I know that, but it’s how I felt, and I am so sorry for just taking off on you like that, I can’t imagine how that must of felt.” TK let go of his boyfriend’s hands and slid onto the ground on one knee. “Now, this isn’t exactly how I planned on doing this, but I found the ring and better late than never right? So, Carlos Reyes, will you marry me?” TK finally opened the ring box as he stared at Carlos with hopeful eyes.
Carlos took a glance at the ring, then looked back at TK before standing up and marching downstairs, this time leaving TK as the one down on the ground, hurt and confused. Carlos however, reappeared within a few minutes, joining TK on the ground holding a box of his own, “Tyler Kennedy Strand, you are probably the most frustrating, disorganized, and competitive person I have ever met. Seriously, who hides a ring so well they don’t even know where it is, and who makes proposing a competition? Although I must say, I think you won, at least the most dramatic proposal award. But yes, I will marry you, if you will marry me?” Carlos once again opened his ring box and looked at TK.
“Of course I will marry you!” TK lunged forward wrapping his arms around Carlos and knocking him to the ground kissing him all over. Carlos laughed before grabbing his fiancé's face and giving him a passionate kiss on the lips, rolling them over into a large pile of clothes. “I guess I need to clean up this mess…”
“Not right now.” Carlos said as he grabbed the ring he bought for TK and slid it onto his finger, smiling as TK did the same to him. “It’s a beautiful ring, I love it. But I am still curious how the room got this trashed when you had it hidden on the ceiling?” Carlos stared at TK quizzically.
“Well, it was my grandfathers ring, and I asked my dad for it a few months ago and brought it home before realizing that I should have just kept it stored there, so I ending up just moving the ring’s location every week or so and by the time I finally built up the courage to ask you, I couldn’t remember what the newest hiding spot was…” TK explained sheepishly and Carlos chuckled at his antics, “What about you? This ring is gorgeous by the way, but where did you have it hidden?”
“Well, I got that about a month ago, and I’ve just been waiting for a good time to ask you, although I had a good advantage on the hiding spot seeing as my job requires me to own a safe, that no one else has access to…” Carlos laughed.
“That is so not fair! I’ve been literally climbing around the house and stuffing it into the bottom of drawers for months, and you just get to lock yours up in the gun safe! I will be taking that most dramatic proposal award you offered me, I believe I deserve it.” TK exclaimed before reaching up to kiss his fiancé again.
“Yes, you do.” Carlos smiled as he kissed him back, laying in a pile of laundry, not caring at all that their room was a complete disaster, only caring about the fact that the love of his life wanted to marry him. Ok, maybe Carlos cared a little bit, after all, every single item of clothing they owned was on the floor, but that could be dealt with later, they were too busy adding more clothes to the mess as they celebrated their future together.