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The first time he proposes, they are barely eighteen years old.
There’s nothing special or extraordinary about the day. They’ve spent it like most days that summer: morning volunteering at the senior center, break for lunch, and then afternoon doing whatever they want. The summer heat is thick, but not nearly as thick as it will become later, and after a lunch of deli meat, tomato, and lettuce on hard rye bread, they climb up one of the bluffs outside the city, winding through the trail before splitting off from it and exploring. Or not exploring, simply going out of their way to find a hidden lake they’d found a couple of weeks before, but more prepared for it this time.
Christopher stops her just once before they get there, brushes a thumb along a corner of her lips, and then smiles gently. Tomato juice. He takes his thumb between his lips, grins around it. It’s sweeter. But when Eve leans up the rock to kiss him, he scampers away, further up the trail, further up the bluff.
The lake water freezes to the touch. Christopher breaks through it smooth as anything, barely making a ripple, but Eve chases after him, kicking up droplets left and right. He splashes her when she gets too close. They fight – they play – and it makes the final kiss and the warmth of his body pressed against her all the more comforting when it comes.
Afterward, spread out on the shore, curled up against him with his arm wrapped around her, holding her closer, he says it in the barest, smallest of breaths, I could spend the rest of my life like this. With you.
You could, Eve murmurs, tired and not really sure of the conversation. I wouldn’t mind.
Christopher shifts beneath her, hoisting himself onto his elbows. We should get married. You and me.
Everything comes into sharp focus. Eve stares up at him, searches his eyes, tries to read his expression. You want to get married? To me? Her voice squeaks. Right now?
No. Christopher chuckles, and he cups her face with one hand. Not right now. But maybe someday. He searches her eyes the same way she searches his and offers her a gentle smile. Would you mind that too terribly?
Eve blushes. Her gaze drops. S-s-sure.
When Christopher lifts her chin, he has the biggest smile on his face, and when he kisses her, Eve has never felt so at peace.
Nearly five years pass before he asks her again.
Five years. Graduation. College. Christopher breaks up with her. A tentative new relationship with someone who seemed sweet. Not Christopher, but sweet.
And now here, alone, in her apartment, sobbing over the pregnancy she never meant to have and the sweet-seeming child who’d run as soon as she’d told him about it.
She hasn’t spoken to Christopher in months. He’d broken up with her, sure, but they were passingly gentle with each other in public when they came across each other. It doesn’t happen at all during the school year, but every now and again, over the holiday break, over the summer, sometimes they run into each other. It’s fortunate for her that he’d stopped volunteering at the senior center during the past few years; in those early days, she wouldn’t have been able to see him while she was there – it was hard enough without him; she would never have survived with him. Now, the wound has scabbed over. Not quite scarred, it will open and bleed all too easily if she picks at it, but it’s healing. It was healing.
But it isn’t her fault if in her most desperate hour no one else will answer their phone. It’s that desperation that leads her to call Christopher in the first place, her oldest and best friend, even if he’s not…even if he’s not hers anymore. She’s certain he won’t answer either; she wouldn’t answer, if he called.
(That’s a lie. An absolute lie. One that she tells to herself but never believes.)
Christopher barely makes it into the apartment before Eve collapses, sobbing, against his chest. When she hesitates, he brushes a hand soothingly through her hair, just the same way he had when her grandmother died, just the same way he had when one of the cheerleaders tore her apart for—
Funny, how she doesn’t remember what for, only remembers, barely, that it happened.
I’m here now, Christopher murmurs, soothing, gentle. You’ll be okay.
Eve knows better than to believe him, knows that doing so will only rip open that scab in her heart again, knows that he’ll just leave again, that even if he’s here right now, there’s no reason to believe he will stay. Friend he may be, but that’s all he is now. All he’ll ever be.
She relaxes into him anyway.
It’s after everything’s been said and explained, after the far too long time it takes to accomplish that because Eve can’t always speak, and when she does, it’s broken with fresh sobs and gasps, and maybe she doesn’t say or explain everything, but Christopher understands enough, his eyes darkening the more he understands, and that look scares her, although she can’t say why.
Don’t. Eve meets his eyes, or tries to; it’s hard to focus enough through tears to see anything that exactly. Leave Ted alone. He doesn’t mean anything by it.
Christopher’s jaw tightens, his teeth gritting together. At first, he doesn’t say anything, and he never does on that point, never promises that he won’t go after the child who knocked her up, never suggests, in the future, that he didn’t. Instead, he settles and says, You should marry me.
Eve blinks twice, still curled against him. What?
You should marry me, he repeats, clearer this time. I’ll take care of you.
This time, it’s Eve who chuckles, the first note of laughter – albeit bitter – since Ted walked out on her. No. She’s firm, more firm than she feels she’s ever been. No. She shakes her head and buries herself in Christopher’s chest, crippled with nervous laughter. No, no, no, no, no.
It’s a thought that reverberates in her mind No while secretly, underneath everything going on, she thinks, I wish you meant it.
The third time, he has a ring.
It’s a small thing, dainty, thin and gold. A small diamond rests in the center. It sparkles in the light.
Christopher doesn’t make a big deal out of it. This is no big gesture, although a part of Eve longs for one, longs for some stronger indicator of a love towards her that she still doesn’t quite believe anymore. No, he merely holds it out to her, so small in the palm of his open hand, and looks up at her. Will you marry me?
Eve runs a hand over her baby bump. She bites her lower lip. There’s such hope in Christopher’s eyes, but she still doesn’t believe it. Believe him. There’s no reason for him to still be here. After she called him so many months ago, he should have left. He should have been done with her. Just like he was before. Just like he had been until she called.
It’s only some misplaced sense of duty and honor that’s keeping him here. Eve knows that, and she believes it wholeheartedly.
No, she says again, and she feels it even more sure within her than she did before. No, Christopher. I can’t marry you.
It wouldn’t be fair, she thinks, ignoring the disappointment he wears, eyes focused completely on the child still growing within her as he puts the ring away. I won’t make you stay because I made a mistake. You wanted to be free of me.
So be free.
Eve finds the ring in Christopher’s coat pocket once. She wasn’t trying to find anything; she’d only picked his coat up with the intent to hang it on the rack near the door. Normally, she isn’t this neat, but her mother’s away for the weekend again, and something within her wants to be…something. She can’t put her finger on exactly what it is she wants to be.
The first time Eve invited Christopher to stay while her mother was away for the weekend was years ago, between the first proposal and the second, when she’d known full well that he loved her more than the moon and the stars and the sun all put together, when she’d been a child as much as her sperm donor was, when she’d wanted, desperately, to be filled with the man she planned to one day marry, who she’d thought, at the time, would one day marry her. She’d wanted to play at what that looked like – to play at husband and wife – and Christopher hadn’t denied that longing, as much as she’d thought he would.
She’d love him then the same way she loves him now, and she wants him just the same.
Eve hangs the coat up but doesn’t put the ring back in his pocket. Instead, she carries it with her into the bedroom where she’d left him and holds it out between her thumb and forefinger. You still have this? You weren’t planning to—
No. Christopher sits on the edge of her bed, shoes tucked beneath it, and glances up, his eyes lighting with the brief glimmer from the diamond atop the ring. Not unless it felt right. One corner of his lips curves up with amusement. Are you asking me?
Eve shoots him a look.
Fine, fine. Christopher holds his hands up towards her, palms out, in a defensive position. He chuckles, that amused curl spreading into a half-grin. His head tilts ever so slightly, that unkempt dark hair nearly brushing his shoulders. Then the smile sobers. Will you? he asks, gentle. Will you marry me?
We’ve already— Eve feels the frustration bubble up within her. She doesn’t even have the words, so she shakes her head, closes her hand over the ring, and walks it back to his coat and hides it deep within his breast pocket.
I love you, Christopher says the last time. He whispers it, so soft Eve thinks the words can break beneath her fingertips.
It isn’t as though the proposals have ramped up in the weeks leading to her due date. They haven’t. Sure, there have been moments here and there where he’s snuck it into conversation casually, and Eve has always, just as casually refused. It’s almost a joke between them now, how often he proposes and how often she refuses, and it makes all of it seem significantly less serious. She hadn’t been sure he meant it before; she’s even less sure he means it whenever he brings it up now.
There had been a spectacular moment around the holidays where she’d been absolutely sure Christopher meant to propose, but he hadn’t done anything at all. Instead, he’d given her a knowing look and a little smile, and she understood it then: I wouldn’t do this in front of your family. I wouldn’t put you on the spot like that. And that’s true. He wouldn’t. Nothing to do with how often she’d refused him at all, nothing to do with any foolishness or embarrassment they might feel if—
In that moment, Eve thought she might say yes. In the next, she was glad he didn’t say anything at all. She was sure she would have regretted it.
But right now, with a stomach stretched far larger than she ever thought it could, with the accompanying pain that her doctors said she would just have to live with until the baby arrived, and with a baby who seemed to adamantly refuse leaving her at all, Christopher’s words sound like a prayer.
I love you, Christopher says, and Eve wants more than just about anything to believe him.
Eve shakes her head. You left me. The words lay dagger sharp between them. You left me, and you wouldn’t tell me why.
Christopher doesn’t argue with that. He doesn’t say, But I chose you now, because in the grand scheme of things, what does the now matter? He only looks at her with eyes full of what she once believed was love, with an expression carved with regret.
Eve, Christopher asks her once, when they’re curled up in bed together, when she’s just getting rest after a day of not knowing what to do with Brendan and having to learn as she goes, I could spend the rest of my life like this.
She’d thought he’d forgotten. So could I.
Christopher props himself up on one elbow, so much like he had the first time, and searches her face, her expression, for something neither of them can name. Is that what you want?
Yes, Eve thinks, and Yes, Eve says, and she rests her head against him as she whispers so softly, I want to spend the rest of my life with you. Before he can say the words, though, she continues, But don’t ask. Her hand curls against his chest. Please don’t ask me again.
You’ll say no.
Eve nods against his skin, hides her face against his chest, and tries not to cry.
It’s months later, nearly a half year after Brendan is born, nearly nine months since she’d moved in with Christopher in the first place (in part to avoid how often her mother kept asking when she was going to marry him – a question which has lowered in frequency but not in intensity, even though Eve has tried so hard to insist that she doesn’t want to marry Christopher and that her mother’s constant prodding isn’t going to make that any better), over a year since that fateful phone call that Eve never should have made.
Three weeks after Christopher finally explains why he left.
(In part. Eve feels like there is something missing there, something he’s left unsaid. She hasn’t felt the need to press into it further, but it sits there in the center of her chest, nagging at her. She ignores it, as always.)
There’s nothing special about the day, nothing extraordinary about it. It’s the same as their days typically are – Eve carries Brendan with her to the senior center, not to volunteer, but to spend time with everyone, with her old – literally – friends; Christopher goes into his job at city hall, making friends and connections, networking in a subtle way with the same charm that won her over in the first place, though he hadn’t been trying; and returning to their shared apartment at the end of the day for dinner and comfort and a space that feels like home. Christopher plays with Brendan the way he always does, and when Brendan grows so tired he starts dozing on the floor, Christopher picks him up with the gentlest knowing smile at Eve and takes him back to his crib. Brendan whines and cries the way he always does when he’s put into his crib, but Christopher soothes him just the same easy way he soothes Eve’s tears.
I’m here now. You’ll be okay.
Something inside Eve clicks into place. Or maybe it’s always been in place, she’s just only now realizing it.
Eve follows Christopher a little behind and stands in the doorframe as he takes care of their son, and she says it without even thinking, Marry me, breathes it out so softly that her husband and her boy don’t even hear it. When Christopher returns to her, she places a hand on his shoulder again and says it a little louder, but not much, meeting his eyes as she does, Marry me.
Christopher’s eyes widen. Right now? He leans forward. I have connections.
Something in her heart hesitates, but Eve pushes past it. Do you have the ring?
Always. Christopher reaches into his jeans pocket and pulls it out. The diamond glimmers in the light the same as it always has. I always have it on me, just in case—
Eve stops him with a kiss.
Eve’s mother keeps an eye on Brendan while they are gone. Eve says it’s an emergency, and for once in her life, her mother doesn’t press, not even when they get back with their cheeks glowing and bright. Christopher’s contact is quick and efficient, which is good for this sort of thing, and more importantly than anything, he is quiet and tight-lipped.
A few months later, Christopher makes a huge production of asking Eve to marry him, and a few months later than that, on Valentine’s Day, they get married to great applause and celebration.
They never tell anyone about their greatest secret, and Eve isn’t sure she could tell Christopher either – they may have gotten married in a courthouse on a day that only a select few of them know, but in truth? They were married long before that, regardless of proposals, regardless of answers. She couldn’t say just when it happened, but it did.
The ceremonies just made it look good for everyone else.
(The first just made it look good for him.)