Page 74 of Cain

“Don’t know if that’s a good thing,” she sasses me.

“About us.”

She turns, looks at me. Waits.

“I love the life we’ve made. I love to wake up every day with you. I still can’t believe I get to have breakfast with you. You make me laugh. I’m still terrified of messing it all up again.”

It’s a word salad. It wasn’t what I practiced. But it spills out. Everything I feel. Everything I want.

She softens. “If you make a mess, I’ll help you clean it up; just like you will when I screw up.”

I kiss her, feeling lucky. This is who Faith is. Big-hearted. Generous. She’severything.

I reach into my jacket pocket and pull out the small velvet box. No theatrics. No speeches. Just the two of us on a wind-carved ledge.

Her eyes go wide. Her mouth parts in a silent gasp.

“Marry me. Be my wife.”

She throws her head back and laughs. It’s not the reaction I expect. But I love it because her laugh is real and warm and alive.

“Yes,” she cries out.

I slip the ring onto her finger. It’s simple. Elegant. Gold with a small emerald—the color of the Oregon forests where she made her home.

She studies it, then me. “This is the best ring in the whole world.”

“For the best wife in the whole world,” I say.

We kiss, not like it’s the end of a story, but like it’s the beginning of something that will never stop growing.

Two years ago, I watched her walk into my life.

Today, I watched her say yes.

I can’t wait for tomorrow.