(just what exactly) are you proposing?

"Popuri, will you marry me?"

The words sounded significantly different actually being spoken aloud than how he had imagined. He chewed on the stale taste they left in his mouth during the silence that followed. He felt awkward; like a little boy. Maybe he should have practiced this before? Jack hadn't felt the need to practice (practice was something guys probably did when they had a fear she might actually say no). Cliff hadn't really mentioned anything about it, anyways.

Jack extended the tip of a blue feather out through the bottom of his t-shirt. Popuri's cheeks shone red and her face contorted into a painful smile; a smile full of giggles struggling to escape. Popuri watched Jack do a dorky little dance as he pulled the blue feather out from under his shirt. Jack always was the entertainer, even when no one was there to watch.

Eventually Jack wriggled the end of the feather between two fingertips. A hundred dollars for this thing. A tacky little feather with paper-mache and sequins glued to it. Because it was a town ritual, they had all simply insisted upon it. Jack wondered if any of the other bachelors had to do this ridiculous ritual. If so, he bet they didn't have to pay a hundred dollars for this crap. A buck seventy-five, tops. He squinted at the feather. May and Stu probably made it in crafts class. Bastards.

Jack made his way over to Popuri and stuck the feather behind his ear. He lifted a closed fist above her head and rained blue glitter teardrops down. Jack settled his arms around her waist. She smiled and reached up, grabbing the feather between two fingers.

"Ah ah ah," said Jack "Not so fast... is that a yes?" He grinned wickedly and held it back.

"Eee! Yes, yes, yes, of course – yes!" Popuri threw her arms around his neck and kissed him furiously, working up to his lips. "Can I have it now?"

Jack held the feather behind his back, away from Popuri. "I want to do it – put your hands down. Here." Jack tucked the hair on the right side of her face over her shoulder. He threaded the feather through her hair and behind her ear.

"Cute."

Jack looked around at the scene they were about to leave behind. Baskets and baskets of flower petals forming hearts and letters and other gay girly things on the ground. Cliff had done all of this (Cliff was such a fucking fag). But he knew Popuri was eating this shit up.

Not that he ever had to try too hard to impress Popuri (that was, perhaps, what he loved most about her).

Popuri couldn't help but notice that what seemed like hundreds of flowers had been needlessly decapitated. It gave her that same funny feeling where her tummy, like, was trying to jump up out of her throat, and like, run away from her; that feeling she got everytime she thought about Daddy. She wondered if Daddy would like Jack. She reckoned he probably would because Daddy always liked people who would look you in the eye when you talked to them (Daddy always said that).

But this wasn't the time to think about those things. So she stopped.

Hand-in-hand, they left the Goddess Spring behind them and turned to the clearing to greet the group eagerly awaiting their arrival.

a note from your author:

not their first mistake. not their last mistake. it didn't feel much like anything at all.