Chapter 7: Promised Land

"Christian?"

"Hm?" He lifted his head up from her chest, put his weight on his elbow and looked at her.

"I need to talk to you."

Christian groaned and sat up on the floor where they'd eventually ended up as the sofa was too small for the two of them to lie on, "I knew you were going to spoil the moment."

"You don't even know what I was going to say."

"Do we ever say anything to each other that makes us happy?"

"In this case it depends on whether you can remember..."

"Remember what Julia?"

She sighed. If she wasn't going to blurt it out she was going to corner the subject forever, so she just skipped to the point, "this: I will always love you Christian, and not somebody else, no matter what happens next. Julia."

"Wait," Christian said, reaching for his trousers. Something rattled in his pocket, but then he pulled out his vallet and opened it at the front. There was a photo there with him, her and Matt from a few years back. He pulled it out and behind it there was a crumpled, browned and bleary bit of paper, folded up. He opened it and showed it to her, "you mean this?"

Julia's eyes went wide, "I can't believe you kept it all those years."

"I was kidding myself on it was true."

"But it is true, Christian. It is true. I was madly in love with you back then, but I couldn't marry someone who sold me out to his best friend, didn't have a cent and by the way didn't ask me to marry him!"

"I wanted to spend the rest of my life with you."

"But you never said so Christian! How was I supposed to know when I saw you with a different girl every day!"

"So? What if I did say? You know it would've not changed anything. And what does that matter now? Why do we have to talk about this?"

"Because I was hoping it wasn't too late yet."

Christian looked at her seriously, long and careful, making her cringe under his look. If he was going to reject her, it was fine, at least she had tried to pay for her mistakes.

"Well, let's see," Christian started, making her wonder what kind of blaming list was coming up, "selling best friend topic, what are we doing now you think? Cents, I have those and asking you to marry, I've not done that before and presently I only have the ring on me I asked back from Michelle and I didn't think you would want that..." Christian laughed, "I've done this twice so far over the last year, but will you marry me?" There was no more time to waste if she at all meant it, they wasted enough of it already.

Julia was tongue-tied for a few seconds as the whole encounter went better than she'd expected. "I dunno what to say."

"Oh, for God's sakes Julia, it was you who forced this. What do you want then?" He said irritated.

"Sorry. Sorry. I mean...I belong to you, I always did, but making it official? What about the kids? Sean? Finances?"

"Where there's love, there's a way? If there's no love you can do all you want, you won't manage? Didn't you learn that yet?" He said with that cockeyed expression that she loved.

"Wow, a huge family, three children right away..."

"At least we don't have to play catch up and cry over the years lost..."

"Sean will not talk to us anymore..."

"Do you want to marry me or not?"

"Yes, I do," she looked into his eyes and knew that everything would be okay cause of the firmness of purpose and love that emanated for them.

They didn't dare to move for a while, each fearing the dream would shatter and Christian still didn't understand the course of events. It could have not happened by chance. She had planned all this, even if he did surprise her with the proposal right away a bit! "When you phoned, you did know Sean wasn't there at the practice, right?"

tbc