The last six months had been quite hectic, both the boys had settled into their new schools, life had changed quite a bit, Molly had transferred to the reserves so that she could spend more time at home and Charles was retiring and would soon be starting teacher training. Following planning permission going through, building work had started to convert the two cottages into one family home for them all. They were living mostly in what had been Molly's half of the house, whilst the builders worked on a new kitchen and family area taking up the whole ground floor area next door, there was now "a hole" in the wall between the two houses covered by plastic sheeting and they had to constantly keep an eye on Charlie as he was always trying to crash through the opening into the building site for his latest imaginary adventure.

It was the 14th February, Valentine's day and also Charles last day before he was discharged, he would report to the base after lunch, collect the last of his belongings, say his goodbyes and complete the formalities. Molly was going with him as support for what was going to be another big turning point in his life. Amidst all of this happening they had both completely forgotten about Saint Valentine, fortunately Sam hadn't and he had been planning a surprise for Molly and his Dad for quite a few weeks with the help of Nan who Sam thought despite her lack of military training was great at covert operations.

Molly had arranged with Nan to collect Charlie from School and meet Sam back at the house as he got a bus back. Molly and Charles were not expected back until early evening so once Sam had arrived home the three of them got to work.

They began carrying a fold up table and a couple of chairs through to the building site space the new kitchen and family area were nearly finished and Nan had persuaded the builders to have a clear up for her earlier, they set up the table and chairs and put a table cloth on, Sam and Charlie were busy placing candles and tea lights and strings of fairy lights all around the room. Sam set up the projector he had persuaded one of his teachers at school to lend him overnight and connected up his laptop so that he could load up something he had been working on for several months since they had all moved in together. Nan had been out to the shops to buy Champagne and had ordered food from their favourite Chinese restaurant in town, a few weeks ago when she had been babysitting Sam has persuaded her that they have a go at making fortune cookies so that they could personalise them specially.

It was just before six thirty and Molly and Charles pulled up on the drive, Charles had noticed the lights were out in the house apart from dim lights coming from the downstairs area next door. Nan had been keeping watch and as soon as she had seen them pull up she had ushered the boys out of the back door they were going to the cinema so that Molly and Charles could be on their own.

They got out of the car and Charles started walking towards next door, Molly followed him Charles found the key on his ring for the front door and opened it very slowly as he hadn't got a clue what was going on and where the hell Nan and the boys were, Molly was close behind and was starting to feel a bit worried…..the needn't have been there was a note pinned to the inside doorway, Charles opened it

"Taken the boys to see a film,

Happy Valentine's Day,

All Sam's planning and they did most of the work between the two of them bless their hearts

have fun

Nan xx"

They went through to the new part of the house to be met by a of sea candles and fairy lights, in the centre of the room was a table all laid and two chairs, on the wall to their right there was a picture of the four of them all together that had been taken on a recent weekend away, Charles spotted a laptop set up on a chair with a note on it saying "Click me" he turned around and smiled at Molly who was stood rooted to one spot with tears streaming down her face. He walked over to the laptop and clicked and then walked back to stand beside Molly and put his arm around her shoulders. They watched a combination of pictures, music and film footage which they didn't know at the time Sam had spent hours putting together, he had clearly been rooting through old photographs that Charles had packed and brought from Bath, Nan had also been helpful with some of her own and Molly's photo albums and he had clearly done lots of filming on his i-pad that they had not been aware of. It was like watching each of their stories gradually coming together on film, it was beautiful and as Molly turned to look at Charles she could see he was also crying now too.

As the film show finished Charles took Molly into his arms, gazing at her for what seemed like forever she reached up and wiped a tear from his cheek he reached down to her and did the same, whispered "Happy Valentine's Day gorgeous" and then kissed her.

They looked around the room, Charles could smell food, he spotted plates, and a box of takeaway food, they started to open up the boxes and filled a plate each and moved over to the table taking a seat at either side, there was Champagne so he poured them both a glass offering her a toast "to our amazing family" before they began enjoying the lovely food. Charles and Molly were so touched by how much thought had gone into this even down to their favourite dishes from their favourite Chinese restaurant, it must have taken them forever to light so many candles and tea lights it was all so magical.

They had thoroughly enjoyed the alone time, they had alternated between laughing, crying and exchanging long sexy looks between them. Charles had put some music on from the laptop and they had swayed around the room kissing and cuddling by candlelight he had wanted to lift her up to christen one of the new kitchen worktops but wasn't sure what time the party planners would be back.

They sat back down at the table and Charles poured them some more Champagne, there were four little gift boxes laid across the middle of the table that having been so distracted by each other and the delicious food they hadn't got round to opening yet.

Molly reached for one of the boxes and opened it to find a plastic ring with a heart on it, aww how sweet she thought, Charles laughed and opened his and found a similar plastic ring with a rugby ball on it smiling and thinking how cute the boys were for planning this whole evening and the pretend rings. They both took the other two boxes and opened them to find a fortune cookie in each one, they always had great fun with the boys opening the fortune cookies when they went out to the restaurant so they thought this was also a lovely touch that they had remembered this too. They snapped the fortune cookies together and each took out the slip of paper, looking down to read them.

both had the same words "Will you marry me?"

Their eyes met and both simultaneously said "Yes"

Charles got up from the table, moved over to Molly, got down on one knee and put the heart ring onto Molly's finger, offering up his for her to do the same with his.

She threw herself into his arms and he hugged her tightly kissing her over and over again.

Molly was giggling "well it looks like we have more than a lovely meal to thank the boys for"

Charles chuckled too "Indeed it does" and mouthed "I love you" closely followed by a "ditto" from Molly.