Chapter 12
The two weeks before their senior year started went by quickly. Ben had his clinical rotation and final testing to complete, and Felicity had a big project at the museum. They spent every moment they could together outside of work. Most every evening was spent fantasizing about their wedding day, and especially their honeymoon. Ben finally got Felicity to agree to Bali, and was so eager to go away with her, he often joked they should just elope so they could go ahead and go to Bali. Felicity just laughed and said, "no luck, my love." She was insistent on a beautiful, small ceremony with all those they loved in attendance.
They also talked about when they would tell all their friends, but had to wait just awhile longer as Elena was still out of town. Ben was nervous when she said she wanted to invite her parents and have a nice dinner for everyone. They would even make like it was simply a birthday party for Ben, whose 21st birthday was coming up. And then they would surprise everyone with the news. He said, "I can see their expression now, complete disbelief and utter dismay." Felicity laughed and said he was being silly, they both loved him, especially her mom who now spoke so highly of him. "In fact", Felicity remarked, "I've been wondering about her change of heart about you actually. I wonder what happened." Ben just looked at her and smiled, pleased that her mother had not told her about his little speech, but glad it had worked.
Ben said his mom was coming into town for his birthday anyway so it would work. He was excited to tell her about their engagement, as she was so happy when he told her that he was in love with Felicity. "She started crying and all, it was like I had told her I had won the lottery or something." Felicity giggled and said she was just happy her son was finally growing up, which made Ben tickle her and say "grown up, eh?." Ben did agree with that assessment though, saying he had never been so happy as when he knew that he was in love with her and that she loved him back. They talked about the first time they made love and how they both knew then that they were meant to be together.
Meghan kept teasing Felicity that she was going to tell everyone that they knew about their engagement, which made Felicity all the more anxious for their dinner party. She could not wait to wear her ring and for all the world to know that she was marrying Ben Covington. The thought of it still made her giddy. She could not believe sometimes that it was true, that she was actually going to marry the love of her life. And now they each had plans for their future and their careers, and that made her feel like everything was going to be just perfect.
Ben was a bit less certain of their future career plans and was in fact starting to really wonder about his decision to go pre-med. He wasn't sure, even after doing well on his paramedic test and being awarded his licensure, that he could really do it. He loved hearing Felicity's confidence in him, but he just didn't feel the same. And he was afraid of letting her down. So when he went to the registrar's office to change to pre-med and to talk to his counselor, he was not surprised at the response that he got.
"Okay, pre-med. Let's see what classes you have taken thus far," his guidance counselor said as he looked at Ben's transcripts. "Hmm...you really haven't taken that many classes that meet any of the requirements. And you're going to be a senior right?"
"Yeah. I know it may seem like I don't have any of the right classes, but this is really something I want to do. Do you think there is any way possible that I could do it? I mean, how many classes would I need to take?" Ben asked with uncertainty in his voice.
"Well, it looks to me like you will need a lot of classes, in fact, even with taking 18 credits each semester there is no way you would be able to graduate pre-med. You'll need to take another semester at least to get all your credits in. Is that something you can do?"
"Another year? I don't know. I didn't think it would be that bad. I don't know, maybe this is stupid," Ben said as he grew more discouraged.
"No, it is not stupid, you just need to figure out if it is what you want to do and work as hard as you can to do it. It's possible, you just need to maybe work on your grades a bit. They aren't bad, but in order to get into medical school they will need to be better."
"Yeah, I know," he said, then paused to think things over. He thought of Felicity and her belief in him, and how he could do anything. "Okay, sign me up for pre-med and let me know what classes I should take."
When he got home to the loft, Felicity was there sitting on the couch watching TV. He was surprised to see her home so early from work.
"Hey babe, you're home early," he said as he walked over and kissed her on the forehead, sitting down next to her.
"We have been working so hard that Professor Morton let us off early today to make up for it. I thought maybe we could go out to dinner and a movie if you want," she said as she moved her hands across his chest.
"Hmm..that sounds good," Ben replied, growing quiet.
"What is it?" she asked, noticing he seemed a bit quieter than usual. "Nothing," he tried to say, but quickly noticed she didn't buy it. He laughed and said, "You know me too well."
"Yes, I do, so spill it," she smiled.
"Well, I went to talk to my guidance counselor and we talked about my pre- med thing and I need to take all sorts of classes so I don't know that I can graduate pre-med," he said sadly.
"But Ben, we knew that might be a possibility, and didn't you say that you could get a Health Science degree with the classes you've already taken? Then you could take the rest of the classes you need later on," she said encouragingly.
"Yeah, I guess," he replied, still quite a bit concerned.
"Ben, what is wrong? Why are you doubting yourself now? You have been doing so well, even been excited about starting this semester. Don't get discouraged now. You've done so well, and you are a licensed paramedic now. Think of all the good experience you will get and how that will help you in med school."
"I don't know, I guess I am not sure that I can do it. I mean, I know that you think that I can, and I try to believe that, but I don't know....I just wonder sometimes. And- and I don't want to, you know, let you down," Ben admitted.
"Ben, you will never let me down. Just try to believe in yourself more, okay? You are such a strong, capable, smart person. I don't know why you can't see that," she said as she caressed his face.
Ben leaned into her touch and sighed. "I don't know what I ever did to deserve you."
"You don't need to deserve me, all you need to do is love me," she replied as she leaned in to kiss him lightly.
"I do love you, more than anything," he whispered, looking at her with love.
"Good. Then do me a favor, okay?"
"What?"
"Try to love yourself as much as I love you, okay?"
He giggled and took her into his arms. He kissed her on the cheek and whispered, "What time are we going to dinner?"
Felicity laughed and asked, "Why? Do we have other plans before we go?"
"Yeah, we do. That is if I get my way we do," he said and pulled her off the couch and led her into their room.
They made plans to move into their new apartment the end of September, as that is when it was available. Until then, they would stay at the loft. They were actually enjoying it, as it was sort of practice for their new place. And since the one room was so small, they were really getting used to being in each other's space all the time. Felicity's clothes were all over his floor, in boxes and in suitcases. He joked that his bachelor pad was taken over and he would never have his own space again. But Felicity knew that he was glad to have her there, because she often caught him just looking at her stuff in the room and smiling.
Ben had loved the apartment when she showed it to him, just as she knew that he would. It was a studio apartment in Brooklyn. It was in a nicer neighborhood then their last one, but was still within their budget, which was now going to be a bit more than last year since Ben was going to be working as a paramedic part time. The apartment had a simple kitchen that overlooked their living area. There was no living room bathtub, which they both joked was too bad. They had kind of liked that in their last place. The bathroom was the only separate area, everything else was basically the same room. Felicity's favorite part was the bed, which came down from the wall. She laughed and said that whenever the moment struck them all they had to do was pull the bed down and go for it. There was a beautiful window in the back that looked out over a small playground and picnic area that was shared by all the tenants of the building. Ben loved that the building was near a basketball court, so that he could play whenever he had the time. Felicity was excited about decorating their new place and Ben was looking forward to having a place to themselves. He was growing tired of having little privacy with her, and now they could make dinner and watch movies without worrying if others would walk in when they decided to take a break and make out.
Elena finally came home from summer break the week before classes were to begin. Felicity was surprised to see her friend looking so happy, since before she had left she had been so despondent when she had realized she could not accept Tracy's marriage proposal. It turned out that Tracy had come to see her in Buffalo and had asked for another chance, this time with no marriage proposal. So they were taking things slow, and so far everything was going well. Felicity was very happy for her friend, and knew that she really loved Tracy, but just wasn't ready for marriage yet.
The night of Ben's birthday party finally arrived. All of their friends were there, Meghan, Sean, Elena, Tracy, Javier, Samuel, even Richard. Everyone enjoyed the food and wine, and her parents seemed to enjoy talking to Ben's mom. They had met before in Palo Alto, but had never really talked much. Felicity was pleased they seemed to get along. When dinner was over and everyone was sitting and enjoying their evening, Ben tapped his fork to his glass and asked for everyone's attention. Ben was suddenly very nervous, so he took his other hand in Felicity's as they both looked at all their family and friends.
"Excuse me, umm...Felicity and I have, we, uh, we have something that we would like to say."
"Oh good, finally," Meghan murmured. Felicity just glared at her and Meghan didn't say a word in reply.
"First, I wanted to thank everyone for coming to my party. It means a lot to me, to both of us, that you are all here. And I really appreciate all the presents. But... Felicity, she gave me the best present of all," he paused to look over at her, gathering strength to continue when he saw her face. "You see, this summer, I asked her to marry me, and well, she said yes." He looked at everyone with a big smile on his face, beaming with happiness.
The room erupted with hollers and congratulations. Sean came quickly over and embraced Ben in a big hug. And Elena screamed, running over to Felicity and jumping up and down with joy. Javier started crying and said "oh my baby, oh my baby," over and over again, until Samuel finally had to calm him down. He then approached both Felicity and Ben, with tears still in his eyes, and gave them each a hug and kiss. Ben accepted the hug begrudgingly, but refused the kiss saying, "no way, man." Meghan just stood back and said, "I knew it," with a smirk on her face. But the reaction they were not expecting was Ben's mom's, who started to cry. Ben went over to her and hugged her tightly as she said, "I am so happy for you." Felicity's mom was a bit quiet, but said to both of them that she was happy for them, giving them both hugs.
Felicity's dad continued to sit on the couch as everyone else was gathering around them patting Ben on the back and hugging Felicity. Ben noticed this and nudged Felicity to go talk to him.
"Dad? How come you are sitting here?" she asked, a bit hesitantly.
"Don't you think this is too early? I mean, you are both still so young. You have no idea where you are going to live after graduation," he said quickly.
"Dad, can't you just be happy for me, for us? We are getting married, I don't know how every little thing is going to work, but I know that I love Ben and that I want to be with him the rest of my life."
"I just think this is a colossal mistake, I mean have you really thought this through, both of you? You are still so young, what are you going to do when you graduate? What kind of jobs are you going to get?"
Ben walked over at this point to stand next to her, listening to her dad's reaction.
"Dad, I know you were disappointed with me changing majors, but I have a plan now, I want to teach art. It is something I really want to do. And more than that, I want to be with Ben. You have to know that, and I'd like it if you could respect it," she said strongly, taking hold of Ben's hand as she finished.
"Well, I still think this is a mistake. But I know that you will do what you want to do." He paused for a moment, looking at them both. "And I will always be there for you," he said, then got off the couch to shake Ben's hand. "Son, I hope you know how wonderful a girl you are getting."
"Yes sir, I know. And I want you to know that I will always do everything I can to make her happy. I love her. And she...she means the world to me," he said with conviction.
"That's good to hear. Just take care of her, okay?"
"Yes, sir. I promise."
Ben watched Dr. Porter walk over to the group and exhaled. "Man, he is tough. I hope I don't mess up or he may kill me."
"Ben," she said and just smiled at him. "He is just over protective. Don't worry about him," Felicity assured him.
They turned around to look at his mom who was talking excitedly to Felicity's mom, who still seemed rather quiet, but was smiling. Felicity wondered if she was worried because she herself had gotten married young. But Felicity knew she and Ben were different and would tell her mom that.
Just then, Richard approached them and said to Ben, "Hey, Mr. Slick. Looks like you are getting the old ball and chain. Me, I'm still playing the field."
Ben and Felicity looked at each other and laughed, releasing the tension of the evening a bit as they shook their heads at their friend.
The two weeks before their senior year started went by quickly. Ben had his clinical rotation and final testing to complete, and Felicity had a big project at the museum. They spent every moment they could together outside of work. Most every evening was spent fantasizing about their wedding day, and especially their honeymoon. Ben finally got Felicity to agree to Bali, and was so eager to go away with her, he often joked they should just elope so they could go ahead and go to Bali. Felicity just laughed and said, "no luck, my love." She was insistent on a beautiful, small ceremony with all those they loved in attendance.
They also talked about when they would tell all their friends, but had to wait just awhile longer as Elena was still out of town. Ben was nervous when she said she wanted to invite her parents and have a nice dinner for everyone. They would even make like it was simply a birthday party for Ben, whose 21st birthday was coming up. And then they would surprise everyone with the news. He said, "I can see their expression now, complete disbelief and utter dismay." Felicity laughed and said he was being silly, they both loved him, especially her mom who now spoke so highly of him. "In fact", Felicity remarked, "I've been wondering about her change of heart about you actually. I wonder what happened." Ben just looked at her and smiled, pleased that her mother had not told her about his little speech, but glad it had worked.
Ben said his mom was coming into town for his birthday anyway so it would work. He was excited to tell her about their engagement, as she was so happy when he told her that he was in love with Felicity. "She started crying and all, it was like I had told her I had won the lottery or something." Felicity giggled and said she was just happy her son was finally growing up, which made Ben tickle her and say "grown up, eh?." Ben did agree with that assessment though, saying he had never been so happy as when he knew that he was in love with her and that she loved him back. They talked about the first time they made love and how they both knew then that they were meant to be together.
Meghan kept teasing Felicity that she was going to tell everyone that they knew about their engagement, which made Felicity all the more anxious for their dinner party. She could not wait to wear her ring and for all the world to know that she was marrying Ben Covington. The thought of it still made her giddy. She could not believe sometimes that it was true, that she was actually going to marry the love of her life. And now they each had plans for their future and their careers, and that made her feel like everything was going to be just perfect.
Ben was a bit less certain of their future career plans and was in fact starting to really wonder about his decision to go pre-med. He wasn't sure, even after doing well on his paramedic test and being awarded his licensure, that he could really do it. He loved hearing Felicity's confidence in him, but he just didn't feel the same. And he was afraid of letting her down. So when he went to the registrar's office to change to pre-med and to talk to his counselor, he was not surprised at the response that he got.
"Okay, pre-med. Let's see what classes you have taken thus far," his guidance counselor said as he looked at Ben's transcripts. "Hmm...you really haven't taken that many classes that meet any of the requirements. And you're going to be a senior right?"
"Yeah. I know it may seem like I don't have any of the right classes, but this is really something I want to do. Do you think there is any way possible that I could do it? I mean, how many classes would I need to take?" Ben asked with uncertainty in his voice.
"Well, it looks to me like you will need a lot of classes, in fact, even with taking 18 credits each semester there is no way you would be able to graduate pre-med. You'll need to take another semester at least to get all your credits in. Is that something you can do?"
"Another year? I don't know. I didn't think it would be that bad. I don't know, maybe this is stupid," Ben said as he grew more discouraged.
"No, it is not stupid, you just need to figure out if it is what you want to do and work as hard as you can to do it. It's possible, you just need to maybe work on your grades a bit. They aren't bad, but in order to get into medical school they will need to be better."
"Yeah, I know," he said, then paused to think things over. He thought of Felicity and her belief in him, and how he could do anything. "Okay, sign me up for pre-med and let me know what classes I should take."
When he got home to the loft, Felicity was there sitting on the couch watching TV. He was surprised to see her home so early from work.
"Hey babe, you're home early," he said as he walked over and kissed her on the forehead, sitting down next to her.
"We have been working so hard that Professor Morton let us off early today to make up for it. I thought maybe we could go out to dinner and a movie if you want," she said as she moved her hands across his chest.
"Hmm..that sounds good," Ben replied, growing quiet.
"What is it?" she asked, noticing he seemed a bit quieter than usual. "Nothing," he tried to say, but quickly noticed she didn't buy it. He laughed and said, "You know me too well."
"Yes, I do, so spill it," she smiled.
"Well, I went to talk to my guidance counselor and we talked about my pre- med thing and I need to take all sorts of classes so I don't know that I can graduate pre-med," he said sadly.
"But Ben, we knew that might be a possibility, and didn't you say that you could get a Health Science degree with the classes you've already taken? Then you could take the rest of the classes you need later on," she said encouragingly.
"Yeah, I guess," he replied, still quite a bit concerned.
"Ben, what is wrong? Why are you doubting yourself now? You have been doing so well, even been excited about starting this semester. Don't get discouraged now. You've done so well, and you are a licensed paramedic now. Think of all the good experience you will get and how that will help you in med school."
"I don't know, I guess I am not sure that I can do it. I mean, I know that you think that I can, and I try to believe that, but I don't know....I just wonder sometimes. And- and I don't want to, you know, let you down," Ben admitted.
"Ben, you will never let me down. Just try to believe in yourself more, okay? You are such a strong, capable, smart person. I don't know why you can't see that," she said as she caressed his face.
Ben leaned into her touch and sighed. "I don't know what I ever did to deserve you."
"You don't need to deserve me, all you need to do is love me," she replied as she leaned in to kiss him lightly.
"I do love you, more than anything," he whispered, looking at her with love.
"Good. Then do me a favor, okay?"
"What?"
"Try to love yourself as much as I love you, okay?"
He giggled and took her into his arms. He kissed her on the cheek and whispered, "What time are we going to dinner?"
Felicity laughed and asked, "Why? Do we have other plans before we go?"
"Yeah, we do. That is if I get my way we do," he said and pulled her off the couch and led her into their room.
They made plans to move into their new apartment the end of September, as that is when it was available. Until then, they would stay at the loft. They were actually enjoying it, as it was sort of practice for their new place. And since the one room was so small, they were really getting used to being in each other's space all the time. Felicity's clothes were all over his floor, in boxes and in suitcases. He joked that his bachelor pad was taken over and he would never have his own space again. But Felicity knew that he was glad to have her there, because she often caught him just looking at her stuff in the room and smiling.
Ben had loved the apartment when she showed it to him, just as she knew that he would. It was a studio apartment in Brooklyn. It was in a nicer neighborhood then their last one, but was still within their budget, which was now going to be a bit more than last year since Ben was going to be working as a paramedic part time. The apartment had a simple kitchen that overlooked their living area. There was no living room bathtub, which they both joked was too bad. They had kind of liked that in their last place. The bathroom was the only separate area, everything else was basically the same room. Felicity's favorite part was the bed, which came down from the wall. She laughed and said that whenever the moment struck them all they had to do was pull the bed down and go for it. There was a beautiful window in the back that looked out over a small playground and picnic area that was shared by all the tenants of the building. Ben loved that the building was near a basketball court, so that he could play whenever he had the time. Felicity was excited about decorating their new place and Ben was looking forward to having a place to themselves. He was growing tired of having little privacy with her, and now they could make dinner and watch movies without worrying if others would walk in when they decided to take a break and make out.
Elena finally came home from summer break the week before classes were to begin. Felicity was surprised to see her friend looking so happy, since before she had left she had been so despondent when she had realized she could not accept Tracy's marriage proposal. It turned out that Tracy had come to see her in Buffalo and had asked for another chance, this time with no marriage proposal. So they were taking things slow, and so far everything was going well. Felicity was very happy for her friend, and knew that she really loved Tracy, but just wasn't ready for marriage yet.
The night of Ben's birthday party finally arrived. All of their friends were there, Meghan, Sean, Elena, Tracy, Javier, Samuel, even Richard. Everyone enjoyed the food and wine, and her parents seemed to enjoy talking to Ben's mom. They had met before in Palo Alto, but had never really talked much. Felicity was pleased they seemed to get along. When dinner was over and everyone was sitting and enjoying their evening, Ben tapped his fork to his glass and asked for everyone's attention. Ben was suddenly very nervous, so he took his other hand in Felicity's as they both looked at all their family and friends.
"Excuse me, umm...Felicity and I have, we, uh, we have something that we would like to say."
"Oh good, finally," Meghan murmured. Felicity just glared at her and Meghan didn't say a word in reply.
"First, I wanted to thank everyone for coming to my party. It means a lot to me, to both of us, that you are all here. And I really appreciate all the presents. But... Felicity, she gave me the best present of all," he paused to look over at her, gathering strength to continue when he saw her face. "You see, this summer, I asked her to marry me, and well, she said yes." He looked at everyone with a big smile on his face, beaming with happiness.
The room erupted with hollers and congratulations. Sean came quickly over and embraced Ben in a big hug. And Elena screamed, running over to Felicity and jumping up and down with joy. Javier started crying and said "oh my baby, oh my baby," over and over again, until Samuel finally had to calm him down. He then approached both Felicity and Ben, with tears still in his eyes, and gave them each a hug and kiss. Ben accepted the hug begrudgingly, but refused the kiss saying, "no way, man." Meghan just stood back and said, "I knew it," with a smirk on her face. But the reaction they were not expecting was Ben's mom's, who started to cry. Ben went over to her and hugged her tightly as she said, "I am so happy for you." Felicity's mom was a bit quiet, but said to both of them that she was happy for them, giving them both hugs.
Felicity's dad continued to sit on the couch as everyone else was gathering around them patting Ben on the back and hugging Felicity. Ben noticed this and nudged Felicity to go talk to him.
"Dad? How come you are sitting here?" she asked, a bit hesitantly.
"Don't you think this is too early? I mean, you are both still so young. You have no idea where you are going to live after graduation," he said quickly.
"Dad, can't you just be happy for me, for us? We are getting married, I don't know how every little thing is going to work, but I know that I love Ben and that I want to be with him the rest of my life."
"I just think this is a colossal mistake, I mean have you really thought this through, both of you? You are still so young, what are you going to do when you graduate? What kind of jobs are you going to get?"
Ben walked over at this point to stand next to her, listening to her dad's reaction.
"Dad, I know you were disappointed with me changing majors, but I have a plan now, I want to teach art. It is something I really want to do. And more than that, I want to be with Ben. You have to know that, and I'd like it if you could respect it," she said strongly, taking hold of Ben's hand as she finished.
"Well, I still think this is a mistake. But I know that you will do what you want to do." He paused for a moment, looking at them both. "And I will always be there for you," he said, then got off the couch to shake Ben's hand. "Son, I hope you know how wonderful a girl you are getting."
"Yes sir, I know. And I want you to know that I will always do everything I can to make her happy. I love her. And she...she means the world to me," he said with conviction.
"That's good to hear. Just take care of her, okay?"
"Yes, sir. I promise."
Ben watched Dr. Porter walk over to the group and exhaled. "Man, he is tough. I hope I don't mess up or he may kill me."
"Ben," she said and just smiled at him. "He is just over protective. Don't worry about him," Felicity assured him.
They turned around to look at his mom who was talking excitedly to Felicity's mom, who still seemed rather quiet, but was smiling. Felicity wondered if she was worried because she herself had gotten married young. But Felicity knew she and Ben were different and would tell her mom that.
Just then, Richard approached them and said to Ben, "Hey, Mr. Slick. Looks like you are getting the old ball and chain. Me, I'm still playing the field."
Ben and Felicity looked at each other and laughed, releasing the tension of the evening a bit as they shook their heads at their friend.