When Simon topped the rise out of the riverbed, he saw that Kaylee had returned to the overlook spot they had visited only a couple of hours earlier. She had changed into a blue shirt and her faded, sleeveless coveralls. She still gripped her arms around her, and as he drew closer, he could tell she was shivering. He moved up slowly and spoke her name softly from a few feet away.

She startled, drawing in a sharp breath. She did not turn around, but she did not move away. Her hand wiped quickly across both cheeks and returned to clutching the other arm. She was crying.

Simon froze an arm's length behind her. Making her cry tore at his heart. They bickered often enough – more often lately, it seemed – but it usually never rattled her this much. When he upset her, she would snap at him, or pointedly note his error, or bemoan his shortcomings, or pout and walk away. At worst, she simply grew quiet and withdrew to her engine room or her bunk. For all her sensitivity, Kaylee rarely cried. Her crying now, because of him, unnerved him. He wanted to reach out and draw her into his arms, but he feared she might shrink from his touch. He stood rooted to the slickrock and tried to recapture all the words he had assembled in his head during the walk over, now dashed away into the dust.

As he stood mute, gathering his thoughts, a red flash in the corner of his eye caught his attention. For a moment, his gaze turned in the same direction that Kaylee was staring – and his jaw dropped.

Simon saw the vista as if for the first time. The angle of the late-day sun illuminated the sandstone formations such that they glowed. The russet and peach colors of earlier now pulsed a range of vibrant, fiery reds, like a bed of coals that stretched to the horizon. The air was crisp and cool with the fall of day, but he swore he could feel heat radiating off the glowing stone. The formations burned with energy: raw, ancient, powerful. The view was no longer just impressive. Now, it was beautiful. It was breathtaking. It was magical. It was... "Wow..." he breathed and filled his eyes with the sight.

He did not know how many minutes, or just moments, had passed, but he was finally drawn from his communion by the light touch of Kaylee's hand on his.

He turned to her. Like the view, her features were suffused with red and sharply defined in the low angle of sunlight. Her eyes looked puffy and bloodshot, and her cheeks shone with damp. He also noted the look in her eyes: hesitant, but questioning. Her gaze held his and her hand stayed on his, and he dared hope she would listen to him.

"Kaylee, I..." he began as he grasped both of her hands – and realized how chilled she was. "You're freezing." The shock of cold jolted him into doctor mode. "Here, put this on." He slid off his coat and held it out, open and ready for her, as the gentleman his upbringing had made him.

Kaylee hesitated a moment, and then slipped her arms into the offered sleeves and pulled it close around her. "Thanks," she murmured.

He rubbed her upper arms, trying to warm her up. He offered her a small smile, which she returned in half. Her lips pursed a moment before she asked, "Why are you here, Simon?" Her voice sounded wary but not dismissive.

He slid his hands down her arms, gently gathering her hands in his again. "I owe you... a better answer."

Her fingers tightened a bit in his grip, and her eyes widened slightly. That was the only invitation she gave him, and he plowed on. "I once told you that the hospital was my home, and I won't lie and say that I wouldn't want to go back there. Not that hospital, maybe, but somewhere like it where I could make a difference in so many lives. It's why I became a surgeon." He saw and felt her tense, but he continued. "But if I ever could go back, I'd want you to go with me."

Her eyes widened still more. "Simon," she whispered. "Serenity is..." she started and faded.

"I know. I know. Serenity is your home. She is my home, too, and I don't expect that to change for a long time. But if..." He hesitated, afraid of his next question, and then he shook his head in chagrin. "You've always had so much more courage in our relationship than me. I owe you the same." He took a deep breath and a plunge. "You know I love you, Kaylee. I love you more than I ever knew was possible. And I see a life with you – a future, a family. But I don't know if that life will keep me on Serenity until the end of my days. I don't know if that is even realistic. I don't have plans to leave – truly, I don't – but if I ever do leave this ship..." He swallowed. "Would you come with me? As... as my wife?"

Kaylee took a step back, and her mouth gaped in surprise. "Simon, are you askin'...?"

Simon was surprised, himself. He had not meant to add the last question – not yet, at least. He had wanted her answer to whether she would go with him before he took the next step. But when the word "wife" passed his lips, he knew it was right. He wanted her, for all his life, unconditionally. He could only hope she felt the same. And so, traditionalist that he was, Simon knelt before her. He smiled up at her astonished face and spoke, for once certain of his words. "Kaywinnet Lee Frye, will you marry me?"

Kaylee stared at him, mute with shock or surprise or... he could not tell what. Kaylee speechless was nearly as rare as Kaylee crying. A full ten nervous heartbeats passed, and Simon began to worry he had managed to say something wrong again. "Kaylee? Are you...? Did I...?"

"Are you really sure, Simon?" she whispered.

"Yes," he replied, nodding. "Absolutely. It doesn't matter where I am, băo bèi, as long as you are with me." He inhaled nervously. "So... will you marry me?"

She gripped his hands tighter, and he could feel her body quivering through her fingertips. She sunk slowly to her knees with him, and as she did, a smile spread across her face, until she was beaming in joy. "Yes, Simon," she finally said. "Yes and yes."

Simon hardly dared believe her. "Really? You will?"

She laughed, a joyous ringing sound. "Yes! Yes, Simon Tam, I will marry you."

Simon experienced a peculiar sensation, as if pieces of his mind lifted up, shifted around in mid-air, and fell back into a new configuration, with new wrinkles but tighter cohesion and greater harmony. This choice felt more right than he could have imagined. He grinned like a child and clutched Kaylee in a tight embrace, burying his face in her hair, inhaling the scent of her: lemons and oil and fresh air. He tried to hold himself in the moment and savor the most astonishing joy he had ever known. He could have stayed there all day, his beloved Kaylee – now his fiancée – enfolded in his arms.

It was Kaylee who pulled back and kissed him. He could feel the coolness of spent tears on her cheeks and lips, but there was no sadness in her kiss. He could not mistake the elation and the hunger he felt in her lips on his, her tongue tasting his. Her hands slid up his back and her fingers entwined possessively in his hair. He felt the stirrings of arousal – with her kisses, he always did – and momentarily considered pulling her down to the ground and consummating their engagement right then and there. But the sane part of his brain reminded him they were in full view of Serenity's cockpit. Also, his knee was beginning to ache on the hard stone.

Reluctantly, he stopped the kiss and touched his forehead on hers. "I love you so much, Kaylee," he breathed as he stared in her beautiful eyes, which now glistened with happiness.

"Love you, too, Simon," she responded with a catch in her voice. "So, so much."

After another long moment of gazing on her beaming face, Simon stood and offered his hand to his fiancée, a word that was going to make him smile every time he thought it. "I have something for you," he said as he helped her up. Illiciting a surprised yip from her, he slid a hand into the pocket of the coat she wore and produced the little red box with a flourish of his wrist, like a magician revealing a hidden dove.

"This," he explained, as he placed the box in her hand, "is very special to me and my family."

Kaylee opened the box and peered inside. Simon watched her expression morph from curiosity and excitement to confusion and, though she tried to hide it, disappointment. "It's a... Is it a coin?" she asked.

Simon laughed, not at all offended. "Yes, it's a coin." He remembered the first time his Grandma Tam had shown him the contents of this box. She had snuck with him up to his mother's room one day when he was a boy, not long after River was born, with the declaration that they were on a special secret mission. She was going to show him an important relic, a family treasure, she said, of which he would one day be the next custodian. She had sniffed that his mother, Regan, was too high-born to deign to wear it, but he, Simon, should know its importance. When she had showed him the coin – an old Chinese bronze coin, blackened with age, and looped through its square hole in the center with a black silk cord – his reaction had been very similar to Kaylee's.

"I know." He laughed again. "It doesn't look like much, but this is one of the treasures of the Tam family going back generations."

Kaylee's expression was intrigued again, but still confused.

Simon pulled the coin and cord out, slipped the box back into the pocket, and held the coin up for Kaylee to inspect. He pointed to an oxidized and barely-discernible set of characters on one side. "Can you make those out?"

She puzzled a moment. "Shùn zhì tōng bǎo?"

"That's right. You've got better eyes than most."

"Emperor... ?" she began to translate and then looked astonished. "That's from ancient China on Earth-that-Was, ain't it?"

Simon nodded, delighted that she appreciated the significance. "First emperor of the Qing dynasty, in fact."

"That means," she breathed, "this is older than the Exodus."

"Yes, this coin pre-dates the Exodus Launch by more than five hundred years."

"That must be worth ..."

"Quite a lot. Maybe even as much as Serenity." He looked at it with wry amusement. "If I were able to sell it, of course."

"Is that why you brought it from home?"

Simon blinked. Kaylee's quick mind was one of the things he loved most about her, but he did not want her to think he gave her this gift as an afterthought. Still, it did no good to lie to her, so he nodded. "I tried to find a buyer on Persephone, the day before I boarded Serenity, but no one was willing to buy it, at least not for anything near its worth." He shrugged at her surprised look. "I forgot the provenance papers, and without those, this is just a well-done replica, as far as any dealer on the street was concerned. And I could not go to a serious dealer, one who might know of my family, because of my fugitive status."

Kaylee nodded sympathetically.

"But in the end," Simon continued, "I was glad I could not sell it. It reminded me of my grandmother, who first told me about it. I loved her very much. She was the only one of the family who believed me about River." Simon paused a moment in remembrance. "She passed away before I could get River out."

"Oh, honey," Kaylee said softly as she put a comforting hand on Simon's arm. "I'm so sorry."

He lay his own hand on hers in gratitude. "It's a great shame you won't get to meet her. She would have loved you as much as River, I know it."

Kaylee smiled and stepped closer.

"There is also another reason I am glad I couldn't sell it," Simon said, "and that's because of Tam family tradition."

"Of course. You gotta hold on to family heirlooms."

"True, but not just for that. As it happened, the very next day the Verse gave me a reason to need it, although I did not know it at the time. You see," he said as he stroked his fingers along the silk cord, "the Tam tradition holds that the oldest son gives this humble, blackened, ancient coin to the woman he marries, as a wedding gift."

Simon set the cord around Kaylee's neck and square-knotted the ends together. He whispered, "It's a little early for a wedding gift, but I want you to have it now. I can't give you a ring, not yet anyway, but I can give you this." He touched the coin nestled at the base of her throat. "It suits you." He looked in her eyes. "My treasure."

Kaylee's fingers joined his over the coin, and she breathed his name. Her lips wobbled, and Simon kissed her, a light pressure that sent sparks between them.

There would be a proper ceremony sometime – Simon would see to that – but it was at this moment he considered they were married. They held each other a long while, whispering endearments, sharing kisses, and exchanging promises, as the late afternoon light spread across the landscape.

... ... ... ... ... ... ...

The sun was threatening to set, and the shadows were gathering with twilight when Simon realized it was time to get back to the ship. He was reluctant to end their moment but was aware they could not stay much longer without raising concern among the crew. "I imagine the Captain is about ready to shoot me at this point," Simon said lightly. "He made it abundantly clear he was not happy I upset you."

"I 'spect he'll forgive you when we tell 'em our news," Kaylee said and squeezed her arms around his waist.

Simon considered the reactions the crew might have. Delight from River and Inara, to be sure, and quiet approval from Zoe. Jayne would be crude but probably amused. And Mal? Hard to say, but Simon had hope the captain would accept their engagement as a good thing. Simon smirked. "Dinner should be interesting tonight."

As they turned back towards Serenity, Simon saw movement on top of the old freighter. In the fading light, he was not sure what he was seeing until Kaylee confirmed.

"It's River!" she exclaimed. "She's..."

"Dancing," he finished, amazed.

Inexplicably, River was dancing with abandon on the hull just behind the cockpit windows. Simon's first reaction was concern that she might fall from the precarious place, but he squelched that in remembering her uncanny surefootedness. Instead, he watched in pride and joy at her exuberant display. River leaped and spun and flung her arms above her head in exultation. A warm grin spread across his face. "Why in the spinning worlds is she doing that?" he wondered aloud, though not really caring about the answer. He just enjoyed watching her dance with such delight.

"She's feeling our happiness, Simon," Kaylee said with awe.

At that moment, River stopped her ecstatic dance, gracefully and deliberately, and turned to face them. She touched her fingertips to her mouth and then swept her hand towards them – throwing them a kiss, Simon recalled from so many dance recitals in her youth. Kaylee was right. As much as he resented the origin of River's psychic abilities, he had long ago given up denying them. For once, right then, he actually was glad of them. Glad that his sister could share the happiness of this moment with him and Kaylee. He laughed out loud, and threw a kiss back to her.

River returned to her joyful cavorting, and in a sudden burst of ebullience, Simon grabbed Kaylee around her hips, lifted her up to his chest, and spun her around him.

Kaylee squealed with delight until he set her down and planted a hungry kiss on her lips. This kiss told her they had better get back to their bunk soon because the only things keeping him from making love to her right there were the hard desert rock and his sister in full view.

Kaylee gazed into his eyes, and placed a hand on his cheek. "Simon, I want you to know. When I said 'yes' before, I meant 'yes' to everything. Yes, I will marry you, and yes, I would go with you, if you ever need to leave. Much as I love Serenity, I love you more."

Her words held him speechless between jubilation and humility. He finally compromised at levity. "Well, that is high praise, indeed!"

"You better believe it, mister," she mock-scolded, as the hand on his face playfully wapped his cheek.

He grabbed that hand and brought it to his lips. "Oh, I do. And I plan to earn that praise every day of our lives together."

The happy couple turned to face the view one last time before heading in – the amazing view that looked to Simon like a giant hearth. "You're right," he said as he squeezed Kaylee's hand. "It is quite romantic."

~ END ~

Notes:

My thanks to my dear friend Ivy for review and feedback. Additional thanks to Wikipedia for everything I learned about Chinese coins and the inscriptions thereon. The impressive view described herein was inspired by the magnificent Fiery Furnace section of Arches National Park in southern Utah, USA. Whether it is romantic might be debatable, but it is unarguably incredible, particularly in the "magic hour" of late afternoon sun.

Thank you so much for reading! Feedback is very welcome.