A/N: I think it's so sweet how he kept waiting for her all those years, that I just had to write his 'final' proposol. Enjoy!
Minerva & Elphinstone
o0o
There she stood in the doorway;
I heard the mission bell
And I was thinking to myself,
"This could be Heaven or this could be Hell"
o0o
Elphinstone Urquard cleared his throat nervously. He was about to meet with his longtime friend, Minerva McGonagall, who was now a teacher at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. They had known each other for more than 30 years now, ever since Minerva had started as an apprentice at the Ministry. Elphinstone had fallen in love with her almost immediately. He knew it was a cliché, the middle aged boss falling for the nineteen year old assistant, but he couldn't help himself. At some point, he had asked her to marry him but she had kindly refused. She liked him as a friend, she had said, but that was it. He had never stopped loving her, though. Even now, thirty years later, he could still feel his knees tremble and his heart flutter whenever he saw her. He had proposed many times during those years, but always her response had been the same. He sighed. He had recently retired and he had decided that today, he would ask her one last time. If she still refused him, he would finally accept his loss and never talk about it again.
When he knocked on the door of the castle, Minerva herself answered.
"Elphinstone! How wonderful to see you! How are you doing?" They greeted each other warmly and Elphinstone suggested they take a walk around the lake.
They talked mostly small talk, about her job and his retirement, about earlier times when they had worked together, about the dark times they were in with Lord Voldemort rapidly rising to power and the waging war.
When they eventually sat down at one of the benches overlooking the lake, Elphinstone fidgeted with his hat.
"You know Nerva, I've been thinking," he said. Nerva was his nickname for her, though he made sure never to use in the presence of others, for she wasn't particularly fond of it.
"Yes?" she turned her head towards him.
"You know I'm retired now and that I bought a little cottage in Hogsmeade," he said. She nodded, sensing where this was going, but politely pretending not to. As he continued his story, she thought to herself: Poor Elphinstone. He has asked so many times already but he keeps having hope.
She'd had her reasons to refuse of course, the most eminent one being the memory of Dougal McGregor, the boyfriend she'd had when she was eighteen and with she had broken off her engagement. She loved Elphinstone too in a way, but she had never stopped loving Dougal, even though he had gotten married to someone else a couple of years later, and she had always felt it wouldn't be fair to Elphinstone to have that memory overshadow them. But now Dougal had died, and she couldn't think of another reason why she should refuse if Elphinstone were to ask her again. She couldn't keep mourning a teenage heartbreak forever now could she?
"So, you're probably fed up with me asking this," Elphinstone pulled her out of her reminiscences and laughed nervously, "but Nerva, would you be my wife?"
She smiled at him and took his hands, having made her decision. "You know what, Elphinstone? That would be wonderful."
I really enjoyed writing this piece, I hope you enjoyed reading it. Let me know! More is coming up!