"Horses, seriously? We're going to ride behind horses?" Eli asks.
"Don't you like horses?" Ty asks, with way more panic than the question needs, although Eli is completely oblivious to it.
"Yeah, horses are great, it just seemed like it was a little bit over the top."
"It's our anniversary, nothing is over the top," Ty states.
"I so don't deserve you! You're like the most romantic guy ever, and I am such a dud," Eli says as he climbs into the carriage.
"You are so not a dud," Ty insists, taking his place next to his partner taking his boyfriend's hand, "And I am sorry that I'm too sappy."
"Are you scared of horses or something?" Eli asks.
"No why?" Ty says.
"You hand is drenched in sweat!"
Ty pulls his hand away, and wipes both palms on his pants while muttering, "Sorry."
"I can't believe it's been a year since I was a jealous puddle outside of your dorm room."
"Thank goodness you did, because I never would have found anyone as great as you," Ty says.
Eli tilts his head toward Ty's so that they touch, just barely. Although they've been kissing in private for a couple of months now, Eli is still not ready for a public display of affection beyond hugging and hand holding. The two of them have developed a sentimental head bump as a secret code word for a kiss.
"So, Eli, what do you think we'll be doing on our fifth anniversary?" Ty asks.
"I don't know, that's still four years away. It's tough to even imagine it."
"We'll have been graduated for two years, so I suppose you'll still be at seminary," Ty says. He's hoping this is going to get Eli to open up about other plans. Maybe plans that involve something other than his career. His partner however is completely silent.
Ty forces himself to focus on the horses before him. It was a stupid idea to wait for the proposal at the END of the date, wasn't it?
-0-
Eli is fumbling with the lock to his door, and Ty figures that he is just doing that by way of distraction when he thinks of how he is going to respond to the note that is written on his door. Then, the lock opens, and Eli walks into his dorm room, and waiting for Ty to walk in and give him a goodnight kiss.
He expects Ty to just walk in and give him a goodnight kiss. Ty is dumbfounded. Is Eli saying no? Is he pretending like nothing happened?
Ty is frozen on the spot. He's dreamt about this for months, and in none of his visions did Eli pretend that it wasn't happening.
"Ty? Are you ok? You look sick; do you want to come in and sit down?"
"No?" Ty says.
"Was that a question?" Eli asks, completely confused.
Ty shakes his head, and then nods it, "You're saying no?"
"No to what? You didn't ask me anything did you?" Eli says, searching his mind for the memory.
Ty points to the white board on Eli's door. The one he'd asked Olivia to write his proposal on while he was on a date with Eli.
Eli's eyes go wide, and his mouth drops open.
The sweat on Ty's hands increases in volume, and his stomach begins doing some sort of black flips that he can't identify as excited or terrified. He's putting all of his brain waves into trying to categorize them, because then there will be no brain waves left over with which to panic.
"Ty, why don't you come inside?" Eli asks.
"No, inside is where you are going to say no. If you were going to say yes, you would do it in the hallway. If you were going to say yes, you won't be worried about me making a scene. I'm going to stay out here, where the good answer is."
"Tyler O'Neill, my answer is going to be a little more complicated than 'yes' or 'no', and I want you to be sitting down when you hear it. Ok? Now come on in, and you know I love you."
Ty nods, but doesn't move.
Eli takes his hand, and runs it down Ty's arm in a way that he knows causes goosebumps to populate it. When he reaches the hand, he gives it a gentle tug, and Ty follows him into the room, and allows the door to be shut.
"Why do you want to marry me?" Eli asks when they are both sitting cross-legged on his bed a few minutes later.
"Because I love you," Ty says with a smile.
"Ok, right, but why now?"
"Because I love you now?" Ty says, as if confused by the question.
Eli sighs, "Ty, we're super young. Nineteen. Not many people get married at nineteen."
Ty shakes his head, "We're not getting married right now. We're getting engaged. I thought we could wait until next year on our anniversary to get married."
"Ok, well, twenty is still pretty young. Besides, what exactly do you mean by 'marriage'? We can't get legally married."
"No, but there is this designed beneficiary agreement thing that I looked up. It's the closest we can get to marriage right now. Of course, that would just be the signing of some legal forms. But I would want to have a big ceremony. You know, have a wedding, even it isn't legal."
"Ty, you don't just want to get married this young so we can have sex, do you?" Eli asks, blushing at the question.
"No. I mean, I do want to have sex with you. But this marriage isn't all about that. I want to spend the rest of our life together. When we think about our future I want us to both see the other one. I want us to live together, and eat all of our meals together…"
"We already eat most of our meals together," Eli interrupts.
"I want to eat all of our meals together. I want to sit next to you and do homework, and share the Sunday morning paper, and wake up next to you, and just be together."
"You want to promise forever in front of all of our family and friends, and share holidays," Eli says.
"Oh," Ty says, not having considered the implication behind Eli's words in all of his planning.
"You want me to tell my parents we're together, and would they please come watch their minister son desecrate everything they believe in?"
"You won't have to tell them," Ty whispers.
"Ty, when I get married, I want my parents there."
"Who are you marrying in this imagination?" Ty asks.
Eli leans forward, and brushes bangs off Ty's face, "You. I definitely know it would be you."
"So, it's kind of like a yes, but really a no?" Ty asks.
Eli nods, "I told you this answer was going to be complicated. I'm not really ready to be married, or even engaged. But I love you, and I want to marry you someday."
Ty nods his head feeling a great deal less devastated than he had a few minutes ago. "So, I wasn't sure what the rules on engagement were when you were both boys. I mean… usually the girl gets a ring, and you're not a girl, so…"
"I don't need anything," Eli says.
"Well, I got us matching watches. Is that weird?" Ty asks, pulling his out of his coat pocket.
"Not weird at all," Eli says, opening the box.
"You like it?" Ty says with a flinch.
Eli nods his head as he puts it on, "Now every time I check the time I'll be thinking of how I wished I was spending time with you."
"You can do cheesy," Ty says with appreciation.
The Next Day
"So, how did the engagement go?" Olivia asks, plopping her tray down next to Ty.
"Pretty good," Ty says, while stirring raisons into his oatmeal.
"Pretty good? You got engaged! How can it only be pretty good? It should be amazing, life changing, the most amazing thing that has ever happened to you!"
"Well, we didn't actually get engaged," Ty says.
"What?" Olivia practically squeals, "If he said no, that doesn't qualify as 'pretty good', and I'm definitely going to beat some sense into his head!"
"He said 'not yet'," Ty says, putting his hand on her arm to calm her.
"Oh," Olivia says with, the wind clearly knocked out of her sails.
"We're really young, and he hasn't told his parents yet. I get it, and we're happy together. There is no need to rush things. I just thought… we'd been dating a year, and we'd known each other for almost two years. I didn't really think that I was rushing things too much."
"But you are young," Olivia says, offering her friend a smile.
Ty nods his head.
"So, did he give you a guess on when you wouldn't be too young anymore?"
Ty shakes his head again.
"Oh, you know what you should do? Make this proposal an annual event until he says yes! I mean, it might take a couple of years, until you are out of college or something, but you could propose each year on the same date, and at some point… he would say yes!"
"You don't think it's too pushy?" Ty asks.
"I think it might just be the most romantic thing that I've ever heard of," Olivia says, wearing what Ty has come to call her 'swoon face'.
"Being an English major has completely ruined you. You read far too many dusty romances."
"My dear Tyler, there is no such thing as 'too many' of any sort of books."
"How is your real-life romance going?" Ty asks.
Olivia rolls his eyes, "He was obviously not even aware that it was our anniversary. He did nothing. Well, that's not true, he burped in my mouth during a kiss."
"That's disgusting," Ty says, making a face.
"Or apparently funny, if you have a Y-chromosome," Olivia corrects.
"Nope, I've got the Y-chromosome, and it's disgusting."
"Sometimes I forget you're a boy," Olivia says thoughtfully.
"Well, thanks so much for that!" Ty exclaims.
"Is it weird that we share an anniversary when we're not… together?" Olivia asks, stabbing her breakfast.
"No, I think it's a kind of cool best friends thing," Ty says, nodding his head with assurance.