Chapter Two
WITH KELLY’S REASSURING him about the holiday and easing his fear on that score, Walter focused on second-guessing his decision to propose at Thanksgiving rather than at the movie until his head hurt from too much thinking. If Kelly wanted to make their viewing it together an event, if that was so precious to him and important they do it alone, maybe he should make a proposal part of that. Except he didn’t want to dilute either experience. And he couldn’t shake what Cara had said, that she wanted to see Walter propose, that everyone would want to.
Though the other demon haunting Walter was his terror that Kelly might say it was too soon to get married. In which case Walter would rather hear the rejection at a movie theater in front of a few hundred strangers than surrounded by their closest friends and family. Everyone kept telling him Kelly wouldn’t say no, that he was as ready as Walter, but the closer Thanksgiving came, the more sick to his stomach Walter became. He deeply regretted his plan to ask Kelly during dessert. He wasn’t going to be able to eat a damn bite of the meal, he’d be so nervous.
As Thanksgiving week started, between the food preparations and the proposal, Walter entered an altered state of anxiety and terror, the impending movie screening utterly forgotten. It didn’t matter how much his sister, Kelly’s sister, his friend Rose, or Cara reassured him. There were too many ways for Walter to get the proposal wrong, which meant he would get it wrong, a thought he couldn’t bear yet couldn’t manage to escape either. Kelly asked if he was okay a few times, and Walter lied and said it was school stressing him out. Normally Kelly would have pushed, because it was a pretty bad lie, but this time he was too caught up in the food prep and his own classes. To make things worse, Walter realized while Kelly was glad to see their friends and family, if he’d had his way, they’d have spent the holiday alone. Walter had assumed Kelly wanted everyone to come join them for a meal…but no, this was only what Walter had wanted.
He was going to be a horrible husband. If the smell of smoke wouldn’t have disappointed Kelly all the more, Walter would have caved and bought a pack of Marlboros when he went out for soy milk Wednesday night after everyone had gone back to their hotels. He hadn’t lit up in years, but that didn’t stop him from wanting to inhale a full pack in the parking lot of Lund’s. He managed to refrain, but he didn’t sleep a wink, only alternated between staring at the ceiling and Kelly’s slumbering profile.
His insomnia worked out well in the end, because it meant he could turn off Kelly’s alarm and start the turkey himself, beginning the labor-intensive walnut lentil loaf for Sue, Kelly’s vegetarian mother, and putting a last spit-shine on the apartment before everyone arrived. When a timid knock sounded on the door at seven thirty, Walter was surprised to find Sue standing there.
“I had Dick drop me off. He and Lisa will be by around ten thirty, but I wanted to come help cook.” Sue bussed him on the cheek as she breezed into the apartment. “Besides, I had a feeling you’d be a little nervous.”
Walter’s love for Sue, already deep and wide, carved new trenches to store the affection in his heart. “I still worry it’s too soon to ask him.”
“Hush.” She dusted imaginary lint from his shoulders, then let her hands linger there as she looked him in the eye. “If it were anybody else, I’d agree with that statement. But if you’re the one asking? I say it’s a perfect time.”
The very idea of anyone else asking Kelly to marry them made Walter feel like he could grow fangs. He didn’t say that, though, only thanked his hopefully future mother-in-law and gave her a big hug.
The food prep occupied Walter’s mind the rest of the morning, and as the apartment filled up with scents and family, he felt like he was dancing on top of a strange cloud. It was wonderful to see everyone, even his mother and grandmother, who somehow didn’t manage to ruin everything. There were simply too many other people present who weren’t interested in their dramatic saga, making them wet blankets that did nothing but hiss and dry out in the home fires the others ignited.
Kelly seemed to like having everyone around once the meal got going, and he told Walter as much when they were alone in the kitchen putting the last touches on the turkey and lentil loaf before bringing them out for the big reveal. “This is cool, having everyone here for a meal. It’s crowded, but it’s fun.” Kelly wrapped his arms around Walter’s neck, smiling. “Because it’s in our house.”
He kissed Walter softly, spreading warmth out from Walter’s solar plexus in a slow, sweet burn.
Once they started eating, Walter resumed feeling nervous, knowing what was coming. Rose and Cara kept giving him bolstering smiles and the occasional encouraging elbow, right up until the time they all three retreated into the kitchen to set up the proposal.
“I’m going to throw up,” Walter murmured as Cara fussed with his collar and Rose queued the MP3 player and WiFi speaker.
“You’re going to be fine.” Cara stilled his hand where it worried Kelly’s class ring and squeezed his fingers. “He’s going to say yes. Trust me on this.”
“Yes, but is this the right way to ask him?”
“Yes,” they replied in unison.
Despite this, Walter still quaked as he waited for Rose’s cue. When it was time to bring out the pan, his whole body felt like jelly.
He’d wanted to include an element from Tangled in his proposal to Kelly, and after hours of racking his brain and far, far too many viewings of the digital version on his laptop when his hopefully soon-to-be fiancé was sleeping beside him, Walter had decided putting the ring in a cast-iron frying pan was the way to go. Everything else felt too convoluted. But now that the moment was here, he wasn’t sure.
“It’s fine.” Cara patted his arm as she tested the weight of the pan in her hand. “I didn’t know you guys had a cast-iron pan. It doesn’t even look like you guys have used this one.”
This was because the sole reason they had a cast-iron pan was the role-play Walter wasn’t ever giving Cara details about. She’d assume Kelly did more than hold it, and that one time, he’d kind of…
Thankfully, before Cara could read enough of his embarrassment to press for more detail, Rose returned from the dining room.
“Okay. It’s time, I think.” She took Walter’s hand and squeezed it as Cara passed him the pan. “You’ll be great, don’t worry. And he’s going to say yes.”
The pan was heavy, and Walter was grateful for every pound as he rearranged the towel, his free hand shaking. His ears rang as he heard his cue from the girls—There’s something wrong with the dessert…no, the other one—and he wobbled into the dining room feeling as if he too were made of heavy metal, stiff and unyielding.
Then he saw Kelly’s face, bright and perfect and gazing at him in mild confusion, and the whole world came into focus. Walter knew, then, that it would all be okay.
“See for yourself.” Walter held the pan out to Kelly.
Kelly lifted the tea towel.
Walter’s heart skipped a beat as Kelly’s gaze fell on the ring, as it dawned on him that he was being proposed to. Kelly pressed his hand over his mouth, looking as if he was trying not to cry. Then the girls started the music from the kitchen—“Waiting for the Lights,” one of Kelly’s favorite instrumental songs from Tangled—and Kelly did cry. And laugh.
Walter took the ring out of the center of the empty frying pan. He held it up so Kelly could see it, hoping he was able to notice the swans engraved on the gold band through his tears. Walter did his best to smile rakishly like Flynn Rider, but he was too nervous, and it came out pretty much bald Walter Lucas instead.
“Kelly Davidson, will you marry me?”
Kelly wiped at his eyes and glanced around the room at his family, then back at Walter. Walter tried to keep himself steady, balancing the pan as he knelt on one knee, still holding out the ring. He squeezed the handle of the pan tighter, making Kelly’s class ring cut into his finger for reassurance.
Please say yes, Kelly.
“Well?” Cara prompted from behind Kelly. “Are you going to say anything?”
“Yes,” Kelly said, beaming, laughing.
The room broke into cheers as Walter set the pan aside, slid the ring on Kelly’s finger and stood, taking him into his arms.
For the rest of the meal, Walter felt like he could fly over downtown Minneapolis. He remembered someone putting pie in front of him, but he wasn’t sure if he ate it or not. He knew he never let go of Kelly’s hand, that Kelly kept kissing his cheek, kept telling him he loved him, whispering it into his ear as if he couldn’t help himself. Walter leaned into every confession, letting his eyes fall half closed, drinking it all in.
Mine. He’s going to be mine. Officially. Forever.
When everyone left and they were alone, Kelly climbed on top of him on the couch and kissed him for an hour, murmuring how much he loved him, how perfect the proposal had been.
“Walter—Walter, I never dreamed…”
Kelly ran his hands over Walter’s face, which meant the ring scraped Walter’s skin, and he decided this was his new favorite kink. Walter slid his hands inside his fiancé’s shirt, teasing the buttons open one by one as the kisses changed to something deeper.
“Maybe I should have done it in costume,” he said when they came up for air.
Kelly smiled against his mouth, a wicked grin that made Walter shiver more than the fingertips trailing down his collarbone. “Maybe you should go put it on now.”
Once upon a time Walter would have laughed at anyone who’d suggested he’d be the type of person to put on a cartoon character’s clothes and do kinky bedroom cosplay with his fiancé. He’d have laughed at the idea of having a fiancé, period.
Once upon a time Walter didn’t know how to dream about once upon a time. Then he’d met Kelly.
He kissed the man he loved, lingeringly, on the mouth. “Go get into your tower, Rapunzel, so I can break and enter.”
Kelly kissed him back, biting him lightly on the lip. “Don’t keep me waiting too long, Eugene.”