“I need Stacey!” the director called from the curtain. Maybelle quickly stuck another pin into Stacey’s hair, praying it’d stay in place without the hairspray.
“Break a leg!” she said, wishing the actress good luck. After working with her on the murder mystery, Stacey had recommended Maybelle to the musical theater that opened up a few months after Maybelle had moved to Michigan. Financially backed by Winter, and advertised as much as the mansion, the theater had been a huge success, and Maybelle had been working there steadily since it opened.
She rushed to little Hadie, the six-year-old actress with a voice like a Broadway star, and fixed the flowers in her hair. “How we doin’?” she asked as Hadie fidgeted with her costume. “Need to do our calm dance?”
Hadie’s dimples popped on her cheeks, reminding Maybelle of the solitary dimple on Garreth’s chin. The little actress nodded, and Maybelle stood straight and put her hands on her hips.
“We do the chicken, the chicken, the chicken,” she started, dancing and clucking and singing like a chicken while Hadie giggled. “Then we do the mouse, the mouse, the mouse…” Hadie was the cutest, sneaky mouse, making squeaks and funny faces. Maybelle spun around and shook her hips, running through the rest of the animals, ending with the boogie. Hadie’s nerves were chased away with her laughter, and she gave Maybelle a tight hug around the waist before skipping off to her cue. It was moments like this that reminded Maybelle of how happy she was, how each dream she had was transforming into reality before her eyes.
“Miss Monroe?” a stage hand said, holding out her phone. “It was going off on your table.”
Maybelle thanked him and a slow smile spread across her face as she answered the video chat.
“Hey there.”
“Hey there, beautiful.”
He’d added the beautiful just last week; the first time he’d said it his ears fired up red and he shook his head and asked if that was okay. Maybelle had answered him with a big kiss.
Garreth’s face lit up her screen, his smile just as handsome as it was the day she’d met him, but much less nervous. Maybelle rushed to the back mirror so the stage microphones wouldn’t pick up their conversation.
“Curtain is almost up, so I have to be quick.” She tilted her head and soaked in his adorable face. “But it’s good to see you.”
“You too.” He dodged someone coming his way. He must’ve been walking down the street or something, only it was a bit dark for that.
“Where are you?” she asked, but a sly grin was all the answer she got.
“Bells, I…” he gulped, and a rare wave of nerves ran across his face. It’d been a few weeks since she’d seen such nervous behavior from him, but every time he overcame something that scared him, he’d find something else. Maybelle found it more charming than the smooth talking of Casanova.
“Yes…” she prodded, always the one to help him say something he wasn’t sure of.
“Okay, here goes…” he said, the phone stopping its jostling. He must’ve stopped walking. “Gonna say it quick, like I do.”
“And I’ll zip it, like I try to do.”
He laughed. “Indeed. All right, here we go.” He took a deep breath and Maybelle held back a grin, knowing that keeping quiet was going to be tough. Every time he expressed his feelings, he’d do it in a rushed pace, but the words were so darn swoon worthy she couldn’t help but squeal or contribute or reciprocate in some way.
“Do you know the story of Psyche and Eros?”
“You can’t tell me not to talk and then ask a question,” she teased. He wrinkled his nose at her.
“Okay, well, I’m going to tell it anyway.”
She pressed her lips together and waved for him to continue.
“Psyche was the most beautiful maiden on earth; so beautiful, in fact that Aphrodite herself was jealous and asked for Eros, her son, to make Psyche fall in love with a hideous monster.”
“If you’re comparing yourself to a hideous monster, so help me…”
He laughed, shaking his head. “Eros was going to do it, but he took one look at Psyche and couldn’t.”
Her heart fluttered. “Aww, that’s sweet.”
“It gets better,” he said, a tease in his eyes. She loved that he was comfortable spouting his knowledge. She could listen to it for hours… and interrupt just to make him laugh. “Psyche was beautiful, yes, but no one loved her. They adored her from afar but passed her by for other maidens. And Psyche never fell for any of them. Her parents went to the oracle to find out what would become of her, and Apollo told her to head up to the top of the mountain and await the monster who would take her away to be his wife.”
“That is not better.”
“Trust me.” His phone shifted, almost like he was sitting down. “So Psyche waited for her husband and when she was taken away, she woke up in the most beautiful mansion with everything she could ever dream of.”
“Frostville?” she teased, but he nodded, almost as if he knew just how magical that mansion truly was.
“Eros had fallen for her,” he said, almost reverently. “He took her away, catered to her every need, treated her like the angel she was. She was given immortality so she could live with him forever.”
“Okay, it did get better.” She flicked her nails against the dressing table, closing the lid to an opened makeup case. “Any particular reason you’re telling me all this?”
Half his mouth perked up. “Psyche translates to soul. Eros, to love. Love and soul… something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately.”
Her back straightened, electricity running up and down her arms. “Really?”
“I’m the overlooked guy,” he said. “I know you don’t believe me on that, but it’s true. I get overlooked because I hide. I’m a dull light in a sky full of bright stars. It didn’t bother me much, but it did the older I got, the closer I got to feeling like it may not happen for me.”
“I know how you—” She zipped her lips shut, apologizing with her eyes for interrupting. She definitely did not want him to stop talking.
He gave her a grin, a look of absolute adoration in his eyes that she’d never seen from anyone else. It was a look of understanding, of friendship, of love.
“Bells, I came alive when I kissed you, and I’d do anything to keep kissing you for as long as I live.”
Her heart thumped fast and hard, nearly jumping from her chest. It was the most romantic thing anyone had ever said to her, and it took everything in her not to respond.
“I wasn’t the smooth guy or the brave guy, but when I’m with you, I want to be. I want to be romantic and brave and charming and fun and… I want to be yours.”
She bit her tongue, a squeal threatening in the back of her throat, joy making her darn eyes well up.
“Uh… Miss Monroe?” the stage hand said from behind her.
“In a minute.”
“Actually, you might want to come see this for a second.”
She grudgingly sighed, frowning at Garreth. “Sorry, I will respond—if it’s my turn to talk,” she teased, “but give me a…”
Her voice floated away as she walked on the stage, the curtain up, the spotlight on Garreth. Her phone fell to her side, her heart pounding at the sight of him on his knee, a microphone in one hand, his other tucking his phone into his pocket. He gave her an adorable, nervous smile, his hand shaking as he held the microphone to his lips.
“Hey there,” he said, and she let out a happy laugh, joyful tears springing to her eyes. She scurried toward him, knowing this had to be scaring him so much, but if it did, his smile didn’t show it.
“I know it’s sudden. We haven’t been dating long, but… I don’t think I can wait anymore.”
“Me neither,” she said a little too loudly, and the cast around her laughed. Garreth propped open a little black box, but her eyes weren’t on the ring. They were locked on the man of her dreams—a man she’d hoped with all her heart would one day do exactly this.
“Will you marry me?”
She let out a squeal and hopped into his arms, knocking him off his shaky knees and bringing him to the floor. She kissed him with all her heart, with everything she had in her. She was more than happy to be the Psyche to his Eros.