Page 173 of The Fake Out Flex

"Not even one?"

"No, really. I'm fine."

"Not even, like, the top one?"

I stare out into the audience and am met with a sea of blank faces. What is he doing? Why is he so insistent on me eating a cold fry?

I glance down at the packet in his hands and almost drop the microphone. "Oh, my goodness!" I gasp.

Fraser drops to his knee, plucks out the top fry, and discards the rest on the floor.

There's a ring, a deep, vivid, canary-yellow diamond center stone accentuated by smaller white diamonds, sparkling on it.

He takes it off the fry and reaches for my hand. "Evie, it may have taken me almost eight years to ask you to be my girlfriend, but it took me about eight seconds to realize I needed to buy this ring and put it on your finger the second I saw it."

"Where did you see this ring?"

"In a jewelry store in New York."

"You were just casually walking down the street in New York and decided to pop into a jewelry store?"

"Correct."

"This something you do on a regular basis?"

"Evie, you're overthinking it."

"I'm just curious about your big-city shopping habits. This is important information for me to factor into the decision I'm about to make."

"You're not going to have a decision to make if I don't get the chance to ask the question."

"Good point. Continue, please."

"Thank you. I know this is sudden and maybe a little too soon, but I also know with everything I have in me, that I want you to be my wife. The mother of my children. The assistant coach to your junior league and para hockey teams." He swallows. "I want to share the big moments of life with you, but also all the small, ordinary, even mundane ones, too."

It takes me a moment to catch the reference. "'Sweet Nothing,'" I whisper, holding his gaze, remembering our dance at the beach.

He nods. His normally piercing eyes have become misty.

So have mine.

Because for all his grand gestures—like this amazing proposal, like buying me a hockey stadium and team, like flying across the country just because he had a hunch I might be feeling bad—so many of my favorite moments with him have been simple ones.

Like lying on the floor talking.

Like laughing as we eat burgers and way too many malasadas.

Like just being together and knowing that this is right. That we belong together.

"You make me a better man, Evie, and I want to be the best man I can be for you every day for the rest of my life."

He looks at me and smiles, and I honestly don't think I've ever felt happier than I do right now.

"We don't have to get married this year, or even next year. We can have the world's longest engagement if that's what you want." He takes a small breath, then resumes, "So, with all that said, Evelyn Willow Freeman, will you do me the honor of being my wife…someday?"

"Yes! Of course I will. Yes!" I sputter into the microphone.

My hand trembles and tears start to fall down my face as Fraser eases the ring onto my finger, the grease from the fries helping it slide on effortlessly.

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