Page 68 of Just My Ex

“How do you ask, Navie?”

When Navie responds with “please,” I grin at her from the rear-view mirror. She’s been saying “Mom and Dad” this and “Mom and Dad” that a lot lately. It has a nice ring to it.

I slip into denial from the fact that my little girl’s heart is going to break when we have to go back to Irvine by hooking up my Bluetooth to the car’s speakers.

“Take On Me,” by Aha starts playing and Henry growls and turns it off.

“Hey!”

“If she doesn’t like this, I’ll change it back,” he says. He pushes a bunch of buttons to change it to “I Won’t Back Down” by Tom Petty.

Navie kicks her feet in unison to the song.

“She likes it,” he insists, a slow smile spreading on his face as he watches her dance.

“Is this title a subliminal message?”

“What? That I won’t back down on trying to educate our daughter on the finer points of Tom Petty?” He glances at me. “Yes.”

“You’re incorrigible,” I say.

“So I’ve been told.”

I eye him carefully. “But you’re also different now. Different from how you used to be.”

Flashbacks of yesterday and the tumultuous, other-worldly kissing in the hallway of Sebastian’s suite singe me, all the way through. No one has ever made me feel the way Henry does.

We haven’t talked about it yet. But maybe we should just kiss some more instead of trying to find words to explain what all this means.

His tongue darts out to his lips, hesitating. “I’m different? That sounds ominous.” But his dash of a glance tells me maybe it’s not … that he hopes it’s not a bad thing.

“It’s a good thing.” I want to keep going, to explain that he’s more engaged, more present. But it might not be best—for me—to do a deep dive into all his better qualities at the moment.

“So, let’s see the socks.” He reaches a hand down to try to pull on my pant leg.

I trap his hand in mine against my leg. “I’ll have you know that my socks are matching today. We’re going to your parents’ house. Please.”

“Do you remember the first time I took you there?” He has his hand back securely on the wheel.

Which is the responsible thing to do. Yet, I miss him touching me.

“After we were already secretly engaged? Yes.”

“It wasn’t official. I couldn’t make it official until I’d fully disclosed what my family was like.”

I laugh. “Well, same with me. You needed to know I came from acrobats, dancers, and gag connoisseurs.” I pause, letting the memories of my first time in Denver take me over. “You remember what your father said to me?”

He groans. “How could I forget? ‘Quinn, in our family we don’t get married until we’re pushing thirty, so don’t get any ideas.’”

“And you weren’t even twenty-five yet. Utterly scandalous, Henry.” I laugh. “I still remember his face when I told him my parents got married at nineteen. Within seconds, he was calculating how much his delinquent future grandchildren were going to cost him.”

“And surprisingly, you still said yes a week later.” His gaze lingers on me, and he has to tear it away to pay attention to the road.

For some people, their engagement is a big affair, with hidden cameras and public involvement. I’ve had more than one friend get proposed to via flash mob, I kid you not.

But not Henry. If anyone could make a proposal so achingly tender and sweet, it was him. I figured he would, and he did not disappoint.

In the months between his first deployment to Afghanistan and his second to Iran, we talked daily about marrying each other. Until one day, he asked me unofficially—sort of a “If I were to ask you to marry me …”

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