Page 148 of 1001 Dark Nights: Bundle Forty-Seven

“I’m getting it. I’ll be right back.”

He passes through the kitchen and heads down the hall.

I check my phone for new messages from Violet while I wait for Sidney. She’s at Toby’s for an impromptu Mathlete’s meeting because Toby and Michael are having a freak out about their upcoming competition, but otherwise everything is fine. I’m just so grateful she’s such a responsible young woman.

Sidney reappears a few minutes later with a silver bucket and a bottle of what looks like champagne and two fluted glasses.

“Champagne? You sure you’re not angling for butt stuff tonight?”

“For someone who says she’s so against it, you sure bring it up an awful lot, babe.”

“I do, don’t I?”

“Mm. We can come back to that. Later. After you’ve had a couple glasses of champagne.” He winks and sets the ice bucket on the table, then rounds it so he’s standing in the sunset's halo.

He adjusts my chair and then drops to one knee in front of me.

“I don’t know if outdoor sexy times is a good idea. I’m not particularly quiet and I worry that my screaming might scare people into believing there are wolves lurking close by.”

He grins. “Head out of the gutter for a minute, babe.”

He pulls a small velvet box from his pocket.

“Oh!” I slap a hand over my mouth. “Oh my God. Is that what I think it is?”

“It’s not a cock ring.”

I slap his chest. “And you’re on me about getting my head out of the gutter!”

“I love you.”

“I love you, too, Sid, so much. I can’t believe this is happening. I mean, it’s the perfect setting, but I really didn’texpect this. Okay. I’m shutting up because I’m ruining this.” I bite my lips together.

“I know we haven’t been together all that long, but I can’t imagine my life without you, Skye. I’ve been looking for you for a long time, and now that I have you, I want to spend the rest of our lives falling in love over and over again. I want to fall asleep beside you and wake up next to you. I want lazy Sundays where I watch hockey and you try to distract me by wearing low cut tops. I want to remind you to take lactose pills when we go out for dinner, so you don’t have to deal with gastro demons. I want the ups and down and everything in between. I just want you, Skye, and everything that comes with you. I want you to be my wife, but more than that, I want us to be a family. Will you marry me?”

“Oh my God, yes, Sid. Yes, I’ll marry you. I’m a terrible cook, but I give great blow jobs, so I hope that balances things out.”

We both laugh and I choke back a sob as he flips the lid open. Nestled in the velvet is a gorgeous ring with a huge rock of a diamond. It twinkles magnificently in the waning sun.

“Wow. This is just. Wow! It’s gorgeous, Sidney. Just stunning.” I hold out a trembling hand.

“I hope it’s not too much.” He lifts it from the cushion, his own hands shaking as he takes mine.

“It’s ridiculous and perfect.”

He slides the ring on my finger when a spider the size of a freaking softball descends from the roof above, heading straight for our outstretched hands.

“Oh my God! Holy shit!”

“Oh fuck, that thing is huge!” Sidney shouts when it reaches eye level.

I don’t think about what I’m doing. I instinctively react, yanking my hand free of his. My chair topples over and I do a very uncoordinated backwards somersault while screaming mydamn head off. I hop to my feet and almost roll my ankle while I continue to shriek like a banshee.

Sidney, being the much more reasonable of the two of us, yanks off his flip-flop and slams it on the table repeatedly until the giant spider is nothing but an obscenely large splatter mark.

“Is it dead?” I peer at the green and black smear on the brown tile and glance up. “Are there more?” I succumb to a whole-body shudder and hop back again.

“It’s very dead and I don’t think there are more.” Sidney glances up and does the same shuddery thing. “At least I hope not. Way to fuck up my proposal, asshole,” he mutters at the smear.

---