Page 31 of Valentine's Day Proposal

Finally, as I ducked back into the hall, now cluttered with newcomers to the party, I noticed Willow leaving the bathroom. She was wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. At the same time I saw her, I saw Peter. He approached her from the opposite direction, and we arrived almost at the same time. Willow leaned over the drinking fountain and took a long drink of water, and Peter scowled.

“What are you two doing out here? You should be in there preparing to celebrate. The announcement is in less than half an hour.” Peter wore his usual casual suit with no tie, a standout amongst the black ties and ball gowns.

“I’m not feeling well. It must be nerves.” Willow bent and drank more water, then straightened and faced me.

“What’s going on?” I was irritated, and I knew I shouldn’t have been. “I thought you weren’t sick anymore.”

“I said it’s just nerves. Sometimes this happens when I get nervous, okay?” She brushed a stray brown hair off her exposed shoulder and corrected her posture.

“You both need to get back into that room.” Peter scolded us for a moment. “And why haven’t you picked up your phone all day?”

I winced, remembering waking to my phone being submerged in a glass of water next to me. “I dropped my phone in water,” I told him, wincing. “Give us a second.”

Peter retreated back to the hall, and I glanced at the clock and knew he was right. They would read the final decision from ballot offices across the state any minute, then they would call us with the result and our reaction would be recorded.

“Look, I get it. You aren’t happy here. It’s almost over now, okay? After they read the results, no matter what happens, you are free to return to your life as normal.” Her expression wasn’t what I expected. She looked hurt for a moment, genuinely in pain, then her face calmed, and she smiled.

“I think you’re going to win, but if you don’t you can always try again in a few years.” Willow hooked her arm around mine and said, “Shall we?”

Shaken, I cleared my throat, unable to respond to her. I hadn’t expected to see that hurt expression on her face. I thought of all things to say, what I told her would have been a relief, that she would be happy to return to her normal life and take her money. Now I led her back into the noise and chaos of the celebration a bit uneasy. Had I read her entirely wrong?

“Willow, I need to know something,” I said as we walked into the room.

“Anything, Charles.” Her fake, pasted-on smile was back, playing the “good wife” for the cameras and constituents.

“Do you want to stay here? Did something change? Are you in love with me?” Now definitely wasn’t the time or the place to ask a question like that, but if I waited a single second longer, I’d lose my nerve. We dodged a few waiters carrying trays of champagne and weaved toward the stage. I glanced at her a few times, and if I wasn’t mistaken, she had tears in her eyes. But what did they mean? “Answer me,” I ordered, stopping the train. I had to know.

As I turned to face her, the crowd closed in around us. I was lost in her eyes that I could see clearly were brimming with tears. She smiled, hooking her arms around my neck and pulling me down for a kiss. But it wasn’t the kiss I wanted. I wanted the kiss that reassured me that I was right—she wanted to stay. What I got was a camera-friendly kiss, the type Peter had forced us to practice over and over. It didn’t entirely reject the notion that she wanted to be here, but it didn’t scream “take me I’m yours.”

When I backed away, searching her face, the cameras started flashing and Peter was there, pulling me on stage. Willow followed, a reluctant victim to the chaos. All of our hard work would be decided in the next few minutes, but the decision I wanted would have to wait. When we got home, I was going to pry it out of her one way or another.

28

WILLOW

If I could drink, I would have a fifth of whiskey in me by now. I paced the floor of the apartment waiting for Charles to return home. I had called his phone at least 20 times before I remembered having dunked it in water in that damn hotel room. My angry reaction had backfired, leaving me without a way to contact him on the night that I needed to talk to him more than ever.

When he asked me that question, I wanted to break down and tell him everything—my feelings, what I wanted, the baby. But the crowds moved in. I got nervous so I kissed him, and then Peter was there whisking us away. He was stupid to have asked me that question right then, right in the middle of that mess. Why didn’t he ask me this morning when we were getting ready? Or last night when we were falling asleep?

“Dammit, Charles!”

Every time a car pulled into the parking lot below, I hovered, thinking it was him. I tried to relax and watch a show, but every channel had a banner scrolling along the bottom of the screen revealing the results of the elections. Charles’s name kept popping up, reminding me that he was not where he was supposed to be. I should have just answered his question there at the party.

I punched in the number to Peter’s phone, thinking maybe that I’d raise him that way. My phone clock indicated that it was well past one a.m., and I’d left the party around ten-thirty. The call rang through to voicemail, and I suspected a little too much partying was going on, so I called again. And again.

Finally, when Peter picked up, he sounded more groggy and tired than drunk and partying. The room he was in was quiet, not exactly what I expected from a raucous party of political celebrants. It took a few seconds for him to speak, but when he did, I knew I had made a mistake.

“Willow? What’s wrong?”

“Charles… he’s not home. Is he with you?” I lowered myself to the couch slowly, remembering my first night here and how Charles had expected me to sleep on this couch. Tears filled my eyes now, wondering where he was and why he wasn’t here with me.

“No. It’s well after midnight. I left the place around eleven, and Charles was already gone. He’s not home?” Peter sounded more awake, and I felt bad for waking him up.

“No, he’s not. I thought the party was going on still.” I sighed. “If you hear from him, call me.”

“He doesn’t have a phone, remember.” Peter yawned. “I’m going back to sleep. I’ll call you in the morning. He’s a big kid. He’ll be fine. Get some sleep, Willow.”

I hung up, now worried. I had been irritated before, upset with him even. Now I feared something had happened to him. I saw the way he was drinking before I left. He’d had several glasses of champagne and I knew he had a tendency to overdo it sometimes. I chewed on my lip, wondering who I could call. I bet Nina would know where he was, but I didn’t have her number. I had liked it that way at first. It meant she couldn’t annoy me. Now I wished I had just tolerated that annoyance for a while.

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