Epilogue #3
If she were being honest, Max was definitely still having a lot of those pinch-me, is-this-real-life kind of moments.
And today had already been full of them.
She still couldn’t believe that they were here, together—in Michigan, on her vineyard, fixing up the house that, if everything went according to Max’s plan, they would raise their kids in.
Like, c’mon—how was this really her life?
She glanced at Annie. The crisp May air, still holding the lingering chill of the long winter, turned her cheeks a rosy pink that Max wanted to remember forever. Halfway down the row of cherry trees, Annie slowed, sliding both hands into her jacket pockets.
“You know how much I love you, right?” she said, her voice softer than Max had ever heard it before.
“I do, and you know how much I love you, right?”
Annie smiled, tilting her chin slightly to look up at her as she stepped closer still, her lips parting. “When we came out to visit the vineyard last year, I told you that I was upset I met you at a time in my life where I felt like I was such a mess.”
Her dark braid shifted as Max nodded, remembering the conversation they had had in the cozy bed of the cabin.
“But now I can’t help but think about how silly that was to say.”
Annie shifted her gaze away, looking down at the scuffed toes of her boots, and that’s when Max picked up on it. A nervousness she hadn’t felt from Annie in a long time.
Her question was tentative as she asked it. “Everything’s okay, right?”
“Everything is more than okay,” Annie responded, the nervousness still there but mixing with confidence now.
Annie withdrew her hands from her pockets, and that’s when Max noticed it: a small wooden box clutched in her grip.
Time felt like it was moving at half speed as she watched Annie lower herself down onto one knee on the soggy, damp earth in the middle of the cherry orchard blossoms in full bloom, holding the tiny box up in front of her—a box Max instantly recognized as her mother’s ring box.
“Annie—what? How did you—?” Her voice shook as she tried to figure out one: how Annie had gotten that box, and two: if this was another one of those pinch-me moments, because from where she stood, it definitely looked like Annie was proposing to her.
“Don’t steal my thunder.” Annie’s smile was wide and toothy as they laughed. A breeze picked up, swirling tiny petals all around them, making Max feel like they were in a snowglobe, just the two of them, this moment frozen in time forever.
“I wanted to be the perfect version of myself when I met a woman like you. But you’ve shown me that perfect isn’t always better.
It’s about the journey of sifting through the messiness of life with people who love you and stay by your side through each and every growth moment, and Max, I want to be there for all of yours.
” Annie’s voice cracked, raw and trembling with her excitement that had now fully replaced any nervousness.
Max listened, tears prickling her eyes as she fought them back. She did not want to be the kind of girl who cried at her proposal, but it was too late.
“My roots are planted wherever yours are. I can’t imagine growing with anyone else but you. So, I have a very important question for you. Maxine Martin, will you marry—”
“Yes. One hundred times yes!” Max blurted out before Annie even finished her question, pulling her to her feet as she peppered her face with kisses. “Yes. Yes. Yes.”
Annie laughed, removing the beautiful ring—a marquis-cut diamond Art Deco-inspired style—from the box, gingerly sliding it onto Max’s ring finger. “You could have let me finish the question.”
“I could have, but I already knew the answer. Wow.” She sighed, looking down at the ring on her finger, the weight of the band unfamiliar to her.
Sunlight caught in the beveled edges of the stones, twinkling in a mesmerizing way.
“It’s beautiful.” Her eyes met Annie’s electrified gaze. “God, I love you.”
“I know—love you right back. Now are you going to keep looking at your new sparkly object, or are you going to kiss your fiancée? I believe you owe me one passionate kiss as per our wager this morning.”
“Fiancée,” Max echoed, loving the way the word sounded rolling off her tongue as she stepped closer to Annie, both hands cupping her cheeks as she poured every ounce of herself into her kiss. “How was that for passion?” she murmured, lips brushing Annie’s.
It took Annie a moment before her eyelids fluttered open, those deep blue eyes and intense centric sunbursts meeting hers, and for a moment the two of them looked at each other, rooted to this perfect spot.
But it was Annie’s quietly content voice that stayed with her as she breathed, “Ten out of ten. No notes.”
Max smiled, lacing her fingers through Annie’s as they began their trek back up the hill towards the farmhouse. All around them, branches stirred in the breeze. A flurry of pale pink and white petals danced around, celebrating them as they walked hand in hand.