24. Jake #3
Allen turned away from the vastness of the heavens and met Jake’s gaze with tears glittering in his eyes. He placed his other hand onto Jake’s, giving him strength to steady his trembling.
“I love you,” said Allen. “I’m grateful your dumbass teammates dragged you into my store that night.”
“That was mostly Riley’s idea,” Jake admitted.
Allen’s laughter was like a siren’s song harmonizing with the crashing of the waves. The world was orange and red around them, the sand was still warm on Jake’s bare feet from the heat of the midday sun, and the air smelled of sea salt and roses.
Jake knew this was the moment he was waiting for—there would be no better time.
“Jake?”
Jake gently removed his hand from Allen’s, determined to go through with it before his boyfriend had a chance to get worried. He reached into his jeans pocket and removed the box he had been keeping safe all day.
“Allen—”
“Oh fuck.”
Jake looked just in time to see Allen smack his hands over his own mouth, like he was forcefully stopping himself from saying anything.
Trying not to let his expression come off as too serious, Jake held the small box up for Allen to see and carefully opened it.
The band was simple because he knew Allen wouldn’t want anything flashy, but the gold was high-quality, and the diamond embedded in the metal was sparkly enough to draw some attention.
The most important part was the date engraved inside the ring; the day they first met.
“I—”
Jake scowled and held his breath, confused when the words wouldn’t come out. He had thought of what he wanted to say so many times it should have been easy to blurt them—to do something—but his mouth didn’t want to work.
Allen was still holding his hands over his mouth, waiting patiently for Jake to speak while his eyes kept looking down at the ring, but he didn’t rush him.
Jake loved him so much. He wanted to tell him that and so much more, but when he finally found his voice, the only words he could get out were—
“Do you want this?”
Allen’s eyes went wide at the same time Jake’s did, and they both glanced at the ring like they were expecting it to add something to the conversation.
Mortified, Jake contemplated leaving Allen and running into the ocean to drown himself, but Allen stopped him before he had a chance to bolt.
“Yes,” he said, attempting to remove the ring from the box with fingers that were shaking too hard. “Oh my god, I love you. I can’t believe you got me with this. I thought you were worried about something else, not this.”
Jake was trembling too, but he managed to remove the ring for Allen and lifted it to his finger, both laughing when they struggled to slide it on.
“‘Do you want this’ has to be the best proposal question in history,” Allen said, laughing quietly as he wiped the tears from his eyes.
“You’re literally perfect. I thought you would take me to a fancy restaurant, but this—this was exactly what I wanted.
You adorably fumbling, and me crying like a baby against the backdrop of a romantic sunset. ”
Jake’s chuckle felt like a release of tension in his body, and he felt so tired he wanted nothing more than to lie on the beach and take a nap. “I envisioned wooing you with my words. I had a lot more to say.”
Allen shrugged and lifted onto his tiptoes so he could take Jake’s face in his hands. “I don’t need a thousand poetic words and grand gestures to know how you feel about me. All I need is the warmth in your eyes, your gorgeous smile, and a kiss to seal it.”
Jake heard the message loud and clear. He scooped Allen into his arms and kissed him, unable to stop smiling when Allen laughed against his mouth.
When that didn’t feel close enough, Jake lifted Allen off the ground and continued the kiss, lips brushing, hands caressing, and laughter echoing as they became tangled up in one another.
By the time they finally pulled apart, they were breathless with laughter and joy, and Allen couldn’t stop looking at his ring and smiling in a way that warmed Jake’s heart.
They held hands on the way back to the car, stumbling in the sand and clinging to each other until Jake’s face hurt from smiling so much.
“I was going to suggest we spend the night at the cabin,” said Jake, gesturing to the structure that half-heartedly beckoned him closer with images of bending Allen over every surface they could find.
“But?” Allen asked, his coy smile suggesting that he already knew what Jake was thinking.
“I want to go home to the others. I want to wrap Kingston in blankets and hold him while we watch sad movies, and I want to keep Riley between us until he understands how loved he is.”
Allen’s growing smile told him that he was thinking the same thing.
“Then let’s go see our boys,” he said, lifting his ring to show it off and letting the last of the sunlight catch the diamond until it glittered. “Besides, we need to work on getting those two engaged. Then we can be a complete set.”
Jake liked that idea.
He liked that idea very much.