Breathless

Chapter 35: The Swing - June 10 - One Day in the Future

"Mom, I need every single bloom," Blaze insisted as they cut roses from her bushes.

"I know, darling. Are you going to want my help delivering them?"

"Nope. I got this."

"Yes, I rather suppose you're becoming an old hand at this by now, aren't you?" she responded with a quirky grin that matched his own.

—

An hour later, Ruby pulled her car up in front of her house. As she exited her vehicle, she glanced up and caught sight of Blaze's truck across the street. Eagerly, she turned towards her house. And stopped cold as her eyes touched her porch swing. She slammed her door shut and hurried towards her home.

Blaze was grinning down at her as she rushed up the sidewalk and took the stairs as quickly as she could. She came to a halt three feet from her swing. It was covered in red roses. Except that...in the middle of that swing sat a beautiful man. He was beaming up at her. Rather like that cheerful sun from whose rays she had fled until Blaze invaded her life with his devotion.

"Blaze? What on earth? You've planted a garden in the middle of my swing again."

"Actually, no. I've planted a man in the middle of your swing. And a garden surrounding him," he chuckled.

"Why?" Her eyes hadn't left his face. She was more enthralled with the man in the midst of those beautiful blooms than she was by the roses themselves.

He cleared his throat. "I believe the answer you're looking for is found in a poem. So I shall recite it to you."

He held her gaze as he spoke.

"I could never have found

A love more resplendent

Than my lovely red rose.

By her gaze I am bound.

Nothing's more transcendent

Than being where she grows.

"Can I live in your pretty garden

Under the rays of your brilliant sun?

Can I revel in your devotion,

And not allow my heart to harden,

But bask in the joys my friendship won,

And delight in the heat of passion?

"Ruby, my shining gemstone,

Would you walk with me for life,

Always clinging to my hand?

Ruby, my resplendent rose,

Would you be my willing wife?

I'll join you in your dreamland."

Carefully, he stood up and reached for her hand. "Come, sit among the roses."

He helped her to get settled in her favorite seat as the perfume of hundreds of roses engulfed her with their peace. He beamed down at her for a moment before his smile faded, and a serious light entered his eyes. Then he knelt before her on the boards of her old porch. He gazed earnestly up at her as he spoke with all the passion that he'd contained in his heart for her for nearly twelve long years.

"Ruby, I love you. Will you marry me?"

A tear slid down her cheek as she realized what he had just done. He had redeemed her favorite seat in the whole world. He had brought her swing back into a place of beauty, by replacing its memory of a demanded divorce with an appeal for her hand in marriage. To a most wonderful man.

"That depends," she responded as another tear slid down her other cheek.

"On what?"

"How many roses I'm surrounded by."

"Ah. How many should you be surrounded by?"

"Enough to last the rest of our lives."

His grin split his face in half then. "That works. There are enough here for both our lifetimes then. One for every year."

Her delicate copper eyebrow quirked. "How many is that?"

"Two hundred and forty. One hundred twenty years for you and one hundred twenty years for me."

"But, Blaze, you're two years older than me. So I should get two roses fewer."

"No. It's one hundred twenty years more for each of us. I want to spend at least one hundred twenty years with you, Ruby. That way we can get to know our great-great-grandchildren."

"Our great-great-grandchildren?" That lovely eyebrow was dancing in the sky again.

"Yep. The ones with fiery copper hair and bright aquamarine eyes."

"Don't you mean midnight hair and jade green eyes?" she asked with a teasing smile.

"Well, either way I'm not going to see them if you don't say yes. And I still think they'd be prettier if they favored you."

"Yes, Blaze. I will marry you!"

A smile danced about his lips as he reached into his pocket and pulled out a little velvet box. He opened it and held it out to her. Inside, nestled above a golden band was a perfect solitaire diamond. On either side of it two rubies sparkled in the light of the sun.

"I couldn't resist," he whispered. "A girl named Ruby should own at least one ruby."

"But, Blaze, there are two rubies in this ring."

"I don't know if you noticed, love," he glanced at the twenty dozen roses, "but your fiancé believes in extravagance. Only one ruby would never do. That's why you're getting two."

"Ha! Once a poet, always a poet. You're rhyming again, Blaze."

"Am I? I didn't intend to."

"That's just what poets do."

"Oh, dear. Is it catching? Now you're rhyming too?" he breathed as he lifted his face to receive her kiss.

Then amid their chuckles, he slid the ring onto her finger.

"Does it fit?" he asked with concern.

"Perfectly," she murmured as she quickly discarded the remembrance of her ring from Owen never fitting her quite right. Owen's days occupying any real estate in her mind were long gone. She had room for only Blaze now.

"Blaze? I've been giving thought to baby names..."

"Oh? Have you now?"

"Mm hmm. I think we're going to have a little girl with midnight hair and jade eyes, and I'd like to name her after her daddy."

"You want to name her Blaze?" he asked incredulously.

"Ember."

"Hmm. I think we're going to have a little girl with bright copper hair and beautiful aquamarine eyes, and I would like to name her Emerald."

"Emerald?" she laughed.

"What? You're my Ruby, precious like a gemstone. I think we should carry on the family tradition your mother started. Naming all our girls after jewels."

"Hmm...you do, huh? How about we compromise? We could name her Emerald Ember. But she definitely has to have green eyes."

"All right. It's a deal. Emerald Ember with green eyes. As long as she gets her mother's glorious flaming copper curls."

And that is precisely what she got.

The smile crowning her tiny face left both of her parents breathless.