Page 56 of A Very Bumpy Christmas
“Melanie Mason,” he says, voice low and precise and a little wrecked, “I want to spend the rest of my ordinary, extraordinary life making lights stay on with you. I want to keep you safe without ever boxing you in. I want to learn you forever, and be learned by you, too. Will you marry me?”
I laugh, I cry, I cover my mouth with one hand and clutch our son with the other because there aren’t enough hands for this much feeling.
“Yes,” I say, and it’s easy. It feels like all the sticky notes in the world rearranged into one word. “Yes, yes, yes.”
He slides the ring on my finger and kisses me like we’ve already kept every promise; Ev snuffles his approval and we both laugh against each other’s mouths. Lucas ties the tag to the lemonornament with the satin ribbon and hangs it back on the tree. Our words belong there. They always did.
Outside, carolers drift past on the sidewalk singing something ancient and tender. Snow hushes the city into a softer version of itself. My phone buzzes—group chat exploding with heart emojis and threats to throw us a party we absolutely cannot stop. Dean sends,
DEAN: Redundancy achieved.
GUNNER: Operational snacks en route.
DUKE: About time.
I lean back into the couch, the ring warm against my skin, my son heavy and perfect against my heart, Lucas’s shoulder solid beneath my cheek. The future no longer feels like a cliff you squint at in bad weather.
“Hey, Ev,” I whisper into the soft cap of his head. “This is the part of the story where we say ‘and they lived happily ever after.’ But here’s the secret—ever after isn’t one night. It’s lights that stay on, and questions asked out loud, and slow yeses, and cinnamon rolls, and a dad who knows where the extra batteries live.”
Lucas kisses my temple. “And a mom who makes everything brighter,” he adds, like he’s just stating a fact.
The tree glows. The lemon gleams. The tag spins gently, our vows catching and releasing the light. We’ve had the storm and the scramble and the silence that taught us how to listen. Now we get this: cocoa, a ring, a sleeping boy with a name that fits, and a life we’re building in the town we chose.
Happily ever after isn’t magic. It’s maintenance. It’s love with a checklist and a thousand tiny improvisations. It’s us.
And tonight, it’s Christmas.
Epilogue
LUCAS
Three months turn out to be the difference between surviving and living. Everett has opinions, a laugh that detonates in the middle like a firework, and a sleep schedule that’s… aspirational. The sticky notes are still on the fridge. The wedge still goes under the door—ugly, effective—but our world is bigger than the apartment now.
Amelia shows up in leggings, a messy bun, and the feral focus of an aunt on mission. “Go,” she orders, already bouncing Ev and fielding the Major’s pleading eyes. “I will text hourly. I will also send pictures you didn’t ask for.”
“Checklist’s on the counter,” I say out of habit.
“You’re still assuming I need a list?” she shoots back with a grin. “We’re good. Go make romance.”
Melanie squeezes my hand as we step into the cold. March has teeth, but the sky is high and clean. I loop us through streets we know by breath. She slants me a sideways look. “You’re not telling me where we’re going.”
“Observation: correct,” I say. She laughs—still my favorite sound—and leans into me across the console.
We roll past the mural alley, the bookstore with the first editions, the coffee shop that knows our order, and then farther north where the houses sit back from the street like they’re listening. The truck eases to a stop in front of a craftsman with a deep porch, a wide yard, and a shape that readssteady.Twinkle lights run the length of the railing like constellations I pinned there myself.
Mel’s breath catches. “Lucas…”
“Come see,” I say, pulse doing its own sprint.
I help her down and take her to the gate. It swings cleanly on hinges I greased myself. The yard is wide, fenced, and already has the beginnings of a raised bed where we’ll try not to murder herbs. A sapling lemon tree—absurd for this climate, viable in a big planter—waits like a dare.
“Two-dog minimum yard,” I say.
She laughs into a hand that’s just started to shake. “Is this?—?”
I pull a small key from my pocket, silver on a lemon-yellow fob engraved withBuild here.My voice goes steadier than I feel. “Ours. If you want it.”
Her eyes brim, then overflow, the happiest kind of hurricane. “Ask, don’t assume,” she whispers, and I nod.
