Hapless (5 page)

Ty nodded and coughed.

“Uh… Ed and Buttercup,” Micah called. “My boyfriend is allergic to cats, and we really need to get to the nearest Metro stop.”

No. No. No, no, no, no, no. Ty snapped his head up, nose throbbing, eyes itching, misery blooming fast and real in his gut and down his throat.

“You didn’t get to see the tree,” Ty croaked.

Micah smiled. “I can kind of see it from here.” He craned his neck and gestured. “It’s beautiful.”

“But… but….” Ty bit his lip. He didn’t want to propose like this. Not when he was leaking from a few different orifices and his voice sounded like he was channeling Kathleen Turner. “You’re the prettiest princess,” he said sullenly.

“And you’re a snotty Prince Charming.” The expression Ty wore had to be pathetic because Micah quickly added, “And the best boyfriend ever, even when you’re being ridiculous.”

Ty opened his mouth to protest but ended up coughing, which turned into wheezing and gasping. At that point Micah put his foot down, and within a few minutes, Ed and Buttercup dropped them off near a tourist sundry stand where Micah bought medicine for the exorbitant tourist price. Then they were heading to the nearest station.

Two Benadryl and one Metro ride later, Ty never felt better.

“I love you, you know,” he said, half-awake and leaning heavily into Micah’s side as they stumbled into the apartment. “Like, I totally love you.”

Micah grunted in acknowledgment.

Ty didn’t know why Micah was cranky. Ty was magnificent and floating. In fact, he was so… so… sleepy. How did he get so sleepy?

“And sex,” Ty said. “You said so much sex.”

“You’re loopy and you need a shot off your emergency inhaler, and then bed.”

Nodding, Ty followed Micah into the bedroom, bumping into the wall a few times and then into the doorframe before making it inside. He took the inhaler Micah shoved at him and used it, his lungs feeling better than they had in
ever
.

“Okay, lightweight, let’s get these clothes off.”

“Yes!” Ty said, shrugging out of his sweater. He kicked off his shoes and fell against the bed. He wriggled down his jeans but was too tired to try and get them farther than his knees.

Micah rolled his eyes fondly and pulled them off, along with Ty’s socks. Once Ty was undressed, Micah pulled back the blankets and ushered Ty into the bed.

“Sex?” Ty asked.

“Not tonight.”

Huffing, Ty closed his eyes and snuggled into the pillow. “Fine,” he said on a breath. “Also, just so you know, I’m going to marry you. Someday. You’ll see.”

“Good to know,” Micah replied.

Ty felt the bed dip, and then Micah drifted his fingers across his brow. “Did I mention I love you?”

“I love you too, Prince Charming,” Micah said, and Ty drifted off to sleep.

T
HE
UNIVERSE
was surely telling him something.

Twisted ankles, bad hockey games, and choking women Ty could deal with. A cat, though? Cat fur and dander on a horse ride? Seriously? That was second-level cosmic asshattery.

If that wasn’t a big enough sign, when Micah pulled off Ty’s jeans, the ring box fell out and bounced under the bed. Ty nearly had a heart attack the next morning when he couldn’t find it. He did, but Micah didn’t notice it. How could he not notice it? It was a plain box, but it was clearly a ring box.

It wasn’t
subtle
.

Ty pinched the bridge of his nose and took a steadying breath.

His frustration with his failed proposals began to mount and then bleed over into his everyday life.

His supervisor sent him an e-mail telling him he couldn’t leave edits on his client’s novels that questioned the real-world validity of flying off into the sunset on the back of a dragon, or question the hero’s masculinity by asking if he could literally sweep the heroine off her feet after being a captive for a month. (He stood by that one, thank you very much.)

Worse, though, it crept into his relationship as well.

When they were making cookies for the hospital’s employee holiday party, Ty scowled as he decorated the Christmas trees. When Micah surprised him with a nice dinner, Ty could only think about chocolate lava cake and idiots who hid engagement rings in champagne glasses. When Micah had his last hockey game before the holiday break, Ty opted not to go for the first time ever, citing work.

Micah noticed.

“You’ve been weird,” Micah said, stretched out beside Ty in their bed. “Like, replaced-by-an-alien weird. Are you okay?”

Ty shifted around among the nest of blankets. “I’m fine.” He wasn’t, but he couldn’t very well tell Micah he’d been trying to propose to him since right after Thanksgiving, and still hadn’t.

“Okay, I just… did I do something? Is it because we couldn’t go to South Carolina to see your folks? I have to work, but that doesn’t mean you can’t go on your own.”

Ty frowned, Micah’s words sinking into his skin, piercing him to the marrow. He rolled over and slung an arm over Micah’s middle.

“And miss Christmas with you? Never.”

“Are you sure?” Micah’s tone was timid and small. “You seem distant and… sad.” He cleared his throat and seemed to disappear amid the pillows. “You don’t want to break up, do you?”

“No!” Ty replied quickly, forcefully. He squeezed Micah tighter and pressed his face into the crook of Micah’s shoulder, his heart aching that he even allowed the seed of that thought to plant in Micah’s brain. And if he could kill the idea, Ty would propose right then, but he didn’t trust that the apartment wouldn’t burn down around him if he did. “No, of course not. I’m sorry. I’ve been stressed.”

Micah shuddered next to him, letting out a heavy, wet breath. “Good,” he said. He clutched Ty’s hand. “So the romance novels burning you out? I find that hard to believe.”

Humor was Micah’s defense mechanism, and Ty latched on to it. “Two words—moist cavern. I didn’t know if they were talking about sex or spelunking.”

Micah laughed. He twined their legs together. “Tell me more about these wet caves.”

“Are you sure? The world of romance can get pretty hairy.”

“That’s what she said.”

Ty chuckled helplessly into Micah’s skin. “Fine. I’ll tell you all the sordid details.”

Ty did in excruciating, hilarious detail that had Micah in stitches. Whispering in the dark, entwined with his happily ever after, Ty knew Christmas was fast approaching, and he vowed to do better. He would set the idea of being engaged aside until after New Year’s, and would try to enjoy the moment.

He could do that.

Well, he could try.

S
ITTING
IN
the glow of their Christmas tree with the apartment lights turned low and sipping the hot cider Micah had made in the crockpot, Ty should be happy. He should be so happy to be sitting with his boyfriend, their feet propped up on the coffee table, the soft lilt of Christmas carols filling up the apartment. He wasn’t. He tried, but he still felt like an utter failure.

Christmas Eve. It was Christmas Eve, and Ty still had the ring tucked away in the sock drawer. He’d tried. No one could say he didn’t try, and maybe, maybe he should just suck it up and propose right then.

It was romantic. There was no doubt about it. Wrapped up in Grandma’s afghan together, Micah tapping out a beat on Ty’s thigh with his talented fingers, their bodies pressed together, their hearts beating in sync. He’d never felt closer to Micah than right then.

Their past year together had been… well… perfect. Not counting Ty’s last few awful weeks.

It wasn’t their first Christmas as a couple, but it was their first Christmas where they were both finally settled. They had jobs. They had incomes. They had friends and hobbies and their future stretched out in front of them, unknowable but hopeful. So hopeful. And all the bumps in the road they would surely encounter would be met head-on, together instead of as two different entities.

Ty’s heart seized with the weight of it all. When he breathed, Micah breathed with him, and it was significant and tender, and everything that made Ty want to be with Micah forever was tangled up in the moment.

“Hey,” Micah said softly. He squirmed around on the couch and took Ty’s cup from his hands. He set it on the table. “I want to talk to you.”

Ty raised an eyebrow while Bing Crosby crooned about a White Christmas.

Micah ran a hand through his hair, ducked his head, his cheeks stained pink. He bit his lip, and fuck, he was beautiful.

“You know I love you, right? Like… I know I’m not as good at showing it as you are. I don’t plan hockey games or carriage rides, but all the decisions I’ve made, like not going back to Michigan when I graduated and taking the job at the hospital and all of that was with our future in my head.”

Ty frowned. He reached over and clasped Micah’s twitching hand. His palm was clammy. “I know, Micah. Okay? I know.”

He blew out a breath. “That’s awesome. Really awesome. Because I need to ask you something.”

Micah slid off the couch to one knee. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small black box.

Ty’s pulse skyrocketed and his mouth flapped open.

“Will you—”

Ty jumped to his feet, the afghan falling to the floor, and in the movement hit the coffee table. The mugs of cider tipped over and splashed everywhere, making dark puddles on the carpet. Micah fell back onto his ass, startled, clutching the ring to his chest.

“No!” Ty shouted because… because
he
was supposed to be the one proposing. Not Micah, and Micah needed to not talk for a second, for a minute, while Ty recalibrated. He shook his head and held out his hands, fingers splayed in the universal sign of “fucking stop, please!”

Micah looked up with wide eyes, like Rudolph in headlights. His expression morphed from mortified to crestfallen to livid in the space of seconds.

Ty was going to puke, and his stomach swooped like he was in free fall because he suddenly realized what he said, what he had done. He’d fucking ruined everything again, and a lump lodged in his throat because he had turned down the love of his life
by accident
.

Slowly Micah stood and snapped the case shut. “Oh,” he said. “Oh, okay.”

“Micah—”

“No. Don’t…,” he groaned. He scrubbed his hands over his face. “Don’t. I just… I thought we were in the same place, but I guess not. Obviously. I’m wrong. I guess. I’m…. Fuck, this is embarrassing.”

“Micah, stop, okay. Stop.”

Ty reached out but Micah staggered away, out of the living room and toward the door. “No, I need to… I need to leave. Maybe. I should go for a walk.”

Ty’s middle clenched. “You need to shut up,” he said. He strode forward and grabbed Micah’s shoulders, stopping his progress toward the door. “Look at me.” Micah refused, staying scrunched in on himself, his knuckles white from the grip he had on the little black box. Softening his tone, Ty tried again. “Look at me, please.”

Micah raised his head. His eyelashes were wet, his cheeks stained, and Ty was an asshole. The biggest asshole ever.

“Stay right here. Promise me.”

Micah cut his gaze to the side but nodded, lower lip caught between his teeth.

Ty let go and ran. He sprinted down the hall to their room, knocking into the wall in his hurry. He flung open the sock drawer and yanked the ring out. Then he ran back to the living room to find Micah still standing where Ty left him, looking like a child who was just told Santa wasn’t real.

All dignity, all formality, all planning, all of it gone, thrown to the wayside—because what had it gotten Ty thus far but disappointment and a large credit card bill? Ty embraced the cliché and dropped to his knees in front of Micah. He held up the box.

Micah raised an eyebrow, lips pursed and bitten red.

“Oh, right,” Ty said, fumbling with the lid. He managed to open it without pinching a finger, and presented it, the silver ring glinting in the twinkle lights.

Micah stared at it for a long moment. So long Ty’s hand began to tremble and his knees started to ache.

Then Micah met his gaze. “You asshole,” he said, voice choked. “You fucking asshole.”

“Is that a yes?”

Micah laughed, loud and unrestrained, head thrown back. “Wait, wait,” he said between bouts of chuckles, “this is why you’ve been so weird. The dinner at Jack’s and the carriage ride and the hockey game. Please tell me you tried at the hockey game.”

Ty nodded, rubbing the back of his neck. “Yeah.”

“Oh my God,” Micah said, hand over his mouth. He looked positively gleeful. “You are awful at this, aren’t you? You are completely hapless.”

“Hey! At least I didn’t go for Christmas Eve. What are you, Dial-a-Cliché?”

“Oh, and a woman choking and a cat-fur blanket were any better?”

Okay, so Micah had him there. “At least I was inventive! And romantic. I tried to be romantic.”

“And this isn’t romantic?” Micah said, gesturing toward the puddles of cider saturating the carpet, Grandma’s afghan in a heap, “Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer” blaring on the radio.

Ty made a face.

“Fine,” Micah said, acquiescing. “I went tried and true. It worked, didn’t it?”

And then they both stuttered to a stop because it hadn’t worked. Ty knelt on the carpet. Micah stood above him. They both had rings in their hands, and neither one had said yes and neither one had really even asked.

Micah looked between his own box and Ty’s, nose adorably scrunched.

“We’re a mess,” he said, sinking to his knees. The squish when he made contact with the carpet didn’t help matters at all, but was forgivable, especially when Micah’s expression was open and honest, his eyes very blue, his hair a mess. Everything Ty had fallen in love with was right there in Micah’s mismatched socks and his heart on his sleeve.

“I love you,” Ty said. “I love you. I love you so much it scares me. It fills me up and makes me a better person, and fuck, it hurts sometimes. But it’s the best I’ve ever felt.” Ty took a breath. “Micah Alan Vandermeer, will you marry me?”