“Are you ready?” I ask, taking Bray by the hand to help her out of the car.
She raises the other hand to her face and adjusts the blindfold over her eyes.
“Now don’t try to peek,” I say.
“I’m not!” she laughs. With my help, she stands up beside the car door, curling her fingers over the top of the door to have something to hold on to. “It’s not even my birthday.”
I shut the car door and pull her carefully beside me as we step onto the grass. “It doesn’t have to be,” I say and squeeze her hand.
Her lips spread into an even bigger smile. She grabs me with her free hand when her heels go over a bump in the ground. I cup her elbow in my hand to steady her walk.
“Well, you could’ve told me not to wear heels,” she says as she struggles to stay upright.
“Sorry, I didn’t think about that,” I say with a hint of a grin in my voice. “But something tells me you won’t need any shoes.”
It’s a hot summer evening, just like we like it. The night is approaching, but the light of the day is still barely holding on as the sky transitions into twilight. The fireflies are already out, twinkling off and on all around us. I walk with her hand in mine, guiding her farther out onto the land. I can feel how excited she is the way she clutches my hand. That huge, toothy smile beaming under the fabric of the blindfold. The joy in her voice.
When we get to a good distance, I stop and walk behind her, fitting my fingers on the blindfold knot.
“Oww! Be careful.”
“Sorry, babe,” I say and try the knot more carefully so I don’t pull her hair.
Finally, the knot comes loose, and I let the blindfold drop from her eyes. She gasps and stares unblinking out at the massive field with trees on all sides. A large pond with a dock sits off to the east with a cluster of trees behind it. Her fingertips dance over her lips.
“What…” She looks over at me. “What is this?”
I smile. “It’s ours. I’ve been saving up for a down payment since the day I started my roofing job three years ago. Got a bank loan for the rest. It’s all ours. All thirty-two acres of it.” I point in the distance toward the woods. “And just over there is a creek.”
Her fingers begin to tremble, still resting over her lips.
“I’m going to build our house here,” I add, taking her into my arms, wrapping them around her from behind.
Her tears start to flow and she makes a cute snort-choking sound when she tries to force them back. I turn her around and pull her into a hug.
“A new beginning, remember?” I say and squeeze her gently within my arms. I kiss the side of her head and rub the palms of my hands up and down her bare arms.
She sniffles and wipes the tears away from her eyes. “I can’t believe you did this.”
A little worried she isn’t reacting the way I had hoped, I ask, “Are you… upset?”
She lifts her face away from my chest and looks into my eyes, shaking her head as a few new tears roll down her cheeks.
“No,” she says with a faint hint of disbelief in her voice. “This is… it’s… I just love you so much!” She jumps into my arms, wrapping her arms around the back of my neck, her thighs wrapped around my waist. Her lips kiss my face all over, even my eyelids and the little hollow under my nose. I squeeze her tight.
“You were right again,” she says and breaks the hug, setting her feet back on the ground. She bends over and grins at me.
“About what this time?”
She slips off her heels. “About not needing shoes.”
Then she shoves me in the chest with the palms of her hands and knocks me right on my ass in the grass, then takes off running. The sound of her laughter carries on the breeze.
For a moment I just watch her, a brief moment suspended in time that I want to cherish forever. I watch as her dark hair wafts behind her and bounces majestically against the back of her thin white dress. The way her soft, lithe legs run gracefully over the tall, prickly grass, and the brilliance of the fireflies blinking all around her. I watch how the twilight casts shadows on her smiling face when she looks back at me, and I get lost in the moment just before I take off after her.