And for a man as good as mine, it really did come down to that.
He loved me.
So he would hugely inconvenience himself for half a year to do something special for me.
See, McCoy had gotten better about using his words to express his feelings. But he still, primarily, showed me how he felt through his actions.
Like this.
My mouth opened and closed several times, but there seemed to be some sort of short-circuiting going on in my brain right then because none of the thoughts could seem to untangle themselves from one another, let alone find their way from my brain to my lips.
So I did the only thing I could do.
I just... launched myself at him, spilling my champagne all over the both of us as I wrapped him up with arms and legs, raining kisses down the side of his face, his forehead, down his nose, then finally on his mouth.
"So, I take it you like it," McCoy declared, pulling back to smile at me.
"I love it. Almost as much as I love you," I told him.
"You haven't even seen it yet," he informed me.
"I don't care. It's perfect. Whatever it is, it's perfect."
"So, I guess we can just go then, huh? You don't need to see it," he said, lowering me to my feet.
"Shush," I said, slapping his chest. "Show me," I demanded.
With that, I handed my flute to Joss who was still lingering nearby, wearing his cut with the word Prospect on the chest and across the back, took both McCoy's and my sister's hands, and walked into my new nail salon.
"Oh, my God," I said, my voice getting thick as the tears flooded my vision.
He'd recreated my sketches.
I'd been designing ShyBelle for ages.
And I was always doing sketches for my dream salon.
"It's exactly how I drew it," I declared, squeezing both their hands.
"Well, sort of," McCoy said. "You, babe, are indecisive as fuck. Do you have any idea how many times you have changed the type of tables over the past six months? Because I do. Three times. I ordered the tables three times," he said, shaking his head.
"You changed it every time I tweaked the sketches?" I asked, the tears just pouring down my cheeks as I turned to look at him.
"I wanted you to have it exactly as you wanted it," he told me, reaching out to wipe my cheeks. "Now stop crying so you can actually see it all," he demanded, giving me a smirk.
With that, I pulled myself together and walked around the shop. My shop.
One whole wall was lined with white tufted pedicure chairs whose sides stuck out a bit, giving each customer a little bit of privacy. The nail station ran along that wall with marble table tops and light pink velvet seated chairs for the techs and customers. Each station had its own rose gold dome light above them.
There was a wall of nail polish, a front desk, a waiting area with comfy blush-colored barrel chairs.
Then, maybe my favorite part of the whole thing, there was a five-foot section of wall that was at least six feet high that was done in a mix of pink flowers and muted green foliage with the salon name in script above average head height. A selfie station of sorts. Which would work great for marketing on social media.
"Teddy's idea," McCoy explained as I ran my hand over the flowers.
"This is... everything is perfect," I told him, feeling my eyes get glassy again.
"Fuck, no. No more crying."
"Say something not so sweet," Belle suggested, smile soft, sweet, a glimmer of my old Belle that was still a part of her under all that strong and hard.
"Oh, right. There's a room in the back for waxing pussies," McCoy said, making both Belle and I choke then let out surprised laughs.
"That works," Belle said, shaking her head.
"Teddy also thought that pussy and eyebrow waxing might be part of your future business plan," he said, reaching for my hips, pulling me against him.
"It' amazing. Perfect," I told him. "The perfect anniversary present. Oh, thank God," I added when his face went shocked and horrified. "I didn't remember either!" I told him, smiling. "Belle told me. I was freaking out the whole way over. Well, it is a perfect I have an amazing boyfriend present, then," I told him, leaning up for a kiss.
"Boyfriend, huh?" he said after.
As it would turn out, he wouldn't be a boyfriend for too much longer.
McCoy - 10 years
I got her a house with a center kitchen.
And then we made us some kids to make sure said house with the center kitchen was never ever clean or quiet.
Except for on Saturday mornings when Belle came by to steal our children and teach them how to beat on one another more efficiently.
"Babe, take a break," I demanded, plucking the rag out of her hand. "It's only going to get more jelly or peanut butter or slime on it again in an hour."