“Didn’t we skip that second part,” I murmur.
He silences me with a hard, pointed kiss. “Doesn’t matter. I’m a traditionalist, what can I say.” He winks. “Besides, it’ll be much easier for you to find newer, better writing gigs now. To write what you actually want to, rather than what other people tell you you should be writing on their behalf.”
I let out a little huff that turns into a laugh. “You’re right… It’s long past time I started taking charge of my career.”
“That’s the spirit.” He grins at me. This time when he leans in, I don’t pull away. His lips sink into mine, soft and sweet and everything I’ve ever wanted. His hands encircle my waist, and I realize I don’t have to always be the strong one. I can rely on him to hold me up too. It’s all right. He’ll be there for me.
When we pull apart, I grin at him. “I love you, Charlie Cross. For real.”
He pulls me onto his lap, until I’m straddling on him the bench. Then he smiles up at me, his eyes on fire. “And I love you, Lila Baker. For real. For good. Forever.”
Epilogue
Six Months Later
“You’re kidding,” I say, laughing along with the woman across from me.
She shakes her head. “Honest to god, that’s how he proposed. I was half-asleep in bed, dying of throwing up—well, it was morning sickness we found out later—and he just sort of… stuck the ring onto my finger while I was in a daze.”
“What did you say?” I pause and switch off my mic to take a long gulp of water, because my guest today has been hilarious, and I feel dehydrated just from all the laughing I’ve been doing.
“When I woke up properly, I took it back off, threw it at him, and demanded he do it properly when I didn’t look like something that had just crawled out of a cave to die,” she replies, and we both snort. “But,” she sighs, “his re-do was pretty damn epic, I have to grant him that. He asked me again at the top of the incline that overlooks our hometown, when we were home visiting our family for a holiday weekend…”
I grin, and prop my chin in my hand, watching her talk.
It’s been six months since my own wedding. Fiona screwed me over on a podcast, pretending the series of articles I’d written were all bullshit, and throwing me under the bus to try and bring up her own ratings. Ever since that day, besides writing that manipulative backstabber out of my life for good, I’ve been working on my own project.
I started a podcast called Fake True Love, and the very first story I told was our own. I never mentioned the part about Fiona talking us into doing the article series. I figured karma would be a big enough bitch without any help from me in that department.
But I did tell the rest of the story completely truthfully, from messy start to even messier finish.
The series must have struck a nerve, because my podcast took off, even though Fiona did everything within her power to try and denounce me, claiming I’d quit writing for her because she was being honest and trying to uphold journalistic integrity.
It didn’t matter. Ratings for my show soared, more and more listeners spilled in. And as the comments, interactions and ratings grew, I realized: this could be a series.
A podcast where women came on and talked about real life things. Relationships, careers. The trouble we have navigating both at once. How we want to have it all, despite the world constantly telling us that we can’t. And how, a lot of times, we manage to build ourselves pretty cool lives, despite whatever the naysayers have to say about it.
As my guest of the week’s story wraps up, I thank her for coming on the show, and offer a little bio at the end, talking about the Etsy shop she runs on the side, while raising her kids and working from home. Then we officially wrap, and I shake her hand, thanking her again off-air this time.
She actually hugs me. “It was so nice to talk to someone so genuine,” she says. “And to get to share our love story. I never really thought I could share it somewhere like this, because we’re just two normal people, you know?”
“That’s what’s so inspiring about it,” I insist, grinning at her. “Because we’re all just normal people. We all want to know love is possible for us too, not just princes and princesses or whatnot.”
“Fair point.” She grins and hugs me one last time before she heads out of my office.
Yep, that’s right. I have my own office now. Screw Fiona and her rental space shared with those tech bros. After I moved in with Charlie shortly after our wedding, I was able to save up enough money to rent a private office of my own, in one of the nicer office buildings in town. There’s even free coffee and tea included, nice stuff, not the crap that Fi’s rental used to share.