The Engagement: Part 3

Want more details? Read Part 1 and Part 2 first.

ROUGHLY THIRTY SECONDS BEFORE I figured out where we were headed, I started to panic. At this point I had an idea that we may possibly but may also probably not be getting engaged that night, but that’s not what I was freaking out about.

It was the music.

We’d been listening to my iPod on shuffle. My mind didn’t really register the song playing in the background until the most popular part of the song started playing. My first reaction was skip it. But would he know that the song I skipped was “Love Story” by Taylor Swift? Would he hear the soft, pleading voice of Juliet:

I got tired of waiting.
Wondering if you were ever coming around.
My faith in you was fading-
When I met you on the outskirts of town.
And I said…

Romeo save me, I’ve been feeling so alone.
I keep waiting, for you but you never come.
Is this in my head, I don’t know what to think-

I waited that long. Just long enough to formulate what to say. My eyes scanned the street ahead and without thinking I pointed my hand and said in a voice that was way too loud, “The courthouse is so cool!”, while subconsciously wondering if he, like me, was listening to the lyrics in the background:

He knelt to the ground and pulled out a ring and said…

Marry me Juliet, you’ll never have to be alone.
I love you, and that’s all I really know.
I talked to your dad — go pick out a white dress
It’s a love story, baby just say… yes.
Oh, Oh, Oh, Oh, Oh.

” – Erm I mean, the state capitol building! Courthouse? What was I thinking!?” I nervously laughed over the music, trying to cause a distraction.

Turns out there was no need, as he was worried about something completely different: trying to find the entrance to the parking garage through all the construction zones. After a few turnarounds, we were there. Parked. Getting out of the car, and I asked him if I needed my purse and my jacket. I figured if he answered both, then I’d need my camera because he was for sure proposing tonight, but if he only answered jacket then nothing was going to happen and I’d probably spend the rest of the night trying to talk myself out of being downhearted about it.

He answered that I’d just need my jacket.

BUT HELLO. Do you wanna know the stupidest thing I did all night? It wasn’t talk about how much I had to pee. It wasn’t what I said after he proposed. No. The stupidest thing I did all night was leave my purse in the car. My purse, which held my camera, which is usually an extension of my arm.

I want to go back 48 hours or so ago, grab myself by the shoulders and shake myself silly for that. TAKE YOUR FREAKING CAMERA you silly, idiotic girl.

He grabbed my hand and we entered the building from the parking garage. We’d been in the building before, it was one of the first places we’d come to as a new couple and it’s pretty popular around these parts. It was the Joseph Smith Memorial Building at Temple Square. We took the elevator up to the top. Again, nothing we haven’t done before, but this time he walked up to the desk at one of the two restaurants – The Roof to be exact – and gave them his name.

Our waitress walked us to our seats past “Alex”, the pianist who played Disney classics on a glass piano, and I was stunned. We were seated on the far west side of the building, eye level with the Salt Lake City Temple. It was lit up and absolutely beautiful.

But I still wouldn’t let myself think the words ‘ring’ or ‘engagement’ or the scariest one, ‘proposal’. I wanted it so badly I ached, but what if it didn’t happen? What if I fainted and fell over? I’d never fainted before, but anything was possible.

I excused myself for that bathroom break I had been looking forward to, and started hyperventilating in the stall. I forced myself to look in the mirror, really look in my eyes and tell myself to breathe. It wasn’t easy, but once I felt that I had it under control I went back to our table. The Roof wound up being one of the best buffets I’d ever eaten at – what little I could eat anyway. I remember the spicy ham, the delightfully sugary honey butter, how I couldn’t decide if I was eating a roll or a croissant, all those little things stuck in my memory. I also remember finally catching on – he’s nervous. I’m nervous. We’re nervous. We were more comfortable and carefree on our first date than we were Saturday night, sitting across from each other, both trying to figure out something to say without talking about that, which I still wasn’t allowing myself to think of.

“See those people behind you? They’re probably getting engaged tonight,” Kevin said over our plates. And I wanted to tease him, to throw back an ‘oh yea? Are we?’ but the crazy part of my head (the part that left my purse in the car) told me not to ask. If I don’t ask, I won’t jinx it, and it may still happen.

He got the bill and paid it without letting me peek and we headed out the doors onto the streets of Salt Lake City. I could tell he was right about the jacket call – ten seconds out and I was already shivering. I would have listened and taken the warmer jacket, like he had suggested, but instead I took the lighter jacket, the one that would probably look good in the pictures I didn’t get to take because I left my camera, in my purse, in the car.

He wrapped his right arm around me and tried to warm me up as we walked. I took a step to the right – a step towards the garden and reflection pond – the epitome of every typical engagement, but he pulled me straight, towards the outer wall of the Temple. “Would you like to go see the horses?” He asked, without waiting. He knew he didn’t need an answer.

We paused in front of two horse-drawn carriages, but there was a line gathering. A line full of loud, boisterous high schoolers decked out in formal wear. Kevin mumbled a few words about the cold and grumbled the word, “Prom” more than once but each time I told him that it’s okay. I don’t mind waiting, and I wasn’t that cold but if he didn’t want to wait we could go.

But he wanted to wait, and I wasn’t going to fight him. In my head I was busy doing a mental checklist of the contents of each of his pockets. Back pockets were too small for a ring box, and so were front pockets so those were out. I was on his right side, and so I put my arms around him and leaned in with the pretense of a hug. I pulled away satisfied that there wasn’t anything there in the left pocket either, so as far as I knew, we were just on a very nice, very expensive date. Yes. That was it.

A rough voice interrupted my musings. “Sir? There is a carriage waiting for you on the other side if you’d like.”

Continue to Part 4