“Not yet.” First things first.
Shannon is remarkably silent on the limo ride to our destination, giving me half smiles and little caresses. Sex in the limo in a new city is a bit daunting, and for once I don’t want to sleep with her.
I know, I know. Back up the limo. That’s right.
I don’t want to sleep with her. Not now.
I’m too wound up, too full of cortisol and adrenaline and testosterone and whatever hormones drive me to ask her to marry me. My cup runneth over and I’m both full and empty, both free and chained. Cupid’s arrow struck me but it was attached to a rope that binds me to Shannon. We’re tied to each other for eternity.
The proposal is just a formality.
“How can you get away from work like this?” she asks, as if the thought suddenly came to her. “Isn’t the New Zealand launch a big mess? How can you take two days off?”
I give her a puffed-up, proud smile. “Got it all under control. Dad handed me that big mess but with the right management, I got new subcontractors in on the development, a crack software support team, and we sent coupon codes out to sixteen thousand subscribers as an apology. Sales are through the roof, systems are functional, and Dad can go eat a pile of monkey dung.” That little condition for getting Mom’s engagement ring didn’t work. I bested Dad.
She gives me a half-pleased, half-sick look. “Can we talk about something other than poop?”
I squeeze her hand and laugh.
As the limo stops in from of the sleek silver and glass building, she smiles.
“The MOMA! I’ve never been.” Her smile dazzles me as we enter the Museum of Modern Art.
“I know.” We get out and enter like everyone else, though I have a membership card. When your family donates the equivalent of the GDP of a small island nation to the arts, you get free admission and ten percent off the gift shop like everyone else.
We walk in, bookshelves and brochure racks everywhere, and I take Shannon past all of it, to the right, pressing the button for the fifth floor on the elevator panel.
“What are you doing?” she asks, puzzled yet intrigued. Her earnest brown eyes search mine, and she squeezes my hand. Mom’s ring rests in my front pocket now, no longer needing to be hidden. Shannon knows I want to make this right, to propose and ask her to marry me, but she doesn’t quite know the particulars.
But you can be damn sure there won’t be tiramisu within a hundred feet of us.
Years have passed since I’ve been here, but the route is ingrained, an invisible hand guiding me.
“Wait! Dec, I want to look at—” Shannon objects as we fly by other paintings.
“We will. Trust me,” I say back, squeezing her hand.
“Is this some special speed tour? Like speed dating, but for the MOMA? Ten seconds per painting?” she jokes.
We turn a corner and then there we are.
The Van Gogh gallery.
I stop so fast that Shannon bumps into me from behind, her body soft and yielding. I’ve become a brick wall, shrouded by a supernatural sensation, an eerie feeling that is a combination of deja vu, grief, and pure joy. My muscles pulse and my heart begins to beat so fast it feels like my chest shudders. I’m numb and on fire, cold and tense. At ease and alive.
I can feel her here. My mother. Her ring is in my pocket and her soul is smiling on us.
Maybe Shannon will get a chance to meet her after all.
“Honey, what’s wrong?” Shannon asks, turning me toward her, hands on my cheeks. All I can do is blink. Senses on fire, ears perked for sound, it’s as if I can hear her if I just focus enough. Feel her. Call her.
My eyes catch on the painting that is my destination and I take one step toward it, then two, holding Shannon’s hand and bringing her there. My hand crushes hers but she doesn’t flinch, her purposeful strides matching mine. She does not question me now. She only follows.
And there it is.
We stop, captivated, Shannon’s eyes on the painting.
But mine are on her.
And there, in front of tourists wearing earbuds to listen to guided tours in their native language, amidst parents with toddlers in backpacks and elderly people in wheelchairs, in the swirling pleasure of humanity in every shade, every voice, every belief, I drop down to one knee, Mom’s ring already in my palm before I look up at Shannon’s beautiful face, and I say her name.
“Shannon.”
A hush fills the already-quiet gallery.
“I came here as a boy on the edge of manhood with my mother. We stood in front of this very painting, and she told me that one day I would find my morning star. The yin to my yang. The love of my life.”
She pulls her fingers to her mouth, covering her lips, and tears fill her eyes, a shaky smile making her ethereal.
“You are the star that lights up my darkest nights. You are the sun that I revolve around. We met in a men’s room—”
The hush becomes a series of troubled murmurs in the background, and Shannon laughs, then sniffs.
“—and you nearly broke my penis on our first date—”
The crowd around us gets bigger. Shannon’s openly laughing now.
“And I wouldn’t have it any other way. My life before I met you was neat and orderly. I had all the control. All the power. My world made sense and if it didn’t, I made it make sense. What I didn’t have was any of the love, Shannon.” My voice catches, wobbling as I say her name. “You brought back love.”
“Oh, Declan,” she says, bending down, eyes filled with tears, searching my face.
I’m determined to do this just right, and swallow, hard.