Perpetual Smile

I was nervous. I blowdried and straightened my hair, singing old Evanescence songs to keep my mind busy. I didn’t want to think about whatever my big surprise was. “Gotta relax,” I told myself.

My sister came upstairs and knocked on the bathroom door. “Mikey’s here,” she singsonged.

“‘Kay. I’ll be down in ten minutes.”

It was good to see him. He looked awake and alive. He was wearing a Joker beanie with holes for the eyes and he was just as happy to see me as I was to see him. He sat at the table, so I bent down to kiss him — over and over. I wrapped my arms around him and stood behind him, refusing to let go.

“I should probably let you go, huh?” I said a few minutes later.

“Yeah, you don’t wanna choke me.” He paused. “Can I give you your presents now?”

“Uh — shouldn’t we wait? ‘Til after dinner?” I chewed on my lower lip.

“Can I at least give you one? I’ll give you the smallest.” He reached into a ginormous JCPenney bag and pulled out the latest issue of The Dark Tower: Treachery.

“You got my Stephen King!” I flung my arms around him again and smothered him with kisses. “Thank you!”

I managed to get him to wait until after dinner. He reminded me of a kid on Christmas morning, he was so excited. We went out for a cigarette after dinner and he said he wanted to give me my presents when we got back downstairs.

“I got you three — no, four — things.”

My eyes popped out of my head. “Four? Dammit, I lose! I only got you two!”

“It’s not a contest,” Lauren said when we came back downstairs and I told her about my defeat.

“Yeah, well, he said his present was gonna make me cry, so it kinda is,” I grumbled.

“Can you hand me my bag?” Mike was practically bouncing off the walls. I tried my best to be cool and not explode into a million little pieces as I handed him the large white bag.

“I’m giving you yours first,” I said, and cut him off as he started to object. “You’ve got to at least let me try.”

“We’ll open them at the same time. Or one at a time,” he compromised.

I took a deep breath and handed him the larger gift of the two. He handed me a DVD-looking package. He ripped his open and grinned, holding up the Clue game. (He had told me he was thinking about buying us each a DS, so we could play Clue together with them. I’d tried to convince him not to, and had gotten him the board game so we could play together without him spending all that money on me.)

“Now you,” he said.

I carefully opened the package and nodded when I saw Pulp Fiction.

“Now you can watch the whole thing.” (I’ve never seen it — I know, I know — and he always tells me how great it is. He bought it for me so I could finally see it. Translation: Now I have to watch it, whether I like it or not. (; He’s crafty like that.)

He gave me the next gift, and I handed him his big gift — even though the package was relatively small. (I really wanted to post pictures here when I first got it, but didn’t want him to drop by here and accidentally see it. Then I got lazy and didn’t bother with doing a password-protected post.) He unwrapped and opened the box, and fingered the silver chain.

“So there’s your promise ring,” I said, grinning. “If you don’t like it, we can exchange it.”

My family oohed and aahed in the background, but in all honesty, to me it was just me and him.

“No, I like it,” he said, hesitating to take it out of the box. It was looped through foam and he didn’t want to break it. I helped him get it out and helped him put it on. It looked good on him, especially against the creamy white of his skin (yes, love, you are a Casper).

My next gift was a tee shirt of Harley Quinn and the Joker — the Mad Love tee shirt we’d seen in Hot Topic. He really wanted it, but it only came in a girls’ shirt.

“This is us,” I said, as I held up the tee for my family to see. Of course, minus the part where Joker treats Harley like shit. Heh. And I’m pretty sure neither of us are crazy. (Right?) So I guess you can scratch that.

I had nothing else up my sleeve. He plopped a huge box in front of me. My eyebrow went up. What the hell could it be? “Maybe it’s a box inside of a box,” I joked, trying to not look nervous. Dad laughed and then Mike laughed. I eyed him suspiciously. “I bet it is,” I said as I started to open it.

“Newspaper,” I said, shuffling through the stuffing in the brown shipping box until I came to another box. It was much smaller and white. I gulped. It was the right size…

I opened it with the speed of a twenty-year-old toaster heating up a bagel. Inside sat a small leather box. It was too big for a necklace or bracelet. I felt the heat rushing to my cheeks, and the tears pricked at my eyes. Fuck, don’t cry, I thought.

“Just — yeah,” Mike said as I shook the leather box out of the white one.

My heart pounded in my chest as I opened it. Something shiny and silver flashed, but I read the note first. My heart just about stopped as I finished reading it and stared at my promise ring.

“Read the note,” he said, softly.

“I did,” I choked. I could feel the blood in my cheeks, and suddenly the room was too hot. “Wow.”

“Do you like it?” His voice was so quiet, so unlike his usual loud self. (Yes, darling, you are loud.)

“Mmn-hmmn.”

“Does it fit?”

I took it out of the box, fascinated by its delicate and silky softness. A cluster of balls formed a diamond at an angle, connected by thin white gold bands, the main band itself thick white gold. I tried it on the first finger of my right hand, then the middle finger. “Nope, nope,” I said. I slid it onto my right ring finger and it fit perfectly, like it was made for me.

“It isn’t loose?”

“No — it’s perfect. Thank you,” I said, and kissed him.

“Did you see the inside?”

“No,” I said, an eyebrow going up.

“Read the inside,” he told me.

I read LOVE M·C engraved in block letters. “Wow,” I said again.

I spent the rest of that night and all the next day — except for when we were sleeping — smothering him with kisses to the point where it probably got yucky for everyone else to watch.

I feel like the luckiest girl alive. He’s — sorry, crying here; must be a delayed reaction — made me feel safe and loved, something I never thought I could feel again.

I know this is the real thing, for two reasons: With him, I feel like I belong; when I’m with him or his family I don’t feel awkward or out of place. I haven’t just fallen in love with him once; I fall in love with him over and over, hard and fast. Like right now. It’s kind of gross, how in love with him I am. It shouldn’t be real, but it is.

I can’t believe this is happening to me.