Nine Minutes in Heaven Read online

  What about my face?

  He touched me there. “I see in it…”

  Sheer terror? Extreme anxiety?

  “Love,” he said.

  That, too.

  “This night has been magical.” Patrick was still talking, still smiling, though also choked up. I could hear it in his voice. “I didn’t see how my life could be any more charmed.”

  I should have stopped him.

  “But now, I know of just one more way.”

  Why wasn’t I stopping him?

  “Okay.” He set me down, guided me to face him, and then gave me a kiss. “I’m ruining your plan. Forget everything I said. It’s your turn to talk.” Patrick straightened out his shirt and pants. He fixed his glasses, his hair, and even smoothed down his beard. “What did you, Jefferson, and Calvin have planned? What did you want to say, or should it be what did you want to ask?”

  Oh, boy, I thought. Now what?

  “Patrick…”

  I had to do something. Stammering and stuttering was the best I could come up with, though. As for Patrick, he couldn’t stand still.

  “Oh. Wait! Hold up.” He took his phone from his pocket. No wonder his pants were sagging. His phone was huge. After hitting record on the camera, as the silver-gray sky began to brighten on a new day, despite the storm outside still making a mess of things, he held it up to capture the moment I hadn’t planned on being one. “Go ahead, Goose.”

  Still, my mouth was open, but no words would come out.

  “Aww. You’re shy, now. I’ll do the talking. You just say one word when your turn comes.” Patrick then turned the phone to face himself. “Goose Tucker, these have been the happiest three months of my life. Would you consider making all the ones I have left even happier? Goose…will you marry me?” When he aimed the screen toward me, I felt as if I’d pass out. “Do you know your line?”

  I swallowed hard. “Yes.”

  Patrick jumped up and down. “He said yes!”

  Technically, the word had come out of my mouth. It had come in answer to the last question posed, not the first one. Since I never clarified that, Patrick used his happy exclamation—He Said Yes!—to title the video post of the whole thing on his Facebook page.

  “Rings! Rings!” Patrick got very excited about those after showing me the upload to his feed. “You can’t have a marriage proposal without rings!” He turned in a circle, then pulled up his pants, which had fallen to his ankles during the jumping, there in the middle of Cost-Mart.

  “I’m not supposed to open the jewelry case,” I said.

  “Jewelry, schmelry. You’re a very unique man, Goose Tucker.” The sentence was punctuated with a smooch. “I think you deserve a very unique ring, and I am going to find the perfect one in this store!”

  Patrick darted off, but then returned for another kiss, before heading down the center aisle. At the intersection, where Toys met Apparel, he paused for thought, by all appearances. With a glance left, and then right, he was off again, straight ahead toward the registers.

  Patrick made me smile. Spending the rest of my life as his husband was not a bad future to imagine. I just wasn’t ready. I had doubts, mostly about myself. Still, if he was going to pick out a ring for me, I figured I should reciprocate.

  “Unique…unique…Help me, here, fellers,” I said to the Calvin and Jefferson mannequins.

  Sometimes they were chatty. Other times, not so much. This was one of their silent moments, so off I went on my own.

  I scoured the store, starting in the jewelry section, despite the rule about the locked display. Nothing spoke to me, anyway, so, I headed for Camping Gear next. Patrick and I had shared a very significant moment, one of our firsts, in a tent while on a road trip the previous fall. I thought there might be something there that would be fun and appropriate.

  A set of hotdog skewers made me smile. We’d grilled over an open fire that night. I picked them up and fanned them out where they were attached to one another by a plastic ring. It wasn’t that ring I was thinking of, but rather the top of each skewer, where it bent into a circle. They were too tough to break, though. I’d been thinking I could snap off the ring on top, but no go. So, I hung them back up.

  The store was rather dark. Emergency lighting supplied by the generator meant items were difficult to see until I was right in front of them, even with daylight starting to come. That also resulted in me tripping over something—tripping, then sliding as if skiing across the shiny floor on top of whatever was now in the middle of it. Saving myself on a shelf of goggles and other watersport supplies, I reached down to pick up the hazard that had nearly killed me. It made me laugh.

  “Jefferson…Calvin…?” I had no doubt they’d helped me out, after all. “You think? Really? It’s a little large for an engagement ring.” I couldn’t help myself, though. The way it tickled me, I knew Patrick would love it, because of how we’d spent the better part of the evening snowed in.

  “You ready?” he called out.

  Perfect timing. “Just about.” I ripped open the packaging, took a deep breath, and blew. “Whoa.” The task ahead of me was going to be harder than anticipated.

  “Where are you?”

  “Be right there.”

  “Hurry.” As I grew dizzy from huffing and puffing, Patrick grew impatient.

  “Shh.” Even my shush seemed too loud. Then, Wilbur, who’d been with us all night, began to bark at my side. “Shh.” I tried to quiet him, too. “You’ll wake up Carrie.”

  Carrie was still snuggled up under several blankets on the inflatable mattress I’d set up to ensure her a good night’s rest. That was my hope, at least. Wilbur had been snoring away, too. With any luck, Carrie was a sounder sleeper than he.

  “I wouldn’t mind sharing this moment,” I said, scooping up my Frenchie, “but she needs her sleep.”

  “Goo-oose. Or should I say, Marco…?” Patrick called back to our earlier game.

  “Polo.” Dealing with my rather odd ring while simultaneously carrying Wilbur was no easy task, either.

  “Where are you?”

  “Right here,” I said, just a little bit louder, rounding a shelf of Russell Stover’s marshmallow, caramel, and maple cream Valentine’s Day hearts put out for sale two days before Christmas. “Give me a second.” I could see Patrick back up by the jewelry case, as I continued to blow. He was down on bended knee again.

  “Come to me, Goose. We’ve been apart far too long.”

  My heart skipped once, and then some more, the first time in amazement and total adoration, the second and beyond with anxiety. “Deep breaths, Goose.” I said it and took some, for their calming effect and to finish with my ring.

  “What are you doing?” Patrick’s voice, though lowered, still boomed.

  “I’ll be right there.” I shout-whispered and peered from behind a display of winter hats so he could see me put one finger to my lips.

  “I hope so. If not, I’ll start singing.”

  No one wanted that.

  “Hey.” Finally, at Patrick’s side, I hid my symbol of engagement behind my back. “We have to do this a little more quietly.”

  “I know teenagers.” Patrick went on to explain how his family tree featured a bunch of way younger half and step siblings, along with the two biological sisters he’d mentioned when we’d first met. His mother was on her third marriage, his father on his fourth. That was a track record I probably didn’t want to think about right then. “Kids Carrie’s age can sleep through fireworks,” he said.

  “I hope so.”

  “Me, too, since rockets go off every time I’m near you.”

  Oh, boy!

  “Hmm,” Patrick said. Shifting side to side while down on his knees, he tried to get a peek at what I was concealing. “I’m intrigued, but me first. Close your eyes and give me your hand.”

  The plastic pool toy behind my back squeaked, like two balloons rubbing together, when I moved. As Patrick slid his makeshift ring past my knuckle, suddenly,
I had second thoughts about mine, and third, fourth, and fifth thoughts about a whole bunch of other stuff.

  “Did you save the tag, so Carrie can run the code through her register when the store opens?” I asked. “We have to pay for these.”

  “There is no tag. I pilfered my supplies from the employees’ lounge and made it myself.”

  “Oh. We were supposed to make them? I didn’t know that.”

  “Goose.” Patrick gently squeezed my hand. “Look at me.”

  “My eyes are closed.”

  “Open them,” Patrick said, “and find mine.”

  They were bright and happy when I did, with creases in the corner because of how broadly he smiled, at least at first.

  “These aren’t the feelings I ever want to bring out in you, Goose.” The smile returned when I offered one to him, just to make that happen. “You are amazing to me, and whatever you came up with, I am going to love it, because it means something to you and to us.”

  His words brought a smile to my face for real.

  “That’s better. Now, look at the ring.”

  It was a twist of colored paper clips, four of them, green, yellow, orange, and white.

  “I guessed at the size.”

  “It’s perfect.” And it was, as if the finest Italian jeweler had crafted it custom to measurement.

  “The orange represents autumn, when we met, fallen leaves, Halloween jack-o-lanterns, like at your house and in your visit with Jefferson and Calvin tonight. The white is winter, our snow day and this moment, as Jack Frost makes magic outside, creating a night for us we will never forget.”

  “I never will.”

  “Green is for spring, yellow for summer sun. I can’t wait to spend them together with you, this year and many more to come. Marry me, Goose.”

  “We did the words part already.”

  “Have you changed your mind? Is your answer different?”

  “No.” Here was my out, but I couldn’t. I just couldn’t. “I mean, keep going.”

  “It’s your turn.” Patrick rose and then kissed me. “Show me yours! Show me yours!”

  “It’s kind of…dumb.”

  “Goooose. What did we discuss?” He closed his eyes and put out his hand. Three digits and his thumb bent, he then wiggled his ring finger, sticking straight at me.

  I tried the same move. It was harder than it looked.

  “What’s the holdup, here?”

  “Oh. Patrick O’Hanlon…” I took a knee. “With this ring, I thee engage.”

  “‘Til death do us part,” Patrick said.

  I slid the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle inflatable pool ring all the way up to his armpit. He touched it in a couple of places, including the top, where the opening rested against his left shoulder.

  “You should probably open your eyes.”

  Patrick did, to take it all in.

  “See, I told you it was—”

  He cut me off with a yank and a kiss once I was back on my feet. “I love it! Big man, big ring. I’ll wear it everywhere.”

  I laughed, despite my swimming thoughts. Maybe I was the one who needed the pool floatie. “How?”

  “Well, I’m not sure yet, but I’m never taking it off.” Patrick threw himself into me for another kiss.

  Pop!

  “Fireworks!”

  “Shh.” I’d followed his glance toward the ceiling, even as I knew we knew better. “I don’t think so,” I said. “Your engagement ring is deflating. Cheap ass merchandise.”

  “Hmm.” Out of air in no time, down at Patrick’s wrist now, the thing looked like a ruffle around his pajama sleeve. I was tempted to ask him to flamenco.

  “That sucks,” I said.

  “We can make it work. This piece that’s hanging, the plastic where it shredded. Can you see?”

  “It’s dark.”

  “Look closely.” Patrick brought it too close. It tickled my nose and my heart.

  “G and P,” I discovered, after pushing his hand back ever so slightly. “One above the other, from the words teenage and power.” I sang the final few lines from the TV cartoon theme song.

  “Also, for Goose and Patrick. Is it okay?” Patrick took the ripped piece between two fingers.

  “Sure. More than okay, actually. I hate to repeat myself, but it’s…”

  “Perfect,” we both said.

  Patrick tore off the not so little strip, about the width of his whole hand and close in length, a square, of sorts. “Tie it around my finger.”

  Folded into a mini bandanna shape, twisted a couple of times, it was kind of lumpy, but it worked

  “I’ll never take it off.” Patrick’s vow was sealed with a kiss.

  “Me, neither. My paper clip ring is priceless.”

  So, there I was, happily, luckily in love and accidentally engaged by the end of the first month of a new year. Days passed, and though I spoke to Patrick a gazillion times over the course of each one, I never expressed my trepidation.

  A week or so after the big storm, he invited me to his house, where another grand gesture awaited me.

  “What the…?” I spotted the glow still halfway down the road. Once close enough, I realized there were words, words written in the snow with battery operated Christmas lights down inside carved-out script.

  Goose and Patrick.

  Patrick’s handwriting was much neater enlarged. His normal scrawling was usually hard to decipher. He claimed it was an occupational requirement.

  “Aww.” I wouldn’t have been able to dim my smile had I wanted to.

  The moment Wilbur and I got out of my car, Patrick appeared on his front porch. Also adorned in lights, he began to sing. The song he chose, appropriately, was “You Light Up My Life,” substituting Goose every time the word “You” came up in the melody. He substituted notes, too, his own sharp, flat, and off-key ones in the place of those written. I listened to the whole thing. Well, most of it.

  “‘Cause Goose, Goose lights up my-y-y-y—”

  “Shut up, O’Hanlon!” Patrick’s neighbor wasn’t enjoying the show.

  “Yikes.”

  “He’s a grouch,” Patrick said, pulling me into his arms. “Ignore him.”

  I noticed the song went unfinished.

  “He’s also moving, thankfully. The place is up for sale. I’m considering buying it myself, maybe tear the house down and put in more bees, a pool, a greenhouse, and a tennis court, or just a large play area for Mr. Wilbur, when you guys move in.”

  “I didn’t know you played tennis?” It was warm in Patrick’s arms, despite enough chill in the air to keep snow on the ground and make all those things he mentioned seem far off in the future.

  “I’ll learn.” He pulled me closer, and we kissed.

  “Would you mind finishing the song?” I asked afterward. “I’m a little OCD about that sort of thing.”

  Patrick’s smile was as bright as the twinkling Christmas lights that twisted around him. “You must be, if you’re asking me to sing. How about you finish? Be my guest.”

  I touched his heart, then put my lips to his. “Life,” I said.

  Patrick reached for my hand, to hold, I assumed, but he brought it to his mouth, then took my second finger inside.

  “Mmm.”

  “Oh, yeah.”

  With my finger all wet, he touched it to his shirt, light blue linen thin enough to show off the stiffness of his nipples. Guiding me by the wrist, we formed the letter G over Patrick’s heart, like we’d done in the store days earlier, after making love while the snow fell outside. It left a dull but legible mark in the fabric. “Life,” Patrick repeated.

  Once inside, the shirt came off quickly, that and everything else the two of us had on, as we quickly headed upstairs. Patrick put a letter over my heart at the start, our first time in his bed, using a medium that was special to him.

  “I brought out a jar of honey.”

  “Yum.”

  “Have you ever tasted raw honey?” he asked me, his
already sticky hands on my face.

  “Only once or twice.”

  “Ah, but have you ever eaten it out of a man?” He squeezed the bottle over his belly button.

  “Not until now.” I licked my lips before and after.

  We used the honey unsparingly. Patrick’s entire bedding ensemble was going to have to be laundered, something he said was well worth it.

  Quite sticky myself by the time I came all through his belly fur, I mixed my salty with his sweetness using both hands. “I love you, Patrick.”

  “I love that you do.” He kissed me and commented, “Mmm. Even sweeter than usual.”

  Wilbur came in once the two of us got quiet. Right up on the bed, he started licking Patrick’s toes, lapping and grunting like his namesake probably did. Though I had started someplace else, eventually, I had done the same, way before him.

  “It tickles.” Patrick said the same thing both times.

  “He’s not shy.” I grunted myself to stand. “Come.”

  “Again?”

  “We’ll see. Show me to your shower.”

  We left a noticeable trail all the way, one Wilbur stopped to sample a couple of times.

  “No, baby boy. Keep moving.”

  He followed us then and settled onto a fluffy beige bathroom rug in front of the sink, while Patrick and I cleaned up ourselves, before tending to the mess. Anyone who’d claim household chores like washing bed linens and cleaning honey footprints off hardwood floors on hand and knee couldn’t be fun would change their minds doing it naked with Patrick O’Hanlon.

  “Should I help?” I asked, “Or just stand here and take in the view?”

  “Your choice.” Patrick wiggled his bare ass. “Remind you of Wilbur?”

  “Reminds me of something else.” I smacked it hard.

  The basement, where the washer sat, was quite chilly.

  “Maybe we should have dressed.”

  “I can keep you warm,” Patrick promised.

  By the end of the spin cycle, we had to head back to the shower.

  Valentine’s Day came next, the first I felt like celebrating in forever. The morning after our snowy night adventure and engagement fiasco, I’d told Patrick I was going to eat a stack of fifty flapjacks once Rip and I were done plowing out O’Hanlon’s Pharmacy’s parking lot. Weeks later, Patrick still remembered that, apparently. He made me sixteen, served not in a stack, but one by one.