On the drive over to his mammy’s where he is sure Katy will be, he is rehearsing what he is going to say, as well as trying to come up with a clever way to display the ring. His heart is racing as he pulls up into the driveway and takes the ring box out of the bag and shoves it down into his pocket, which causes a huge bulge that she is sure to notice. “Maybe I will take it out of the box,” he says to himself, removing it from the box and shoving the ring as far down into his pocket as it will go.
When Bo walks through the door, he smells the toast that his mammy must be making for turkey sandwiches, seeing as it is noon and that is Katy’s favorite food. Lucky for her it is also his mammy’s most famous dish. She can make seven different kinds of turkey sandwiches, which one you get just depends on what kind of mood she is in that day.
“I’ll have one too!” Bo shouts back to the kitchen and Katy comes around the corner and jumps up into his arms.
“I still cannot believe you turned around and came all the way back here,” she says to him. “I kind of feel like a princess in a fairy tale that the prince came back for, except I have no idea how long you are actually staying.”
“How long are you staying, Bo?” says Viola as she spreads the turkey salad onto the sandwich.
“I’m not very sure yet, Mammy. Turkey salad? This must be a special day if you made turkey salad.”
“She opened the last jar of pickles too,” says Katy. Katy goes back over and gives Bo another long hug and stands there in his arms feeling like a true princess that has found her prince.
“What are you doing all of this for, Mammy?” asks Bo.
While Katy’s back is still turned to Viola, she sticks her hand up to show him the number five and points to his pocket where the list was so as to ask him if he was planning on doing number five on his list. Bo slightly nods and points to his other pocket where she can see a tiny circular shaped thing at the very bottom.
“Eeeeekk!” Viola shrieks.
“Miss Viola!” Katy almost jumps out of her skin as she turns around to see what is wrong. “What happened?” Katy shouts.
“Oh, I thought I saw a mouse,” Viola replies. “I guess it was my eyes playing tricks on me, it must have been a shadow.”
“Mammy, would you mind if we ate outside today? It’s pretty cool out and I could use the fresh air, I’m feeling a little stuffy,” says Bo.
“Sure, honey,” replies Viola, “why don’t you and Katy go on out there? I will be right out with your lunch.”
While Katy excuses herself to the restroom, Bo and his mammy try to figure out what to do with the ring. Before they could figure it out, Katy is already washing her hands and opening the bathroom door, so Bo shoves the ring into his grandmother’s palm and rushes over to meet Katy in the hallway and walks her outside. He shoots his mammy a desperate look over his shoulder as they walk out the front door.
“Let’s swing a bit,” Bo says as they walk over toward the swing that his grandfather had made for his mammy.
“It’s so romantic, isn’t it?”
“What, what is so romantic?” Bo asks as Katy laughs at how weird he is acting.
“It is romantic that your grandfather built this house and this swing for Miss Viola, and that this is where they were sitting when she told him she was pregnant with your father.” “Yep, that’s pretty romantic,” he says as his mammy comes out the front door and hollers for Bo to come grab their plates.
When Bo gets up to the door, he grabs both plates, and there it is! The ring he had bought is sticking up out of the toast of Katy’s turkey sandwich. “It’s now or never,” he thinks to himself as he takes a deep breath and turns to walk back to the swing.
He puts his plate down first in the seat next to Katy, and then gets on one knee and holds the turkey sandwich up to her face and says, “Katy, you are the most perfect woman I have ever or will ever meet again, and I cannot let you go. My life has changed for the better since I met you and I need you. Will you please eat this turkey sandwich and accept this ring?”
Katy, still stunned at the proposal, is crying, but Bo can’t tell if it is from happiness or if she is crying over the way that she was just proposed to. Bo lowers the turkey sandwich down from her face and looks up at her, and to his surprise, “Yes, Bo Brogan, I will.”
He takes the ring out of the bread, wipes it off with his napkin, very gently picks up her hand, and takes her ring finger and slides the ring on.
“It’s beautiful!” Katy exclaims. “I have never even dreamed of a ring like this, but if I could have any ring in the world that I wanted, it would be this one. How did you know I love pink diamonds?” Katy asks.
“I just noticed that you have a lot of pink things, plus, I think there is a reason that I have been driving a pink car around for a week,” he says while tearing up himself.
Katy runs to Miss Viola and shows her the ring and asks if this was what all of the fuss was about today and if she knew that he was about to propose.
“Of course, it was what all of the fuss was about,” replies Viola, “and of course, I knew he was going to propose. Mammy knows all. It might take a little nosing around to find out but I always find out. Now why don’t you two take a walk and get some alone time while I clean up this mess and start supper?”
“Sure thing,” Bo says as he looks back over his shoulder at his mammy one more time before walking off. She is holding up the number one, as if to say “Go tell her your plans for the bakery.”
“Wow,” Katy says to Bo as they walk down the sidewalk, “I have to say, I was not expecting that. I couldn’t be happier, I really couldn’t. It’s just something that I have been wanting so bad for the past few years and the right man had never come along, and now that you have, it all just seems too good to be true, ya know?”
“Yes, I do,” says Bo. He takes her hand and starts to jog and says, “I want to show you something.” They round two corners, and with the bakery in sight, Katy starts to see cars in the parking lot.
“What are all of those people doing there, Bo?” she asks.
“Let’s go see,” he says.
As they come up to the back door of the bakery, they start to hear tools working and banging and sanding.
“What are they doing!” she shrieks.
“They, my darling fiancée, are remodeling the bakery.”
“The insurance money hasn’t even come in yet though, I have no way to pay for all of this.”
“That’s ok, Katy, because I already did.” She looks up to him in shock and awe of the happenings of this day, her whole world just got turned right side up again. Her world has not been this perfect since both of her parents were alive.
“This is amazing!” Katy proclaims.
“You are amazing,” Bo says to Katy, “my life would not be the way it is now if it wasn’t for you helping me to figure out what was missing in my life. You let me know that I am not the ruler of the worlds and that everything doesn’t always have to be won or bought, that I am a real human being and I am allowed to be an imperfect person because I have a perfect God that loves me and forgives me. And Katy, if I would have never met you I would have been the same way that I have always been for the rest of my life, and I would have been miserable.”
“There is no way that this day could get any better,” she says as she laughs, still amazed at everything that has went on in the last hour.
“Yes, it can,” Bo says with a cocky grin which, no, he has not lost, and honestly, Katy kind of likes. His confidence is very appealing to her, at least she knows that he will never be afraid of a challenge.
“Let’s go, there is one more thing I have to show you,” Bo says.
“Does this have anything to do with what your mammy pulled out of your pocket this morning?” she asks.
“Mammy pulled something out of my pocket this morning?”
“Yes, it looked like a napkin,” she says.
“Ahhh, that makes sense,” replies Bo, “never put anything past Mammy, Katy, alwa
ys remember that.”
They take off walking down the street once again, but this time it’s back to Miss Viola’s house to get in the car. Bo opens Katy’s door for her and does a little bow as she sits down.
“Where are we going?” she asks impatiently.
“You will see, just hold your horses,” says Bo.
They drive four miles to an open lot next to a shopping center and park and get out of the car.
“Ok Bo, what is this?” she asks.
“This, is the home of the Daniel Bates Memorial soup kitchen,” he says.
“How in the world did you know my dad always wanted to open a soup kitchen?”
“Well, Katy, like I said, I went to the bakery every day after football practices my whole life, I would sit there so I didn’t have to go home to my mom, and me and your dad would talk. He told me about his dreams and I told him about mine.”
“Oh,” says Katy, “and what were your dreams back then?” she asks.
“I dreamed of being a professional football star and marrying the prettiest girl in the world. At least I get to fulfill one of those,” he says as he pulls her in for a kiss.
“You are amazing,” she tells him as she looks into his eyes. “God really did send me my prince, I am on cloud nine. Are there any other surprises that you have for me? Because I’m not sure if I can handle any more today.”
“Oh yes, actually, there is,” Bo says, “I signed us up for yoga.”
Katy literally falls to the ground laughing at this one and pulls Bo down with her, and they roll around on the ground laughing and laughing until their bellies hurt.
“Are you serious, Bo?”
“I am way too serious, darling. I am taking all of your advice because nothing you have ever said to me to date had led me astray. Everything you have said to me has been a complete blessing. I am amazed at how changing my attitude and taking a few tips from a little girl has made my life so much more fulfilling, I would have never thought I could be this happy.”
“Me either, Bo,” she says, “you have given me some good advice too. I need to start doing more for myself, so last night, when you left, I sat down and started looking into nursing school. I want to finish my nursing degree. That way I can help people all day long, and I will be happy as a clam, except now with all of these endeavors you have gotten us into, I don’t know if I will be able to. We will have to hire people to work at the bakery and the soup kitchen if I am in school all of the day.”
“That’s not a problem, Katy, I am selling The Squire. I need to be here. I can open up my own law office here, and I am going to sell The Squire, and we will have enough money to fund and employ the soup kitchen, so don’t worry, I stayed up thinking about this all night long.”
“Oh, I see,” says Katy, “that’s why you fell asleep on my couch as soon as I left the room.”
“You caught me! That is exactly why.”
“You know, Bo, out of all of the people in the world, I would have never thought that you would be the person to come back to this town and be such a blessing to it,” says Katy.
“Well, this town makes some awesome people. I mean there is ME, for one, ha-ha. And there is you, and my mammy, and your dad, and your mom. This town itself is a blessing and it deserves for the people who live in it to give back a little sometimes, like your dad did. I’m just trying to do my part, that’s all. Now how about we get back to mammies, I can only imagine what she has made for our engagement night dinner.”
“What do you think it is?”
“I don’t know, but I am starving. Hopefully it’s chicken spaghetti, or chicken pot pie, or jambalaya, or corn casserole or chicken and dressing. Heck, I could eat anything right now. I just remembered that right after I proposed, she basically ripped the plates out of our hands and sent us on a walk.”
“Maybe she was afraid I was going to change my mind,” Katy says giving him a sassy look and pinching him.
As they walk up the front steps, they smell dinner cooking.
“Mm mm mm mm, it smells like chicken spaghetti and corn casserole.”
“You’re right!” Mammy shouts from the kitchen. “Now you kids get on in here so that I can see that ring and we can say the blessing, we have so much to be thankful for today.”
“Amen,” Katy and Bo say at the same time.
Small Town Tango Page 8
