“Dad, now?”
When I nodded, Frankie pulled away from me and began to jump up and down on the spot, clapping his hands with excitement.
“Maisie West, you know how much I love you and I was going to do this all romantic at the lake with lanterns and wine and maybe some flower petals thrown in, which we can still do if you want to, but something like this shouldn’t need to be planned. Something like this should be done when it feels right and it feels right at this exact moment, so will you marry me? Will you allow me to make us all Coopers?”
My heart pumped wildly as I opened the box to reveal a square cut diamond on a white gold band. Staring down at it, Maisie slapped a hand against her mouth.
“It’s beautiful,” she whispered and looked back up at me. “Seriously?”
I nodded. “Yep, and the name thing.” I looked down at Frankie who was gazing at his mum. “I’ve looked into it and we can get Frankie’s name changed easily, seeing as I’m now on his birth certificate.”
“Tell us Mum,” Frankie cried. “Will you marry Dad?”
Maisie grinned and nodded. “Of course I will.”
As I slipped the ring onto her finger, Frankie flung his arms around us and started to jump up and down again.
“I love you so fucking much,” I whispered against Maisie’s mouth as euphoria I’d never felt before washed through me.
“Good,” she sighed. “Because I’m never letting you go.”
“I’d never want to, you’re stuck with me forever.”
As we kissed, hugged, and celebrated as a family, I knew I was where I was always meant to be. It had taken me a while to get my head out my arse and realise it, but there was no denying Maisie and Frankie had always been my destiny.
Sam
Two years later
As I watched Frankie struggle with his homework, I had to feel for him. I hadn’t been the brightest kid at school and Frankie appeared to be following in my footsteps. Not that I cared too much, he’d work for me, if he wanted to, or he could sweep the streets – whatever made my boy happy.
“You okay there buddy?” I asked, running a hand over the top of his scruffy hair. “And have you actually brushed your hair today?”
Frankie looked up at me and grinned. His babyish looks were growing out now that he was almost twelve years old. His cheekbones were sharper and his nose a little wider; if anything he was more bloody handsome than before, but then again I was biased.
“Nope and nope,” he replied. “Why do I need to learn fractions anyway? It’s not as though I’m going to go into a shop and tell them I want two thirds of X as long as it equals Y, is it?”
I had to agree with his logic on that one.
“I know,” I sighed, leaning over his shoulder to read what he was working on, “but you’re expected to learn it to help you to get qualifications and qualifications will help you in life.”
He looked at me quizzically. “How many have you got, Dad?”
My heart thumped hard when he said the word ‘dad’, even now after three years, it still felt amazing and strange to hear it. Yes, we’d had some difficult moments where he’d thrown it back in my face that I’d not been around when I should have been, or that I had no right to tell him what to do, but they were few and far between. Things were generally good and his anger wasn’t anything I didn’t deserve.
“You know exactly how many. I’ve told you this before,” I replied, knowing full well he knew I’d only passed a couple at school and that anything else that I’d achieved had been done in my own time once I was working. “You don’t have to do it the hard way, like me.”
“You don’t even believe in them anyway,” he groaned, looking back down at the paper on the table. “Can’t I just be a swimmer instead?”
We’d had this conversation many times and while Frankie was good, it would take a lot of time and effort to make him great. I was willing to coach him and put the time in, but since discovering football and girls Frankie wasn’t quite so willing, so Maisie and I had persuaded him swimming for fun would be much better for him. That didn’t mean he didn’t smash it in the school swimming galas, because he did, even beating kids in the two years above him, but that was about as competitive as Frankie’s swimming was going to get. Plus, Maisie didn’t like the idea of us both being up and out of the house at four every morning and after what happened to me she would never let anyone else coach him. Also, even after three years or more, she still had the odd panic about when Josh took Frankie. Thankfully though he wasn’t a problem for us any longer. After getting a six month prison sentence, of which he only served three, he moved back to his home town to live with his Dad. We’d heard he was working in a call centre selling solar panels, but it didn’t matter because he was of no significance to us, Maisie was just glad there was no chance of me bumping into him and getting myself into trouble.
“Hey, babe.”
And there she was, my beautiful wife, looking incredible despite only having three hours sleep the night before.
She came over to me and wrapped an arm around my waist, dropping a kiss to my bicep, her favourite spot for kisses.
“She gone down okay?” I asked, lifting my arm to pull her closer.
