Fourth Time Is a Charm?

The first time had been the easiest. 

Sarah took in the moment in absolute shock- stunned into abject horror as she took in the scene before her.

There he sat perched on one knee in all his gangly awkward high school glory, looking up at her with an apprehension only a senior in high school could have while faced with the daunting prospect of proposing. Yes, proposing proposing. The situation looked as absurd as it sounded. Sarah couldn’t understand how this moment arose. Seconds ago Damon had held her Calc 1 textbook in his hands going over final exam review questions with her, and suddenly in the moment it had taken her to turn around and grab her water bottle, he had a ring in his hands instead and was down on one knee?! 

Sarah didn’t know a lot, but she knew this was not right by any means.

No boy who was still doing homework on a Saturday night belonged proposing, or even thinking about marriage. Nope. 

Not. At. All.

So it was with that thought in mind that Sarah stood from her chair to look down into Damon’s eager unknowing eyes, and simply said no.

Honestly, the no came quite easily.

“You don’t even know what you’re asking of me Damon” Sarah began looking down at Damon, as the smile slid off his face and he began to object.

With a wistful sigh way beyond her years Sarah continued, “We’ve barely even touched the real world Damon. I know you’re scared of graduating and moving on, but tying ourselves together for the rest of our lives? In holy freakin matrimony? Well that just is not the answer. I don’t know what the answer is, but it certainly isn’t this.”

Sarah gestured wildly towards the ground where Damon remained perched on one knee, “ All this? This is so not how I planned ending senior year, and I know this wasn't really what you had in mind either."

"I love you Damon" she continued.

"But-" he began to retort.

She held up her hand to stop Damon as he began to rise. "And it's because I love you, that I'm saying no".

Before he could reply and without looking back, Sarah scooped up her backpack and darted down the stairs and out the front door.

***

The second time wasn't as easy as the first, but she wouldn't say it had been too difficult either.

Honestly, it was almost eerie how similar this moment felt to the first. It'd been six years since the first time she'd been proposed to, but yet all the feelings of shock and discomfort came rushing back as though it had been yesterday.

Sarah had been dating Dan for nearly a year, and things were going good. But clearly, Sarah thought to herself, they were not on the same page.

To Sarah "good" meant going on a weekend vacation together.

"Good" might even mean meeting the family.

"Good" did not mean bending the damn knee!

The answer came to her mind as quickly as the question had tumbled out of his mouth. But while the "no" was firm in her mind, she did have to admit it hurt more to speak out loud than it had the last time.

Last time she had been a kid. Damon didn't really want marriage. He wanted the confirmation that he wasn't going to be alone as he took his first steps into the real world. And who could blame him? Years after high school Sarah still felt that fear in the back of her head- the idea that she'd forever be stuck facing it all alone. It was a scary prospect.

And while there had been on and off flings throughout her college days, it wasn't until she had met Dan that she really felt she wasn't taking on the world alone anymore. It was as though a literal boulder had been taken off her back.

After meeting Dan she smiled more. Made reservations for two at cute bistros in the city. She woke up besides someone. She opened up.

People asked her the first six months of their relationship if she was pregnant, because she was really glowing that much.

Having someone to go home to just felt so good.

These were incredible feelings that she was petrified to let go of. But, as she looked down at this man, a man who she loved, his face dimly lit in the candlelight that filled the room, she knew she simply couldn't marry him.

Taking a closer look around the room, she saw the room was full of rose petals that had been scattered across the floor, with candles littered throughout the apartment. The faint sound of jazz music flitted through their bedroom door, and the smell of pesto pasta wafted from their dining room table. The scene looked as though it had carried itself out of one of Sarah's rom com movies. And while the glow of the room was stunning, and the clear effort Dan had put forward was beautiful, it was the very image of the room that told Sarah she was making the right decision when she looked down at Dan and said " I'm so sorry Dan, but no. I can't marry you."

The look on his face pierced her right to her heart, and she tried her best to hold her own tears in as she looked down at the man whom the idea of she held so much love for, but really didn't know anymore.

After a moment of shock, Dan stood up with a stone cold gaze, coming inches from Sarah's face.

"Are you kidding me Sarah? This isn't funny. Especially not after all this effort I put into tonight- into creating the dream proposal for you. Are you really serious? Cause babe this is so not the time for jokes. Not after all this work" he said, voice rising, while gesturing madly behind him towards the dinner and music.

Trying to keep calm in the face of his anger, Sarah closed her eyes and took a deep breath for a moment before reopening them and telling Dan, "I'm sorry Dan, but I am in fact very serious. I really can't marry you. In fact, this "dream proposal" you speak of is the very reason you and I can't possibly marry each other."

A look of rage overtook Dan's face, and he stepped even closer to Sarah, looking down at her with a cold, hard, disdain in his eyes that she had never witnessed before. She stepped back a bit in fearful hesitation.

"Are you kidding me?" he shouted, "What more could you possibly want?! I bought pounds, yes pounds of rose petals to scatter across this stupid apartment. I asked Ricardo to make an extra serving of his fancy pasta during his shift just so that you wouldn't be stuck eating some crap takeout on the BEST NIGHT OF YOUR LIFE!"

"AND THIS DAMN RING?!" he screamed, flinging it towards Sarah who flinched as it narrowly passed her face, "THIS DAMN RING IS WORTH A WHOLE PAYCHECK! YOU SPOILED LITTLE BRAT! WHAT MORE COULD YOU HAVE POSSIBLY NEEDED?!"

Sarah stepped back a little more. "That's just it" she said, "I don't need any of this stuff. I never asked you for any of this materialistic garbage. Do you even remember that I don't like roses?!"

A bitter laugh escaped her throat as she looked around. "I never needed a fancy ring. Or top cuisine. Or even ambiance music. All I wanted was for you to love me. Truly love me. And honestly it seems like that was too hard an ask from me- my bad"

"Of course I love you" Dan said. "Don't you see I did this all because I love you?" he asked earnestly, anger ebbing away.

Stepping forward, Sarah sadly answered "No. You did this because you think you love me. But, whatever girl that is, the version of me that you think you love? Well it really doesn't exist. And I can't spend the rest of my days with someone who doesn't really know me."

"You'd rather be alone than with me, just because I can't remember the flowers you do and don't like?" Dan retorted.

"Honestly, yeah" Sarah said with a shrug as she sat down on the couch and patted the seat besides her. Dan walked over and sat down without a word.

"Really Dan, I think we fell in love with the idea of each other. I loved the idea of not waking up alone. And you loved the idea of holding someone's hand under the dinner table when you go out with friends." Sarah said with a wistful smile. She reached over and lovingly put her hand on Dan's knee.

"But" she continued, "is it the fact that it's my hand under the table that you love? Or is it just the fact that there is a hand to hold?"

Dan looked to her, his eyes admitting what he refused to say aloud.

"Because Dan, when I look down the road forty or fifty years from now, I don't necessarily see your face besides mine when I am sitting outside in my rocking chair. I just see that I'm not alone. And we both know we deserve more than that. You're more than a curb to my own fear of loneliness, and we'd both be selling ourselves short if we moved forward despite that."

Sarah removed her hand from Dan's knee and looked up into his eyes, upon which he gave a slight nod that said far more than he'd ever care to admit. He leaned over and kissed Sarah's cheek and whispered " I'll be back for my stuff sometime next week."

Shuffling past Sarah, he bent down, picked up the ring he had thrown and walked out the door without so much as another sound.

Sarah stood and made her way to bed, where under the covers, for the first time in a long time, she was more than content to go to bed alone.

***

The third time had been painstakingly hard. Of this there was no denying.

It had all begun with a stick with two bold pink lines across it. It was nearly two years after Sarah and Dan had broken up, and Sarah had been casually seeing Aaron for the last eight or so months.

Things were going good, great actually, but neither of them felt the need to pressure the relationship to move any faster than it naturally was going. And while people were constantly pestering them with questions of marriage and babies, both Sarah and Aaron felt remarkably content with the path their relationship was headed down.

That is, until late Saturday night when Sarah peed on a pregnancy test and in exchange got two bright affirmations of a new life ahead- one that neither of them had remotely anticipated.

While certainly neither of them had plans of having a baby anytime soon, neither of them were particularly frightened by the prospect of having one either. Sarah's twenty-sixth birthday had just passed a couple weeks ago, Aaron was just about to turn twenty-nine, and both of them were financially stable and set in their respective careers. Honestly, while neither of them had been expecting it, they figured they might as well go for it. At the very least the circumstances would allow it with relative ease.

So with those two pink lines came new conversations.

Over the last two weeks, the two stayed up late in bed pondering all the ifs ands or buts of their new future ahead.

Homes. Finances. Marriage. All things they hadn't really considered before this moment.

While there hadn't been any real consensus on marriage, Aaron made it clear he wanted to get married- at least engaged before the baby arrived.

"C'mon Sarah" he jokingly pushed, "This baby is gonna make you stuck to me the rest of your life anyways! Might as well make it all permanent!"

"Wowww. How romantic, I'm just oozing at that declaration of love." Sarah sarcastically replied, rolling over to lay face to face with Aaron in bed.

"I'll give it a thought" she said with a wink, "Goodnightttt" she sung as she rolled back over, reached up and shut the lamp light.

Three days later Sarah sat on the toilet, looking down at the dark stain of blood covering her underwear in utter shock. As quickly as the baby had been envisioned, it had disappeared. Sarah sat keeling over in pain, unable to tear her eyes away from what could've been.

After about twenty minutes, Sarah tried to collect herself. She managed to stand up and flush the toilet while kicking her soiled underwear too the side, and stumble her way back into the bedroom. She somehow managed to throw on new bottoms, pull the curtains firmly shut, and fall into bed, pulling the covers far above her head. Then, in the darkness of her room, she finally allowed herself to cry.

About two hours later Sarah heard the door bang shut as Aaron came home from work. "Hey babe I'm home!" he shouted out. Sarah physically couldn't reply and remained looking at the wall, covers up to her chin.

A minute or two later the bedroom door creaked open, and Aaron tip toed in. "Hey hon, sorry I'm late. I had to pick up something, but I'm pretty sure you're going to love it" he said.

Sarah remained silent, lying still facing the wall.

Aaron still unaware anything was wrong, came around to the other side of the bed and crouched down by Sarah's head.

He reached into his back pocket and pulled out an engagement ring.

He smiled sheepishly, eyes full of excitement, and said "I know this isn't the proposal either of us imagined, but I'm ready for us to become a family. So, Sarah Redford- will you marry me?"

Sarah finally looked at him, her eyes void of emotion.

"There's no family to have- so no." she said flatly and looked away.

Aaron looked on at her in shock. After a moment of silence he asked, "What are you talking about? Sarah?"

"The bab- the baby, its gone." Sarah choked out as she began to let the tears escape her eyes once more.

Aaron said no more as he crawled into the bed and proceeded to hold her as they both mourned what could have been. The baby that tethered them together also seemed to have torn them in two.

Two weeks later they each went their separate ways.

***

The fourth time was as easy as the first time. This was an indisputable fact.

It had been a complete coincidence that brought Sarah and Damon- yes that same Damon back together nearly ten years after the first proposal that had broken them up.

It seemed that while the two had grown up a lot on their own, their personalities couldn't have changed too much, because both their friends had set them up on a blind double date. Each had been told by the respective friends that they knew someone who would totally be perfect for them, but told them no more than that.

So it was with complete shock, that when Sarah entered the restaurant she found Damon waiting besides her friend and her boyfriend.

But, pushing past the initial shock she and Damon hit it off as though no time had passed at all.

Now two years after that blind date Sarah and Damon were living together in a small walk up in Manhattan and Sarah had never been happier.

The best parts of their connection had remained all these years later, and all the childish antics they previously held had simply slipped away with age. It felt as though Damon was an extension of her body that she'd been missing for a third of her life, and suddenly she was whole again.

So, it was with no surprise that when she opened the door to their bedroom one Sunday afternoon to find Damon sitting on their bed and fiddling with a shiny diamond ring, that she squealed with glee and tackled him on the bed before he even had the chance to reply.

Yes, the fourth time was as easy as the first, but this time was different.

Because this time she said yes.

And looking into Damon's eyes she thought to herself, perhaps the fourth time is a charm.

Author's Note: After completing my submission I realized I reallllly digressed from the idea of a "singular moment" (lol whoops), but I didn't want to scratch everything so I just kept it! Hope you enjoy anyways <3