Brushing the light snowfall off my shoulders, I ducked under the tiny door frame of her front door and carefully shrugged my coat off. The temperature had suddenly fallen over the last few days in New York City, but Jane’s home never failed to fill my body with warmth whenever I came over.
I glanced down at the fretting little lady as she floundered around me in her adorable kitchen apron and a fluffy towel in her hand. She was extremely worried about all the snow that had melted on my head, but I could care less.
I reached forward, lopping my arm around her waist and effectively halting her motions as I pulled her against my frame. Her cheeks turned a bright red color, as usual, mirroring the red ornament balls hanging from her ceiling.
Her comforting sweet scent engulfed me as I lowered my head, leaning down closer to her until we were just an inch away from each other. I greeted softly, “I missed you, darling.”
Her face immediately flushed into a deeper red as she stammered, “I-I m-missed you too, A-Achilles.”
I chuckled at her adorable reaction and pulled away slightly before tilting upwards to press my lips against her temple. Even though I wanted to kiss her on the lips, I knew that she wasn’t ready yet. Though she would never push me away, I could tell from how her stuttering always went out of control whenever I drifted too close to her.
When I pulled away, she habitually covered the place I kissed her with her delicate little fingers with a dumbfounded expression. She was honestly too cute for me to handle.
Changing the subject, I asked quietly as to not startle her, “Can I talk to Liam a bit before we have dinner?”
She nodded mindlessly and mumbled softly, “I still need about half an hour more to finish dinner anyway…”
I hummed in understanding and gave her waist one last squeeze before letting go of her. Once I dropped Jane back off inside her kitchen, I climbed up the stairs in search of the little one.
I stopped in front of his slightly ajar bedroom door and gave a few light knocks. It didn’t take long before the door swung open, and his little figure popped up in the doorway, staring up at me with sparkling violet eyes that matched the look in his mother’s eyes whenever she got excited.
Liam wasn’t one to initiate much physical affection with me, but he did at least grow much more fond of me since I saved him, enough so that he greeted me with a lighthearted “Mr. Cordova” instead of the previous cold “that bastard.”
He seemed to like me enough to now eagerly wait for my arrival in the evenings. Even though he tried to hide it by acting indifferent around me, he would always present his day’s work to me without fail, kind of like how a son would pine for his father’s praise.
He eagerly grabbed my wrist and pulled me into his room, closing the door behind me as he nudged me onto the beanbag in the corner of his room. “You’re a bit early today, but that doesn’t matter because I just finished the project for my robotics class today.”
He bounded up into his closet and started to painstaking pull a large contraption out. He explained, “The professor was talking about neural nets today and I think I finally figured out how to set up the voice recognition program from scratch. I tried it Ms. Jane and it works pretty well in differentiating between the two of us, but I want to see if it works on you too.”
He was talking at a mile a minute about his project, but I actually wanted to talk to him about something else today.
Trying to catch his attention, I started hesitantly, “Um…”
But he cut me off, not noticing my attempt at all, and continued, “It might take a couple of sentences before it recognizes you as a new voice, but I think it can do it. I used-”
“Liam, I actually came early today because I wanted to talk to you about something.”
He paused and looked up at me in confusion. “About what?”
“About Ms. Jane…” I fiddled with the ring on my finger. “I think you probably already noticed she gave me her ring…”
“Yeah… She hasn’t been wearing it since she came back from taking care of you, even though she never goes anywhere without it.”
“You know that it’s a family heirloom, right?”
He nodded again. “It’s not worth a lot, but she believes that it brings happiness to all the married couples in her family.” He paused for a moment as he eyed the ring on my hand. “I originally wanted her to get a fake ring to pretend that she was already married to stop all the men, or at least stop the majority, from coming up to her. Something thinner and more feminine, but she insisted on using that one instead.”
“Then… What if I got her a real one instead?”
He halted mid-motion and creakily turned his head back to me. “What?”
Even though he was only a five-year-old, my stomach wouldn’t stop churning with anxiety. He was her only family left, and I wanted him to approve of us before I asked her.
Taking in a deep breath, I replied, “I want to return her gesture and ask your mother to marry me.”
I pulled a tiny velvet box out of my pocket and opened it to reveal a large tear-drop-shaped diamond resting delicately on a thin silver band. It was a simple design but still had a classic elegance to it.
He stared at the box with wide eyes and mumbled stupefying, “That’s a big rock…”
I chuckled at his stunned reaction and nodded, “Yes, it is 12 carats of the highest-grade diamond I could find.”
His eyes grew wider. “That’s worth at least a few million…”
I diverted my eyes sheepishly. “Well… Yes… But you can’t tell your mother because she won’t accept it if she knows how much it cost.”
He nodded stiffly. “Then why are you showing me this?”
“I want to ask you for your blessing before I propose to her. You’re her only family, and I want you to approve of us before I do it.”
He diverted his eyes and didn’t say anything.
Slightly discouraged by his lack of reply, I pushed through it and continued, “I know you probably don’t think much of me, but I really do care for your mother, and I know she would want your opinion on this before anything else.”
He backed away slowly. “I-I d-don’t know…”
“I said this before, but you know that I would never try to take your mother away from you, right? I already told your mother this from the start, but I am more than willing to take you in as one of my own and recognize you as the heir of my empire if you would like it. I’m not only asking for your mother’s hand in marriage but also for you to become a part of my family.”
His breath hitched as he backed up into his desk. “I-I…”
I looked at him worriedly as he wobbled about with his tablet tightly gripped in his little hands against his chest. “Liam-”
“You can’t just come in here and drop all of this on me! I’m… I’m not even Ms. Jane’s real family!”
I halted mid-motion. Not her real family?
“My parents didn’t want me because I was a freak, so they threw me out before I even turned two. Ms. Jane was just unfortunate enough for me to try to rob her house one night. I-I knew that she lived by herself and never locked her door, so she was a perfect target. B-But she was just too kind for her own good and stubbornly insisted on raising me after she caught me. She didn’t even yell at me for stealing from her and spent the first-hour bathing and feeding me. So I’ve been leeching off of her ever since.” He pressed his forehead into his palm with a broken chuckle. “I’m just some random kid that she picked off the street because she’s too stupidly naive for her own good.”
He continued to wobble from side to side as he brokenly laughed at himself. His grip weakened, causing his tablet to slip out of his grasp and shatter onto the ground.
I swiftly lifted him off the ground, both out of worry for his well-being and a need to protect his bare feet from the shards.
He squirmed in my hold and pushed against me with as much force as his little fists could muster. “Stop… Please… Just put me down… You shouldn’t treat me so nicely. Otherwise, you’re just going to end up like Ms. Jane…”
I tightened my grip around him, trying to prevent him from falling out of my arms. I quickly stepped over the glass shards and sat down on his bed, holding him in my lap as I gently stroked his head. “Liam, you shouldn’t say things like that… It would hurt Jane to hear you talk like this…”
He shook his head stubbornly.
I sighed and forced him to look up at me, wiping the tears from the corner of his eyes. “I might not know much about what happened to the two of you in past, but I’m sure that Jane already thinks of you as her own son. She always speaks so lovingly about you and talks about you like a proud momma whenever you achieve something new, whether it be winning another competition or just helping her prep for dinner. So please don’t say things like that.”
He stared at me doubtfully before forcing his eyes away from me.
I continued, “I see how much you care for her too. How you always cover the corners of the tables to make sure she doesn’t hurt her clumsy self, or how you always remind her to lock her doors at night, or how you put recklessly put yourself in danger to save her. Strangers don’t do those types of things for each other. Only family does.”
He stayed silent as if he was contemplating my words. After a long moment of silence, he mumbled, “She still hurts herself even after I padded the corners. She hits her head underneath the tables instead.”
I chuckled at his little comment. “Yes… She can be quite clumsy at times, but you would still never want to let her go because she’s your mother, and you are her son.”
He nodded meekly with his head hung low.
“And… if you would allow me, I would like to become a part of your family as well.”
He sighed and nodded again. “I guess I wouldn’t mind that…” He tiredly dropped his forehead against my shoulder as he mindlessly fiddled with the buttons on my shirt. “Does that make you my father, then?”
My eyes widened, not expecting him to ask me such a question. I awkwardly cleared my throat and replied, “O-only if you don’t call her Ms. Jane anymore.”
He hummed in contemplation and nodded. “Then you better make sure she says yes.”
A smile spread across my lips as he leaned comfortably against my chest.
I had come up to talk to Liam, expecting to get shot down almost instantly, but I actually got his blessing.
Breaking us out of our little bubble, a soft voiced called out for us from outside the door, “Achilles? Liam? Is everything alright? I heard a loud crash from downstairs?”
Liam’s eyes widened comically large as they zoned in on his broken tablet lying on the ground. Then he turned to me with pleading eyes, begging me not to tell his mother.
With an amused grin, I chuckled softly at his fear of being scolded by his mother and whispered, “I’ll get it fixed by tomorrow so she won’t find it.”
He relaxed at my answer with a small sigh in relief.
“Achilles? Liam? Say something otherwise-”
Liam immediately bolted out of my lap and opened the door just big enough for his little body to fit through. With a innocent cheeky little grin, he lied, “It’s nothing, Ms. Jane. The robot just accidentally knocked a few books from my table.”
She eyed him skeptically but dropped it when I appeared behind Liam and reassured, “It’s really nothing, darling. The robot is just a little big for his room.”
She nodded understandingly and leaned down to softly scold Liam about testing out his experiments inside of the house. She looked so adorable with the little pout on her lips that I found it hard to take her serious and it seemed that Liam thought the same with the way he stood indifferently in front of his mother with his arms crossed
I chuckled as the crease lines along her forehead grew deeper. She was trying so hard to look intimidating to no avail with a son who was already hard enough to crack for a normal person.
My heart fluttered at the sight. To think that this would soon become a part of my daily life. That these two little ones would become my family.
All I had to do now was to pop the big question and ask for her hand.