His Fake Proposal Led Me To My Real Husband Chapter 36
She instinctively tucked them farther into her sleeves.
There were still a few shallow paper cuts on her fingertips.
“They’re healed.”
I thought of myself before the engagement party.
My hands had been covered in Band-Aids, too.
Natalie looked at me.
“I wasn’t trying to trade those boxes for your forgiveness.”
“I know.”
“I just wanted to finish one thing I didn’t dare to do back then.”
“I know.”
Her eyes slowly reddened.
“So from now on, we…”
She didn’t finish.
I did it for her.
“We won’t go back to how things were.”
She lowered her head.
“Okay.”
“But thank you for coming today.”
Natalie jerked her head up.
“You don’t have to thank me. This is what I should have done in the first place.”
“Yes.”
I looked at her.
“Doing the right thing doesn’t always get you back what you’ve lost.”
“But it’s still the right thing to do.”
She nodded, and tears fell.
This time she didn’t hide them, and she didn’t apologize.
She wiped them away herself and turned toward the elevator.
Just before the doors closed, she gave me a small wave.
I didn’t wave back.
But I stood there and watched until the doors slid shut.
When I got home, I asked Julian to take the cardboard box down from the top shelf of the bookcase.
“Finally ready to open it?” he asked.
“Yeah.”
Inside were a thousand gold favor boxes, stacked neatly.
The one on top sat a little crooked, the lid refusing to close all the way.
I picked it up and pressed the creases back into shape.
A nearby community center was preparing winter gifts.
I called to ask if they needed gift boxes.
They said, “A lot.”
I looked at the boxes in front of me.
“I happen to have a thousand.”Â