I followed him in silence as we walked closer towards the water, wondering what his ulterior motive was. Maybe he thought it would be romantic to take a walk by the waterfront? Maybe he had a specific place in mind? I gave up asking him since I knew he wouldn’t answer me anyway.
“Romantic walk on the jetty?” I guessed.
He nodded and said nothing, so I hopped up onto the rocks behind him and we continued to walk in silence. For the first time that night, I noticed that Dylan was acting a little peculiar as well. I had been so busy trying to cover up my odd behavior with normality that I hadn’t even noticed that he seemed a little bit on edge. But whatever his reason, I could almost guarantee that it wasn’t anything that came nearly as close to the shocker I was about to lay on him.
When we came to the wooden bridge, Dylan stopped abruptly, gazing out at the flashing lighthouse in the distance. As I studied him, I felt an all-too-familiar scenario replay itself in my head. I’d seen that look on his face before. He was acting the same way he did the night that I came back to the hotel after my evening adventure with Walter. I came to the realization that Dylan wasn’t acting strange or peculiar.
He was nervous.
He stared down at his hands for a long time in silence. Several times he started to speak, but nothing came out. It was as if he had rehearsed what he was going to say and forgot the lines.
“When you and I were apart for those few weeks,” he said, “I came here practically every night to think about what to do.”
I reflected back on the night I’d found him here, cold and lifeless, his back growing smaller in the distance as he walked out of my life.
“Come up with any good conclusions?” I asked, trying to force the depressing memories out of my head.
“I did actually,” he replied, staring out into the water. I followed his gaze and saw a large boat in the distance with three horizontal rows of lights. When I looked back at Dylan, our eyes met.
“And what’s that?” I asked.
He smiled at me, but this time it was a genuine smile. “Well, I came to the conclusion that I didn’t want to be without you. Ever. I know I freaked out at the thought of you with someone else and I shouldn’t have run out, but it just… it just made me crazy.” His expression darkened and the nervousness reappeared. “I had never felt that way about anyone in my life and it scared the shit out of me. But no matter where I went, no matter how hard I tried to get away from you, you were always there.” He laughed. A nervous laugh.
I wondered if now would be a good time to tell him the news, considering we were having a heart to heart conversation, but I didn’t want ruin the moment. Here he was pouring his soul out to me and I was about to ruin it by telling him he was going to be changing diapers by this time next year.
“Renee, that was the worst time in my entire life,” he said with a grieving tone.
“Mine, too.”
He shifted his weight so that his entire body was facing me. “Was it, though?” he asked. “Because honestly, I don’t ever want to feel like that again, and I need to know…”
“Is that a serious question?” I interrupted. “Of course it was. Those were the worst few weeks of my life. I didn’t even feel like a human anymore. I was… empty.” All this depressing talk was starting to damper my mood, and I still wasn’t sure what he was getting at.
Dylan exhaled loudly. “Good because we’ve come so far and been through a lot and I don’t know where I’d be without you. Whatever happens in my life, with the band and everything else, I just want you to be there. I don’t give a shit what happens as long as you’re there with me.”
I glanced over at the boat in the distance, wondering if I should tell him. Now was the perfect time. I could get him during an emotional moment and then he couldn’t be upset. Right?
Or what if I ruined our entire perfect evening by telling him? Maybe I should wait until tomorrow. Yes, that’s what I’ll do. I’ll wait until tomorrow.
When my gaze finally shifted from the boat back to Dylan, I noticed that he was shaking a little. Unless he had suddenly developed hypothermia, something was definitely wrong.
“Dylan, what’s…” My voice trailed off as I looked down and saw that he was holding a little tiny diamond ring on his pinky. I leapt backward as soon as I saw it, as if it was going to leap off his body and bite me.
My mouth dropped open and I stared at him in shock, speechless. What a dumbass I was! Here I was freaking out about how to break the news to him that I’m pregnant and the damn kid was having his own mini-heart attack about proposing!
A slow smirk crept across his face as he took hold of my left hand. “Listen, I’m not going to do anything cheesy like getting down on my knees because I think ordinary traditions are overrated, but…” He lowered his head and let out another long sigh. “What do you say?”
I burst out laughing at both his proposal approach and the bizarreness of the circumstance. I didn’t even have to think twice. This was it. I had to tell him.
“Under one condition,” I said, pressing my forehead together with his.
He cocked an eyebrow at me. “And what’s that?”
I cupped both hands over my eyes. Now it was my turn to be nervous. “If the baby turns out to be a boy, I’m electing we name him some sort of bad-ass rock and roll name. Like Tyler. Or Buckley.”
I kept my hands cupped over my eyes for what felt like the longest silence in history. Then, I slowly moved my index and middle fingers apart so I could sneak a peek at his reaction.
Dylan was staring at me with a look of utter confusion. “Are you saying…”
I looked at him with a pained, guilty expression and nodded slowly.
Dylan burst out laughing. “Is that why you were acting so weird?” he asked.
I nodded meekly.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
I shrugged. “It just never seemed like the right time. And we’ve never talked about kids before so I wasn’t sure how you felt about it…”
My explanation was quickly interrupted when I felt Dylan’s lips on mine. I took it as a good sign.
“So, Buckley, huh?” he asked, pulling away from me. “You think he deserves that much credit?”
“Well, he did bring us together and all,” I said.
“Oh, is that what brought us together?” His brows crinkled together. “I thought it was that ten minutes of unprotected passion in a cheap Manhattan hotel room.”
“I’d give it six at most.”
He folded both hands over his heart, feigning a hurt expression.
“So… what do you think?” I asked. “Do we have a deal?”
He pretended to consider it for a second, until I almost pushed him over the jetty into the water. Laughing, he leaned over and whispered in my ear, “Deal.”
Sound Bites: A Rock & Roll Love Story Page 17