Chapter 13 – The Second Proposal
Three months later, Daniel proposed again.
No beach.
No photographer.
No sign.
No candles.
They were in their apartment.
It was raining outside.
Sophie was standing in the kitchen eating cereal at almost midnight after a late shift.
Daniel walked in wearing an old sweatshirt.
He placed the ring box beside her bowl.
Sophie looked at it.
Then at him.
“Seriously?”
“Yes.”
“No speech?”
“I learned my lesson.”
She laughed.
Daniel smiled.
Then became nervous again.
“Sophie, will you marry me?”
She looked at him for several seconds.
Then smiled.
“Yes.”
There was no audience.
Nobody interrupted.
Nobody filmed.
And for a while, that seemed like the perfect ending.
But the beach story never completely disappeared.
Months later, Sophie still occasionally received messages from strangers who had found the old clip.
Some told her to leave Daniel because of his temper.
Others told her Claudia deserved worse.
Both kinds made her uncomfortable.
Daniel stopped reading them.
Claudia never apologised.
In the community group, whenever somebody brought up the incident, she repeated the same sentence:
I stood up for myself.
Daniel repeated his own:
She ruined the proposal.
Neither ever changed their version.
Sophie eventually stopped trying to explain hers.
Because the part nobody seemed interested in was also the simplest:
A man had wanted to ask a woman he loved one question.
Another person decided the moment needed to become an argument.
Then everyone became angry enough that nobody could remember where the argument should have ended.
And even after Sophie finally said yes three months later, the first proposal remained on the internet forever – frozen at the exact moment a stranger kicked the words WILL YOU MARRY ME? into the sand.
