"You're finally here, I have been waiting for hours."

I felt my heart skip around my chest for several long seconds before it finally settled down as I stared wide eyed at Ademide, who was dressed in a black denim jeans and red flannel shirt, completing the attire with black vans, looking absolutely amazing.

  He stepped towards me, running his hand across his head nervously as he watched me with keen eyes. What the hell was I expecting? It had to be Ademide.

  I felt my heart swell with love as I watched this guy who happened to have taken every vacant place in my heart and made it his, a smile spreading across my face. Thinking about it, I had been so scared that he didn't want to see me again since he didn't call, and I had also being too scared to call him, but this.

  "So you planned this," I said, my smile still permanently perched on my lips.

   "Yeah." Ademide scratched his head, then awarded me a boyish smile. "You left yesterday, and I thought maybe I'd give you some space in case you needed it, but your friends called me last night and..."

   "They called you?" I asked, shock evident in my voice.

  "Yeah." He shrugged. "They told me to come get my property, you."

  "What?" I laughed. "Those girls."

  "And I thought I'd use that opportunity to do this, so I asked that they bring you here." Ademide spread his arms wide, making emphasis on the here.

    "Speaking of here, what are we doing here? What's this place?" I asked, looking around my surroundings once again.

  "Do you like the area?" I heard him ask, calling back my attention to him.

  I turned back to look at him to see that look of nervousness back on his face. "It's nice."

  He coughed, then dipped his hand into his pocket and brought out a small black jewelry box, and stretched it towards me. "I wanted to give you this."

  Right at that moment, my heart started hammering so much in my chest that I could almost hear the sound. I collected the box with shaky hands, wondering if what I was thinking about was what was about to happen. Could he be proposing to me? Now?

  He wasn't getting on his knees, though. But it's not every guy that gets on their knees to propose too, some guys prefer to use the method Ademide was using now. Is this it?

  Oh Lord!

  I calmed myself down, then slowly opened the box. My eyes instinctively closed at that point and started opening little by little until I came face to face with a...

  A key!

  Actually, there are a bunch of keys.

  I looked up at Ademide with questions in my eyes, trying my best to make sure the disappointment I felt didn't show on my face. Really though, a proposal would be moving too fast, right?

  "What are these?"

  He smiled. "The keys to our house."

  "What?"

  "Here." He pointed at the gate we were standing in front of. "It's for us, our house. Those are the keys."

   "Oh my God!" I exclaimed, laughter bursting through my mouth.

  So this was the reason he had put the other house on sale, because there was another house. Oh, Mary!

  Ademide would never actually do something without it being important to you both.

  "I should have known, you came back after your rendezvous with her just to have your fun with me and then you plan to go away, isn't that the reason you put this house up for sale?"

  I heard my own voice replaying in my head as pain swept through me swiftly, then I dismissed it. Everything is gonna be fine, we are gonna work things out, and I'm not going to be that awful person anymore.

  "I'm kind of unofficially proposing to you with this house." I heard him say, making me raise my head up to look at his face. That nervous look was back, so this was the reason. "If you accept the key, that would mean you are accepting to be my wife."

  I bit my bottom lip and blinked back the tears that were pulling up at the corner of my eyes as a smile worked its way to my face. I brought out the keys from the box and closed my palm over it tightly. "I accept your key, your love, and your proposal, and I definitely would be your wife."

  Ademide broke into a beautiful grin as the nervousness vanished from his face. He pulled me by the waist and hugged me close to his chest, mumbling thanks over my head.

  I wrapped my arms around him, wondering what I ever did to deserve a person like him, I must have saved a country in my past life. I raised my head to stare at that beautiful face of his, then pulled him down before placing a quick kiss on his lips.

   "Let's go in," I said giddily.

  He raised a brow, then motioned for me to go ahead with his hand. "The keys are with you."

  I moved out of his embrace and turned back to look at the big gate, drinking in the features now. I walked over to it, inserted the key into the lock, and pulled the small gate open. With a quick glance at my back towards Ademide, I stepped into the compound of my home.

  The first thing that caught my eyes after walking further into the compound and away from the security's house was the beautiful lawn on my right side, it looked so green and the white fountain that stood in the middle gave it a stark contrast that only added to the beauty.

  I took in the house itself. It was painted white and gold, shaped in the form of a castle, but not as gigantic as the other one he had sold. For every reason, this had a more soothing feeling. It looked just like my dream house, the house I always wanted to build for myself. My smile grew wider as I looked at the other side to see a basketball court, really!

   "I plan to make sure our kids know how to play basketball." I heard Ademide say behind me. I turned back to face him immediately.

   "Hmmm, already deciding what they would do." I folded my arms.

  He chuckled. "Actually, a basketball court was the easiest to fit into the house plan. A football stadium wouldn't really be easy to..."

  "The hell!" I laughed. "Football... You're funny."

  "Basketball is better than no sport. There's a pool though," he said, then winked. "And there's a garden right at the back just for you, in the case you want to escape the chaos and find a quiet place to write. Wanna go check it out?"

   "Did you draw the blueprint of the house?" I asked, my hands going around his waist. I had the strangest feeling he did because he had put in everything I ever said I wanted my house to have. Just how much of my ranting did this guy commit to memory.

  "Huh, yeah, I did," he said. "I drew the blueprint, but everything was your idea. I even input the underground parking you spoke about. Do you remember?"

  "Yeah, I do." I nodded, finding it hard to believe. "I can't believe you actually remember all that or that you even listen to it."

   "Everything you say means a lot to me, Mary. Even when you sleep talk, I listen." He smiled, then glanced towards the gate. "Lemme go bring the car in before it gets stolen."

   "Okay." I watched him go out the gate, my mind going back to all the awful things I have said to him and wishing I could take it all back, but things don't happen that way.

  I decided I'd go check out the garden and stop standing around uselessly. I walked slowly, taking in the beauty of the house, which happened to be my home. It was everything I thought it would be, maybe even more, and I felt right at home in the place.

Just how much work did Ademide put into building this place? And just how much did it cost him?

Getting to the garden, it was nothing short of what I expected. The place was heavenly. It had the most beautiful flowers and the best scenery. I chuckled to myself when I saw the cabin that was at the far end of the garden, right beside a tree. I knew what the place was for instantly, my writing corner.

  This guy really does listen to every rubbish I say.

I walked towards the cabin and tried to open it, only to find out that it was locked. I looked at the keys in my find and tried to figure out the one that belonged to it. I gave up on doing that and soon started fitting in all the keys until I finally found the one that opened it.

  Once opened, I was welcomed into the most cozy, warm, and beautiful place I have seen in a long time. I ran towards the fireplace immediately. I sighted it.

  "Oh my God! A fireplace!" I squealed, my heart flying around in my chest as I knelt before it.

  I always spoke about wanting a fireplace, but it was the first time I would be seeing one, although it wasn't lit, but it still made me feel giddy.

  "I knew you'd like that?" I heard Ademide's voice say from the door. I looked up at him to see him close the door and walk towards me.

  "It's beautiful, you didn't tell me you built a cabin."

"That was supposed to be a surprise." He chuckled, sitting right beside me. He pulled me onto my butt and closer to him. "I'm glad you love it."

  "I do, I love everything." I looked up at him, peering into his eyes like a love struck puppy. "And I love you."

  He cupped my left cheek with his hand and started drawing circles with his thumb. "I know you do."

   I felt tears pull at my eyes again as I took in the depth of understanding and love I could see on his face. "I-I am sorry...I sh..."

   "Hey," he shushed me, putting a finger in my lips. "It's fine, okay? I understand. Ever..."

  "No, you can't just keep on understanding everything," I said, taking his finger off my lips. "I was wrong, I should apologize. I should have trusted you more, scratching that, I should have trusted you. I shouldn't have treated like you were a reincarnation of all my bad memories. You did nothing wrong to me but love me. And it seems like all I have ever done was hurt you, but you keep putting it aside, and I..."

   "Shh." Ademide placed his finger on my lips once again, shutting me off. I tried to take his finger off, but he persisted. "I'm serious. I know you're sorry, I can see the guilt eating you up and I really don't like it. Nothing that happened is entirely your fault, we both did to ourselves okay, and the good thing is that we're over that, and ready to work things out, and I know whatever misconception you had about me is no longer there, I can see it. I love you, okay, and you love me, that's all that matters."

  He pulled me closer and wiped clean the tears that were underneath my eyes, then placed a kiss on my forehead.

  "Promise me one thing," I said.

  "I'll promise you the world." He grinned.

  "I'm serious," I said in a stern voice, which had him going all serious. "Promise me that you'll let me know if anything ever happens to you. I want to know if you ever get hurt, or... I won't be able to bear it if anything happens to you again without my knowledge. You don't know how horrible I felt finding out that you were in an accident, and I wasn't there for you. So promise me."

  "I promise." He smiled. "I'll let you know even if it's just a needle that pricks my finger, okay."

  I let out a breath of relief, then cuddled myself closer to him.

   "Speaking of getting hurt, I've been in pain for quite a while now. It feels like I'm going to die."

  I sat up immediately. I heard him say this, a terrified shiver going through me. "What's wrong? Is it your head? Where does it hurt?"

  "Right here," Ademide said as he held my hand and placed it directly on his crotch. I jumped out of my skin as I felt hot shivers fill my body up instantly.

  He chuckled, taking in my reaction. "It hurts, though."

  I tried to calm myself down and then looked at him. "You can't die from having blue balls."

  His eyes went wide with disapproval. "Says who? Research proves that a number of men..."

  I pulled him down and jammed my lips against his, shutting off his rants and shutting down every single thinking cell in my brain as I felt my whole body light up with awareness. The moment I felt him open his mouth up for me, I realized then just how much I missed doing this. I missed being able to lose myself in his arms, I missed being able to forget everything that ever exists with my mind only on what we could feel and what we were doing.

   Ademide raised me up, sitting me on his laps. I moaned against his lips as I felt his arousal pressing right into my core. I resisted the urge to rock my hips against him and pulled out of the kiss.

  I tried to keep all my senses calm as I stared at him through hooded eyes. "Let me make love to you."

  "What?" Ademide asked, sounding more shocked than I anticipated.

  "I said I want to make love to you, Ademide."

Yeah!

Two chapters to go.

What do you guys think about Ademide's way of proposing?

It's not the usual get down on one knees, and there's no ring, but it's something.

  I'm still patiently waiting for someone to come and propose to me with house too oo, and definitely a ring. If you're in this geng, gather here, let's sit and wait for our man😂😂😂.

  Thanks for reading, guys.

Love you all.

MARY ADEN.