Redlyn One Shots

Proposal

Big Red took a deep breath, looking in Ashlyn's eyes. He kneeled on one knee, taking a small box out of his pocket. "Ashlyn, I love you more than you could possibly imagine, and the past 4 years have been the happiest of my life. Will you marry me?"

"I—" Ashlyn was left speechless. About 10 seconds passed.

"A- Ash?" He stuttered.

"I... I..."

"Oh." His heart sunk. Deep. He couldn't explain how awful it felt. "I get it."

"Uh, I— yeah... um... I should get back to the apartment now, um... I'll see you... later?"

"Sometime, yeah." He whispered. She started in the direction of their shared apartment. He took a deep, shaky breath. He took out his phone and called Ricky. "She... she said no, and I don't know what to do, we literally live together, but I don't think I can face her right now."

"Hey, yeah, I get it. Come on over."

"Thank— thank you." He nodded and hung up. He found his car in the parking lot they had parked in for their date and drove for awhile to Ricky's apartment. The moment Ricky opened the door for him he broke down.

"Come on in..." Ricky hugged him, leading him over to the couch.

"I thought she loved me." He sobbed. "We wanted to be together forever."

"She does love you..."

"But not enough to marry me." He cried, tightening his hug.

"Maybe something else is going on. Maybe she's not ready yet."

"But Ash's the best at communicating, she would have told me."

"You should talk to her before jumping to conclusions. You can't avoid her forever, you share an apartment." He pointed out.

"I know you're right, but no offense, I need you to go back to being stupid about love for a little while so I can just cry."

"Yeah... that's fair enough." Ricky shifted, still firmly holding his best friend, who continued to sob.

"It was 4 years of h- happily loving Ashlyn, and now... now that's all g- gone. And there's n- no way I'll get... get over her."

"Give everything some time, I promise, things will get better."

"But Ashlyn's... she... she's so amazing... and she's been my rock for years... and I just don't wanna loose her." He sniffled.

"I know." Ricky nodded. "Calm down, then we'll talk."

It was safe to say that as far as calming down goes, Big Red miserably failed. He didn't stop sobbing for 20 minutes, which led to 15 minutes of crying, leading to a good amount of time pretending he was okay while tears occasionally fell down his face as the pair watched a movie to try and cheer him up.

He knew the truth, though, nothing could cheer him up now.

Big Red slept on Ricky's couch that night, not ready to go home and face either Ashlyn ignoring him and humiliating him or her pity. He wasn't ready to talk to her. He was barely ready to talk to anyone.

The next day was a bore, mostly full of Big Red grieving while trying to get everyday things such as work done. The night changed when he found out Ricky had left town for work, and he had no choice but to go to his own apartment.

He knocked on the apartment door instead of using the key in case she needed privacy. "Um, hey, it's me."

"Come on in." He distantly heard the mumble from Ashlyn. He unlocked the door and walked inside.

"Oh... hey..." he looked at Ashlyn, who was lying in bed with red and puffy eyes. There was a wall of pillows where Big Red would usually sleep.

"Hey." She sniffled, sitting up. "What are you doing here?"

"Um..."

"Actually, never mind, the question is where were you last night?"

"I was at Ricky's, because apparently unlike you, I can't just forget last night and expect everything to be normal." He told her.

"You think I'm happy?"

"You're the one who said no."

"The second I walked away last night I started crying, I just didn't let you see. Last night I almost slept on the couch because sleeping in bed without you next to me felt weird. Which ultimately I did, only with a ton of pillows taking up your space. It took me hours to fall asleep, and I can't stop crying!" She whined, shoving her face in her pillow.

"This doesn't make any sense. Why would you say no if you want to be with me?"

"Because I'm not quite ready to be married, Big Red, I'm 21. You're 22. And as much as I love you, I don't think it's quite time yet."

"And you couldn't have said any of this when I proposed?" He asked.

"What did you expect me to say? Go into a long winded speech while we were both in shock? I know how you'd read that, as a break up."

"Well, I was fairly certain saying no to a proposal was a break up too."

"Look... I gave you my reasoning. Now our relationship is in your hands, okay?" She sighed. "I love you, I knew this was all so close to being a break up, so I cried and cried. I'd really appreciate telling me now if I can be happy or cry more. But I do get it if you need to think."

"Um... I mean... I guess I should think but I'll tell you right now we're probably staying together if you want, because I only wanted to marry you to be with you longer. I don't think I really need to be married to... just anyone for the sake of being married."

"O- Okay." She knew it was good news, but couldn't help feeling nervous.

"I'm gonna take a walk. I'll see you in a little Ash."

"Hey, um, real quick?" She looked at him.

"Yeah?"

"Can I just have a kiss real quick? I don't know if it's like... a last kiss or something... but I just want one in case and to cheer me up a little." She asked shyly.

"Ashlyn Moon, I love you." He pulled her into a kiss.

"Thank you. You can go now." She smiled slightly.

"Bye." He gave her a small smile as he left.

He walked around town, loosing himself in thoughts. He turned to walk back to their apartment about 30 minutes into the walk, not wanting Ashlyn to wait any longer. He had ignored her for a day straight already, which he knew was to blame both of them for, but he still had.

"Hey Ash." He sat next to Ashlyn, who put her phone down and turned to him as she began playing with her hands. "Don't be nervous." He kissed her forehead. "So the proposal was something I think I was ready for, and it's perfectly valid you weren't. I know time's sorta the downfall of a lot of relationships, especially things like when to get married or have kids or whatever. Then people have really drastically different opinions on when they should do that, so time's just a big problem. But... I mean, I've never really cared when that happens, as long as I'm in love and they want to. And I'm really, really, really in love."

"I love you." Ashlyn lunged forward to hug him. "Oh thank you for understanding."

"Of course baby." He hugged her back, rubbing her back.

"And I promise that if we're together in awhile, I do wanna get married. And I really wanna be together."

"Great." He smiled.

"Can we go back to normal or does this change much?"

"I think pretty normal."

"Good." She hugged him tighter.