"Hello?" Pt. 2

Proper Engaged

Ok, I'm guessing that you've seen my announcement from the original Hello (Hello Pt. 1). I'll now be posting here until the end of the story. Damn Wattpad and their silly maximum number of updates per story!

Basically, this means that the first 6 months of Hello is on Hello Pt. 1 and the last 6 months will be here. Other than splitting the story into two halves, nothing else will change!

The cover was lovingly and beautifully made by @Hipster_Rain so make sure you all thank our talented cover artist! 

Until tomorrow, peeps,

Sarah, xx

~*~*~

"So," Sophie says, not for the first time either. Her eyes were glued on the ring finger of her left hand, staring at the gold and emerald engagement ring I presented her yesterday afternoon. From the way she's been all googly-eyed over the ring, I think she likes it. "Does this mean we're proper engaged now?"

I laugh. "We're we not 'proper' engaged before?" 

Sophie shrugs in response and turns her attention back onto the ring once more. When I got down on one knee, I knew that the answer would be 'yes,' but that didn't mean that I wasn't a nervous wreck at the thought of proposing. It wasn't until I was on my knee, in front of Sophie, that I fully realised just how much she meant to me. 

Whenever I thought of proposing to Arabella in the past, I was cool as a cucumber; indifferent and unemotional about it all, I wouldn't have minded if she had declined my proposal. Sophie, however, was a different matter entirely. From the moment she asked me to marry her, I'd worried about getting everything right. I'd spent weeks trying to find the perfect ring; I'd painstakingly read through hundreds of Google articles about how to create an unforgettable proposal, and I'd even read the etiquette about asking Sophie to marry me. 

Nevertheless, nothing I'd read and researched could have prepared me for popping the question to Sophie. I hadn't found a ring that perfectly suited Sophie. I'd been to all the high-end jewellers in London and nothing they showed me screamed, "That's the ring." Instead, the ring came from an unexpected source- my father. It was the ring Laurence had bought for Evelyn's mother, Annette, but he never got the chance to present it to her. Evelyn had inherited it from Laurence, but neither she nor her mother had wanted to keep it. Annette and Laurence were in the past; there was no reason to keep the ring. Instead, Evelyn gave it to me with the instruction that it was to be Sophie's ring. Seeing the ring, emerald centre stone flanked by two diamonds on a gold band, I couldn't help but smile and think, "That's the one. That's Sophie."

 Once I had the ring, all I had to do was plan the proposal. Everyone I spoke to told me to make sure that it was unforgettable. I'd Googled all manners of proposals but they all seemed too cliché, which Sophie didn't mind, but I did. How many others would have gotten down on one knee at the top of the Eiffel Tower, or in a hot-air balloon or during a flash mob. No, they all seemed generic and contrived and not at all Danphie in style. Nope, but asking Sophie to marry me a mere hour after bailing her out of prison was a unique way to go about it all. It was memorable, but perhaps not for all the right reasons.