"What is happening?!"
I start to hyperventilate as he starts. "Rocket, you had me the moment I set eyes on you. I would be honored if you'd let me fly to the stars with y—"
My lips lock on his while he's still talking, but that's okay. He already knows the answer.
"Yes, times a billion," I reply, smiling wider than ever at his elated face. "As if that were ever in question."
"But you haven't seen the ring yet."
He opens up the box with trembling hands to show me the ring: a luminous opal with purple gems on each side set in a silver band.
"I've been carrying around my nana's ring for you," he says when I compose myself enough to let him slip it on my finger.
The event sponsor in the green and yellow overalls stammers, "Uh, ma'am?" The envelope with a gift certificate. I nearly forgot.
I open it up and my jaw drops. I wave it at Jet. "Babe, it's too bad we don't have a big lawn, because with this we can afford a whole ride-on lawnmower," I say.
The sponsor nods his head, "And I'm throwing in a lifetime annual maintenance to say thank you for your service, sir, if you should purchase from us."
"Well, actually," Jet stammers, pulling a slip of folded paper out of his pocket. "We can go ahead and get that mower if you want."
I unfold the paper and see what he's done. Jet went and bought two acres of land and didn't even warn me.
"Jet!"
"I'm sorry I didn't tell you; I wanted it to be a surprise. It's not much, the land was real cheap. We might have to live in your trailer while I build our house. But we can make the plans together if you want."
My body cannot handle any more surprises today. My knees feel like they might give out, and he notices; Jet has scooped up in his arms before I can injure myself.
We kiss, and it's a long, messy, achingly heart-melting kiss. If the first time Jet ever kissed me, my world cracked open, this time all the pieces came back together.
"Look at you. You won," Jet says. The look in his eyes tells me that he's thinking the same thing I am. And he's right.
I brush my fingers over his cheeks and kiss him on the nose. "Damn right I did."
Winning is more than a tiara and a title, more than just winning a fiancé. I found my inner animal again. I busted my ass, and I did it. I got the crown. I'm the Butter Queen.
Again he kisses me and I kiss back just as hard. Jet is my fierce warrior, and he's got the warrior queen he deserves. And I'm going to be the best damn Butter Queen anybody has ever seen.
Epilogue
Five years later
Jet
My father-in-law saunters over to me and gets right up close to me, uncomfortably close. "I don't know if you know this, but your wife is outside making wusses out of my grandsons."
Rocket's mom and stepdad have insisted on being a part of our lives now that we have kids. Funny how that works. They didn't come to the wedding, didn't care to visit us or get to know me. Part of me thinks they didn't believe our marriage would last.
But now that we have kids, they've moved back to town and today, they're visiting for our oldest son's birthday.
"What are you talking about, Chaz?"
I'm imagining he's perhaps seeing my wife apply nail polish on Jordan's toes, or Pippin's fingernails, or combing some expensive hair products through Rodman's hair. All of which she does on the regular, and I don't give a fuck. My commercial pilot schedule is down to 70 percent now, which is by choice. I can spend more days outside with our boys, tossing footballs, kicking soccer balls, doing all the stuff I like to do. So there's no reason to keep my wife from doing stuff she likes to do with our kids.
I follow Chaz outside through the sliding glass door, and he gestures at the driveway. "Look at this mess."
I see what's happening, and it makes me laugh. My wife is doing her thing. My best friend Henry and all three little boys are trying out baton throwing and twirling, while Rocket's best friend Jane eggs them all on and snaps photos. Jane's six-year-old daughter Sarah is shouting instructions, to no avail.
"Baby, your stepdad thinks you're sissifying our boys," I say, taking a long pull from my beer.
Chaz splutters. "That's not what I said."
I nudge him good-naturedly. "Yeah, you did."
"Listen," Rocket says, turning toward me and shooting me that look. That look that only my wife can give and make it work on me. "I'm teaching our sons how to throw a baton, so when they get to high school, they're gonna be the best damn color guard that school has ever seen. If they want."
I laugh and have to hand Chaz my beer, sidling up to my wife, grabbing her around the waist, and planting a deep, back-bending kiss on her mouth.
"They're gonna be the best damn whatever-they-want-to-be, because their momma is the best," I say.
The little menaces have devolved their baton practice into hacking at each other with the batons like swords. "Mom, can we be done now?" Jordan asks.
Then he and the other two boys begin their gross-out noises because I'm not done tongue-kissing their mother.
When I'm finished with the kiss, I'm ready to amp up the energy with her in a bad way. I thank my lucky stars that the boys ask to go somewhere with their grandpa and grandma. "Well," Rocket says, "we already opened presents and cut the cake. What do you want to do with the rest of the day, birthday boy?"
"I want to go take my new drone and go to the park," he says.
"That's more like it, let's go," Chaz says.
I'll say this for him. He might be old-fashioned about forcing boys to act
