Ansel, kneeling on one knee, was the exact image of the proposal I had dreamed of countless times.
But the person standing in front of him wasn't me.
"Elara, will you marry me?"
Elara covered her mouth with one hand, trembling as she took the roses with the other.
A dazzling ring was slipped onto her finger. Not a Valente heirloom. Something new. Something bought with my father's treasury.
The two embraced tightly, kissing passionately. Their intimate whispers carried to my ears by the wind.
I found myself unconsciously rubbing the matching ring Ansel had sent me from across the sea.
I never told him the ring was too big.
To keep it from slipping off, I had wrapped half a loop of red thread around it to make it fit.
Perhaps after all this time, when I tugged at the thread, it came undone.
The ring, freed from the thread that once held it in place, slipped off my finger in an instant and rolled into a distant drain.
Just like Ansel, who, after two years abroad, was no longer tied down by me.
An ill-fitting ring doesn't need to be retrieved, just as a man who didn't love me didn't need to be held onto.
"Ansel, I hope your union goes as planned."
"Why? The only one I want to marry is you!"