I take his hands from my hips. Give them a squeeze. Take a big breath. I say, “Esau,” and I look into his eyes. His sparkling, sincere, soulful eyes. I see his passion; I see his fear; I see his hope. I see myself reflected in two blue pools, and I teeter. Before I can say anything, before I can look away, I’ve fallen in, and the ripples obscure his flinty edges.
“So what?” he says, softly now. “Will you marry me?”
I swallow. Hard. Then again. “Esau,” I say again.
“Yeah, babe?”
“Esau, you’re eighteen years old.”
“Not according to the Montana driver’s license in my pocket, I’m not.”
I try not to laugh. Then reaffix my serious face. I raise an eyebrow.
He sighs. “And I’ll be nineteen in September,” he says. “And then I’ll be twenty. So what?”
“So what about your future?”
“What about
