I brought the Botanic Gardens to you!

[Audel Lesley]

"Why are you sweating?" asked Gregory as Audel paced through the clovers in his lounge room, wiping his forehead as he went.
"Because I'm going to pee my pants otherwise, Greg. I'm going to be secreting somehow," he replied, sighing pathetically as he flopped on the moss-covered couch. The flora his house was covered in was no accident. Together, he and his cousin had gotten Demeter and Atala out for the day with Desislava while they busied about setting up the grand affair. Letter after letter of his son's had encouraged Audel to finally take the plunge, stop being such a plonker and ask the woman of his dreams and mother of his child to be his wife. 'I call her Maman anyway, Papa!' Damide had rolled his eyes at him over the holidays. 'She's been Maman since I was five, and you've been seven years too long at showing her you're committed.' Well, it wasn't exactly encouraging to get relationship advice from his eleven-year-old son, but if the boy was pestering then it was clearly time to get a move-on.

It was Greg's idea, seeing as Audel's talent at cooking wasn't going to be a great deal of help in setting up the perfect proposal. He could make her an extra-greasy cheeseburger, but he'd feel bad about himself afterwards. His cousin had suggested the indoor garden and he'd jumped at the idea, but they'd only a few hours to set it up. By the time the two men were finished, they'd covered every available surface with daisies, moss, clovers, begonias, carnations, gerberas, ferns, climbing roses falling from the ceiling and every kind of honey-scented flower there was. Lazy pollen-particles floated through the air in the dappled sunlight. Everything was actively growing, thanks to the exquisite spellwork of his best friend, and Audel was currently freaking out in a romantic greenhouse without the glass.

"Will you stop worrying?" chuckled Greg kindly, plopping down next to the taller man and throwing an arm about his shoulder. "She'd be mad to say no, but if she does then at least you have the prettiest living room in Obsidian." Audel wailed quietly, but it became a little louder when he heard the front door open. "Stand up, love," Greg encouraged. "I'll hide in the office."​

 

[Demeter Lesley]

Atala scrunched up her face in that way two year olds do when Demeter glared at her. She was beginning to understand Audel's frustration with her own sweet tooth as it had seemingly passed to their daughter. She looked across the table at her sister and shrugged. "No, I've not told him yet, I don't know what he'd do! He flipped out when I told him about Atala before and he basically feinted on the bathroom floor. I've been thinking of ways to bring it up, you know, subtly." Desislava shook her head at Demeter, they both knew that there was no such thing as subtle when bringing up this kind of thing. "I wouldn't be surprised if he suspects to be honest." Demeter laughed slightly, smacking Atala's hand away again as she made a grab for the lollies on the table. Slava raised her eyebrow. Demeter shrugged. "You know that thing guys do when they want to say something but don't quite know how and so they avoid the topic completely?" Slava looked at her like she was mental. "Oh, you know what I mean!" She sighed and pushed the lollies into her bag. "Atala, no! Get Daddy to make you something when we get home, you're so spoilt." Atala basically refused to eat anything that wasn't cooked by Audel, with the exception of lollies of course. Demeter dearly hoped it was a phase, she was spending a fortune on groceries.

As they headed back to the house, Atala walked between the sisters, demanding to be pulled along so that she could jump between them. It was something Demeter had seen couples do with their kids before and it was cute so Demeter allowed it. She'd only just turned two though, so Deme was careful to ensure that she didn't hurt herself. As they walked into the house, Demeter looked around, shocked. "Oh no! Did Desideritus get into the puffapods again?!" She immediately walked around the room making sure nothing was damaged, before stopping in her tracks and looking at Audel. "No wait, that's not right, we don't have puffapods..." She looked at Atala who was currently attempting to see if her father was up for cooking her a meal. "I'm... I don't know what's happening right now." She looked over at Desislava who seemed to be stuck in the doorway, halfway between "there is something wrong with this family" and "do I need to clean all of this up". Demeter finally looked back to Audel, picking up Atala as she walked towards him. "Uh, did you use a reverse cleaning spell?" It was all very lovely, of course and the flowers were amazing, but she couldn't really think of a reason why they were here. Unless he knew and this was his way of celebrating? "I'm sorry, I should have told you sooner, I was just worried that you wouldn't take it well, I mean not that I think you'd take it badly or anything."
​

 

[Audel Lesley]

Audel actually had to dab sweat off of his brow before Demeter walked in, but his nervous look gave way to confusion soon enough.
"Puffapods?" repeated the chef blankly before he went a little pink. "No no, not at all dear, you see- wait, take what badly?" This was all getting a little confusing, and it was about to get more so as a great white lion took Audel's voice as the trigger to enter and trotted in, a great blue bow around its neck and a ringbox attached neatly to the end. Greg As Lion sat proudly next to the baffled couple without a care in the world, and Audel knew it was up to him to fix this.

"U-Um," he began, wringing his large hands a little as he looked down at his perfect, enchanting girlfriend and their precious daughter who was gaping at the living room.
"Slouwers!" gabbled the toddler.
"What? Oh, flowers, dearest," he corrected Atala gently, tickling under her chin. Greg As Lion looked expectantly between the couple. Audel gulped.
"Deme, I wanted to- I mean- ..." He was nudged by a fat, white paw. Oh, he couldn't talk anymore, anyway. The chef reached out and fumbled with the ring box instead, hoping to open it and give Demeter the gist since talking wasn't helping to clear things up. Fingers trembling slightly, he looked into the clear blue eyes of his love and suddenly found the courage to sink to one knee.
"This was all for you. To show you how you make me feel, and to ask you ... To ... to be my wife. I'm only sorry it's taken so long. You deserve all this and more, and you always have."​

 

[Demeter Lesley]

Demeter looked between Greg the lion and Audel as the ring box around the feline's neck caught her eye. She blinked at it, but didn't want to get her hopes up. After all, they'd been together for so long that she had begun to thought that they would never get married. She looked back at Audel and breathed slightly as she thought about how to tell him her news. She opened her mouth to speak when she was interrupted by Atala who seemed to pick now as a good time to speak up. Demeter laughed slightly and shook her head, leaning down to pick up a handful of flowers and stuffing them in the space between her and Atala. Audel looked so nervous and she eased is nerves, at least she hoped it did, by smiling at him.

Audel faltered again and Demeter tightened her mouth to keep from laughing. This was all really lovely and she didn't want to spoil it. Finally Audel got down on one knee and Demeter allowed her face to break into a smile as Audel spoke the words she'd wanted to hear from the first day she fell in love with him. She was crying, she told herself she wouldn't cry. She covered her face with her free hand and sniffed. "Oh Sugar! I told myself I wouldn't cry!" Atala was happily laughing to herself and tossing the flowers around as Demeter held her face in the shoulder of her toddler. "In case that wasn't clear, yes." She mumbled into the shoulder.
​

 

[Audel Lesley]

Audel was so relieved and astonished to hear a yes that he was silent for a good five seconds before Gregory broke it by thumping his puffy tail excitably on the floor. Oh for ... The chef flapped a hand at his animagus cousin for silence and broken out into the biggest smile that had ever appeared on his face. He had to get up in order to embrace his fiancee (fiancee!) but his knees nearly gave out in relief. Audel stumbled to his feet and swept his future wife and his daughter into his arms, peppering her cheeks and neck with kisses while Atala laughed and tried to grab his moving head.
"Thank you, Demeter. Thank you," said Audel breathlessly. "You built me again from the ground up, and to say that you'll marry me is a gift that I want to spend the rest of my life repaying."

With that, he took her left hand and placed the engagement ring gently upon it where it shone beautifully, a tribute to his method of proposal and gracing her hand for as long as she lived (or until it got swallowed by a toddler). Greg made Audel jump again by shifting out of his lion form and offering his arms for his niece.
"Shall I take her?" asked the Yorkshireman. "Give you some privacy?" Audel looked to Deme first before nodding for Greg to take her to do some colouring, and he guided his future wife onto the moss-covered sofa to stroke her hands and smile at her. "So, Peachblossom, I thought I heard something about 'telling me sooner'. What's that all about, then?"​

 

[Demeter Lesley]

Demeter was engaged, finally. She was extremely happy and she looked over to her sister who was just as happy as she was and smiled widely at her. She'd never really approved of Demeter not being married, but fully supported her anyway, now her concerns were elliiated somewhat. Demeter was thankful to have Atala and Audel in her life and now soon she would be introducing another to their little family. She really hoped that this would go better than it had before, as Audel had not taken the news as well as she had thought he would, still, at least this time they would be more prepared, having already had Atala. She looked as her sister followed Greg out of the room to give them some space, but she suspected that Slava would stay in earshot wanting to hear how this next conversation went. She really was a terrible gossip, or perhaps that was wishful thinking on Deme's part.

Demeter got comfortable on the couch and smiled back at her fiancée as he held her hands. Now or never. "Well, a few weeks ago I was feeling sick and so I went and saw a healer. I didn't expect it, but I'm happy. We're having another baby!" She said excitedly, hoping that Audel would be happy too. They were well on their way to being a proper family and this was going to be another amazing time for them, if it went well.
​

 

[Audel Lesley]

His future wife (wife!) was making him nervous with her excitement. Occasionally her excitement meant nice things like a new outfit for the baby, or a bubble bath she'd drawn for them both, but mostly it meant she'd bought takeout or had smuggled a new candy stash into the house that he needed to hunt down. Last time she'd warded the stash, and it had taken him two days to find it and confiscate it while she swanned around with lollipops in both her and Atala's mouths. Audel was waiting with polite trepidation for her announcement which, when it came, actually made him sigh with relief.
"Oh, a baby. That's it? Ha ha ha, I thought you were going to say that you- ... you'd ... Wait, what?"
Thump.
Gregory and Desislava came back into the room at the sound of Audel's body hitting the floor. Somehow he'd managed to miss his wife when fainting (thankfully) and the sofa (unfortunately), and had fallen hard enough despite the carpet of clovers to give himself a goose egg.
"You told him, didn't you?" asked Greg in amusement, kneeling down to help get Audel upright. His lion's nose had known for some time, but it was more fun to wait until they'd both figured it out. They probably should have expected this, considering Audel's reaction to the announcement of Atala. The three remaining conscious adults spent the rest of the day fanning and reassuring a panicking chef while the baby crawled through the flowers, oblivious to all but the botanic wonderland.​

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~ FINIS ~​