Who: Tomas Booth and Avis Tremaine
What: New Year's countdown!
Where: Her flat because...it is >>
When: Tomorrow night but it's TECHNICALLY TODAY, SO (January 1st 1979)
She'd better say yes.
Not only because all the guys had told him that she wouldn't (even though that was a big reason behind it, now), but because Tomas wasn't exactly sure what he'd do if she didn't. Put the ring back in his pocket, he supposed, and send it back to the jeweler. It would help the rather large dent he put into his bank account, but that didn't seem as important as getting Avis to agree to marry him. Was that how you said it? Agree to marry. Accept his proposal, that sounded better. Tomas Booth wanted Avis Tremaine to accept his proposal of marrying, on the unselfish reasoning that he wanted to spend the rest of his life with her.
He wasn't sure how he could get any more unselfish than that, so Tomas quite sure this was all in the bag. Unless he couldn't get the nerve to actually ask her, but the night was still young---well, he only had ten minutes until midnight, and he hadn't decided if he wanted to do this in 1978 or 1979. End the year with a bang, or start it off with one? No ruddy clue, but he'd better get a move on it.
Without thinking (because really, when did he ever on such short notice), Tomas dropped the ring into Avis' champagne glass and crossed from the kitchen to the living room, and in his excitement, handed her the wrong glass. He hadn't noticed until he took his first sip and nearly choked on the sight of the ring at the bottom, and clasped both hands around the glass before she could spot his mistake.
"What's your resolution?" he nearly squeaked.
Avis looked to Booth archly the moment that he squawked out his question. "Well," she mused with a shake of her head, "maybe it should be to teach you how to drink champagne without killing yourself." She didn't exactly have a resolution just yet - probably something to do with improving her spells or something silly like that. After a moment of leaning forward to examine him suspiciously, she settled back against the couch again and murmured evenly, "Your champagne's going to get warm like that awfully fast, you know." She pointed a finger at his glass and took a sip of her own.
Spending New Years with someone who wasn't her cousin was new, but she didn't necessarily mind it - then again, that might've had a lot to do with just how fond she was of Booth. Even when he was acting like an idiot (which was an alarming percentage of the time, really), she found that she preferred his company to being alone. That had to mean something, right?
"And yours?" She hoped it didn't have anything to do with expanding his musculature or something.
Tomas stared at her a bit blankly at her champagne-drinking suggestion, and looked into his glass pitifully before taking another slow, careful sip. The ring clinked at the bottom and Tomas winced, knowing he was done for, but threw one arm into the air in a grand gesture to relay his New Year's resolution.
"My resolution is to not lose any paperwork this year," he said, hoping to actually keep this one because Moody was about ready to kill him for this lack of reports. It wasn't his fault that he didn't have some sort of organizing system. Well, it was, but Moody should know that by now, being the guy in command or what not. See, these were the reasons why Tomas kept denying the promotions; he had enough to deal with just being an auror, he didn't need any fancy title to clog his life up even more.
"And," he decided to add, as the thought of things taking up his life came into mind (not in a bad way, because marriage was definitely good, no matter what the guys joked about). His eyes turned to the clock, this could go into either year, he was certain now (it had been leaning toward '79, but right now...) "And I want us to be...more...us. More about us, Avis."
He took another drink, a bit longer than before because if he finished his champagne not only would he have the ring, he'd have a slight buzz that would make this so much easier to do.
"That is never going to work," she remarked with a shake of her head as she prepared to peer into his glass to see what in Merlin's name had made that noise (had he broken the bottle and some of the glass had gotten wedged into the bottom of his? She hoped not - she hadn't checked hers) when he flailed his arm up into the air. Honestly, Avis was surprised that he hadn't hit her in the face by accident.
It didn't occur to her until a few seconds later that she hadn't actually said anything about them being more 'us' ... and she certainly didn't want him to think that she'd meant they couldn't work, so she added after a moment (probably an agonizingly long one), "You always lose your paperwork." She arched her brow when he downed the rest of his champagne and then smirked faintly, leaning in to kiss the corner of his mouth.
"And I'm not quite sure how we could be more us ... we're a fixed quantity as people, you know. Impossible to create or destroy matter."
Tomas stared at Avis oddly, again, and grinned a bit stupidly after the little kiss. "You're a right romantic, aren't you?"
His smile was a teasing one, though, and finally he finished the champagne and, making sure the bottom of the glass was still out of view, tipped it over into his hand, clasping his hand around the ring and pulling out his shirt to dry it on.
"I've never been in love with a nerd before," he started, taking much longer to dry the ring than necessary, but he was nervous, damn it, he was allowed to be over zealous with his ring drying, "I don't think I've actually been in love before, to be honest, but you...well, you did something, I'm not exactly sure what, Avis---that's the God honest truth, I've got no fucking idea what exactly's changed with me, but all I know is that you did it, and I really like it, actually, I love it, as I've said, and I know I'm rambling like an idiot because, fuck, I am a bit of an idiot when it comes to everything but knocking the shit out of death eaters, but---"
In the middle of his ramble he'd somehow managed to slip to the floor and drop to one knee, and now he held out the ring, somehow managing to hold it with both hands, almost wincing at the idea of a negative response from Avis.
"Marry me? Will you marry me, I mean?"
Avis returned the odd stare with a blink, listening to him while he spoke. Honestly, she'd been fully prepared to shoot something about about having never been in love with a loud-mouthed braggart before, but then Tomas had continued to talk and despite the fact that he was making very little sense, Avis managed to get the gist of what he was going for, she thought.
Well, the fact he was down on one knee and holding up a ring helped to clear up any confusion she might've had. She was quite confused as to exactly how they'd come into this situation so quickly, but she found that despite the fact that she felt mildly light-headed it wasn't the unpleasant sort of lightheaded. "Well..."
She tapped a finger against her chin thoughtfully, as if she were putting a great deal of thought and deliberation into this decision (as if she wasn't trying not to squeal like some sort of adolescent girl).
"I suppose." Because hell if she was going to fall to her knees and shout 'yes' over and over again.
That was for later.
He had been grinning because, well, he was bloody proposing to the woman he loved and wanted to spend the rest of his life with! That was an exciting and grin-worthy thing, Tomas had thought, and he'd continued grinning, albeit a bit awkwardly after she'd responded. His grin slowly faded, a suspicious expression quickly taking its place, and his shoulders slumped, head tilting in a confused manner.
"What the fuck does 'I suppose' mean?" he blurted before he could stop himself, but honestly. Here he was trying to be all romantic and sure he messed it up a little, but Avis had to go and be confusing and I suppose. Oy, if that meant yes, 'I suppose' was going to be the answer to every question she ever asked him for the rest of his life, damn it. "You suppose you could because you're bored or you suppose that you actually want to and it's your weird way of saying yes, because if it's that then fine."
How they had managed to turn their engagement (or, well, pending engagement, he hadn't put the ring on her finger yet--actually he'd pulled it back as if he was keeping the prize from her before she answered correctly) into a fight was beyond him, but Tomas supposed, that's how they usually worked.
"Did you honestly just turn an engagement proposal into a fight?" Avis had to stifle the urge to whack him on the back of the head or something ridiculous like that because ... honestly, she supposed she should have just said yes and spared his simple mind the difficulty of trying to process her words. She rolled her eyes and then slid her arms around his shoulders to kiss him a little more firmly, giving the fine hairs at the back of his neck a light tug.
"I shouldn't even answer that question, because I'm fairly certain that if you were sure enough to propose to me, then you assumed I was going to say yes." She shook her head and then let out a soft laugh into his shoulder. "So ... yes, Tomas Booth. I will marry you fully of my own will and not because I am bored. Are we 100% clear about that, or should I send you a memo?"
She paused. "Which you would probably lose. I could have them make an announcement at the office..."
He had been ready to argue the fact that she was the one that had to make things difficult in the first place, but when Avis kissed him all thoughts of fighting melted away (not all, to be honest, they were always fighting but it could definitely be pushed away now) and his arm slipped around her and he pulled her close. Fucking hell, he'd managed to do it without mucking everything up...too badly.
"I would definitely lose it," he responded with a solemn nod, grinning once more and taking her left hand to slip the ring on. Ha, he'd done a hell of a job with this, all on his own! His sister would be beyond impressed with him, Tomas was sure, and hopefully Avis was as well, because of course her opinion of the ring mattered the most. That was just common sense. "So. You're the future Mrs. Booth. If you want to change your name, of course. You don't have to, but it sounds rather nice, I think.
"Avis Booth. Hey, look, you move all the way to the top to alphabetical lists with that name, I think that's incentive enough, really..."
Oh, he was actually citing the fact she'd be ahead in the alphabetical lists as a reason to change her name. As independent as she was, Avis was still entirely willing to change her name to Booth - if only because 'Tremaine-Booth' was a hell of a name to give a child and she didn't want her kid to end up having to spell that on every single form they ever filled out. Merlin, now she was thinking about kids? This 'marriage' thing was putting all sorts of odd ideas into her head.
Of course, the moment that Tomas slipped the ring on her finger all thoughts of anything else fled her mind. She grinned, lifting her hand to admire the ring. "It looks lovely," she arched her brow at him. "Did you get the woman at the store to help you pick it out? Model it for you?" She moved in to kiss him again just so that they wouldn't start another argument (and to make it clear that she was joking about someone else picking out the ring).
"And I am going to change my name, Tomas, despite the fact that 'Booth' doesn't actually start off the alphabet."
Tomas took her ring-less right hand as he stood, helping Avis up with a proud expression on his face. Hot damn, she liked it! That was very good, and he'd have more to brag about in the morning because he didn't ask if she liked it, she went and said it all on her own.
"Nope, that's all Booth, babe," he said with a wink, arms quickly wrapping around her waist as the countdown to the New Year began. Merlin, definitely ending the year off with a bang, he should've decided that a while ago. Totally worked far better than starting it off. Next year was going to have a ton of wonderful things to experience, they had to make every last moment of this year count---and, fuck him if that didn't sound like some gift shop card, but it didn't matter.
"I meant that it moved you up--oh, fuck it," he said, kissing Avis soundly instead of starting another argument. Snogging your fiancee senseless was a much better way to start the year than to be arguing your way into it. Though, he supposed that it would definitely not be a surprise, coming from the two of them.
