Gym Junkie

It’s been a hard twelve months.

Brock has had major trust issues with me, and has been waiting for the other shoe to drop. It took him five months for him to be able to tell me that he loved me again after I broke his heart when I left him.

Stubborn man.

I moved in after a month at my insistence. Even though I knew he loved me, he just couldn’t say it out loud for some reason.

I hurt him a lot more than I realised.

Brock is lying on his back on his deckchair. His eyes are closed, and he’s wearing a black pair of board shorts.

I smile as I watch him. He’s tanned now, his big body rippled with those muscles I love so much. How I ever got a man this delicious, I’ll never know.

“I was thinking, Pock,” he mutters with his eyes closed.

I smirk. “Did it hurt?”

He smiles up at the sun. “A bit.”

I reach out and take his hand in mine, but he pulls his away. “I’m not lying here holding hands like a schoolboy.” He frowns.

Such a Brock thing to say. “What were you thinking?” I sigh happily.

“I was thinking we should maybe get married.”

My eyes snap open. “What?” I lean up to rest on my elbow and face him. “What did you just say?”

He opens his eyes just a little bit, and he smirks over at me. “I was wondering if you wanted to be Queen Pussy Porridge instead of just a Princess.”

My mouth falls open in shock. “Brock Marx! Are you… proposing?”

He gives me a breathtaking smile, full of hope and love and so much promise. “I was simply offering you a promotion.”

I giggle. “You really need to work on your romantic material. That proposal was appalling.”

He smiles and reaches over to take my hand in his. He kisses the back of it.

“But then you wouldn’t like me,” he says quietly.

I’ll never admit it out loud, but Brock being Brock is the most romantic thing in the world to me. I love that he doesn’t try to be something he’s not.

I move to lie down on the deckchair beside him. He wraps his arms around me and kisses my forehead.

“So, what do you say?” He smiles down at me.

I kiss his lips and smile goofily. “Position accepted, what’s the rate of pay?”

Five years later

I sit on the park bench and watch Brock push Kaia on the swing.

She’s two and the apple of his eye. He dotes on her.

We’re married and I’m four months pregnant and I never knew a deep sated happiness like this existed.

Our house is fully renovated and we just bought a farm a couple of hours out of Sydney to go to on the weekends. Simon is in remission and married to Penny and they have a son named Cooper.

I smile as I watch Kaia squeal with glee as Brock pushes her higher and higher into the air.

“Wouldn’t it be funny if her pushed her off and she went flying in the mud headfirst?” Meredith says from her seat beside me.

I giggle. “No Meredith, it would not.”