Updated Mar 23, 2026 • ~4 min read
Chapter 26: Tyler’s permission
CALEB
He asked Tyler on a Thursday in December.
Not about the proposal — he hadn’t decided how he was doing that yet. He asked Tyler about something simpler first, which was: “Is there anything you’d want that’s not already happening?”
Tyler was coiling the rope, which he did well now, the trained hands of three months of practice working the leather automatically.
He said: “What do you mean?”
Caleb said: “I mean — the Thursday lessons, the supper, me being around. Is there anything you’d want to be different?”
Tyler looked at the rope.
He said: “I want it to be permanent.”
Caleb was quiet.
Tyler said: “The Thursday thing and the supper thing and you being around — I want it to not be temporary. I want to know it’s not going away.”
He said it with the specific directness of a child who had asked for things carefully because he had learned that careful asking sometimes got answers and demanding didn’t.
Caleb said: “I want that too.”
“Does Sadie want that?”
“I think so,” Caleb said. “I’m going to ask her.”
Tyler looked at him.
He said: “Ask her what specifically.”
He thought about how to say this.
“I’m going to ask her if she’ll marry me,” he said.
Tyler was still.
He said: “That’s really permanent.”
“Yes.”
“Are you sure you want to?”
He thought about the specific quality of the question from an eight-year-old who had absorbed enough of Sadie’s way of thinking that he checked the thing directly.
“Yes,” he said. “I’ve been sure since August.”
“August is a long time ago.”
“Yes.”
Tyler said: “Is it okay if I’m there when you ask?”
He thought about this.
He said: “How would you feel about helping me plan it?”
Tyler’s expression shifted — the specific quality of an eight-year-old who had been given a role in something important.
“What kind of help do you need?” he said.
“I need to know what she’d want,” Caleb said. “You know her better than anyone.”
Tyler thought about it for a moment.
He said: “She’d want it to be outside. And she’d want it to be just us — not a big thing, not a party. She doesn’t like being the center of attention of a lot of people.”
“Outside,” Caleb said. “Just us.”
“On horseback would be good,” Tyler said. “She loves being on horseback.”
He thought about this.
“I can do that,” he said.
Tyler said: “Can I tell her the plan?”
“No,” he said.
Tyler grinned. “I know. I was asking.”
He worked the rope again.
He said: “She’s going to say yes. You know that, right?”
“I hope she will.”
“She will,” Tyler said, with the authority of a boy who had been paying full attention since May. “She’s not scared anymore. I can tell.”
Caleb looked at the boy.
He thought: he is eight years old and he has been tracking her fear and noting when it lifted.
He thought: this is what it means to be raised by Sadie Brennan — you pay attention to the real things.
He said: “Thank you, Tyler.”
Tyler handed him the rope.
“Same time next week?” he said.
“Yes,” Caleb said.
Tyler went in.
Caleb stood in the yard with the December cold coming in off the mountains and thought about horseback and the valley and outside and just the three of them, and thought about the specific shape of the thing he was planning.
He thought: she’s going to say yes.
He thought: I know that.
He thought: I know her.
He went home to plan it.
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