I looked up from the ring to his eyes.

“Yes, Nathan,” I said. “I will.”

He slid the ring onto my finger, and it fit comfortably.

Rosie came running back to us, her face sticky with cotton candy.

“What are you doing?” she asked, looking at our joined hands.

Nathan crouched down and smiled at her.

“I’m asking your mom if we can be a real family now,” he said.

Rosie looked at me, then at him, her eyes bright.

“Does that mean you’re staying?” she asked.

“Always,” Nathan said.

We walked out of the park together into the warm afternoon sun.

The nine-minute lie had started as a desperate act of survival.

But as I held Nathan’s hand, I knew we had turned it into the truth.