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Chapter 18
Howie and Anne stayed in New York for an additional week after Mickey and Emily's wedding. Anne was finished working, for now at least, and now focused entirely on her four graduate level music courses she was taking. The strange thing was she was on a break from working, and yet, on her break she ended up doing more work than she had done when she was working. Anne had found her classes to be difficult, but that is what she wanted, a challenge, she wanted to force her musicianship to the next level.
Anne had long since left for her first class before Howie was ready to go out that day. He almost left his hotel room twice but could not do it, he was still unsure if what he was planning to do was the right decision. He made a few calls, he asked his parents, his brother John, and also Brian and Kevin, what they each thought if he asked Anne to marry him, each person he talked to thought it was a wonderful idea, and encouraged him to do it.
After that small boost of confidence he decided he was going to do it. He went out late that morning, determined to find just the right ring for Anne. He first looked on the jewelry district on 5th Avenue, in Cartier's, first, but none of the rings he saw seemed to be quite right, Anne would like them, but they did not seem to be the right one, he needed something a little different. He continued to look all along 5th Avenue, with little success, he decided to take a cab back to his hotel, and look for rings again the next day. On his way back he spotted an antique store with a large sign saying they sold antique and estate jewelry, he had the driver let him out so he could take a look. This was something different, perhaps here he would find the ring he wanted for Anne. He peered through the glass counter at the trays upon trays of rings. He was about to turn away when a little glitter of light caught his eye, he bent closer to the glass to examine the brightly polished piece of jewelry, attached to the tray was a small sign reading 'Platinum.'.
"Can I help you?" asked a saleswoman.
"Yes, I'd like to look at that ring," he said, pointing to the one he liked. The woman brought the tray up and took out the ring for him to examine more closely. "It's beautiful, what can you tell me about it?"
"Just a moment," she said, taking some papers out of a filing cabinet under the counter, and also getting a jeweler's Loup out from a drawer. Jewelry, specifically antique jewelry was Anne's hobby, not his, consequently, he knew very little about rings of this type. The woman looked over the ring's documentation, and handed Howie the Loup. "This ring is a size 6½, made by Rupert Kennedy Jewelers, probably here in New York City, around 1922, or 1923. This mark here, the initials, R.K. on the inside of the band, tell us who made the piece. Also we can pretty well guess the year because this has the look of an early Kennedy piece, and 1922 was the first year he worked in platinum, which was very popular in the 1920's, and because it is early it increases the value." She was speaking in laymen's terms, which was good for Howie, but even the saleswoman could tell most of what she said was going in one ear and out the other. "Also, sir, we do have a wedding band that would compliment this ring nicely."
"I'll think about it, so what about the stone?" he asked, looking at the stone held to the delicately engraved band by six small prongs. The saleswoman once again glanced at the ring's paper, to make sure she had her number's right.
"This is a .92ct. round cut diamond, with approximately forty-five facets, and a color rating of I, and it seems to have some small visible incursions. If you'll just look at the ring through the Loup, you will see what I mean." Howie gave her a rather blank look, but did as he was told and looked at the diamond through the tool. The woman proceeded to explain how the rating of diamonds worked. "With a diamond you have the 'three c's', cut, color, and clarity. Cut, is the shape of the stone, color is, well, the tint of the stone. Color is rated on a scale from A to about M or so, the closer to A the better the color, the best diamonds are colorless, and so the most expensive. This stone being an I, has a bit of a milky white tint to it, but it may be a little hard to notice. The final c, is, clarity, this is also rated by a code. The best diamonds are flawless, there are no chips, cracks, anything, on or in the stone, flawless diamonds are extremely rare and costly."
Howie looked into the stone again, two small lines in the stone reflected the light, he could see the problems, with the Loup, but not with the naked eye. "So how easy would it be to resize the ring?" he asked.
"Larger or smaller?"
"Larger, to a size seven, also, replacing the stone wouldn't be hard, would it?"
"No, just as long as the new stone was about the same size. Although we do not sell loose diamonds here, as I said, if you had another stone fairly close in size we could even do the work here. Otherwise, any jeweler should be able to do it. So are you interested in making a purchase today?"
"Yes I am. Thank you for your help. It has been most informative. And depending on what my girlfriend says, I may be back in here to look at that other ring as well," he joked. He paid for the ring, and left the store, he felt like he had found the right ring for Anne, he knew she would love it. He waited for a cab outside the store and examined the small black velvet and white satin box in his hand, he did not even want to let it leave his hand, even to put it in his pocket. He took a cab, back toward the hotel, and reflected on the condition of the stone, it was not a bad stone, especially for being more than seventy-five years old, but it was not a perfect stone either. He knew Anne would love the ring, it was beautiful, but not too flashy, she liked jewelry that was unique, but would not draw attention away from other things. He was happy with his purchase, but in the back of his mind there was a picture of Leighanne's ring, with its enormous, flawless canary diamond, and wondered how much it must have cost. He decided to make another stop, before returning to the hotel, and had the driver of this new cab take him back to 5th Avenue. He walked in the heavy, tinted, glass doors of Tiffany & Co. and was instantly hit with a draft of cool air. He went to a counter that displayed loose diamonds under the glass, and waited to be helped.
"Can I help you?" a gentleman asked.
"Yes, I just bought this ring, and I would like to replace the stone." He opened the box.
"That is a very nice ring, what sort of diamond were you looking for?"
"Um, one with the same shape, but maybe a bit bigger, and uh-clearer, and with a better color?"
"I see, sir, if I might examine the current stone, I could tell where we might go from here." He carefully removed the stone from the setting and examined it under a microscope. "Ah, I see what you mean, sir. I do not mean to sound pretentious, but might I ask how much you are willing to spend?"
Howie truthfully answered, "Money is not really a concern, I want the best quality stone possible."
"Well, in that case, I believe we may have just the thing." After searching for several moments, through several trays of diamonds, he selected one and set it on a black velvet tray. "This is the highest quality diamond that would suit the ring, a one carat round diamond, which is virtually flawless, and has a high clarity rating." The salesman allowed Howie to compare the two stones under the microscope, through the instrument he could see the differences, and consider his options. He decided to replace the original diamond. He was a little surprised when the salesman told him the price of the new stone. It was more than he expected, several times the price of the ring in fact, but it was what he wanted for Anne, so he paid what he jokingly thought of as a small fortune for the diamond. Howie left the ring there for the stone to be replaced, and the ring to be resized.
He finally returned to his hotel, quite pleased with himself, now, since he had the hardware, so to speak, all that was left for him was to think of the time and place. He pondered this question for a while, and put it out of his mind when be met up with Anne for dinner. The question even bothered him after he and Anne had parted ways for the night, the next morning he placed a call to his father for advice.
"Well, have you taken the proper steps?" Hoke Dorough asked.
"Proper steps?"
"Have we taught you nothing, Howie? Ask the girl's father first. It's the proper thing to do."
"Oh, yes, I forgot about that."
"Now remember, when you ask Anne, Howie, it does not have to be anything fancy, just make it special."
"Thanks Dad, you helped a lot, I appreciate it." Howie hung up the phone, and proceeded to make a rather nervous call to Michigan that evening. With his mind and heart put at ease, he returned to the task of 'where and when.' He sort of wanted to do it in New York, because although Anne liked Florida, she had more of an attachment, more memories associated with New York, yes, he decided New York should be the place. Now that he had decided on where, the question of where exactly in the city, and when still remained. He decided their last night together, would be best, this gave him the most time to plan out how he was going to do it, and what he was going to say. One morning he awoke, and had thought of the perfect plan. That afternoon he picked up the ring, and stopped off at a bookstore on his way back. He was going out to dinner with Anne that evening, he knew she would not be back from her class for at least an hour yet, but he stopped off at her apartment anyway. Howie let himself in, with the key Anne had lent him, and took out a piece of paper and wrote out a note to her, and laid it and one of the copies of the play he purchased on the kitchen counter, he left, and went to get ready to go out, and also to read through a specific scene in the play.
Anne got home right on time, she came in and tossed her keys on the kitchen counter, they slid and hit the book, and stopped suddenly, this foreign object caught Anne's attention. She read the note silently to herself. "Annie, I've got an audition of sorts coming up really soon, and I was wondering if you could run some lines with me before we go out? I'll see you at 5:30. Love, Howie."
Anne picked up the book. "The Fantasticks, well that's not a show I ever would have expected to see him in." Anne had seen the show preformed before, so she knew what it was about, but was not an expert on it by any means. "Hmm, 'an audition of sorts,' well, that's an odd way of putting it," Anne commented to herself, she put it out of her mind for the moment and went to get ready.
Howie showed up about five minutes early, he looked very dressed up, in his silver-grey suit and purple tie, they were going out to a very nice Italian restaurant. Anne appeared at the door to greet him, she was wearing a blue print skirt and top.
"You're early."
"I know, I'll take a cab around the block a few times if you want," he joked.
"Get in here," she smiled.
"So could you rehearse with me for a little bit, before we leave?" he asked, holding up his copy of the play.
"Sure, why not," Anne said, when her back was turned to get her copy of the book, Howie nervously patted the breast pocket of his suit coat to make sure the ring box was still there. "Okay I have to warn you, I didn't get to read through much of this today, so I'm going to be bad, and there's no way I'm going to sing."
"I totally agree, I'm not going to try and sing the music either. Okay, I'm going to read Matt's part, could you read the other stuff, I'm starting on page six, where El Gallo, begins talking about the two kids. 'And now for the boy's story...'."
"All right. 'And now for the boy's story,'."
"There's this girl."
"That is the essence."
"There's this girl."
"I warn you. It may be monotonous."
" 'There's this girl. I'm nearly twenty-eight years old,'." Anne noticed he had wandered from the script, when he changed Matt's age from twenty, she figured it had been a mistake. " 'I've studied Biology. I've had an education. I've been inside the lab: dissected violets. I know the way things are. I'm grown-up; stable; willing to conform. I'm beyond such foolish notions, and yet-in spite of all my knowledge-there's this girl. She makes me young again, and foolish, and with her I perform the impossible: I defy biology! And achieve ignorance! There are no ears but hers to hear the explosion of my soul! There are no other eyes but hers to make me wise, and despite what they say of species, there is not one plant or animal or any growing thing that is made quite the same as she is. It's stupid, of course, I know it. And immensely undignified, but I do love her,'." He paused for a second and looked right at Anne. "Annie, that's how you make me feel, please, marry me, please say you'll marry me," he said, knelt down, and pulled the ring box out of his pocket, opened it, and presented it to Anne.
She began to tear up. She could not have seen this coming from a mile away. "Yes," she choked out, the ring glinted in the light, Howie took the ring and placed it on her finger. He hugged her around the waist, and picked her up and swung her around. She was laughing through her tears, and he was doing the same. He put her down, and kissed her.
"Let's go," Anne said, wiping the tears from her eyes. They left to go to dinner, and both of them walked on air the rest of that night. They were going to meet Mickey and Emily for dinner, who had just returned from Boston the day before. They took a cab to the restaurant.
"So how long will it be before the whole world knows?" Anne wondered.
"Well, we did manage to keep the relationship a secret throughout that whole European tour," Howie commented.
"Yes, but that was before we had the whole world looking over our shoulders. I mean, come on, Howie, people are going to notice the ring."
"Let them notice, if they weren't smart enough to see this coming, then that's their problem."
"I suppose." The exited the cab and went into the restaurant, they were lead to where Emily and Mickey were waiting for them.
"Well look at that," Emily quietly said, noticing the ring the ring on Anne's finger.
"Is it new?" Mickey asked.
"Well it sure as hell wasn't there when we went shopping yesterday."
"Well good for them," Mickey said.
Howie and Anne sat down at the table, and took the menus they were handed. After a few moments of talking they ordered.
"Well, if you gentlemen would please excuse me," Emily said, after the waiter had left.
"Wait, Em, I'll come with you," Anne said.
When they were fixing their hair and make up in front of the bathroom mirror, Emily's curiosity finally got the better of her. "Okay, Anne, the ring, what happened?" Anne gave the reader's digest version of what happened, and Emily was delighted. "Annie, I'm so happy for the two of you, so do you know when yet?"
"Em, he just proposed like an hour ago, we haven't exactly had time to think about it, yet. But don't worry, we won't be running off to Vegas any time soon."
"Good. Hey Annie, I got the pictures from my trip back, and I've got the photos back from my little bachelorette party, they're separate of course, Mickey doesn't know they exist." Anne laughed at this last comment. She remembered what some of the pictures looked like.
"I've just got real mixed emotions about the whole thing, I mean, I love him, and this should have been the happiest day of my life, but I'm scared. I want to shout it from the rooftops, but I can't, I'm afraid if people find out, some of those girls will hunt me down and burn me in effigy."
"Annie, don't worry about it, those girls will get over it. Seriously, who couldn't see this coming? Someday I'd like you to explain the attraction between you and latin guys," Emily said, changing the subject.
"What are you talking about?"
"Okay, for example, we were watching Interview With the Vampire, on the tour bus, I start talking about how hot Tom Cruise looked, and you go off on Antonio Bandaras."
"I just maintain that latin guys make the sexiest looking vampires, and I know of a certain music video which proves my point nicely. Oh, and the Antonio Bandaras thing, I have one word for you, Desperado."
"Touché. What about when we were watching Men Strike Back? You were drooling all over Enrique Iglasias."
"Okay, all I said was he was hot."
"You asked me to get you a spoon."
"Well you were fawning over him too, and Kevin..." Anne accused.
"That's not fair, you know Kevin has always been my favorite, and you know he looked good, well, except for that whole skirt thing." They left the bathroom and started the trek back to the table.
"Like a few days later, we were doing something all of them, and I remember I asked Kevin about it, and Nick started teasing him about it, it was so funny."
"Man, I never got to hear this one, what did he do?"
"He was pretending to be Kristin, so he did this really bad voice, 'Kevin, if you ever raid my closet again the wedding is off,' this was before they got married of course. Well afterward, Kevin said a few wise words to our little friend Nick."
"What a dork."
"You don't know the half of it." The pair went back to their table and rejoined 'their men' for dinner.
Howie left New York that morning. There was still some of promotional work to do with the rest of the guys, and a tour to start thinking about. Anne was left to attend her classes in peace. In order not to rouse any suspicions on the current state of her love life, Anne decided to wear her engagement ring on a chain around her neck, instead of on her finger, for now, people asked fewer questions that way. They managed to exist for almost a month this way, with only their innermost circle knowing the truth, and they were sworn to secrecy, although on the Internet someone had started the rumor, they were engaged. On her computer Anne did her best to dispel this rumor, even though she knew it was true, and reminded several people not to believe anything they heard, until they heard it straight from on of the guys or Rose. She loved the Internet, she could talk to anyone she wanted, and no one had a clue it was her. Anne did not see Howie, face to face, during the month of October, but with their rather busy schedules that was to be expected. One evening, close to Halloween Anne got home after her last class to find a rather short message on her answering machine.
"Annie, it's Emily, I was flipping channels when I got home, well, I think you should watch the replay of TRL this evening. Bye."
"Oh God, what did one of them do now?" Anne wondered. "How much you wanna bet someone busted his head this time..." Later that night, she watched the rebroadcast as she ate her dinner, when the news came up, John Norris appeared in front of the tv monitor.
"I've got some news from the Backstreet camp, oh man, they're just dropping like flies." Anne dropped her fork, out of surprise, it clanged loudly on her plate.
"Oh God, here it comes," she said, with a tone of dread an uneasiness in her voice. She had no clue how the public would react, she was praying it would not be as bad as when they had found out about the previous two engagements. She remembered all the hate mail Leighanne got, and really was not looking forward to it. An interview with Howie appeared on the screen, it looked like it was a part of a bigger package that MTV was putting together.
"So apparently there have been some recent developments in your love life?" John Norris asked Howie off camera.
"Youcould say that. Things are going well."
"Is there any particular detail you want to talk about?"
"Well, a while back I came to the realization that I needed to take the next logical step in my life. I just couldn't see myself spending the rest of my life with anyone but Annie, so I decided to ask her to marry me."
"She said yes right?" John joked.
"Yep, thank God."
The camera cut back to the silent studio, if a pin had been dropped, it would have been heard loud and clear. "Well there you have it, another Backstreet Boy, or perhaps I should say, Backstreet Man off the market," John said.
"And don't worry ladies, all the members of `N SYNC are still up for grabs," Carson Daly joked.
Anne quickly switched off the tv and placed a hurried call to Emily.
"Hello?"
"Mickey, put Emily on the phone."
"Oh it's you, Rosie, she said you might call."
"Hello?"
"Emily, why didn't you tell me?"
"I just wanted to see how you'd react. Geez, you don't have to work yourself all into a frenzy over it."
"I am not in a frenzy, I'm just not looking forward to when what is going to happen, happens."
"What are you so freaked out about, now you can relax, no more sneaking around, no more hiding the truth," Emily said blowing off Anne anxiety.
"Em, have you ever received hate mail? Well I have, how about you come over in a day or two and help me answer some, and then you'll see what I'm so stressed about."
"Whatever, Annie, you'll be fine. I'd just better see that ring on your finger the next time I see you."
"You will, Em." Anne took her ring off of her necklace and put it on her finger, and admired it for a moment. "Wait, what was that?" she asked, she had missed something Emily had said.
"I said, 'we've got a wedding to plan,'."
"Oh, yeah, we do don't we? Well I'll have to get back to you on that one. I've gotta go, something tells me, I'm going to get a rather flustered call from my publicist very soon, I'll talk to you later, bye."Anne hung up the phone, she knew her life had taken another turn, with this very private moment in her public life exposed for the whole world to see. Later that night she got back on the computer and did her best to be the voice of reason, as her incognito persona, of course, in several debates that had flooded a couple websites she went to.
"Yes, it's true, didn't you guys see it on TRL? My sister worked on her tour this past year, and she knows her, she told me today, that Howie and Rosie had actually been engaged for about a month now," Anne replied onto a message board, under her alias, Luisa, she had been using it for a little less than a month, and not by accident. Luisa happened to be the name of 'the girl' in The Fantasticks.
"Well, if they'd been engaged for so long, how come they didn't say anything until now?" A girl named 'Dorough's Chick' asked.
"Maybe they wanted some peace and quiet? I doubt she is going to get much peace now, with the news being out and all. I just feel bad because I know she's going to get hate mail, now, like the other two girls," Anne typed.
"Yeah, I heard about that, the other two women got some, Leighanne got dumped on a lot, apparently," another girl named 'Nick's One' stated. "Hey, wait a sec, he called her Annie, I thought her name was Rose?"
"Anne is her real name," Anne replied. It felt really strange talking about herself in third person.
"You know what," Nick's One said. "I bet she's going to get enough bad mail, and I thought a bunch of people here agreed to support the girlfriends/fiancees/wives, no matter what, so I'm going to write her an email congratulating the two of them."
"Thank you," Anne replied.
"What?"
"I mean, I think she would appreciate it." Anne quickly signed off the Internet, she thought she had almost blown her cover. She decided to call it a day. She had midterms coming up in a few days, and needed rest.
Anne talked to Emily the next day, and they chatted for a while. "Yeah, and today this girl, she couldn't have been more than fifth grade, came up to me and asked, 'Mrs. Shumaker, is it true?' " Emily said. Everyone at the small school of only about five-hundred students, ranging from age eight to eighteen, knew that Emily had toured with Rose that summer.
"Well what did you say to her?" Anne asked.
"I said something like, 'Yes, sweetie, I'm afraid so,' the poor little thing looked like she was about to burst into tears. I felt so bad for her."
"You wanna feel worse?" Anne asked. "I'll email you some of the stuff Brad collected off of my site, he only sent me the choicest ones. I think in one I got called a bitch nine times."
"That's awful. At times like this I thank God that Mickey isn't famous. Well you know what, if some of these people are local I could send him over and have him make them apologize," Emily joked, trying to get Anne to smile, she did, Emily could hear it in her voice.
"Somehow I think sending my best friend's husband over to scare a bunch of jealous girls, who are half my age isn't the best answer. They'll get over it eventually, I think it's best just to stay out of their way."
"And how do you propose to do that?"
"I have no idea. I suppose, keep a low profile and hope someone talks some sense into them, I guess."
"Well good luck."
"Thanks, I'm going to need it.
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