Will you marry me?

And while it was not much of a surprise, it suddenly dawned on me that it was definitely harder than one could ever image.  "It's been ten years..." M lamented out of the blue this afternoon.  It took me a while to connect the dots but when I did ten seconds later, I realised that she hasn't let it go, not even after ten long years.

"...since he proposed."

Alas, it was a fairytale that stayed a fairytale, a love story that never really did come true.  And I could only guess the pain from the glisten in her eyes as she spoke about the bus ticket from 1995 with the scribbling I love you... or the plastic lunch box from McDonald's from eons ago where she kept every letter and card he'd written since the day they met, or how she'd noticed his relationship status change from Engaged to Married on Facebook, yet again.

And I couldn't help but wonder why ask "Will you marry me?" if it were never intended to be?