Kind as always, I say, “I thought authors could read.”
The wood of my chair creaks in his grasp. “You’remarried?”
So hecanread. Beaming, I echo, “I’m married.”
Awestruck, Maelin says, “When did you get married?”
Morana touches her fork, fiddles, blushes. “Oh. Uh…like two days ago?”
“This got here faster than I expected,” I muse, delighted. We were also able to move Morana in faster than I initially expected. What luck. What joy.
Viktor puts his whole entire hand atop my marriage certificate, meaning I can neither reach it nor begin the process of framing it.
I smile up at him. “Excuse me, brother dear.”
“You’remarried?” he repeats.
“You didn’t tell me?” Maelin says.
Morana winces. “To be fair, I only just got around to telling myself it happened, like, last night.”
Last night.
Last night.
What a wonderful, glorious thing,last night. I may no longer scorn nights if they are now to come laced in the promises of yestereve. Wow.Last night. Who needs to worry about sleep when exhaustion and bliss carry you into it? Who needs to fear nightmares when waking from one guides you into the heat of your wife’s arms?
Entranced, I behold my wife and forget that I have a very cross big brother breathing down my neck. I also forget that I’m in the middle of making my beautiful, flawless wife a sandwich.
Oops. Back to that.
I reach for the eggs.
From the other side of the table, Crisis says, “Everyone gets married before Viktoris my favorite gag. Kaleb, can you head to the courthouse with Crim before our double wedding? The wedding itself can be a ceremony, but you need to get married first.”
“Sweet pea—” Viktor protests.
“Technically, we were married, and now we’re divorced, and we’ll be married again,” Kaleb notes. “So we all have now, officially, gotten married before Viktor.”
Ifeelthe muscle in Viktor’s forehead pop as I put the top on my mistress’s sandwich and set it lovingly on her plate.
I get another few eggs for my own sandwich. “While we’re talking about grand events as of late, Morana and I are planning to visit her parents from next Thursday through Sunday.”
“I’m still not done talking about—”
“Viktor,” Crisis says, cutting off my grumpy brother’s grumpy tirade. “Sit down.”
Huffing, he returns to his seat, and she pats his head, cooing, “Remember? We wouldn’t be together without Kyran’s help. Kyran, communication king, is allowed to be married before us. He did not do it to spite you. Unless he did. In which case, that is hilarious, and we should respect him for it.”
Grumbling, Viktor mutters, “I’m less upset he got married before us and more upset he—communication king—didn’t tell us about it until I’m getting his marriage certificate in the mail.”
I’m unsure when it was decided that I was acommunication king. Prior to this morning, I mostly communicated in grumbles and grunts. I’ll say what I mean how I mean it, but by no means did I think I was creating an expectation of openness amongst my kin.
“You’re going to visit Mom and Dad?” Maelin asks, wide-eyed. “Um.” She glances at me. “Oh boy.”
“Yeah…” Morana blows out a breath, and some sort of twinship telepathy takes place before I get an inkling that these sisters believe meeting my wife’s parents—again—is going to be an ordeal of some kind.
“Good luck with that, Mora,” Maelin says.
