“What?”
“Ain’t nothing missing when I look at you.”
The words broke through something I had been protecting since the hospital. I pulled him toward me, tossed my nub over his shoulder and let him make love to my body without feeling self-conscious for the first time since starting my new life. Later, I lay against his chest beneath the sheets, with my residual limb resting comfortably over his thigh. His fingers moved slowly through my hair while the diamond on my hand caught the light from the bathroom.
I lifted my hand again and watched it sparkle. “Two hundred and eighty thousand dollars is irresponsible.”
“You ain’t paying for it.”
“That doesn’t make it less irresponsible.”
“It make it none of your business.”
I laughed softly. “I’m going to be your wife. Your money will be my business.”
“See? Now you getting ahead of yourself.”
I acted like I was hurt. “You just proposed to me.”
“And now I’m reconsidering.” He laughed.
I lifted my head and looked at him. He smiled, then kissed my forehead and pulled me closer. The room became quiet again. For months, silence had meant hospital machines, pain, and thoughts I couldn’t escape. That night, it meant Lev’sheartbeat beneath my ear and his arm around my waist. I had spent so long grieving the life Rome took from me that I hadn’t realized another one had already begun. It wasn’t the life I planned, and it wasn’t the body I had known, but it was mine. And, for the first time, I was ready to live it.
EPILOGUE
Navy ‘Nay’ Laurent
The ballroom doors were still closed, but nobody standing in that hallway was calm enough to pretend the ceremony hadn’t already started in their heads. The wedding coordinator kept giving instructions in a low, urgent voice while bridesmaids checked bouquets they had already straightened three times and the groomsmen whispered among themselves about the rings before one of them remembered Lev had refused to trust anybody else with them. Beyond the doors, the soft pull of a saxophone drifted beneath the string quartet, the two sounds blending together until even the hallway felt wrapped in something elegant and warm.
I stood at the end of it with my arm tucked through Uncle Curtis’s, trying not to breathe too deeply because every time I did, Lulu took it as a sign that something on my dress had shifted. She had been behind me for the last five minutes smoothing the train, lifting the lace, laying it back down, then starting all over again like the gown might suddenly revolt if she stopped watching it.
“You done touched that dress a hundred times,” I told her, looking over my shoulder.
“And I’ll touch it a hundred more if I need to,” she answered without even glancing up.
“It ain’t going nowhere.”
“I know that.” She pressed one palm over the lace anyway, making sure it lay flat. “That don’t mean I’m fixing to let you walk out there looking any kind of way.”
Uncle Curtis chuckled beside me. “Leave her alone. She been waiting on this day longer than you have.”
“That’s probably true,” I admitted.
Lulu finally stepped back, but only far enough to inspect the entire back of the dress with narrowed eyes. Once she decided it met her approval, she nodded to herself and moved around to my side. Her hands were trembling just enough for me to notice, though she tried hiding it by clasping them together in front of her.
Uncle Curtis gave my arm a light squeeze. “You nervous?”
I took a second before answering because I wanted to tell him the truth. I had been nervous upstairs. Nervous while getting dressed, nervous while fastening my prosthetic and checking the fit twice even though I already knew it was right. I was nervous when the photographer asked me to stand near the window and smile like my heart wasn’t beating against my ribs. But standing there now, with the doors separating me from the man waiting on the other side, all of that had soothed something inside of me.
“I was,” I said. “Not anymore.”
“What changed?”
My eyes moved toward the closed doors, and a smile touched my mouth before I could stop it. “I remembered who’s waiting for me.”
That was all I needed to say. Uncle Curtis nodded like he understood, and Lulu pressed her lips together, probably to keepherself from crying before the ceremony even started. A few feet away, the wedding coordinator lifted one finger toward the musicians. The sound beyond the doors shifted, the saxophone fading beneath a slower arrangement, and the hallway went still.
“They’re ready,” she whispered.
