Page 86 of D’Vaughn and Kris Plan a Wedding

“Thank you.”

He dipped his chin. “No. Thank you.” Clapping his hands, he took a step backward. “Okay! Now that that’s established, I’m going to disappear and let you two get married. For real this time.”

He jogged down from the platform and I helped straighten the train of D’Vaughn’s gown as we once again faced the officiant. She smiled at us.

“Ready?”

I nodded. “Absolutely.”

D’Vaughn gently squeezed my hand. “Of course.”

“Well,” the officiant began, “I do believe that D’Vaughn’s proposal was better than any hand-written vow I’ve ever heard, so why don’t we skip all of the traditional stuff and jump right to the good part? Kris? Would you like to say your vows?”

Facing each other, I took D’Vaughn’s hands in mine as I stared into her eyes. Her smile was so joyful, full of content, and I couldn’t believe I was moments away from getting to wake up next to it every day for the rest of my life. Taking a deep breath, I spilled my heart out before her.

“D’Vaughn, I knew from that first night that you were something special. It was why I made it a point to stay away from you. I didn’t want the producers to see that I was interested and match me with someone else on purpose.” She gasped, making me smile. “You were kind to everyone that night, even the most obnoxious and annoying of the group, and even though you avoided me, I never got the feeling that you didn’t like me. That next morning, after I saw that it was you, I made up in my mind that I had six weeks to make you fall in love with me, and the both of us standing here right now proves that I was successful. You have such a pure and loving soul. When I brought you to meet my family, you didn’t hesitate to meet them where they were, speaking Spanish to let them know that you respected them and their language, especially in their home. That was huge and meant so much to me, and to my family. When you left, Papi took me aside and said, ‘Estoy orgulloso de ti.’” I broke off, shaking my head and grabbing the tissues that Rhea handed me, wiping the tears from my eyes before folding the paper and wiping those that fell from D’Vaughn’s as well.

“He said that he was proud of me. That you were a good woman and that I needed to take care of you, and he was absolutely right. I know that six weeks isn’t enough time to learn everything there is about a person, but I think that’s good, in a way. For us, it’s perfect. This means that every day I get to learn something new about you to add on to my love. I want to continue to grow what we’ve built, to create a life that brings us both more joy than we could have ever imagined, and most of all, to have you by my side as we experience everything life has to offer. Thank you for allowing me to love you; for loving me back, and for making me the happiest woman on the planet by becoming my wife.”

“Beautifully said,” murmured the officiant. “Do you, D’Vaughn, take Kris to be your lawfully wedded wife? To have and to hold, through sickness and in health, as long as you both shall live?”

“I do,” she breathed. “A thousand times, I do.”

My breath hitched at the love I saw shining brightly in her eyes.

“And Kris, do you take D’Vaughn to be your lawfully wedded wife? To have and to hold, through sickness and in health, as long as you both shall live?”

“I do forever.”

“By the power vested in me from the state of Texas, I now pronounce you wife and wife.” She shot me a wink. “Ladies, you may kiss your soul mate.”

Cheers exploded around us, followed quickly by catcalls as I swept D’Vaughn into my arms, bent her backward dramatically, and planted a gentle kiss upon her lips. She wrapped her arms around my neck and licked along the seam of my mouth until I opened for her, promptly tangling her tongue with mine, seeking out my flavor as I simultaneously siphoned hers greedily.

“I know that’s right!” shouted D’Niesha. “You betta tongue your wife down!”

Her impassioned shout cut through the noise to grab my attention. Dialing back the kiss, I grinned, my lips only a breath away from D’Vaughn’s mouth.

“Happy six-week anniversary, wife.”

Her responding smile was so wide, so seraphic, that it brought instant joy to my already full heart.

“Happy anniversary, my love,” she whispered, “and I look forward to many more.”

Epilogue-D’Vaughn

Season Finale

We were all required to be present at the live airing of the season finale. The stipulation had been a part of our initial contract before we’d even recorded one minute of the show.

The network had managed to squeeze six weeks and hundreds of hours’ worth of video into twelve forty-eight-minute episodes that were stretched to an hour with the help of commercials. The highly anticipated finale took up a two-hour slot. All ten of the original contestants had to sit onstage for two hours and answer questions and explain what was going through our head at any given moment in the show. I was exhausted before we’d even arrived to the studio, but knowing the trip that would follow pumped me up.

It was exactly one year since Kris and I had said I do for real, and after the finale, we were going on a five-day vacation for our anniversary. My excitement was just slightly overshadowed by my nerves. Kris told me that I had nothing to be nervous about since we’d already won and were happily married, but that had nothing to do with millions of eyes on you. Season three of Instant I Do had broken records with ratings and viewership, and had already been nominated for several diversity and inclusion awards. All that told me was that more than a handful of people would be watching the live show.

Our lives had already changed so much in just the past three months. Kris finally received that coveted blue check, with her followers growing from a quarter of a million to more than two million after the first episode aired. Now she was sitting at eight million followers, with several six-figure brand endorsements paying her yearly salary ten times over for a handful of sponsored posts. Her and Rhea had even done a commercial.

Although I’d been nervous about the fallout at my school, the reception after the show aired was phenomenal. I had so many students stopping into my office throughout the day to tell me how seeing me come out on prime-time television had given them the strength and courage to come out to their loved ones that I’d lost count after the fifteenth. The outpouring of love from parents and others in the community had been overwhelming, to where I’d had to filter emails containing certain words to a different server. I still counseled students on their course selection, but now my principal had asked me to dust off my psych degree and consider taking a new counseling position. I’d been talking it over with Kris and Cinta, and while I’d yet to make a decision, I had a pretty good idea which direction I was leaning.

Smoothing my hands down over my dress, I folded my hands across my knees and kept my attention on the host. Ansel, the polished socialite who moderated every season finale, had been bringing us out one by one in the order that we’d been eliminated from the show as the final episode progressed. We were to wait in the green room until we were called, and then walk out onstage when it was our turn. We’d been an hour into the live show when I finally made my way in front of the studio audience along with Kris, Hosea, and Bryce. The four of us were the last ones to make it to the final week.