Page 82 of Fall Over You

“I can be something old,” Ernest says from next to me, and we crack up.

“She has to be wearing it,” Darcy laughs.

“Don’t tell nobody, but my socks are pretty dang old,” I chuckle, kicking up one of my white cowboy boots. “And my ring is new. Put on the veil for me?” I turn and lean back so Darcy can put the comb wherever it needs to go in my hair. Then I take the handkerchief and stick it in my cleavage.

I turn to face Darcy and her eyes are wet. “You look beautiful, Becca.”

I hug her and hold on an extra beat. “I hate that it’s fake,” I whisper in her ear.

I feel her nod against my shoulder. “Look around, babe. I think it’s pretty real.”

Nausea roils in my stomach as I consider the irony. For the most part, I’m getting the wedding of my dreams, but there’s that little detail that the person I’m marrying doesn’t particularly love me.

But I look at the little girl in his arms and remember the stakes. This is for us. For her. For him. For me. And there’s something lovely about that too.

Darcy holds both my hands and swings them between us. “Love it like it’s real.”

We tell everyone to go in, but hang back with Ernest, Dustin, and Ellie.

We stand at the back of the courtroom, and Tyler walks ahead of me, Ellie clinging to him like she’s shy. He kisses her cheek, hands her off to her papaw, and turns to wait for me and my boys. Darcy and Jake snap pictures, while Dusty is on my left and Ernest on my right.

Tyler’s Adam’s apple bobs, the muscles in his jaw straining and his breathing heavy. He bites his bottom lip like he’s about to cry, and the only person he’s looking at is me. I try to issue a reassuring smile, but there’s a pinch behind my eyes that makes it falter.

I will not cry twice in a single day when I haven’t cried in years.

When we make it to where Tyler stands with the judge, my heart races like I just ran up here rather than slowly walked. Dustin hugs Tyler and Ernest shakes his hand. Then Tyler slips his arm around my waist and kisses my temple.

“You’re gorgeous,” he whispers, and my heart skips, somewhere in my throat now rather than my chest. “I like the veil.”

“You probably think it’s stupid,” I joke.

Our pinkies brush while we try to figure out how to be, but Tyler’s fingers thread between mine with a squeeze. “Never. Gorgeous.”

I giggle nervously and look at the judge in front of us, a guy I know I’ve seen before in my time in this town. “Did you two want to say your vows or have me read them?”

Tyler and I exchange a look and unanimously say, “Read them.”

It’s a blur. Our hands join and we face each other.

We’re here of our own free will.

We understand that marriage is founded on mutual respect and affection, and I do genuinely feel that with Tyler now. It’s new and tentative, but I think the days of him hating me are behind us.

And affection, well, something happened on the hood of his LeBaron.

We vow to love, honor, and cherish each other.

His ring slips onto my finger, and mine onto his.

His smile as it’s declared that we are married will leave an echo inside me for the rest of my days.

And our former lives apart become one life together with one tip-toed, tightly-clutched, fervently-delivered kiss.

THIRTY-ONE

TYLER

The beginning of the rest of my life tastes like bubble gum and yellow cake with white icing.