AllFreeNovel
Share Us
It took her a minute to yank her thoughts away from the feeling in her body to what question he might be asking her.
She realized he must want to talk to Kristin and Luke and ask their advice.
With a small smile, she nodded her head toward Kristin and Luke and then looked back at him.
He nodded with a grin, that grin saying that he knew she would understand what he was asking, and it was just a shared knowledge that passed between them. The way it felt when she knew someone so well that they talked without words.
She loved that feeling and realized that she did it quite often with Mark.
“So, to be too personal, but I’m thinking about making a pretty big life change and can’t help but notice that you and Kristin seem to be friends, as well as husband and wife. I’m just wondering how you accomplish that.”
“That’s an odd question,” Luke said, his words a little dry, and Pam got the feeling that he could see right through what Mark was asking.
“Oh my goodness, you and Pam are thinking about getting married! And you worry that it’s going to ruin your friendship.” Kristin’s smile went up like two hundred million times. “I think that is awesome. And I think that marriages based on friendship like the one you and Pam have, which is super strong—I’ve often admired it—are the best marriages. After all, if you’re friends before you’re married, you just become better friends afterward.”
“It’s not automatic though,” Luke said, looking down at Kristin as she tilted her head and looked up at him, grinning.
“It is for you, but for me, you’re right. I had to work on it a little.”
He snorted. “You can see what I put up with here,” he said, talking to Pam and Mark and grinning at them.
Kristin reached her hand around and squeezed his neck while he put his head down and pressed his lips to her temple.
It was so sweet and cute that it made Pam’s heart squeeze again.
She wanted to look over at Mark and see what he was thinking about all of that, but she didn’t want to at the same time. She supposed she was afraid.
She wasn’t going to allow fear to dictate her life, so she straightened her shoulders and turned her head.
Mark noticed her movement, and his head turned and their eyes met.
She couldn’t read the expression on his face. Maybe it was because dusk was falling, or maybe it was because there wasn’t an expression there, at least not one that she recognized.
They really didn’t talk about romantic things at all.
Nothing besides her failed marriage, which was so far from romance, it wasn’t even funny.
“Seriously, guys. You should go for it. Getting married was the best decision I ever made.”
“You think you’re going to feel that way in ten years?” Mark asked with a wisdom that surprised Pam. She hadn’t considered it, but it was true. Sometimes newness wore off, and what started out as something wonderful turned into something that was a ball and chain. But how could one project that far into the future? How could one think that it might change? Obviously, if they felt that it would go that way, they wouldn’t have gotten married to begin with, right?
“That’s a good question. I guess you have to ask me in ten years, because right now, I say no.”
“I’d say that in order for it to not, we have to make a conscious decision to make sure that it doesn’t. A marriage isn’t something that just flourishes without care. You have to put the time and effort into it.”
“People always say that, but I don’t understand what time and effort they’re talking about.”
“The same kind of time and effort you put into a relationship when you’re dating. You try to win someone, then you get married, and they don’t feel special and new anymore, and you feel like you don’t have to do things for them like you used to. But it’s like getting out of bed whenever she hears a noise. I want to roll over and go back to sleep, because I know it’s nothing, but that’s just dismissing her thoughts and her concerns. I wouldn’t dismiss anything she said if we were dating. So why do I think it’s okay to do whenever we get married? That’s the kind of time and effort you have to put into a relationship. The kind of time and effort that is doing things that are inconvenient for you. Just because they make her happy.”
“All you have to do is smile at me and you make me happy.”
“All right. Next time you hear a noise in the middle of the night, I won’t get up, I’ll just smile at you. We’ll see how that works.”
“Okay. You’re right.”
“That’s another thing. Sometimes you just have to give in. I mean, some of us are right more than others...”
“Ouch,” he said as Kristin playfully smacked his head.
