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I reached for his hand. “Flynn, we decided I’d leave in a week. We don’t have to go over it again. I’ll be antsy, but we’ll deal with it.”I’ddeal with it. “Let’s go downtown and walk around.”
“Okay. That sounds like a plan.”
Finally, we got into his new car, the replacement for the car that had been totaled in the accident. I felt like a fraud, sitting next to him.
“What will you do with this when we’re gone?” I asked.
“Sell it and buy something there, although I hate driving in Lebanon. Did you ever notice how two lanes become three with everyone going in the wrong direction?”
We laughed, talking about close encounters on the road. It was cheaper to hire a driver. Flynn parked downtown and we walked around, looking in closed shop windows. We came to a familiar bar that wasn’t crowded for a weekday evening. Sitting at the bar was nice, relaxing, as we shared memories of the last trip. We were building a relationship based on adventure. I wondered how that was going to translate if we ever wanted to have a family. Living in Tripoli, working at the clinic, didn’t mesh with my idea of family life.
We’d never finished the lastdo you want kidstalk. That conversation started when I mentioned Margo.
“My sister announced that she’s going to have twins. That threw me, if I can be honest with you.”
“I’m sorry.” I was so glad he didn’t try to mansplain my angst.
“Yeah, thanks. I have mixed-up, conflicting feelings that swerve between jealousy and anger. No one should have twins after I lost Lucy. It’s disrespectful. But that’s insane. My mother claims we were the first set of twins in the family, but I think she’s wrong, or else why would Margo have them? If I cared, I’d research.”
“Well, did finding that out help you decide if you want a family?”
“If we live in Lebanon, it doesn’t seem like it would be the right thing to have children. What would happen to my job? I don’t have friends there, so I’d be alone, raising a child while you’d be at work every day. No, thank you.”
“They have childcare in Lebanon,” Flynn said, grinning.
“Do I have to make my mind up now? Can we get there and see what it’s like? Right now, it feels like I’m going to work for the rest of my life. Like there won’t be anything else. And the truth is that it is okay. I’m finally a nurse.”
“There are lots of things to do, Bella. Lots of adventures outside of the clinic. We only worked when we were there because our time was so limited. But if we move there permanently, we can get a life. I promise you.”
The entire conversation seemed pointless. I’d had enough of the bar scene when a woman wearing a lime green sari and heavy stage makeup climbed a short set of stairs to a stage. A man wearing a tux and a bowler hat sat at a piano set off to the right and played a soft, romantic set, warming up. She unhooked a microphone from its stand and sang a song that might have been a lullaby, her voice was so soft. I strained to listen to the words. She whispered into the mic, and when the lyrics became clear to me, I realized she was singing a sultry love song.
Flynn listened, too, and we reached for each other’s hand. An older couple got up and danced in the aisle, and then Flynn took my hand and nodded toward the floor.
“Come on. We’ve never danced together. Now’s our chance to get a life.”
He grinned down at me. My pulse quickened, and I knew that when I was in his arms, desire would wash over me and there would be nothing we could do about it in that bar. It might have been in that dive bar, on a weeknight, in the hours between dinner and bedtime, that I knew I was his prisoner for life, passionately in love with Flynn.
We rocked together, dancing. “I just decided that if we go to Lebanon together,” I said, “we have to be married first. I don’t want to sleep alone again.”
He held me close, kissing my hair. “We’ll get married, then.”
Later that night, the job at the car wash long forgotten, while Flynn snored softly next to me, I got my computer out and searched for marriage licenses in Michigan. We could get one the next day, wait three days, and get married at the end of the week.
Closing the computer, I shut my eyes, resting against the headboard. Marriage! I didn’t know myself. How could Flynn know me? I had neglected myself for a while, and now I was hesitant to base my life choices on my desires. I looked over at Flynn. He was so handsome, so kind and generous. And his trust gave me the strength to be brave, to follow my heart.
He woke and caught me staring at him. “God, you’re so beautiful.” Reaching for my computer, he slid it onto the nightstand, his arms threading around my body. “I’m so lucky,” he whispered.
“I was just thinking the same thing.” Then I squirmed down in the bed, and we lay alongside each other. “I’m so lucky.”
We got our license the next day. Next, we told the family. Flynn’s sister, Fatima, was dating a judge who offered to marry us on Saturday. Flynn knew someone who owned a nightclub in Birmingham that had a large banquet room available Saturday night, and he grabbed it. I didn’t have to do much planning. Since we had the enormous space, I asked my family to spread the word. Anyone who wanted to come was welcome.
My mother addressed food right away. “How many people? We’ll start cooking now,” she said, never criticizing or making incriminating statements about the rush.
“I’m not sure, Mom. You talk to who you want to invite and take a head count. I’ll talk to Flynn about his family. My roomies will come, and Skippy and the car wash guys.”
“Bella, don’t invite a bunch of homeless people.”
“Mom, cut me a break. They’re people I worked with for two years.”
