Page 27 of Entangled With You

Ientered the kitchen and announced, “Zach cover your ears. Maybe go la la la.”

He dutifully covered his ears. Emma and Magnus turned to me. “There’s good news and bad news today. Both are that I just started my period.” I pulled down the Midol bottle from the cabinet and dropped three into my palm.

Magnus said, “Aye.”

Emma said, “I was wondering, but didn’t want to ask.” I shot all three into my mouth and swallowed them down with water.

“Yes. The whole sordid thing is completely behind me, so we don’t have to wonder or anything.” I hugged Magnus and kissed him and said directly to him, “And I literally don’t have to talk about it anymore, okay?”

“Och, aye.”

“Good, I need coffee pronto.” I smiled at Zach. “You can stop now.” He dropped his hands.

“I just announced that I’m PMSing on your wedding day, and that I need coffee to try to get on top of it.” I turned to Emma who was rocking Ben on her hip.

“Emma, I promise you, I’m on top of it. Not trying, I am. It’s just you, only you, today.” I pulled out my notebook. “Your appointment for your hair is in one hour. Then we come back here to get into your dress. Then the limo will take us to the — what’s the weather?”

Zach said, “A fucking nightmare.”

“See, that’s why we got the booking on such late notice, because everyone knew the weather would suck. We won’t go out to the beach. We’ll do it in the reception room beside the dinner tables. It will be fine, right, Emma?”

She grinned as Zach brought her a big plate of waffles covered in strawberries and whipped cream. “It’s already bigger, more magnificent than any wedding I ever thought I’d have.”

“See, Zach? That’s why you’re marrying her, she’s perfect. She sees gloomy, windy, stormy weather on her wedding day and she calls it magnificent.”

A stack of waffles appeared in front of me. “...and you and Magnus will take Ben to an indoor gym to wriggle around on mats and beat pans against a wall, then you meet us here, give us Ben, and you go and we’ll meet you there.” I placed a line of checks down the list.

These weren’t my ‘finished’ checks, these were the ‘nervously checking’ checks. But the good news was I had nervously checked them all. One task, done.

13 - KAITLYN

“You look really beautiful.” I fluffed the simple veil down her back.

“It’s not too much?”

“It’s the perfect amount of much. Perfect.”

Ben said, “Ma-ma!” And patted her on the breast.

“I’ve got to get married fast, this dress does not accommodate a breastfed baby.” I put my arms out, “Ben want to go dancing?”

He climbed into my arms and I started dipping and swaying with him like a maniac before he figured out I wasn’t as cool or as milky as Emma. “The music starts in three minutes. I’ll leave you with your mom.” I swooped Ben out the door. He was giggling. I was barely cramping. This wedding had been pulled off. In two weeks we had done it, beginning to end. Well not end, yet, almost end. Okay it hadn’t started yet.

I met Magnus in the front row of the hastily arranged chairs set up in a square in the middle of the room. The tables were pulled away to the side and the guests would have to help us rearrange the room after the ceremony. No one could complain because there was a torrential downpour outside — sheets of rain, sideways, and everyone was on their best behavior about it so Emma wouldn’t freak out. Of course Emma never freaked out. It was one of the great things about her.

Most of our friends stood along the edges of the room, around the tables, cramped in corners. The chairs in the middle were for family and that’s where Magnus and I sat because we were family too.

Ben spied Zach standing at the front of chairs with the minister, and called, “Da! Da!” And everyone collectively oohed and ah-ed because that was really freaking cute. Zach chuckled. I jiggled Ben a bit to keep him happy and gave him his favorite chewy-teething toy.

The music started and Emma walked in. I clutched Magnus’s arm. “Isn’t she beautiful?”

“Aye, he is a lucky man.”

“He is, he’s so lucky. And we are too.”

Magnus kissed me on my forehead and pressed his cheek there, making me feel just so loved.

The ceremony was simple and special. I could tell that Zach’s family didn’t think it was lavish enough. Emma’s family didn’t think it was religious enough. So I concentrated on Zach and Emma’s faces: nervous, excited, in love. That was all I needed to see. They said they would love each other forever and ever until “death do us part.” Tears welled up in my eyes.