I didn't expect the wedding to go off without a hitch like it did, but from the moment I walked into the church until the end of the reception, everything went smoothly. During the ceremony I had a thought in the back of my mind of Taylor suddenly stopping the wedding and yelling, "Rose, I still love you!" and Rose would leave me and they'd run off together, but that didn't happen. It was funny to think about. I knew Taylor didn't want to be with Rose and I knew Rose didn't want to be with Taylor; the two were friends but they both told me repeatedly that, given the chance, they would never date again.
The reception was weird. Mimi seemed to fit in very well with the family, which surprised Taylor. Rose didn't fit this well with my family at their first meeting. I hadn't expected Mimi to hit it off with everyone so quickly, but she just smiled and laughed about it. Taylor was staring at her the entire time, except when the two of them were devouring all of the food. They ate everything; between the two of them they took an entire layer off the wedding cake and were complaining about hunger a few minutes later.
No one really spoke of Zac, although I wanted to. Everybody would sneak a glance at Mimi every once and a while and sigh, knowing it was supposed to be Zac sitting there. I admit to doing it a couple of times myself. I'd look at her and picture Zac sitting there. I just wondered what it would be like if Zac was actually there. He would sit there, playing with his food and not eating it until Taylor asked if he was going to finish it, and he'd hand the plate over with a disheartened sigh. He wouldn't dance, after dinner he'd kind of disappear somewhere and hide out until everybody left. He wouldn't have a good time at all, complaining about how long the damn thing was, and complain a bit more until he could go home. He wouldn't say a word to either me or Rose if he didn't have to, and Mom would grab him and push him at us. He'd groan, say a robotic "Congrats," then walk off before he had to do anything else. It probably was better than he wasn't there, but I wished that the reason he wasn't there was because he didn't want to be there instead of being dead.
There were just a few more things we had to finish before Rose and I left. We weren't going anywhere but home, so I didn't mind staying around. Taylor was sitting in a chair by a table with Mimi on his lap. She was eating yet another piece of the wedding cake. He was either looking down her shirt or at the plate of food. Knowing Taylor, it could be either one. Mimi turned to him.
"Oh, do you want some?" she asked.
"Yes, please." She kissed his nose and turned away, not giving him any. "Hey!" He grabbed a fork and tried to reach for the plate but she held it away from him. He whispered something in her ear and her eyes widened.
"Really?" she asked. He nodded. She whispered something back into his ear then raised her voice. "You're still not getting any."
"Mimi!"
"What?"
"Gimme some!"
"You've had enough," she said, and took an exaggerated bite from the cake.
"You've had more than me!" They began to bicker back and forth and in the act, Taylor somehow hit the plate and it fell on the floor, luckily onto the wood of the dance floor instead of the carpet. They both looked at it, shocked, then Mimi smacked him in the arm.
"You fool! I was eating that!"
"Well that goes to show you what happens when you don't share!" I shook my head. They'd eaten so much already and they were bickering over a small piece of cake that was pretty much all icing. I was tempted to tell them there was more cake where that came from, but they might eat a lot more so I let them bicker. I motioned to my parents to pack away the cake so they couldn't eat anymore.
"Are you sure they're not dating?" Rose asked me.
"Oh, they're dating now."
"Really? How long did it take them to figure that out?"
"Taylor told me he had pretty much no idea until he asked her and she said they were." She shook her head, smiling. "She seems to be a really nice girl. She really lifted his spirits."
"She doesn't look fifteen, I can tell you that," Rose said, smiling. Ryan began to fuss in her arms and she handed him over to me. "But I can tell what Taylor sees in her, she's a beautiful girl and they have a lot in common. He's more himself now." I sighed. "How are you doing, honey? You won't talk about him."
"I'm still upset about it," I told her, looking over at her. "There were so many things we could have done. Zac was obviously ready to kill himself, I mean three days before he actually did it I caught him in the kitchen with a very large, sharp knife. If I hadn't walked in he would have done it then. I saw how rock bottom he was and I didn't do anything about it."
"Honey, it wasn't your fault."
"I know." Before she could say anything else, Mom walked up to the two of us.
"Why don't the two of you head off? We're pretty much done here." Rose looked around, making sure it was true, and nodded.
"Okay." Rose took Ryan from me and gave him a kiss before handing him to Mom. "You've got everything? You know when he's supposed to be fed and when to put him down, right?"
"Rose, stop worrying, I think Mom knows a little bit about how to take care of a baby for the night. She only has seven of her own..." I shut my mouth in realization that my mother no longer had seven children.
"I'm sorry, it's just we haven't been away from Ryan for this long before. I'm worried and you should be too." I rolled my eyes. "Don't go rolling your eyes at me, either. I have every right to be worried, don't I?" she asked Mom.
"Yes you do, sweetheart. Everything will be just fine, and I'll call you if anything happens." She seemed to calm down a bit.
"I'm sorry. I know everything will be okay." She gave Ryan another kiss and turned to me. "Shall we?" I stood up, gave a kiss to my son, said my goodbyes, and the two of us walked out of the hall and to my car. Rose insisted that I didn't get a limo or another car, that we should drive ourselves since we weren't going anywhere. It made me wonder if she resented that we weren't going on a honeymoon, but it was her decision to stay here because she didn't want to leave Ryan for so long.
I drove home, odd that I could actually call it home, and pulled in front of the house. "Are you going to carry me over the threshold?" Rose asked, turning to me and smiling.
"Ugh...do I have to?" I kidded, putting my head against the steering wheel.
"Yes! Get out, open my door for me, and carry me over the threshold so we don't have anymore bad luck." I got out of the car and opened her door for her. She stepped out and right after I closed her door I picked her up off her feet. She put her arms lovingly around my neck as I carried her to the front door.
"Honey, unlock the door for me," I said. She reached in my pocket and pulled out the keys to unlock the door. She unlocked it and opened it for me then put the keys back in my pocket. I walked inside and closed the door behind me.
"Aren't you going to lock the door?" she asked as I began to walk away from it.
"No."
"But..."
"It's fine. Nobody will get in here."
"Then why did you lock it to begin with?"
"Force of habit." She huffed but didn't say anything about it, more eager to see the master bedroom than to worry any more about the front door being unlocked. She whined to me all week to see it, saying things like "we were supposed to be married already, let me see it" but I still wouldn't let her. I took my time going up the steps because I was still carrying her and it was hard to carry a full-grown woman up twenty-seven steps.
I opened the door to the master bedroom and Rose giggled in excitement. I walked in and she jumped out of my arms, looking over the room. "Wow..." she said, taking my hand and walking around the room, looking at everything. She was about to go into the bathroom but I groaned.
"Rose, you can look at this later. I'm tired, let's go to bed."
"You just want to have sex. I know you." I rolled my eyes. It was true but I'd never admit it. "In a minute, sweetheart, I want to see everything." She disappeared into the bathroom and came out a few moments later. "You got the tiles I wanted! I love you!" She threw her arms around me and kissed me. I pulled her against me. "How'd you know I wanted those tiles?"
"Because you told me ten thousand times to make sure I had those specific tiles," I told her.
"Oh. Okay." She rested her head on my shoulder, sighing happily. "Honey, we're married."
"Yeah we are." I smiled and kissed the top of her head, inhaling her scent. For a moment all I could think about was how lucky I was. I had a beautiful wife, someone I knew from the moment we met that we were destined to spend the rest of our lives together. We had a healthy baby boy. Within a week of Zac's death I gained an entire future for my family and myself. Zac opened my eyes and I realized that there was nothing I could do about it, nothing anybody could do about it. Although I couldn't do anything about Zac, I could do something for my new family. I had a wife and a child to think about, and brothers and sisters to continue to look after. As I looked at Rose who stood in front of me, I devoted the rest of my life to make sure this kind of pain never happened to us again.