Neanderthal Marries Human

I glanced around and found them all crying and laughing.

I was surrounded by six of the great loves of my life. How one person could be so blessed, so lucky, so valued, so cherished was a great and beautiful mystery. But I didn’t question it. I just smiled, soaked up the moment, committed it and them to memory, and gave thanks for my fortune, recognizing it for what it was.

It was infinite.

***

We were the last to arrive at the church.

I was told by Marie that this was all planned. Ideally, I would exit the car, proceed into the church, and immediately walk down the aisle.

And that’s basically what happened.

She made us wait two minutes in the car, checked her phone, then informed us that it was time.

Stan rushed forward to help me out of the car, his eyes and smile huge. “May I just say, Ms. Morris, that you are the most beautiful bride I’ve ever seen?”

“Even more beautiful than me?” Elizabeth nudged his shoulder. “I’m sure you haven’t forgotten that dress I rocked at my Vegas wedding!”

When he glanced from her to me like he was caught between a rock and a hard place, Elizabeth laughed. She didn’t quite recover from her giggles until we were up the stairs and in the foyer of the church.

My father was there by himself, sitting in a chair off to one side, watching TV on his cell phone. It looked like the inner door to the church had just closed, as though someone had just walked through them. I glanced at my father as the ladies assembled in their line, grabbing the bouquets of flowers that Marie handed out.

She then crossed to me and handed me a huge bunch of ferns. I smiled at the lovely arrangement—red, burgundy, and orange. There wasn’t a single green fern in the bunch.

“They reminded me of your hair,” she said, then quickly took her place in line.

The music changed. The doors opened. I stepped to the side so I wouldn’t be seen, but I had a good view of the back of the church. It was a small church with dark wooden pews, thick ancient-looking stained glass, and large—especially for the side of the church—Roman columns decorated with gold mosaic.

From where I was standing, it looked completely full.

I wondered who all these people were, but I didn’t have an opportunity to dwell on it.

Elizabeth was the last in line; turned toward me, gave me a small smile, then disappeared. The doors closed.

I turned to my father, studied him for a beat, then placed my hand on his shoulder.

“Dad?”

“Hmm?” He glanced up, blinked at me. His eyes narrowed, eyes that struck me as looking remarkably like mine.

“Can I ask you a question?”

“Yeah. Sure.” His attention moved back to the screen of his phone.

“Why do you send me email forwards?”

His eyes flickered to mine then returned to the cell. “Do I?” He shrugged. “I send funny stuff to whoever is in my email address book.”

I stared at him. I should have been hurt. The email forwards had been, for a very long time, the single piece of evidence that I’d clung to; they were the only tangible sign that my father—the man who fed and clothed me—had any interest in a relationship.

I’d been wrong.

It didn’t matter if he was my biological father. Blood mattered less than love, constancy, support, and sacrifice. I took a deep breath and silently said goodbye to my hope for us. I said goodbye to what I’d always wished he would be.

Going through the motions held no value. I was going to walk myself down the aisle. No one would give me away.

This decision wasn’t some feminist statement or rejection of societal conventions. This decision was based on the knowledge that there was no one to give me away. But that didn’t matter, because I wasn’t walking backward into my past. I was going forward to my future.

I said to the top of his head, “Quinn will come find you after the ceremony to reimburse you for your trouble. You’ve flown all the way out here for nothing, I’m afraid.”

He finally looked at me again, frowned. “What are you talking about?”

I shook my head. “Nothing. It doesn’t matter. Just…goodbye.”

I leaned down and kissed him on the cheek, and then I walked back to the double doors alone, feeling remarkable sense of relief and peace about my sudden decision. I didn’t look back.

Again, the music changed. The sound of Edward Elgar’s “Salut d’Amour” filled my ears, and I laughed in wonder because the music wasn’t being played by an organ.

The song was being played by strings—violins, cellos, bass—and it gave me the distinct impression that I was being pulled into the church, lured by the lovely music into the arms of my lover.

The sound of a hundred people standing was followed by the doors of the church opening.

And there he was.

I didn’t have to search for him. Our eyes simply met, and everything, everyone else was gone. I still heard the music, but it felt distant, like a soundtrack playing in the background of a movie.

I saw his eyes widen and his mouth fall open and his expression change from stoic to stunned.

Quinn Sullivan had lost his composure.

He looked completely astonished and it took my entire slow march down the aisle for him to recover.

I tried to imagine how he saw me: the strapless silk taffeta bodice, the cinched waist, the huge layered skirt with overlapping folds. The delicate wedding shawl felt as light as air, and the kid mohair fingering-weight yarn shone beneath the lights of the church.

I tried to imagine how he saw me, but I was also stunned by the sight of Quinn. He was in a custom cut tuxedo and looked like every woman’s ideal of the perfect man, a fantasy that Ian Fleming had encouraged by creating the character of James Bond as the sexiest man in the world—except that James Bond had nothing on Quinn Sullivan.

By the time I met him at the altar, he was smiling ruefully. He stared at me with narrowed eyes, like he’d just caught on to a grand deception that I’d orchestrated, and he was proud and impressed that I’d pulled it off.

Quinn stepped forward before I’d quite made it all the way to the front. He kept his gaze on me and tucked my hand in his elbow. He kept looking at me as we climbed the two steps to the altar, and he continued to hold my eyes as the officiant welcomed all our guests.

He leaned toward me at an opportune time and whispered, “Nice dress.”

I held his gaze and returned, “Wait till you see what’s underneath.”

If I hadn’t been so enraptured with Quinn and the wonderful enormity of the occasion, I would have noticed that Elizabeth and Fiona cried happy tears throughout the entire ceremony while holding hands. I would have noticed the looks of joy shared by Desmond and Katherine. I would have noticed Steven’s giant smile and Dan’s approving head nod.

But I didn’t notice, because Quinn’s eyes poured his being into mine during the readings, the short sermon, and when we exchanged our traditional vows. His gaze felt like a promise of our future and a celebration of our past. The only time he broke eye contact was when we were proclaimed husband and wife.

And the only reason it happened then was because he pulled me into his arms and kissed his bride.

***

“I’ll keep this short, because I know you’re all looking forward to the open bar.” Dan glared around the room.

A small but pleasant tittering of laughter erupted in the hall. I looked at the faces of Quinn’s extended family, his parents’ friends, my friends, Quinn’s friends, and stared in wonder at the amalgamation gathered.

We were married, and Dan was about to give his best man speech.

We’d survived couple photos—both the hired photographer’s and Donovan Charles’s fashion photographer, which ended up being the cost of borrowing the wedding dress—family photos, and wedding party photos.

We’d lived through our first dance as husband and wife, which happened to be one of the few things that Quinn had an opinion about. I realized he’d picked the song when the opening notes for The Cars’ “Just What I Needed” sounded over the speakers in the ballroom. I laughed so hard that Quinn had to pick me up twice.

Quinn enjoyed his dance with his mother almost as much as she did. I didn’t know who’d picked the song, but I felt like Nat King Cole’s version of “Paper Moon” was perfect.

When the time came for the father-daughter dance, I walked to where Desmond was standing with Katherine and asked him to dance. And so we danced. As the last bars to Ella Fitzgerald’s “Someone to Watch Over Me” drifted through the air, Desmond dipped me. It made me smile and it made me laugh because he did it so well. We hugged, and he whispered in my ear, “I’m proud of you, kiddo.”

I knew my smile was massive because my cheeks hurt when I said, “Thanks, Dad.”

This would likely be the only time so many of the people we loved would be gathered together in the same room. I felt a swelling of gratitude for Marie and Katherine, that they pulled this together and made it happen—and not just the lovely ferns, the impressive cake, the beautiful decorations, and the stunning centerpieces.

I was thankful for the people who’d come to show us that we were important to them, that they were invested in our happiness.

And now Dan was holding a microphone and squinting at Quinn. Quinn was squinting right back.