She heard the door’s hinges creak open, then creak back shut. She held her breath and counted her heartbeats, waiting, as heavy footfalls rang out from the tile floor, shattering the silence. The sound drew nearer. She could see a pair of black shoes, slick with polish and reflecting the fluorescent light that buzzed above them, and above those, the hems of the legs of pants she had picked out herself: a special order from a London shop she’d done a favor for once. She put her eye to the crack between the wall and the door and peered through, and she immediately wished she hadn’t. On the other side of the stall was the last man in the world that she wanted to see. “Y’know, Buck said you’d be in here”, he told her, eyes smiling in on her through the crack in the wall. “Your mom was convinced you’d be in the confessional or something, though. ‘My daughter knows more than to traipse around some bathroom wearing her damn wedding dress!’ Something like that.”

She snuffled and almost choked, trying to choke her emotions back. Mustn’t let him see her like this, lest he figure out what a basket case he was getting married to. She retreated from the door, backing up and slumping back down on the covered toilet. At least she had an eye for clean bathrooms. “Well, you may tell mother dearest that I’m not traipsing, I’m crying. It’s much more hygienic. And isn’t it bad luck for the groom to see the bride in her dress before the ceremony?”

She saw him shrug through the knife-width gap. “I think we’ve both done some bad mojo stuff. Isn’t it bad luck for the bride to panic and hold up her wedding for an hour?”

She wiped a tear from her eye with a single, practiced finger. She might be coming apart at the seams, but that was no reason to ruin her makeup. “I know. I’m sorry. The priest must be apocalyptic.”

She heard him laugh, a half-forced noise one makes when one wants to make themselves believe something is funnier than they know it to be. “You made a pun”, he explained. “It was funny.”

“That’s me. A real barrel of monkeys.”

He rested his arm on the door and leaned against it. “C’mon. Let me in, duchess. What’ll they say if someone were to walk in and see me in the women’s restroom? Think of the scandal.”

She said nothing; the only sounds for a long while were the buzzing of the light and the constant whirring hum that the ventilation fan on the roof made. Something was wrong with it, probably a broken blade. It didn’t sound quite right. She wasn’t entirely sure how she knew that it didn’t, but she did.

“Well, at least tell me what’s wrong.”

“You know what’s wrong”, she snapped. “I’m fucking scared.”
“Why?”

She sat back and clamped a hand to her mouth. She had thought the tears had ended, but his appearance had reignited a surge of emotions. Why did she feel like this, she wondered? He’d told her time and time again that he loved her. He was the father of her child. They’d been living together for the better part of three years, for God’s sake; they were practically married already. This was just a formality.

“It’s not... perfect”, she said finally, choosing her words with a careful voice. “When I was a girl, I had to raise myself. My father was playing football, and my mother had her charities. They loved me more than anything, and they the best they could, but I still grew up by myself. Then Sweetie came, and I had to be a mother for her, too. And then I went to college, and then I took over some of mom’s charities, and daddy’s post-football career, and then I had my fashion, always running from city to city, never having more than a few hours to unwind, going from lover to lover and never letting myself go or drop my walls because I was too busy.”

“And then you came along. God”, she ranted, tears flowing freely now, despite the hard edge her words had taken. “God, why couldn’t you have just been another body? You got me to slow down. You took care of me, let me act like a petulant brat and have my tantrums and moods. Sometimes you played along, sometimes you disciplined me. The point is, you made me feel, God, I don’t know. Like a little girl. And that scares me, more than anything. I never got the chance to be a kid, and now I actually have one. I love you, and I love our son, but you have no idea how scared I am. Of you, of him. I know you love me, don’t worry”, she cut him off, hearing his mouth open and the sounds that come when words won’t suffice start to spill out. “That’s not what I’m afraid of. I’m afraid I’m going to wake up one day and realize that I missed it. Missed everything. Missed our anniversary. Our son’s first girlfriend. Miss all the joy and heartbreak that I’ve grown up expecting from soaps and crappy Eighties movies and my parents’ photo albums. I’m just worried... I’m going to fail you.”

She put her head down, the tears streaming freely down her cheeks. She could only imagine what she looked like now. How could she hope to have a family if she couldn’t even control her emotions after all these years?

“Open the door.” There was none of the light coaxing in his voice that there had been before. He wasn’t asking her anymore. He was telling her that the door was already open, and she should act immediately to bring her reality in line with his. She complied, standing on shaky legs to walk to the door and slide the latch back. No sooner had she than he burst through it, rushing in like wind through a just-opened window to sweep her up in a single, warm embrace. She buried her face in his shoulder, balling her hands up into fists and squeezing the fabric of his jacket as tightly as she could. She wanted to scream, but all she could manage was the tiniest of squeaks. “Don’t you ever talk like that”, he said. “You’re the kindest, sweetest woman I’ve ever met. Don’t you talk like that.”

He tried to think of something clever to say, something to go down in history as one of the greatest lines ever, to be framed in the quote pantheon alongside “Love means never having to say you’re sorry” and “You had me at hello”. But as he wracked his brain, he realized he couldn’t think of a single word. And then he realized even if he could, he didn’t think he could even speak right now. So he contented himself with returning her furious hug.

Time slowed. She could no longer hear the fan with the broken blade buzzing above her head. All she could hear now was the persistent lub-dub of their hearts; hers in her throat, and his, ever calm, beating in his chest, just as sure and just as strong as ever.

They parted, and he held her by the shoulders, looking into her eyes. The sparklings of tears in the corners of her eyes had gone, but the damage was done: her makeup was in tatters, streaked and traced over with salty, drying runnels. He laughed. “God, you look like crap. Let’s get you cleaned up.”

She snorted and raised an eyebrow, then sniffled back an aftershock of emotion. “Well that’s a fine way to talk to your wife, you horrible man.” He led her to the sink, and as she looked into the mirror she quietly agreed with him. She did look like she’d been through the wringer.

He snatched a few paper towels and turned on the faucet. He held her head with one hand and began wiping her second face away. “You do know how long it took me to put that all on, yes?” she asked him, closing her eyes as the cleansing cloth wound its way towards her eyes. She was happy to have it off, and she was enjoying the attention he lavished upon her, but she couldn’t resist playing their game. After all, by her own admission, he made her feel like a little girl, and what little girl ever missed an opportunity to be snide?

“You don’t need it”, he said without emotion, too busy, too deep in his work to notice her attempt to bait him. In silence he worked, washing away layer upon layer of the stuff, working the water deep into her skin, vigorous, but never painful. He was as a man possessed, determined to remove every last trace of the stuff from her body. And after a time, he was satisfied.

He stood back, and she stared into the mirror. Looking back at her, she saw an old woman, standing next to a much younger man. And then he kissed her, and she forgot about the old woman.

“C’mon, duchess”, he nudged her toward the door. “Your public awaits. And I can think of at least one tiny fan out there who’s getting very cranky waiting for the leading lady to start her performance.”

They stepped out through the door and she was unsurprised to find the entire wedding standing about the door, waiting for her in a nervous hush. She found an embarrassed smile and waved. “I do apologize for the delay. I, ah... had to pee. Really bad.” She saw Buck lean over to her mother and whisper something into her ear. She couldn’t hear what he said, but she’d seen him do it enough that she could read his lips as he said it: “told you so”. Her mother broke out into a smile and slid her elbow into her father’s ribs, perhaps a little harder than strictly necessary. They did all of this without ever taking their eyes off of her, without dropping their smiles, full of pride.

The wedding was uneventful, if delayed, and apart from her son crying once (easily remedied by his grandmother’s finger, as nobody was able to find his binky), completely without interruption. So too was the reception. Sweetie caught the bouquet (though not without a fight), her father proved that for all his years playing sports he still couldn’t dance, and she had a joyous, tearful coming-together with her new mother-in-law, who took no end of delight in taunting her about the situation. In the end, though, they decided to just call each other sister. Cake was eaten, rice was thrown, wine was imbibed, and merry was made.

And then it was over. As the door to their house closed, she realized that life was still normal. And once they had peeled off her wedding dress and his tuxedo, so were they. Too exhausted to make love, they contented themselves to fall asleep in a pile on the bed. Her mother had agreed to take care of the baby for two weeks while they had their honeymoon, so they let themselves go, each focusing solely on how much they enjoyed the nearness of the other.

As they drifted off to sleep, she heard him mumble something. She mumbled something in return. Neither of them would ever understand what the other had said, nor would they remember what they had said, but understanding and remembering weren’t necessary. They both knew exactly what they meant: “I love you.”