Marriage of Unconvenience

She grinned.

“Being the planner isn’t easy, is it?” she said, raising an eyebrow.

“No, it’s horrible, make it stop.” She burst out laughing and that made me laugh.

“But seriously, what is happening here because I need to know?” I said.

“Uh, what do you want to be happening here? Do you want to be together?”

“I thought I made that pretty clear last night.” We had both made that clear last night. No gray area there.

“So you’re going to be my... what? Girlfriend? Wife? Life partner?”

“Huh. Yeah. Technically you’re my wife, but... I’m not sure if we should dive right into being married without the dating step in between. But we should probably still call each other wife and so forth around our friends. Ansel is going to lose his fucking mind.”

“Yeah, I bet he is,” Cara said. “He sort of knew that I was questioning. That’s what we were talking about that day. I’m sorry I was so weird for so long. I just had no idea how to talk to you about this without telling you the other stuff.” It had been a lot to take in all at once, but I had adjusted, mostly because it was as if everything in my entire life suddenly made sense. A peace had descended over me that I had never known. As if something had been out of place and had suddenly clunked right where it was supposed to be.

It seemed silly to say that all of this had happened to put Cara and I together. I was pretty sure some higher power hadn’t arranged for my grandmother to die and leave me a bunch of money if I got married and then to make both Cara and I need said money at the same time after making us into best friends. There was no way.

Not that I wasn’t thrilled that all this had worked out so perfectly. Tied up in a neat bow. Of course that wasn’t how life worked, but at least this one thing had worked out for both of us. We’d have to figure everything else out on our own.

“I was paranoid that you hated me. Or that you wanted to stop living with me. That was why I asked you. I was so scared to lose you, Care. I’m still scared to lose you. It terrifies me.” The only thing that compared to losing Cara would be losing my parents.

“Let’s not think about that because I’m not going anywhere.” She held up her left hand, her ring sparkling there. I hadn’t taken mine off either.

“Agreed. But I have one question.”

“What’s that?” she asked, reaching for my hand. I clasped my fingers with hers.

“How do you date someone you’re already married to?”

“No idea, but I have the feeling we’re going to find out,” she said, kissing the back of my hand.

“SO, THIS IS OUR FIRST date,” I said, as I handed Cara her mint chocolate chip ice cream cone.

“Yeah, I guess it is,” she said licking her cone. I was instantly distracted from anything else but what her tongue was doing to that ice cream cone.

“You look like you fell over and hit your head,” she said, and I pretended as if I hadn’t just been gawking at her openly.

“I kind of feel that way. You be careful with that tongue of yours.” She grinned maliciously.

“Why, is it bothering you?” She stuck her tongue out and gave her cone a long lick.

“You are being obscene right now,” I hissed, looking around to make sure no one else had seen the display.

Cara cackled and did it again.

“If you don’t stop, I am going to... do something!” She gasped in shock.

“Oh, no, not something! Anything but something!” I glared at her.

“I am inches away from shoving this entire cone in your face, Cara Lynne. Provoke me at your own risk.” I shoved my cone at her just to watch her recoil a little.

“Haha, that’s what I thought,” I said, going back to my ice cream cone, which was now dripping down my arm.

“You are ridiculous,” Cara said in between licks. I was not going to stare at her tongue and remember how it felt licking the inside of my mouth. I was NOT.

“Yes, I am. And you’re the one who married me, so what does that say about you?” She rolled her eyes.

“That I am a lover of the ridiculous,” she said with a flourish of her hand.