Marriage For One

That shut her up. She gave me another look and bit down on her lip as she grabbed my arm with her left hand too. After a few slow steps, she rested a bit more of her weight on me.

She was as stubborn as a mule. Another thing that made me like her more.

“How are your knees?” I asked, completely aware of how surly I sounded.

Another fleeting look at me. “They feel a little tight. I’m sure it’ll go back to normal in a few hours. We’re closer to the coffee shop than our apartment anyway.”

I gritted my teeth, glaring at the people walking past us. “Right.” After a few minutes of shuffling and resting and wincing, I couldn’t take it anymore. “Put your arm around my neck,” I ordered. When she hesitated, I sighed and did it myself.

“I’m shorter than you, so we can’t walk like that—Jack!”

“What?” I asked, grunting softly when I had her up in my arms.

“Have you lost your mind?”

I started walking at a normal pace, holding her tightly against my chest as she slid her other hand around my neck.

“Jack, you don’t have to carry me, I can walk. Put me down.”

“No. You can’t put weight on your left leg. You’re gonna make it worse.”

“I can. I’ve been walking with your help. Jack, I can.”

“With the speed we were going, you’d reach your coffee shop at noon. What’s the problem? I’m doing all the work here, and I thought you were in a hurry to get there.”

“Jack,” she growled, her eyes shooting daggers at me. I kept my eyes forward and continued walking. “Jack, I’m warning you, you’re not going to carry me all the way to the coffee shop.”

“I’m not? If you say so, I’m sure it must be true.”

“Everyone is staring at us,” she whispered.

“We’ve only passed two people.”

“And both of them were looking at us like we were crazy. I’m not gonna be in your arms while we’re crossing 5th Avenue with all those people around. Everyone will look at us. The traffic! And Madison Avenue!”

“You will.”

“I’m really regretting calling you right now.”

“I couldn’t tell.”

I was enjoying it too much.

When trying to push off of me so she could get down didn’t work, she gently slapped my shoulder with her injured hand and then winced.

I clenched my jaw so I wouldn’t smile. “Stop squirming. You’re not the only one who likes to get to work on time.”

“Fine, have it your way. You’ll put me down once we exit the park.” Since we were almost out of it anyway, a lot more people started to pass us, some of them snickering, some of them giving us disapproving looks. I ignored them, but Rose wasn’t exactly good at that.

“Hi,” she shouted to a stranger walking by and staring at her. “I just hurt my leg, that’s why he’s carrying me. He’s my husband. Everything is good.” The woman just shook her head and quickened her steps. “Jack,” she groaned, her voice muffled by her face being buried in my neck. “They think we’re crazy. I’ll never be able to walk through here again.”

I hiked her up and, with a surprisingly satisfying squeak, she held tighter on my neck. That was fun.

“If you don’t want them to think you’re crazy, I’d suggest stop shouting at them. And you aren’t going to walk through here again anyway, so stop complaining.”

She lifted her head off my chest. “What the hell are you talking about?”

“I’ll talk to Raymond. He’ll come earlier and take you across then he’ll come back and take me to work. It was stupid of you to walk through the park while it was barely light out. You’re lucky you didn’t break your leg or get mugged.”

I could feel her eyes on me, but I didn’t look at her.

“I have pepper spray in my bag. And I don’t need a driver. I’m not the kind of person who has a driver. No offense to Raymond—I like him, and he’s a nice guy—but I’m not like you.”

Finally, we made it out onto 5th, where there were a lot more people. “Thanks for pointing that out. I hadn’t noticed.”

“I’ve been taking care of myself all my life, Jack,” she said softly.

“I know and you’ve done an amazing job. Just because you can take care of yourself, you’re not supposed to let anyone else help you? I’m sorry for committing this atrocity against you.”

“You’re insane.”

“I think we covered that the first day we met. No need to rehash it all over again.”

“You’re also unbelievable, do you know that?” she asked softer.

“I can imagine,” I murmured, a little distracted. Standing next to a group of people, I waited for the light to change.

“He is my husband,” Rose announced to the group. “I fell.”

There were some snickers from the school girls on our left when I hiked her up again and Rose squeaked.