Epilogue One
Three years later…
“How was work?” Peter asks as he opens the door for me, an ice cold glass of lemonade in his hand. Knowing it’s for me, I take it, drink half, then kiss him. “Even sweeter than usual,” he says before stealing another.
“Busy.”
“You love it.”
“Not quite as much as I do you, but yes.” We’re so sappy that his team has started referring to us as Poplar and Birch. Yeah. Trees. To which Peter insisted they leave us alone or we’d branch off. That started a whole conversation using puns and is now one of my greatest memories.
Along with it, though nowhere near as cherished as my wedding day, is getting offered my current position.
After the debacle that Mrs. Green attempted, Peter had insisted on defending me. Seeing as I didn’t believe I’d done anything wrong; I’d tried to talk him out of it, but he insisted. He knew how important my career is to me. That it’s more than just a job. Peter gets it because it’s the same with him.
He scheduled a meeting with the powers that be and proceeded to tell them it was irresponsible to let one person have so much say. That their money shouldn’t be able to buy that autonomy. Yes, they had a right to their opinion, just as everyone else does. But if having that kind of power is what matters most to them, then their funding comes with a price that’s too high to pay because it costs them people that truly care about their patients.
Peter had then gone on to explain that we’d gotten engaged and rhetorically questioned them how many other instances could have worked out just as positively had the couple been given the opportunity to do so.
While I don’t know if any of it made a difference, I do know it made them think about what he said and maybe that would have to be enough.
It didn’t hurt that shortly after that visit it came to light that Mrs. Green had been seeing a married man. And I don’t mean her husband.
So, yeah. Perhaps she felt guilty about what she was doing and was casting aspersions on others to appease it.
Who knows and who cares.
I don’t want people to judge me, so why would I judge them?
A month after Peter proposed, we got married. At first, we’d discussed delaying our nuptials, figuring we could wait, get better acquainted before taking that step. Then we decided we didn’t want to.
We knew what we wanted and that was each other.
Eventually, that will include children. Something we both hope to have. The how doesn’t matter, only the outcome does.
In the years since we’ve met, Carter and Hazel have added to their family, having their first child, Johnny, a few months prior. While Marcus and Skye have expanded theirs as have Tyler and Khary.
We have thoroughly enjoyed being Uncle Peter and Auntie Bella, as the kids prefer to call me. The shortened version wasn’t intentional, but it was a struggle to get all the syllables out in the beginning for one of the kids. When they stopped at Bella, I let it ride, finding it adorable. Now they all do it and I can’t get enough of it.
“I missed you,” he says, stealing yet another kiss. I know he’s not just referring to me being gone for eight hours, but the past few months during a deployment. Thankfully, this one wasn’t as extensive as others have been, but even a day is too long.
“I bet I missed you more,” I tease, knowing it’ll rile him up. When he first gets home, we spend as much time as possible making up for all the togetherness we lost. As he just returned two days prior, we’re still in the midst of that period.
Lucky me.
And I am, over and over that night and the next few as he repeatedly proves it.