26. Abbot #2
“Right in here.” She leads them to a small office full of tidy stacks of paper. There are only two chairs, so Ned lifts Peggy onto his lap, even though she’s grown so tall her feet hang barely above the ground. “Congratulations to you all. And you’re getting married here?”
Abbot touches Ned’s arm. “Did you get my text?”
Ned shifts Peggy to look at her face. “Was there a text from Abbot?”
“Yeah,” she says.
“And?” Ned asks her.
“Pat wants to officiate,” Abbot says. “At the cafe. He said he’d get ordained online, if that’s alright.”
“Just fine by us, as long as he has the proper license,” the woman says.
“Great,” Ned says. “Sounds good.”
Does it? Abbot tries to study him, but the woman is holding out pieces of paper.
“In that case, all you need to do is fill this out for me, and I’ll take your IDs and fill out the marriage certificate.”
“I have this, too.” Ned pulls out an envelope. “I didn’t know what page you needed.”
It’s from a law firm Abbot doesn’t recognize, a series of papers inside that she flips through. Abbot takes a pen from the holder on her desk, focusing on the form in front of him.
At the first line, he hesitates. Groom, Bride, Spouse are the options.
Does it matter, as long as he doesn’t select Bride?
He takes a breath, checks Groom, and quickly fills in today’s date.
He adds his name, writes Geneva, Switzerland for where he was born, hoping that won’t cause any issues.
He has his US passport at his house, if she asks to see it.
His birthday, his age, his father’s name—and his mother’s.
He pauses with the pen hovering over the page, like now, finally, Ned will realize what they’re doing. Who Abbot is.
Beside him, Ned kisses the side of Peggy’s head and catches Abbot’s eye. “Okay?”
Abbot jerks his chin in a nod. Ned wanted him to talk, and he did, and Ned is still here with him. Marrying him.
Quickly, he writes his mother’s name and his own address, then passes the form to Ned.
It takes him longer, reaching for a paper on the desk. “What’s the date of dissolution on there?” he asks.
She reads it to him, and Peggy watches Ned write that down.
“We’re not changing any names, right?” Ned flips back to Abbot’s sheet, where he’d left Proposed New Name After this Marriage blank and filled in his social security number.
It’s more statement than question, so Abbot shakes his head. “I hadn’t thought to.”
Ned points at the form, the side of his mouth curving up. “And we’re not first cousins?”
“I suppose it would be a rather interesting meeting of my father and your parents today, if we were.”
“We don’t get many of those, thankfully.” The clerk gathers the form, signs the bottom, and presses the paper into her notary stamp. “I’ll be right back with the certificate.”
Peggy squirms on Ned’s lap. “I have to go to the bathroom.”
“Can you wait a minute?” Ned asks.
“Yes,” she says and then shifts again. “No.”
“Alright.” Ned stands up. “Let’s go find one.”
Abbot sits alone in the office, waiting. There’s a view of a parking lot outside the window, the cars encrusted in salt amid piles of dirty snow.
It’s his wedding day. Their wedding day. They’re marrying each other today. By tonight, they’ll be married, and tomorrow too, and the day after and the day after that. He touches the pane of glass and his finger leaves a small mark.
“Cold feet?” the clerk asks when she comes back to find Abbot sitting alone.
Abbot jerks around to look at her.
“I’m kidding. I just saw him in the hall and I got his John Hancock. You can sign here, and then you’re all set.”
The marriage certificate is a thick, long sheet of paper, with the seal of the State of Maine on it, and Ned’s scrawled signature at the bottom. Abbot adds his next to it.
The clerk carefully folds the paper, tucks it into an envelope, and hands it over. “That’s valid for ninety days,” she says. “Once the ceremony is performed, your officiant has seven days to bring it back here.”
“He’ll have it back on Monday,” Abbot says.
“We’ll take care of it then, in that case. And again, congratulations.”
Abbot murmurs a thanks and backs out of the office. The waiting room is empty, but he finds Ned in the hallway outside the women’s bathroom.
“Got it?” Ned asks and Abbot holds up the envelope. “Great.”
“Yes. Great,” Abbot says. It is. They got here in time, and they’ll have this filled out as soon as they make it to Pat, and then—
And then it’ll be done. They’ll be married.
Abbot wants to move toward Ned, meet him in a kiss, ask if he’s really very sure.
But Ned leans toward the bathroom door, listening, then taps on it. “You all set, hon?”
“I can’t reach the soap!” Peggy yells back.
Ned gingerly pushes into the room. There must not be anyone else in there, because he goes in and emerges a minute later with Peggy. “Ready?” Ned asks.
“Yes. Do you need a ride to your car?”
“You don’t have a booster seat,” Ned says. “We’ll walk.”
Abbot could go get their car and bring it here, save them being out in the chill. He could have also gotten a booster seat. Should have. He’s had a year to do it and never even thought to.
He’ll get one soon. This weekend even, or next week. Have it in his car and ready for Peggy, like it ought to have been already. “Ned,” he tries.
I didn’t visit my mother in the hospital, he told Ned, whose answer had been to hold him all night.
How? Abbot still wonders, but it’s Ned. Perhaps, in the end, he shouldn’t have been surprised at all.
“We’re doing this,” Abbot says. It’s less of a question than it might be.
“Sure as hell are,” Ned says.
“You’re certain?”
“Do you trust me?”
“Yes,” Abbot says and it’s such a simple, easy answer. “You really want to marry me?”
“Hell yeah I do.”
Can Abbot really trust that? Yes. Yes, he can.
“You’re not supposed to swear,” Peggy says but Ned just lifts her up to his hip.
“What’d’ya say, Pega-saurus. We’ve got a party to get to, don’t we?”
And with that, Abbot follows them down the sidewalk, off to his wedding.