Chapter 22
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Wow, what a perfectly normal family breakfast.
Kyran
I’m smiling. Just getting that out there, so everyone knows. I am smiling.
In the morning.
In front of my entire family.
Which has them all noticeably on some kind of edge.
Well, except for Crisis and Kaleb, who I suspect possess the rare ability to put two and two together.
Settling my wife into her seat beside me, I take my chair and beam at the marvelous spread laid out before us. Toast. Eggs. Bacon. Hash browns.
Why, there are the tools to make a whole entire sandwich here!
What a beautiful day.
I reach for a slice of toast, and my wife smacks my hand, hissing, “You are not about to do what I think you’re about to do.”
Ah, where are my manners? “Do you also want a breakfast sandwich, dearest?”
Heat sprays itself across her pretty cheeks. Her eyes flick toward our family, which is abnormally silent and watching us, then back to me. Shrinking, she nods.
I get four slices of toast and begin my assembly by mashing a few slices of avocado on top of two. “So,” I broach, conversationally, “what’s up?”
Viktor’s expression blackens as he rises from one head of the table. Looming above everything, he stalks to my back and slaps a yellow envelope down beside my place setting.
I glance at it.
At the capitals. At the bold.
THIS ENVELOPE CONTAINS: MARRIAGE CERTIFICATE
PLEASE DO NOT BEND.
A thrill shoots through me.
Beyond my beautiful wife, I hear Maelin whisper, “Mora, you’re glowing.”
Then Viktor stabs my marriage certificate, leans down against the back of my chair, and growls, “What, pray tell, is this?”
Kind as always, I say, “I thought authors could read.”
The wood of my chair creaks in his grasp. “You’re married?”
So he can read. Beaming, I echo, “I’m married.”
Awestruck, Maelin says, “When did you get married?”
Morana touches her fork, fiddles, blushes. “Oh. Uh…like two days ago?”
“This got here faster than I expected,” I muse, delighted. We were also able to move Morana in faster than I initially expected. What luck. What joy.
Viktor puts his whole entire hand atop my marriage certificate, meaning I can neither reach it nor begin the process of framing it.
I smile up at him. “Excuse me, brother dear.”
“You’re married?” he repeats.
“You didn’t tell me?” Maelin says.
Morana winces. “To be fair, I only just got around to telling myself it happened, like, last night.”
Last night.
Last night.
What a wonderful, glorious thing, last night.
I may no longer scorn nights if they are now to come laced in the promises of yestereve.
Wow. Last night. Who needs to worry about sleep when exhaustion and bliss carry you into it?
Who needs to fear nightmares when waking from one guides you into the heat of your wife’s arms?
Entranced, I behold my wife and forget that I have a very cross big brother breathing down my neck. I also forget that I’m in the middle of making my beautiful, flawless wife a sandwich.
Oops. Back to that.
I reach for the eggs.
From the other side of the table, Crisis says, “Everyone gets married before Viktor is my favorite gag. Kaleb, can you head to the courthouse with Crim before our double wedding? The wedding itself can be a ceremony, but you need to get married first.”
“Sweet pea—” Viktor protests.
“Technically, we were married, and now we’re divorced, and we’ll be married again,” Kaleb notes. “So we all have now, officially, gotten married before Viktor.”
I feel the muscle in Viktor’s forehead pop as I put the top on my mistress’s sandwich and set it lovingly on her plate.
I get another few eggs for my own sandwich. “While we’re talking about grand events as of late, Morana and I are planning to visit her parents from next Thursday through Sunday.”
“I’m still not done talking about—”
“Viktor,” Crisis says, cutting off my grumpy brother’s grumpy tirade. “Sit down.”
Huffing, he returns to his seat, and she pats his head, cooing, “Remember? We wouldn’t be together without Kyran’s help. Kyran, communication king, is allowed to be married before us. He did not do it to spite you. Unless he did. In which case, that is hilarious, and we should respect him for it.”
Grumbling, Viktor mutters, “I’m less upset he got married before us and more upset he—communication king—didn’t tell us about it until I’m getting his marriage certificate in the mail.”
I’m unsure when it was decided that I was a communication king. Prior to this morning, I mostly communicated in grumbles and grunts. I’ll say what I mean how I mean it, but by no means did I think I was creating an expectation of openness amongst my kin.
“You’re going to visit Mom and Dad?” Maelin asks, wide-eyed. “Um.” She glances at me. “Oh boy.”
“Yeah…” Morana blows out a breath, and some sort of twinship telepathy takes place before I get an inkling that these sisters believe meeting my wife’s parents—again—is going to be an ordeal of some kind.
“Good luck with that, Mora,” Maelin says.
“Thanks. I…really don’t know how I’m going to explain anything. I can’t express enough how this just…happened.”
“Just happened?” Lukas asks, a brow arched as Clara prepares his plate for him. “How do you just happen to get married?”
Morana looks at me. “How indeed.”
I demystify the situation: “It involves bribing neighbors and paying off a magistrate.”
“What?” Viktor interjects.
“You know something, brother dear?” I smile as my sandwich comes together. “You don’t need to worry about that. All that matters is that Morana and I are married now, everyone’s favorite couple officially together, woo.” I crunch a bite out of my sandwich.
“Congratulations, squirt,” Lukas says.
“Maelin and I were placing bets on it being a triple wedding in April,” Zakery notes.
Maelin squeaks. “No, we weren’t.”
Yeah, they totally were.
I swallow. “I wouldn’t have lasted till April. I have no idea how Viktor’s managing.”
“Poorly,” he grunts, gazing at Crisis in such a way that suggests he’s regularly tortured with want of her.
Ah, yes. I used to know the feeling, but no more. Now, I live in merriness and cheer.
See if having a wife and stable rest doesn’t alter my archetype completely. Just call us reverse grumpy/sunshine now. Judging by the pouting divot currently making a home beneath my lover’s lip, she maintains all her precious grumpiness. While I am smiling. Radiant.
She catches my eye, and her little frown softens until the divot settles. Then she is radiant, too.
Huh. Maybe boiling either of our characters down to merely grumpy or sunshine is asinine.
As she takes a bite of her sandwich, she rests her shoulder against my arm, and I find myself falling in love with her—all over again.