Chapter 36
WANTED SOMETHING DIFFERENT
“I’m sorry, Mom,” Kenzie said. “I don’t know how people got your number. Just don’t answer it.”
This just blew her mind, the lengths people would go to to get a story.
She was a nobody, but a nobody marrying a somebody—or someone with connections to a big name—was obviously newsworthy.
As much as she wanted to spare her parents this, there wasn’t much she could do about it.
“Your father is upset. People are talking about us.”
“I can’t help it,” she said. “What do you want me to do? You’re the one who told people I got married. You started it.”
“Don’t give me that attitude, young lady. You’re the one who has to live with the consequences of your actions.”
“And I am,” she said. “No one is asking me how I feel. How Nelson feels. Or how we feel about each other. No one seems to care that we love each other.”
“Do you love him or the idea of him?” her mother asked.
Her fist flew around. She knew her mother meant well, but it didn’t make her feel any better to hear the harsh words.
“I love him. Not the idea of marriage. Or who I’m married to. But him as a person. I fell in love with him when I witnessed his character the day after we discovered what had happened. How he was there to support me. To not leave me stranded to deal with this alone. He kept coming back to me, Mom.”
“Because you didn’t want anyone to think you pursued him.”
“That’s right. I didn’t want anything that is being said, but that doesn’t seem to stop any of it.”
“People are more attracted to evil behaviors than righteous ones.”
She growled. “Mom, I don’t need another lecture. I’m married and I love my husband. If you feel the need to respond to anyone or say anything, use those words.”
“I don’t appreciate being asked how it feels to have my daughter married to such a wealthy family. It’s a shot against how we live,” her mother said.
Her shoulders drooped. Everyone had their pride.
“Mom. I’m sorry. I told you before that I wanted to help you both when I got on my feet. I’m going to do that, but it will be with my money, not Nelson’s. What he has is his.”
“That’s right,” her mother said. “We don’t want any of it.”
It wasn’t the time to fight with her mother about this.
“When Nelson gets home, we are going to talk. We’ll make sure that people stop bothering you. Or at least strangers. I can’t do anything about the people in town. They’d talk to you if I married someone from high school just the same and you know it.”
“Everyone is too nosy for their own good.”
“Call it evil,” she said sarcastically.
Her mother laughed. A sound she hadn’t expected. “I told your father that.”
“Good. Mom, I love you both. I’m sorry that what I’ve done is rubbing off on you guys. That you’re having to deal with it. I never wanted that to happen and didn’t think it would.”
“Kenzie, I know we are hard on you.”
“You are. It’s your way, but it doesn’t mean I love you any less or you love me any less. I just wanted something different.”
“And that’s not wrong. Maybe there was a time in my life I thought I wouldn’t have minded it. Or wouldn’t mind an easier life.”
She let out a breath. It was the first time her mother ever said that. Ever opened the window a tiny crack that maybe some changes could happen there too.
“Mom, we’ll get there for you too. No one needs to work that hard. Neither of you. When you two are more open minded about things and stuff settles down, I’ve got a few ideas.”
Her parents might not like that, but it was actually ideal for farmland that wasn’t good for much farming anymore.
“Focus on you now,” her mother said. “Don’t let anything distract you from the bar in a few weeks.”
“I’m trying not to let it,” she said.
She hung up with her mother and turned the music on and went back to studying. She needed something to take her mind off of her name being dragged down not just through the mud, but wrung out and then thrown back into the grunge again.
When the door to the kitchen opened an hour later, she was surprised to see Nelson walk in.
“What are you doing home?”
“We need to talk.”
“Great. I don’t even want to know what is being said now. But you should know that my parents are getting calls from strangers now too.”
“Jesus,” he said. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because I didn’t know until an hour ago and I’m not going to call you every time I hear something new. What’s that?”
He had a bag in his hand.
He put it down and pulled a ring box out. “A new wedding band. There is no reason we both can’t wear one now. The news is out and I’m not hiding it. Are you?”
“No,” she said. He flipped the lid and she shouldn’t have been shocked by what she saw. “Nelson! I can’t wear that.”
“You can and you will,” he said, laughing and grabbing her hand. “It’s just a band.”
“A band with four diamonds on it.”
“They are just half a carat each. It’s the only band they had in your size that I liked. If I had more time, it would have been bigger.”
She looked down at the two carats’ worth of diamonds on her hand. Small by Carlisle standards, but massive by Raye standards.
“It even feels heavy.”
“Will you stop,” he said.
“Where is yours?” she asked. “If I’m going to wear one, so are you. Can we go buy one?”
“I hope you don’t mind, but I did. I liked this.”
He opened another box and pulled out the thick black band and slipped it on. It fit his personality.
“I like it too.”
He took his phone out. “Give me your hand.”
She did, he put it in his, held them together so that their rings were showing, then snapped the picture.
“Can I see it?”
“You can see it on social media,” he said.
She watched as he typed something, then turned the phone around.
There was a post of their hands with the rings, then a big heart above it saying, “My Love.”
Her bottom lip trembled. “That’s nice.”
“This is part of us talking. We can’t sit back and say nothing. I’m not going to continue to let things be said about you. I’m just not. Our marriage was unconventional. I get it. It’s a fact we can’t hide.”
“No.”
“But we shouldn’t hide our love either.”
“I don’t want to,” she said.
“Good. Haters are going to hate. Lovers are going to love. We can be the better people and love.”
She put her arms around his neck. “I like loving, but hate what is being said about you and your family.”
“We can weather it and have for years. We will for many more years. This is more about you. I put a lot of thought into this. It wouldn’t have mattered who I met and married, there’d be talk about it. It’s happened to all my siblings.”
“All of them?”
She hadn’t done much research to even know that.
“Yes. West got the most press. Braylon got some. Laken got a big amount, but not in a horrible way. It had more to do with Jamie. Foster has always kept to himself so not much said there. Elias being down south, we didn’t hear as much, but there were things touched on.
Rowan is dating Saylor, but it’s getting serious.
They’ve had a few bumps with people in his circle and her family.
It happens. Talia got pregnant within a month of meeting Jace. ”
“I saw that funny article,” she said.
More like Aileen told her. That they’d made a joke out of Talia following in her mother’s footsteps.
When people laughed at themselves, others seemed to shut up.
She needed to remember that herself.
“I didn’t have the best reputation of my siblings. All my fault. I know it. But I realized today that I have earned their respect. Even if I need their help, they accepted me and the changes I’ve made, how I’ve grown up.”
“I see it,” she said.
Kenzie felt she got a touch of that with her mother today. Not as much as she wanted, but maybe the start of something.
“This is how I want to handle our marriage and what is happening. I’m not saying words right now. I want to post pictures. This is the second one that’s going up now.”
He turned his phone to her, showing the picture of the two of them together at her law school graduation, holding her diploma in front of her.
She wasn’t some poor farmer’s daughter.
She was going to make something of herself.
Something she’d been doing long before Nelson came into her life.
“That’s a nice picture.”
“Are you good with me posting it?”
She nodded. “Yeah. I shouldn’t feel the need to prove myself to anyone.”
“No. Not even to me. You’re everything I always wanted and never knew until I woke up next to you in a strange hotel room.”
She laughed. “You’re everything I never knew I could love and didn’t think was in reach, but I’m so glad you’re the one who stumbled in and married me in my drunken stupor.”
“Speaking of drunken stupors, I’ve got one more picture that is going to be posted,” he said.
“I’m not sure I like the look on your face,” she said.
He was scrolling through his phone and then turned it around for her to see one of their wedding pictures.
You couldn’t see much of her ugly gown or his tuxedo T-shirt. What you saw was them kissing below a sign that said, “Luv’ng Our Way.”
She kissed him just like that picture, knowing that it was true. They were going to love their way and no one could take it away from them.