Don't Kiss the Bride: An Age Gap, Marriage of Convenience Romance

by Carian Cole

  “So? Who gives a fuck?”

  My cell phone buzzes in my pocket and I pull it out to see a text message from Skylar. It’s a picture of Cassie and Gus all snuggled up together on the couch.

  Skylar: OMG look how cute they are. They love each other!

  Smiling, I type back a quick reply.

  Me: Very cute. How’s the men in kilts?

  Skylar: Sexy. How’s pool? Did you get all the balls in the right holes? ;-)

  Me: LOL. I always do :-)~

  “Who’s that?” Kyle asks, nodding toward my phone.

  “It’s her.”

  “The wife?”

  Wife. It sounds so fuckin’ strange.

  “Yup.”

  His eyes narrow as I shove the phone back in my pocket. “You like her, don’t you?”

  “Of course I like her.”

  “No, I mean you’re into her. I can tell. You never smile like that.”

  Shit. Is it really that obvious?

  “I always fuckin’ smile,” I say defensively. “And she’s just a friend.”

  “Can I meet her?”

  “I don’t think she’s ready for you,” I say. “Maybe someday.”

  Something brushes against my shoulder and I look up to see Jolie passing our table on her way to the restrooms. Kyle bends down and picks a small piece of a white napkin off the floor. He studies it then tosses it across the table at me. “It’s her phone number.”

  “Her who?”

  “The redhead. I think she tried to drop it on the table but her drunk ass missed.”

  I snort and throw it back at him. “You keep it. I’m not interested.”

  He folds it up and stuffs it in his wallet. “I’m going to. I’ll get some fuckin’ fake tattoos. She’ll be all over me like flies on shit.”

  Yawning, I stretch my arms and crack my neck. “I should go. My back’s killin’ me.”

  “Go?” he repeats, leaning his arms on the table. “It’s still early. Let’s have a few shots and get some girls over here and have a belated bachelor party.”

  Standing, I pull on my leather jacket and straighten the collar. “Two drinks is my limit now. You gonna be okay to get home? I can give you a lift.”

  “I’m not that drunk. I’ll be fine.”

  He’s less wasted than he usually is. The crowd has thinned out and the college party seems to have moved on to a more exciting venue. I’m sure once I leave Kyle will get bored and go home.

  I squeeze his shoulder. “I’ll see ya Monday morning. Don’t be hungover.”

  “This is your idea of late?” Skylar says, glancing at the clock on the living room wall when I get home. “It’s barely midnight.”

  “I think riding in the heat all day made me tired.”

  Her eyes fixate on me. “What’s on your face?”

  “Where?”

  “On your cheek.”

  I reach up and brush off the side of my face.

  “The other side,” she says, narrowing her eyes like an eagle. “Is that lipstick?”

  Cringing, I wipe my hand across the other side of my face. “Yeah, some chick kissed me.”

  She squints at me curiously. “A girl just walked up to you and put her lips on you?”

  “Basically, yeah.”

  She scratches her head. “Does that happen often?”

  I flash her a smirk. “Not often enough.”

  “It’s a tacky shade. No wonder you came home,” she teases. “You want to watch some TV with me?”

  “Are you still watching Highlander?”

  “Outlander. It’s soo tragically romantic and good. They’re kind of in an arranged marriage, too.”

  I hope the show’s not giving her crazy ideas. Our story isn’t going to end tragically good, or romantic. It’s just going to end—simply and anticlimactically.

  She’ll go her way.

  I’ll go mine.

  Simple.

  I try to ignore the fact that if it were simple, I wouldn’t have turned down sex with a hot chick because I couldn’t stop thinking about my eighteen-year-old fake wife.

  Not good.

  Not good at all.

  “I think I’m just gonna head to bed,” I answer.

  Disappointment flashes across her face and disappears just as fast. “Okay. Goodnight, Lucky.”

  “’Night.”

  “Watch out for any random kisses on the way upstairs,” she jokes.

  The first thing I do when I get to my room is scrub the hell out of my face.

  Chapter 19

  Skylar

  I’m doing Pilates in my room when my phone buzzes with a text.

  Jude: Can you come down to the basement?

  Me: That’s not at all creepy, said no one ever.

  Jude: Just come down here. Wear shoes with rubber soles.

  Me: Still creepy.

  Jude: Stop being a bad wife ;-)

  Laughing at his little joke, I roll up my Pilates mat, slip on my sneakers and head downstairs.

  The basement is unfinished and musty, with a cold concrete floor. I rarely come down here unless I need something out of the big wooden pantry or need to do laundry. Jude stores his tools down here, and lots of old boxes and furniture. One corner is set up as a gym, which he uses several times a week.

  My sneakers squeak as I make my way toward him at the far end of the cellar, and I realize the floor is wet. By the time I reach him, we’re standing in about two inches of water. He’s frantically moving cardboard boxes off the floor, piling them up on an old workbench and on stacked wooden pallets.

  “Yikes. What’s going on?” I ask.

  “The sump pump broke,” he replies, not looking at me.

  “What’s a sump pump?”

  “It’s like a vacuum that keeps the basement from flooding when it rains a lot.”

  “Oh,” I say, looking at the rising water on the floor. This can’t be good.

  “Help me move this stuff. I can’t let it get ruined. Try to move the lighter ones, if you can.”

  Quickly, I grab an old dusty box that has Erin written on it in black marker, and move it to the other side of the room where it’s still dry.

  I carry two more Erin boxes, then help him push an old filing cabinet and a desk out of the water.

  “Thanks,” he says, wiping the back of his hand across his forehead. His long hair is sticking to his sweaty face.

  “You’re welcome,” I reply. “Who’s Erin? A former wife?” I counted six boxes with her name on them, and he was obviously in a rush to move those first.

  Catching his breath, he leans back against the old desk. “My little sister.”

  “Oh. She used to live here, in my room?”

  “Yeah.”

  I wonder why Erin didn’t take her stuff with her when she moved out.

  “How old is she?” I ask curiously.

  He lifts the hem of his T-shirt and wipes his face with it, putting his abs on full display.

  Holy moly.

  My mouth has suddenly gone dryer than the Sahara. Swallowing, I drag my eyes from his chiseled eight-pack.

  “Hopefully, she’s twenty-six,” he says.

  “Hopefully?”

  “It’s a long, long story, Sparkles. I gotta run to the hardware store, get a new sump pump, and clean this mess up with the shop vac. My entire Saturday is fucked.”

  “I could go with you,” I suggest tentatively. “You could tell me about her on the drive. I’ll help you when we get back.”

  His attention shifts down to the growing puddle on the floor. I wonder if I’ve overstepped our roommate line in some way. We’ve been married four weeks today, and we’ve been pretty much keeping our distance from each other, except for dinner and a television show together.

  “Or I could start shop-vacking the water while you’re gone,” I say, trying to fill the silence. “I’m not going to let you do all this by yourself. I live here, too.”

  He finally lifts his gaze. The thin lines around h
is eyes are deeper. His eyes a little red-rimmed with exhaustion and defeat.

  “You can come, if you want,” he says.

  Silence sits between us for the first few minutes of the drive to the hardware store. I think back to the first day we met when he gave me a ride home.

  I had no idea he’d change my entire life.

  I’m just about to bring that up when he starts to talk in a low, haunting, voice, “Erin was my younger sister.” He tells me all about how she simply disappeared one day. How he searched for her for weeks and how the police had finally assumed she was either a runaway, or dead.

  Horrified, I listen. Erin was only sixteen. Two years younger than me. Vanished, without a trace or a clue other than a strange text message. Jude’s voice cracks with emotion as he talks about her, and it’s heartbreaking. He believes she’s dead because she wasn’t the type to run away. They were close—she’d never leave him without saying good-bye or being in touch, especially after all this time. The story doesn’t end there, though. He goes on to tell me about his mother and her fight with cancer, her recovery, and the way she moved out—leaving him with a house full of memories and little more than the occasional phone call and a few birthday and holiday cards since. I knew Jude had a bad time with drugs and alcohol when he was younger, but I didn’t realize it had anything to do with everything he just told me. It shifted my idea of his substance abuse from something reckless and rebellious to the thing that numbed his pain.

  I reach across the truck and put my hand over his. “I’m so sorry,” I say, my own voice strained. “It’s just… horrible.”

  I can’t believe a young girl could disappear like that. Where did she go? What happened to her? The unknowing and lack of closure would drive me insane. My dad basically disappeared from my life, but I know he’s somewhere living a new life—just without me. But with a situation like Jude’s, I’d need answers. I can’t imagine how he feels.

  Jude nods, and spreads his fingers apart, inviting mine to interlock with his. The way he squeezes my thin fingers between his sends a cozy warmth through my limbs. It’s that subtle, unspoken connection—the hand hug.

  We stay that way—hands locked together—until we get to the hardware store. While we’re shopping, I can’t stop thinking about his missing sister and the way my chest hurt hearing the pain in his voice. I like thinking that holding my hand was comforting to him. When I first met him, I wouldn’t have pegged him as the affectionate, vulnerable type, but I’m slowly seeing that under his rough exterior, hides a totally different animal.

  It takes us hours to dry up the basement. Using the shop vac to suck up the water is oddly satisfying, though. Jude has been in a state of frustration, venting about old houses and the dangers of mold spores.

  “I’m going to mop with a little bleach,” he says when we’ve dried up all the water. “Why don’t you go upstairs? The smell will give you a headache.”

  “What about you?” I ask.

  “I already have a headache. I have a mask to wear, it’s not a big deal.”

  “If you’re sure?”

  He gives me a tired grin. “I’m sure. You were a big help. I’ll be up in a bit.”

  Reluctantly, I go upstairs to feed the pets and take a hot shower. I’ve felt sweaty and sticky all day, and my feet have been wet and cold for hours. Wrapped in a soft terry-cloth robe, I sit on the bed and scrub at my hair with a towel. My stomach growls, reminding me I didn’t eat today—something I’m still struggling with.

  Earlier, Jude stopped at a fast-food restaurant on the way back from the hardware store, and I froze up when it was time to order. I wanted a roll. All the pictures of food on the glowing menu in the drive-through overwhelmed and nauseated me. So much stuff oozing on burgers and salads. A row of cars accumulated behind us, pressuring me to decide fast, with no time for me to analyze ingredients.

  Jude was frustrated and rightfully so. He was having a shitty day and was stressing about the house. He took a chance and ordered me French fries, but they were soggy and felt icky on my tongue. I gagged and spit it out, then refused his offer of half his hamburger bun. Because I wanted him to enjoy his entire burger and not ruin it by giving part of it to me.

  He actually offered to give me the top of his burger bun, just so I’d eat. How sweet is that? And now I feel like an epic bitch because I said no. He probably thinks I’m an ungrateful brat.

  Today was what I call a bad food day. I note this in my journal app so I can discuss it with my therapist and dietician this coming week.

  “Hey.”

  His voice startles me, and I almost drop my phone when I look up at my doorway. He’s holding a plate of cinnamon toast in his hand with that damn grin on his face.

  Toast is still bread, but it’s what I think of as enhanced bread.

  “I thought you might want something,” he says, which is his polite way of saying you should eat.

  He tries. He really does.

  “Lucky… you don’t have to feed me,” I say, taking the plate from him.

  “You worked your butt off today helping me.”

  “I live here. I should help when shit breaks. You don’t have to thank me or make me dinner.”

  “It’s toast, not surf n’ turf.”

  I take a bite and chew slowly. He continues to linger in my doorway. He never comes all the way inside unless he asks first, or if I tell him to. I sneeze and rub my nose. “Damn. I can smell the bleach on you. You should change or shower and clear your head so you don’t get sick.”

  “Yeah, I’m gonna go clean up.” He rubs his hands together. “It’s only eight o’clock; you want to Netflix and chill after I shower?”

  I choke on my toast. “Um, I don’t think that means what you think it means.”

  His face goes blank with confusion. “What? Watch a movie and unwind after a shitastic day?”

  “That sounds great, but that’s not what Netflix and chill means.”

  “Care to enlighten me?”

  I lick butter off my fingertips. “It’s basically slang for hang out and fuck.”

  He pales. “Seriously?”

  “Yup.”

  He holds his hands up defensively. “I just want to watch a movie. No side of fucking involved.”

  A mild tinge of disappointment tugs my mouth into a frown that I quickly try to cover up by taking another bite of toast. How does he do this to me? I really just want us to be friends, but somehow, I keep tipping over into this weird, unfamiliar place of stomach butterflies, awkward conversations, and racing heartbeats.

  “Don’t worry,” I say. “I didn’t think you were trying to hook up with me.”

  “Good. If I was, I wouldn’t be lame enough to lure you in with a movie.”

  I blink at him.

  “Not that I’d be trying to lure you at all,” he says quickly. “Or hooking up with you.”

  “Um, thanks?”

  “Wait, only because I wouldn’t be into you like that.”

  “You want a shovel, Lucky? You’re digging yourself pretty deep.”

  “I’m just saying I wouldn’t do that. I mean, you’re pretty, but—”

  “You’re being a really bad husband,” I interrupt, using our little inside joke. I can’t remember how or when we started teasing each other about being a bad spouse, but at times like this, it breaks the awkwardness.

  I smile at him as he shoves his hand through his messy hair. “I’ll be in the living room in about an hour. If you want to watch a movie and impress me with your ability to not eat hot, buttery popcorn, that’d be great.”

  After he leaves, I pick up my cell phone and text Megan.

  Me: Change of plans, I can’t hang out tonight.

  Megan: But Carson was going to stop by. I wanted you to hang with him.

  Me: I’m sorry. I’m not feeling great. Maybe another time?

  Megan: Sure! Feel better! Xo

  Netflixing and not-chilling with Jude sounds way more fun than enduring a not-so-ra
ndom setup. Anyway, I’m married now. Should I really be dating? Isn’t that bad karma, even if it’s not a real marriage?

  Chapter 20

  Jude

  I’ve just settled on the couch with a bowl of fresh popcorn in my lap and the dog at my feet when Skylar joins me, wearing a white sweatshirt and fleece footie pants with peace signs printed on them.

  Laughing, I shake my head and shovel popcorn into my mouth.

  “Don’t you laugh at my pants,” she says, sitting in her usual place—the recliner a few feet away from the couch. “My feet were freezing from standing in all that water.”

  “Your outfits never disappoint.”

  “You’re just jealous because my feet are all warm and cozy.”

  “Not a lie,” I say.

  “Did you pick a movie yet?” she asks, twisting her hair up into a messy ponytail and tying it with the white band she had around her wrist.

  “I was waiting to see if you were coming down.”

  “I felt like I had to after your badly misplaced pick-up line.”

  I grab the remote and bring the Netflix movie menu up on the screen. “Obviously, I haven’t tried to pick up a chick in a while.”

  “Obviously,” she repeats. “Speaking of, Megan was trying to set me up with some dude named Carson tonight. She described him as odd. I bailed out of that fast.”

  “Why? It’s Saturday night, you should be out having fun.”

  “Nah. Having awkward convos with some guy with a last name for a first name who’s probably just going to try to get me drunk and have sex with him isn’t my idea of fun.”

  I stifle a laugh. I was that dude when I was seventeen. “What’s your idea of fun, then?”