by Marci Fawn
63
Faith
My body is sore in ways I didn’t know it could be. River isn’t gentle, not always. Only sometimes, actually – and I love that about him. My hand goes to my throat and I rub it, the in-between of my thighs going slick as I remember exactly why it’s so sore.
We’re still not living together, technically, although one of us is over at the other’s house all the time. It’s almost like we have two houses; I’m not sure how to feel about that, but I know I shouldn’t be imagining River squeezing my throat at the dinner table. Dawn is still in bed. I’ll need to wake her up soon for breakfast – at my house today.
I smile, but that’s nothing noteworthy. I’m always smiling. River makes it impossible not to. Dawn’s place it still set from where she’d been sitting there earlier, when she woke up in her excitement too early. I look at the time – that was maybe half an hour ago, and I still haven’t gotten up. He should be here soon.
Soon.
I’m already rising from my seat when I hear the knock on the door. I go to tell River that he doesn’t need permission to go in his own house – even though this one is mine… It might as well be is – but I look and see that he’s standing in the open door, his hand knocking on the frame. He doesn’t need to ask for permission. He’s already in.
But he does anyway.
“Can I come in?” He has a sloppy smirk on his face and it makes my heart flutter.
“You don’t need to ask permission,” I say back to him. I’ve been waiting for him all morning. “I thought you were all excited.”
“I could take that one of two ways,” he says, his eyes roaming my body before he checks around the room to make sure our daughter isn’t here. I laugh. River’s not always a gentleman, but… He sure does have manners when it comes to being around her. I love that about him.
But… Still. I try to turn my face stony and hope he won’t see the twinkle in my eyes at the statement he’s just made.
“You know what I meant. You’ve been begging me to let you cook for us for ages,” I cross my hands over my arms. He does the same. I’m about to try to imitate his eyebrow raise when he does it first, his brows both starting to waggle as I fake anger. “You’re the worst!”
“You love me,” he comes to me, holding me, wrapping me in his arms. “So, how about breakfast?”
“Let me wake up Dawn,” I whisper back against his lips.
He just grins. “I’ll come with you.”
So we both wake her up. And then we make breakfast together, all of us, even though River does most of the work and Dawn tries to take credit for all of it. We finally sit down at the table to a breakfast of eggs, pancakes, berries, and…
“Bacon!” River almost moans and I roll my eyes at him. “Pass the syrup.”
Dawn tries to, her short arm reaching across the table to pass him the dish we’ve left it in. She makes it almost half of the way there. Luckily, River’s tall enough to reach it. He takes the syrup and douses his bacon in it, and both my daughter and me cringe.
“Don’t knock it ‘til you try it,” he shrugs, taking a huge bite of his monstrosity.
“That’s horrible,” Dawn says. She struggles sounding out the word, trying to say it the way I do when I’m judging River for his antics – jokingly.
“You sound like your mother,” River laughs, still eating.
“She should,” I say, making a hand motion for the syrup as River passes it to me. I want to try it after all. “She learned the word from me.”
“Whatever,” he grumbles, grinning over at Dawn. “So, Sunrise,” he grabs a pancake and puts another on her plate, even though she’s only gotten through two of them. “Have I ever told you that you have grandparents down in Florida?”
“No, but I knew that,” Dawn grins.
“And how’s that?” He seems genuinely curious.
“Someone doesn’t remember what they put in her July fourth video,” I tease him. He hits my thigh with his under the table, and we all giggle, happy together as Dawn proclaims she knows all the words to the videos by heart.
And over breakfast, I swear I almost see River cry.
Somehow he convinced me to come watch another of his fights. This might be the first one I’ve been to, if you don’t count the one where I walked in looking for him and found him a mess. He says it doesn’t count. And we don’t talk about it.
We say everything we can think of before the match, but River tells us we don’t have to worry. Dawn isn’t concerned, and she tells everyone that. She also tells everyone she sees that he’s her daddy, and I smile at how proud she is – even though it’s a little embarrassing.
We’re in the front row when she turns to a girl beside us. She points to River, saying, “I gave him a flower for good luck”, and everyone knows. There’s white petals on the way to the ring. Some people think it’s hilarious. Most would probably think a boxer carrying a flower was some sort of softie who was going to get his butt kicked – I don’t use the phrases River does. It feels awkward to think about – but River is tough. Resilient. I’ve always admired that about him. The girl besides Dawn smiles at her and squeals in glee, asking her name.
“Dawn!” she says, high-pitched, squeaky, and happy. “What’s yours?”
“Elizabeth,” the girl says. I look over at her; she looks like she’s seen too much to be the nerdy type of Elizabeth. She smiles over at me too when she sees me, but she isn’t as happy as she is when she looks over at Dawn. She gives me a nod. “But you can call me Liz.”
Dawn’s opening her mouth again but the words are drowned out by the sound of a ref calling for the fight to begin. He introduces the fighters. River and some other guy whose name I’m not paying attention to. The only one who matters is River. It seems like everyone in the stadium thinks the same, too –
It’s a big match, and River’s a big boxer.
They exchange hits and I feel my heart rise in my throat in terror when I see River’s fists go up. I know he’s a strong guy but I’m so worried he’s going to get hurt. He takes a hit once and I gasp in horror, moving to cover Dawn’s eyes as I realize she’s… Into this. My mouth falls open and I have to keep myself from dropping my eyes, going back to watching the match every few seconds –
Round one ends. Both boxers take a break for water and River gives me a thumbs up, but just watching this I feel like I’m about to die. Dawn’s clapping the entire time.
Round two. Fight.
Hits, hits, and more hits. My eyes aren’t even open by the time round three ends and River is announced as the winner. I knew he would win, but… I let out a breath finally able to breathe properly, and it feels like my heart is starting to, well, actually start again.
Dawn squeals and is trying to crawl into the ring before anyone can stop her, and I get up to follow her, still horrified by what just happened and by how happy my toddler is about this. River laughs, taking the mike from the ref and points out Dawn, saying that’s his daughter, and “she seems like she’ll be wanting boxing lessons.” And “that,” he points to me, “is my wife.”
The crowd cheers more than usual, but he settles them down. “Well, not my wife. Yet. In fact, I’m going to ask her to marry me.” He looks right at me as he says this. And then he leans a hand out and pulls me up so both me and Dawn are standing beside him in the ring.
“But first,” he bows obnoxiously, “some news.” He coughs here, waiting for the room to go silent. It takes a second and he yells louder. “I know some of you didn’t expect me to come here today, and some of you judged me for being a family man.” He looks directly at Thomas before his eyes meet the crowd. “And some of you, well, some of you thought I wouldn’t show up. But here I am.
And you people are the ones who think I’m going to say. From now on, I’m only fighting local – to be with Faith, and Dawn.” He smiles at both us. “I’m settling down. Good night.”
Then he throws the mike down and takes me in his arms, kissing me vio
lently as the cameras flash on us both. The crowd is screaming, and I can’t tell if it’s a good or a bad thing, so I just press myself as close to him as I can, needing him to keep me safe in this environment I know nothing about. Distantly, I hear Thomas screaming with Sabrina beside him telling him to calm down, that this won’t ruin River’s ratings –
And it won’t. The media loves him even more. We’re posing like darlings, and I hear the words of the crowd now –
They’re all screaming his name. River Xavier.
64
Epilogue - Faith
This is the second time I’m in a white dress but it’s so much better than the first. I wasn’t expecting River to propose to me, but the minute he does, I say yes.
And here we are now. River is somewhere in another room. He wasn’t supposed to see me – it would be bad luck, and we don’t need any of that, especially considering how good everything has been…
River isn’t hiding in my skirts like she would have once. She smiles at me, pushing her body next to my skirts. She’s bigger than last time. She’s almost five now. I kneel down next to her and kiss her forehead, feeling her smile against me. She’s my flower girl. The basket she’s holding is a little too big for her, though, and the amount of flowers in it drag her arm just a little too far down to the ground.
“Are you sure you don’t need help with that?” I ask her, taking my finger and bumping her nose with it, already knowing the answer. Since she’s gotten older, she only takes more and more after her father. She’ll refuse all help. She’s a girly girl, but she still wants to prove she can be just as manly as her dad.
I love her so much. She shakes her head at me frantically, and I move my hand away from the basket handle. I’ll remember this forever, so I let her do it – she’s so cute.
Outside, I hear the first notes of the organ start to play, and I nudge Dawn with my shoulder like I’ve done to River hundreds of times. I’ve seen her do it, too – she takes after both of us. I love all of it.
“That’s your call, sweetheart,” I say. She nods at me again, and then runs off, tripping over her pink dress in her haste to cover the room in red roses.
I know that maybe I should hold my eyes, wait to see River in his suit until I’m standing on the podium in front of him. But I can’t. I need to look at my love – soon to be my husband – and see him. He’d tried to convince me that we should see each other before we were married, and I know what he’d have intended. By the way he’s looking at me, I’m surprised he let me off with my “traditional wedding” excuse, excuses I don’t mean.
He takes my breath away. I can only hope that I do the same for him, and I drop my eyes. I don’t know if anyone can see me through my veil, but…
“Faith,” he’s being quiet enough that I can’t hear River say my name, but I can see his lips move and I’ve watched that mouth enough times to know what he’s saying. My name.
My feet are desperate to rush to him, but I don’t want to trip over my dress. It’s really long and flows past my ankles out behind me.
I wanted River to pick it out with me, but not only is there that thing about luck, he’s…
Really bad with picking out wedding-appropriate outfits.
For women, anyway.
The suit he’s in is perfect and fits him well. He looks so handsome. More than usual. I finally make my way up to the podium, but I can only wish my father were walking me there.
Instead, I’m alone.
But I’m walking towards River, so in a way, I’m not alone. I stand across from him, keeping my eyes on him. He can’t see me well through the veil, but I can. He groans in agitation and pushes it back as the priest speaks. His family is in the front row. I wave to Sabrina standing on the sidelines – my maid of honor – hoping she’ll catch my bouquet. She’s with that one guy who came to send River away. He’s not that bad, though… I still don’t like him.
But I’m so happy right now, I just want my best friend to feel the same. River’s coach is the same distance away from him – his best man. He practiced his speech for ages. It’s beautiful.
But it’s about us now. River and I.
I’m not even listening as the priest says the words. I focus on River, not caring about the speech and just wanting to get to the most important part:
“I do.”
Followed by another, higher: “I do.”
And then we’re pronounced man and wife. And River sweeps me into his arms like we’re at the end of a love story and he kisses me violently, and the whole room erupts in cheers. I throw my bouquet to the air, aiming for Sabrina – there are a few others, who try to jump up and grab the flowers for themselves, but she catches it, and I smile at her. Luckily, she hasn’t busted her leg again, like she did a year ago in Greece.
There’s talk and we’re on the floor. We get a few dances in, and River sweeps me off my feet – just like I’d expected him to. But halfway through, we sneak over to the cake and grab a few slices for ourselves, before it’s all gone.
“We’re not staying for dinner,” River says, wrapping an arm around me. I lean into him, my head resting against his shoulder.
“Why not?” I ask him. But I already know. He smiles at me, his hand under my chin as he pulls my face up to him for yet another kiss. I smile back at him and we hide together under the massive height of this cake –
“I don’t know why you got something so big,” I say. We chose the flavors together, but he was insistent on having a cake that could feed maybe 300 people, although I could count the number of people here on both of our hands. There were more outside, though, taking pictures. I was ready to accept that, but that didn’t mean they were getting any cake.
River says nothing. He just winks at me. And I gasp, slapping him in pretend indignation as I know exactly what he means and exactly why we’re not going to be eating dinner.
He tells me just that, his hands moving towards me like he’s not guilty of anything. Because he isn’t. But we’re going to stay and enjoy our wedding a bit more, like we’d always joked we might when we were children. And now, as adults, it’s just as beautiful.
The foyer is decorated in white with flowers everywhere, and there are tables cast to the side so that there’s a room for people to dance. Dawn is the only child there – for now, at least, River and I are the only one with a baby. Maybe Sabrina will have a baby eventually, too, though, and then whenever she gets married, it won’t be so lonely. I laugh thinking about it and turn to River, whose eyes have gotten serious looking at me.
I didn’t even notice that my hand had slipped to my belly.
“I’m not pregnant,” I reassure him. Surprisingly. We sleep together a lot.
“A shame,” he says, leaning closer to me and pulling me up so that his arms are under my thighs like he’s carrying me away to be loved on the beach. He bites me on the neck, growling against my skin as I giggle, batting at him so others won’t notice until he pulls my arms up too and I’m completely around him.
“We’re supposed to stay at our wedding,” I say, wondering if he really wants to go right now. Because I do. We’d already booked the hotel room before our wedding. We just have to get there and…
I bite my lip thinking about it, but say nothing more.
“Traditionally, the bride and groom go off to celebrate their marriage by making another baby,” he says, heading towards the door and tugging at my white dress as he talks, not caring if anyone sees us. “And based off how little you let me see you before today, I’d say you’re really into tradition.”
I am.
We both are.
Time can only agree with us.
Also by Marci Fawn
Dirty Plaything
Fighter Daddy
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