by Katie Ashley
After clearing my eyes, I watched in amusement as Ansel deepened the kiss into one with a little more kick. Whistles and catcalls erupted around us. When Ansel pulled away, he grinned at the crowd. “Just wait until tonight.”
While others gasped in horror, I only laughed at my brother’s antics. The other bridesmaids met up with their groomsman at the top of the altar and the started down the grassy aisle.
I gave my groomsman, my husband, a beaming smile, before linking my arm though his. While keeping a smile plastered on his face, he asked, “How are you feeling?”
“I’m fine.”
“Are you sure you haven’t been on your feet too long?”
“I’m sure.”
“Maybe we should get you some water before we do the pictures?”
I laughed. “William, I’m not the first woman to be nine months pregnant, you know.”
“I know.” He grinned at me. “But you’re the first one I’ve been married to.”
When we reached the end of the aisle, he bent down and kissed me. Staring into his eyes, I saw deep adoration. “You are so beautiful,” he murmured against my lips.
“And you’re so full of it. I look like an obese Smurf.” The cobalt colored dresses looked amazing on the other bridesmaids—the svelte ones that is. While they all had worn gorgeous, strappy sandals, I’d been forced into flats.
“You do not. You look just as beautiful as you did on your wedding day. Maybe more because you have life within you.”
Once again, tears sprung in my eyes. With the pregnancy hormones, it seemed I was always gushing, which I loathed since I hated showing emotions. William had learned to accept my new softer, weepy side. He would just smile and teasingly say, “I vowed to take you for better or worse.”
William and I had gotten married a year and one day after my dad’s death. The superstitious part of me had stuck to the old saying that you shouldn’t make any major decisions until a year after a death. Since I had never been out of the country, William flew us, Ansel and Melanie, and his grandparents to Italy. Although I had initially balked at the idea of a designer dress, William’s grandmother talked me into one. So I stood in St Mark's Basilica, the Cathedral of Venice, in a Cinderella type gown with a crystal beaded bodice and a five foot train. With just the six of us, it was an intimate ceremony. Afterwards, we had dinner at a nearby restaurant.
Later as we were dancing to the music of a street violinist, William said with a smile, “The first time I ever laid eyes on you, I saw you in white just like you are today.”
I laughed. “I think the color is the only similar to what I was wearing then and what I’m wearing today.” With a wink, I added, “But I just might tie you up and spank you tonight.”
His dark eyes flared with desire. “Thank you, Mistress Sophie.”
I groaned. “We talked about you calling me that.”
In the year leading up to the wedding, we had worked at devising what our relationship would look like. Although it was the place that brought us together, 1740 also harbored too many negative memories for us to ever want to play there again. We decided that whatever playing we did, it would be in the privacy of our own home. But we were going to keep things simple--we wouldn’t be remodeling the basement to make a dungeon. Instead, we ordered a new BDSM bed that to the average eye looked like a canopy bed with intricate carvings in the wood. Only William and I knew the difference. There would be no titles like “Mistress”, and playing would only be for fun—William wouldn’t be expected to cater to my every whim, and I wouldn’t boss him around…too much.
William had moved in with me at the farm a few months after Daddy died. In the afternoons after he got in from school, he had the overseer start instructing him about how to run things. Soon he came to enjoy the farm almost as much as I did, and it was so nice having him shoulder a lot of the responsibility.
I don’t know how I would have survived my overwhelming grief without William. He was the towering strength I didn’t want to admit I needed. He was there to hold me when I woke up sobbing in the middle of the night. And he also gave me the space I needed when I was having days where I just needed to be alone with my thoughts and feelings.
On what would have been my second year of teaching, I started instructing at the community college I had attended. With my “reputation” coupled with my lack of tenure, it had been hard getting a job in the public school system. William had fared better at keeping the assistant principal position he had gotten after being let go at Milton. But he had high hopes of starting his own charter school—one that catered to students with physical and emotional disabilities. After everything I had experienced with my dad, I was totally onboard with the idea. He hoped to open it in within a year.
After we’d taken what seemed like a million pictures, William took me by the arm and led me over to the giant tent that had been erected on the lawn. Catering waiters hustled around with trays of champagne and hors devours. At the kick of a tiny foot against my ribs, I ordered, “Ooh, get me some of those mushrooms.”
With a laugh, William pulled out a chair and eased me down into it. “Yes, ma’am.”
As I watched him dash off to honor my request, I couldn’t help feeling immensely blessed that such an amazing man loved me. Like Daddy had said, any love worth having was fighting for. Although William had done most of the
He returned with a plate laden down with mushrooms and mini quiche. “I figured you were really getting hungry.”
“You mean your daughter was getting really hungry,” I mused through a mouthful of quiche.
William beamed. “Michaela is already as feisty as her mother.
“Yes, she is.” Before we had found out what we were having, we knew we wanted to honor my father by naming the baby after him. So once we learned it was a girl, we decided on Michaela Alexandra, which honored both my dad and William’s mother. She was due in two and a half weeks, although I had a feeling she might make an early appearance.
Once the wedding party was assembled, the best man, Ansel’s high school friend, Jody, got up to make a toast. I did okay until Jody mentioned my father. “Michael was always so proud of Ansel, and I’m sure he would be busting with pride today. His greatest desire in life was that his children were happy. I know he’s smiling down from Heaven today at the sight of Ansel and Sophie so happy in love.”
I didn’t hear the rest of Jody’s speech because I began to cry. William wrapped his strong arms around me. More than anything in the world, I wished my dad was here today with us. I knew once Michaela came, I would have that wish again. I hoped that she looked a little like him—maybe that she’d have his blue eyes.
More than two years might have passed since his death, but I still felt his loss each and every day. There was no expiration on grief—it was a burden you carried for the rest of your life. While there would always be a part of me missing, William and my unborn daughter were the greatest comfort I could ever imagine.
“So let’s raise a glass to the bride and groom,” Jody said.
I eased out of William’s arms. I didn’t want my grief to rob this moment from me. Although I was only drinking water, I took my glass and rose to my feet. “To the bride and groom,” I said.
Ansel had teary eyes as well as he nodded his head at me. As the others in the tent followed suit, I took William’s hand in mine. I first brought it to my lips to kiss it tenderly. Then I brought it to my abdomen. “I love you,” I said to him.
“I love you, too.”
Weaving our fingers together, I smiled as our daughter kicked against our hands. We were bound together in name and by our child, but most of all, we were bound in love.
Katie Ashley is a New York Times, USA Today, and Amazon Best-Selling author. She is a hybrid author with the traditionally published series, Vicious Cycle, by Penguin as well as the popular Indie series The Proposition and Runaway Train. She lives outside of Atlanta, Georgia with her daughter, Olivia, and her two very spoiled dogs. S
he has a slight obsession with Pinterest, The Golden Girls, Harry Potter, Shakespeare, Supernatural, Designing Women, and Scooby-Doo.
With a BA in English, a BS in Secondary English Education, and a Masters in Adolescent English Education, she spent 11 1/2 years educating the Youth of America aka teaching MS and HS English until she left to write full time in December 2012.