I managed to secure the ring most of the way onto Timothy’s finger without dropping it. His ring was a plain gold band, which is the one he had chosen — no sparkly jewels for him. My soon to be husband smiled at me and pushed the ring on the rest of the way. The band looked nice on his hand. I liked the idea that all the hordes of women who fluttered around him would see proof that he was married, although in today’s world that would probably still not keep them away, but it was a statement that he was committed, married.
Timothy kissed me then, even though that was not the place in the wedding where we were supposed to do so. “I would not notice a horde of women, even if they were fawning and naked,” he whispered in my ear. “A Pooka cleaves only to one.”
What could I say to that? It sounded too good to be believed, but I kissed Timothy’s cheek and gave him a huge grin.
Meanwhile, the officiate waited for us to conclude our brief kiss/conversation. The guests also seemed patient. None of them lapsed into conversation or started an audience’s normal cough and body shifting during such pauses. I was glad our ceremony wasn’t strict and formal. Timothy and I were writing a new path, our own path, I presumed.
Next, it was Timothy’s turn to say the magic words that were supposed to imprint the ring permanently on my finger, not that I’d ever want to take it off. Timothy had bought me a gorgeous diamond ring with emeralds cloistered around it as my engagement ring. As he placed the new addition, the wedding ring, on my finger, I saw that it fit together perfectly with my engagement ring. The shine of this new double row of rings was probably visible clear to the guests sitting in the farthest of the living room chairs. Wow! The ring set was super beautiful! I wanted to stand there admiring the way it looked on my left hand.
The officiate once more cleared his voice, and then he slammed the whole ceremony into a homerun: “By the power vested in me by the State of California, I now pronounce you husband and wife. NOW, you may kiss your bride, Sir.”
That was a given. We joined more closely than before and took a moment to really do the kiss properly. As always happened with Timothy, when he kissed me deeply, there was no awareness in me of anything else, only Timothy and the rightness of his body pressed to mine, his lips meeting mine, his arms pulling me closer until we were one body, one mind.
“All right, you guys,” my friend, Cara, said. “You can do that all you want later. But now, let’s go get some wedding cake!”