A Thousand Letters(11)

I laughed and kissed him. "Easy to say."

He tightened his hold on me. "We can run away. Elope. Have a huge party. Get married in a church. Get married by an Elvis impersonator. I don't care how. I just want you to be mine, forever. I want you where I am. It's that simple."

I took a breath and let it out. "And when you're deployed?"

"Come back and stay with Dad and Sophie. Stay wherever I'm stationed. Whatever you want."

"You make it sound so simple."

He pulled me even closer, bringing my body flush with his. "I love you. You love me. Everything else is details." He angled for my lips, kissing me between hushed sentences. "Wherever I go, you go. Forever. Because I'll love you forever, Elliot."

My heart burned, lit up like a beacon for him, and he lay me down, held me, whispered his promises through the night, that one perfect night where everything in the world was right.

It was the last night we ever got.

The next morning, the sky had lightened only by a shade when he left me with a kiss and a promise, and I lay in bed for hours, smiling, dreaming of everything to come.

It was what I wanted. He was what I wanted, and even though I was afraid of what we would face, it was right. I would be with him, so everything would be just fine.

So naive.

I climbed out of bed when the sun had broken over the horizon, the glint of my engagement ring catching my eye with every motion of my left hand. My family was asleep, so I sat in the kitchen with my notebook, sipping coffee in the quiet morning, putting all of my emotion into words of love and hope, phrasing verses in an attempt to explain the inexplicable.

After a while, I turned my face to the sun, looking out the window, considering what would come next as I anxiously awaited my family's awakening, fashioning the speech in my mind. We'd agreed to meet at his house afterward to spend time with his family, maybe even trying to get both families together for dinner later. I smiled, imagining it all, elated to celebrate.

My father woke first, shuffling into the kitchen to pour himself coffee — I'd made enough for everyone, as I always did. I didn't look much like him, more like my mother, her dark features and big eyes present in all three of her daughters' faces. He was lighter in coloring, shrewd in the eyes, his lips set in judgment, even when he slept, which was unnatural. Happiness was not a trait that most of my family knew, ever since my mother died while bringing my younger sister Beth into the world.

My mother was the last happiness I'd known, until Wade.

Dad sat across from me with the newspaper, taking every opportunity to give me his opinion on what he read. We rarely agreed, and I never said so because there was no discussion, only his opinion and everyone else's, and everyone else was wrong. But that morning I just smiled and listened, wondering if he would notice the sparkling diamond on my finger or the fact that I was floating above all of us.

He didn't. But I didn't mind.

Mary was next up, also unseeing. Then Beth, my younger sister and father's shadow and favorite pet. As we sat, none of them saw me. I was virtually invisible in my own home, the odd duck. Where my sisters were like my father, a little vapid and a lot opinionated, I was more like my mom: quiet, reserved, content. And it wasn't as if I didn't see them for who they were, it was just that I accepted them for who they were unconditionally. I knew there was no changing them, and they were happy with who they were. And I required no watering, no tender care. I found ways to feed my soul from a very young age, knowing I couldn't depend on them for that.

The practice made me feel whole, self-sufficient.

I closed my notebook, laying my hands in my lap, with a whisper of a smile on my face.

"I have something to tell you all."

Dad didn't look up, just shook his paper to straighten it. "Oh?"

My sisters didn't look up either — Beth took a bite of her bagel, and Mary got up to pour more coffee.

"Wade asked me to marry him."

Everything stopped.

Dad's paper dropped by an inch as he glared at me over the top. Mary turned, coffee pot in hand, looking shocked. Beth slowed her jaw, a wad of bread in her cheek like a dairy cow.

"What?" Dad asked, the word hard.

My smile slipped. "He … he asked me to marry him, and I said yes."

"You've got to be kidding me," Mary said, annoyed. "You're seventeen, Elliot. You can't get married."

I watched as my hope for their support slipped away. "We would wait until after my birthday. This … this was always the plan, though we'd always planned on waiting until after I graduated. But he asked me to come with him sooner, and I said yes."

Dad's face was red as he huffed and blustered at me from across the table. "You said yes, as if you have any right to agree to such a preposterous thing. You can't do anything, not while you're still living under my roof."

"Dad—"

He slapped the table, making the coffee cups jump and us along with them. "This is ridiculous, Elliot. You're still in school."

"I'll finish school wherever we end up," I answered, undeterred.

He paused for a split second. "You can't marry your high school crush."

I drew a long breath through my nose. "You did."

He gave me a look. "I sure did, and instead of marrying John like I really wanted, I married your mother and was miserable until the day she died."