Purple Hearts(23)

We shared the elevator with a woman and a man about our age, dressed in formal clothes. They had their arms around each other. The woman was holding a bouquet of daisies. Oh, God. These people were actually getting married. Luke and I stood with our shoulders barely touching, Frankie humming quietly along with the Muzak version of “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road.” We were such a sham.

As the elevator doors opened, the woman turned to me. “Y’all getting hitched, too?”

“Yep!” I said, putting on a big smile. “This guy,” I added, slapping Luke on the back.

Shit, shit, shit. Did people who love each other slap each other on the back?

“That’s me,” Luke said. His swallow was audible. “I’m the guy!”

“Say,” Frankie said to the couple as we exited to the wood-paneled hallway, pointing in both directions, “where is the room where the ceremonies are held?”

“You already got your license?” the man said.

“Right,” Luke said. He looked at me, his eyes searching. “The license.”

“The license,” I repeated, looking back at him. Shit. “Not yet. We should do that.”

“So cute,” the woman said. “You two look so nervous. Wedding day jitters!”

“Because you can’t get married by an officiant until you’ve had a license for three days,” the man said. “Maggie and I learned the hard way last week,” he added, and they looked at each other, giggling.

“Fuck” dropped out of my mouth. Luke was leaving the day after tomorrow.

The couple’s giggle turned into nervous laughter, then faded altogether. The woman looked at me like I was bleeding out of my eyeballs. Her eyes traveled the length of my body, stopping briefly on the antler tattoo, then over to Luke.

I grabbed Frankie’s arm. The Normals have picked us up on their radar. They know we’re not like them. Abort, abort.

“But not for military, hon!” the woman said suddenly, pointing at Luke’s bag. “You in the service?”

“Active duty,” Luke said, eyes on the woman, as if willing her to explain.

“Actually,” she started, looking at her fiancé, “I think there’s an exception for the seventy-two-hour waiting period for active military?”

“Yeah?” I said.

There was relief, but part of me had kind of wanted it all to be over, some clear obstacle that barred us from pulling it off. Up until now, it had felt like a harebrained scheme, just on my shoulders, which meant that if it didn’t work out, I shrugged it off and found another way. Now it was spilling into the wide world, with Luke and Frankie and clerks and strangers named Maggie.

“Well, if you’ll excuse us,” Frankie said, putting on his most charming smile. “Thanks for your help.”

The license was the easiest part. Blank spaces for names and social security numbers, and a line to sign. Cassandra Lee Salazar.

I watched Luke sign Luke Joseph Morrow.

Frankie snapped a photo of us standing at the counter, our hands barely touching each other’s backs.

“Well, that’s it,” I said to Luke, and he nodded, glancing at me for a moment. He had been quiet through the whole thing. A lot of “yes, ma’ams” and “no, sirs.” He kept checking his phone, rubbing the back of his neck, like it was painful to be here.

“You’re not even going to pretend to be happy?” I asked him.

He shrugged. “No one’s watching here.”

I lowered my voice. “Yeah, but aren’t you relieved that it’s almost over?”

“It’s not over for me. I’m on my way to Afghanistan, Cassie.”

I stepped back. “Right.”

Our officiant was a volunteer notary, a man who either knew God personally or had drunk three espressos that morning. He towered over Luke and Frankie and me in a hunter-orange polo, with a balding head and visible gold teeth. Frankie held up his phone, filming it all.

“Any preference for prayers?” he asked.

“Sir?” Luke asked.

“Jewish, Christian, Muslim, Pagan, I got ’em all. I got the widest variety of Christian prayers. Catholic, too.” He counted on his chubby fingers, listing them in his deep accent as if he were giving us options for video game consoles at Best Buy. “Serenity Prayer, Hail Mary prayer, the Lord’s Prayer, ‘The Lord is my shepherd’ prayer, any psalm, really, and that Corinthians one is popular, the one that goes ‘Love is patient, love is kind’?”

I couldn’t wait to tell Nora about this guy. But then I realized: How the hell was I going to explain any of this to Nora?

“There’s also the no-prayer option, being we’re in a government office. I’m happy to merely officiate over the proceedings.”

“That’ll be fine—” I started.

“Maybe the Serenity Prayer?” Luke said, his voice cracking just a bit. He looked at me for permission. “My mom used to like that one.”

“Sure.” I shrugged. Next to me, Frankie nudged me with his elbow. “I mean, sure, sweetheart.”

While the officiant dug behind his podium for a Bible, I remembered Luke saying in the diner that he had lost his mom. I couldn’t imagine. Well, I guess I could, considering I never had a father, but he was never mine to lose. For a second, I wished that my own mom could be here. Fake or not, she had always wanted to see me get married.