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She knew the bones of it, and she knew the heartbreak. She knew what it looked like for someone to actively die in front of her eyes, telling them it was okay to let go, helping to ferry them into the afterlife. She knew what it looked like when someone was so dead they were essentially a science fair project, exhumed when a company decided to put up a strip mall over an unmarked grave.
And she knew how it felt for all her family to die. One after another, everyone who ever mattered to her slipping away, leaving her behind to carry on alone. Always alone.
Decca. My fiancé.
My heart raced at the thought. The word itself felt wrong. Bulky, like the hockey gear Waylon made me buy to join his beer league team. Gear that was designed for my protection in case I fell on the ice or caught a puck to the bridge of the nose, but that forced me off balance and sent me careening head first into the wall at our last clinic.
Decca would complete my family if she actually went through with what she’d proposed.
I shouldn’t sayif. Shouldn’t even think it.
But things were... complicated, to say the least.
When Decca proposed, it felt like a storm had broken in me, like rain on a too humid night. More than relief, an exultation. Angels and trumpets and the Hallelujah chorus.
But the sudden joy of her proposal took a downshift once the idea had settled.
I wasn’t supposed to be blessed with a wife.
The wretchedness of my youth should never be rewarded with a life partner, especially not one like Decca. She was too kind, too giving, too selfless. Too good for a man like me.
I’d never dreamed of her and I... well, okay, I dreamed it, but that’s where our relationship should have stayed. In my dreams.
The sudden sharp left turn of our relationship from good friends—with me occasionally pining, lusting, and obsessing over her—to partners for life, had been the answer to a prayer I hadn’t dared offer, but it was also giving me whiplash.
It was so new, so raw, I’d barely begun to process it. I had yet to tell either of my fathers about my split-second answer to what—if I knew Decca—was surely a split-second, tarot-induced question on her part.
I could rely on Decca. I knew that. Part of what made her so... not easy, but exhilarating to talk to, was that no matter how much bad she’d seen in her life, nothing was more important than whatever conversation we were having at the time. It didn’t matter if we were discussing how to topple the patriarchy, or what we like to add to our ramen (sliced, fried pork and a soft-boiled egg for me, heaps of bamboo shoots, mushrooms, and hot sauce for her), that was the thing that held the utmost importance for her. She threw herself at her friends.
I knew she’d throw herself into this marriage, too. But I didn’t want it to be that way for her. I didn’t want her sacrifice, and I didn’t want to be her burden.
That was the real reason I’d reserved a crack of dawn tee time on the hottest day of the year: to throw myself onto the tracks of their wisdom train and let it flatten me with the truth behind my idiotic life choice.
I came here for them to talk me out of it.
Dad’s chest labored with each breath in the passenger seat.
I gritted my teeth and steeled myself against the days to come. I would not let this blindside me.
Expect the worst. That way, nothing could disappoint you.
Today was not about death, though. Today was about life. And love. Maybe... if that’s what Decca intended with her proposal. I was so excited when she asked, I basically ejaculated out the wordyeswith the same adolescent vigor I’d had when I came in my pants dreaming of her.
After the first cold, noxiously bitter pale ale at the golf bar, I was finally ready to make the announcement.
Well, maybe after the next round.
“Gus, spit it out,” Dad said after watching me twist my dripping glass in circles. “Why are we here?”
“From the looks of it, I’m the only golfer at this table, so I’ve been curious about that myself,” said Father Vasili. He was an old man. Much older than Dad, but despite his long hair, full beard, all-black clothing and clerical collar, he fit in anywhere and with anyone.
I chuffed out what was supposed to be a laugh, but even that was strained.
“Yeah, uh. Okay. I’m uh... getting married.”
“Bravo.Na Ziseis!Do it quickly so we can schedule your ordination. Great Lent will be here before you know it, and it’d be a blessing to have some help with the forty-seven services of Holy Week.”
I was stunned. My forced smile froze. I wasn’t expecting them to accept the news. Not without so much as a question. “You aren’t even going to ask who?”
