it be just that…the past.
Windsor didn’t have anything to drink at the reception, and I obviously didn’t either. I wouldn’t fault her had she wanted to drink all night, though. I just don’t extend that kind of offer to myself. Nothing will cloud our wedding night together. I want to feel everything tonight. When the limo pulls up to the hotel valet, I hop out before the driver can open our door and offer her my hand. Slipping back into her shoes, she takes it, her face already flushed, her eyes all fucking mine.
I checked in earlier in the day so all of our stuff would be here already and so I could make sure everything was perfect for when Windsor walks in for the first time. This is like a transitioning night. Starting tomorrow she’ll be living in my house all the time. I wanted her to move in with me after Vegas, but she resisted saying that we’ve gone this far, we might as well keep her an honest woman. Which was sort of a joke because I’ve defiled that woman every day since I proposed to her. Sometimes even multiple times a day. She stayed with me most nights because I needed her to. I couldn’t sleep without her. When she had early mornings I would spend the night at her house. Practicality wasn’t really on the top of our list when she decided we wouldn’t live together full time.
“I know you’re supposed to carry me over some threshold or something, but maybe you should, like, dangle me over the threshold by my ankle to break tradition or something? What do you think? You game?” Windsor asks when we stand in front of the suite door. She has her hands on her hips as she stares at the door like it’s going to bite her.
“I’m game. You carry me,” I offer. I scan the key card and kick open one side of the French doors, exposing the expansive suite the size of a house in front of us. Her mouth drops open. This was a surprise for her. I’m sure she expects flowers, but what I’ve done is even better.
“How did you get all of these photos? And blown up this quickly?” she asks, eyes wide. I motion for her to hop on my back. Her eyes dart around taking in everything at once.
“I’ll piggy back you inside. It’s not technically carrying,” I explain. She has to hike up her dress to get up and I get a small peek of her black, sheer garter. It sends a shock directly to my groin. Keeping her on my back, I walk over to the first series of huge canvases. She slides down, holds my hand, and puts her free hand over her mouth, her eyes teary.
Julio Bigcock made a return to Facebook to steal every photo of Windsor he could get his fat hands on. Cropped portraits of her smiling face, photos of her and Gretchen, and the rest of her friends. He even went back so far as to get a photo of her and John Nash when they were dating. The photos are larger than life. Literally. They are huge.
She walks slowly from each image to the next. I stay where I’m at, by the door, and watch her expression as she takes in each one. Windsor gets to the photo. The one I never told her I saw. It’s the group shot of her and the Rosy Team on their night out with Nash. She laughs a little and moves on to view a black and white photo of her and me. She’s sitting in my lap gazing at me with a look of love on her face. It’s not the same as the look she’s giving Nash in the previous photo and that’s the point. That nothing is really as it seems. Different types of love look different ways. A photo of her mother and her when she was in middle school comes next, then one of her and her father at a father-daughter dance taken a few weeks before his accident. At the very end of the row is a photo of all three of them. Her family. Her mother is looking at her father with that same substantial look.
I wrap my hands around her middle and pull her back against me as she cries happy tears. “My family,” she says. I turn her away from the photo and face her toward the