Marcia is seventeen, and along with Darryl, has moved south in Alaska to attend the Anchorage campus of the Alaska State University. She wants to pursue her dream, but will it pursue her instead?

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I want to thank Malady, once again, for his help checking through this story for the many errors I frequently insert, as well as listening to my sometimes completely crazy ideas about the direction of the story and telling me how crazy they are!

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Chapter 19

July 1^st, 2023

10:47PM

Chet and Mage lay in bed, talking about the day. It was still daylight outside, and would be for quite some time, but they had some blackout curtains. Like many of them, however, they weren’t completely effective, and the room was nowhere near dark.

Mage commented that it was nice seeing Marcia finally wholly herself, but it was very awkward seeing Trish again.

The younger girl had never been Mage's favorite person as she had always been competition. Even before Mage revealed her true self, Trish obviously had a crush on Chet.

“What do you think?” Mage asked.

Chet sighed heavily. “It’s tough.”

“What is?”

“Her being here.”

“And why?”

Chet didn't answer at first so Mage asked, "did you ever sleep with her?"

"Of course not!" Chet exclaimed. Mage nodded, as Chet had assured her of that long ago.

Finally, he said, "It just reminds me of how much of a child I had been."

"You were trying to please your biological father, and you grew up a lot during that time."

He nodded, but then said, "You know, I think I knew that it would never work between her and me. It wasn't childishness on either side really." he sighed. "If I’m honest, it was kinda a rebound. I'd just lost…" he searched for the right words. "Chester Andersen… And I needed some kind of healing." he paused and when he continued talking, it was very carefully. "No, it wasn't losing him. It was losing so much of my life while trying to please him. I needed to heal from that."

She nodded in understanding.

"If we'd gotten together at that time, I don't think it would have worked between us either."

"You're probably right," agreed Mage.

“Huh?”

“When you said you didn’t think it would have worked out between us either.”

“Wait a minute,” Chet said, honestly confused. “You don’t think it would have either?”

“Well, it’s nothing against you, Chet.” She was a bit worried about putting her thoughts into words. She didn’t want to insult him. “Honestly, Chet, if you hadn’t have grown during that time, I wouldn’t have…” her voice trailed off. This was not the way she wanted to say this.

“So you’re saying if I hadn’t grown up, you wouldn’t have been interested in me?”

She rolled onto her side to face him, and propped herself up on her elbow. “Chet, I’ve always been interested in you!”

It was his turn to roll to face her. “So you want to explain what you were saying?”

“Darryl told me you’d changed, Chet. I needed to see that you really had changed.”

“So, if Trish hadn’t have moved and we broke it off, you would have stepped in and taken me away from her?”

She was going to vehemently deny that she’d ever do such a thing, but then she saw a tiny smirk at the corner of his mouth.

“Could I have?” she asked, smiling coyly.

“No,” he said simply.

Her expression went from flirtatious to affected outrage as she hit him on the chest. “What!?”

“You couldn’t have,” he asserted.

“You would have preferred to be with her!?”

“It’s not that at all, Mage.”

“What is it then?”

“I’m always faithful.” With those words, he leaned in and gave her a kiss on the nose, and when he backed away, she reached around with her free hand and pulled him in for a more traditional, deep kiss.

-=#=-

11:30PM

Marcia was laying down on her bed, while her fiance sat in an armchair beside the door. The atmosphere in the room was tense, but not because of Trish being back.

They had already talked about that, and had agreed that they were happy to have their friend back, but they figured it would be awkward for Chet and Mage.

The tension that they felt now stemmed from their morals. They had made the promise to their parents to wait until they were married for extracurricular activities. But now, the last barrier to their marriage was time, and keeping this late night visit non-conjugal was difficult, to say the least.

Eventually, Darryl stood and walked over to the bed. He knelt down and took her hand. “This is really hard, Foxy,” he told her. She nodded agreement, and he continued. “I’d like to propose something to you.”

“We promised, Darryl,” she said, but there were tears in her eyes as she said it.

“I know,” he said, “but that’s not what I was going to suggest. With me living in the same house as you, it’s just gonna be harder and harder.”

She gasped and said, “It wouldn’t be any easier if you lived elsewhere!”

“It might be easier to resist, but that’s not what I was suggesting either.”

“Okay?”

“What if we only had a week to wait instead of a month?”

“You mean get married now? We’d need a court order as well as Mom and Dad’s consent.”

“You do realize, Foxy, that we know the Supreme Court Judge of Alaska pretty well, right? He’s a member of our family?”

“Okay,” she conceded. “But what about all our friends who are scheduled to come to the wedding? What about Carl and Rikki? Granny?”

He nodded, thinking. “Why couldn’t we have a big ceremony on that date, but have our actual wedding sooner?”

“We could,” she said. “I don’t want to give up the big ceremony, Darryl.”

“Neither do I,” he agreed.

“Ha! You’d be happy with jeans, a t-shirt, and bic lighters for candles!”

“There is that, yeah, but I know you want the ceremony, and I’m willing to go all-out because I know that’ll make you happy.”

“That’ll help, sure, but being married to you will make me happy.”

—# =-

The next morning, Marcia and Darryl were in his Mustang, heading southeast to Fire Lake, where both of their parents made their homes. It was still pretty early, since Gloria had insisted that they have breakfast when they came over.

Marcia was somewhat nervous that her parents might not stomach the idea of moving up the wedding date, and speaking of stomachs, she wasn’t quite sure she’d be able to fit anything into her own, along with the butterflies that were there. Darryl, however, seemed to be confident that her parents would agree, and he was looking forward to having one of Gloria’s breakfasts, with her delicious homemade sourdough bread.

Darryl seemed so confident everyone would agree that Marcia began to suspect that the subject had been discussed before. "Darryl," she said."Can I ask a question?"

"Sure,'' he replied.

"You seem pretty sure about this. Have you already discussed it with Mom and Dad?"

"Maybe," he replied.

"I see. So, that’s a yes." She nodded to herself. "And their reply was favorable?"

"You could put it that way," Darryl hedged.

"Darryl James! You can be so exasperating sometimes!"

He glanced at her, and once more marveled at how wonderful she looked. She was the most beautiful girl in the world, and he was going to marry her.

Still, he wasn’t gonna let her get away with the middle name deal. “Oh oh,” he said. “You’re bringing out the big guns. I guess I should explain, huh?” She gave him a dirty look for that, and he laughed then relented; "Well, while you were in surgery, your parents kinda suggested it might be something we should think about. I guess they knew how hard it would be living in the same house."

“But we’ve been living in the same house for quite awhile,” she objected.

“Yeah, but the last barrier is gone. Well, not barrier. Uh, you know what I mean.”

“My birth defect is gone.”

“Yeah, that.”

“So we could have normal sex now?”

“Normal between a man and woman, yeah.” he clarified.

“I see,” she said, smiling while her eyes brimmed with tears.

“Wait a sec… Why are you crying?”

“You dork,” she blubbered. “I’m happy! I think getting married in two weeks is the perfect thing to do!”

Darryl pulled into Mike and Gloria’s lake house and saw that Bob and Liz were also present. As Darryl grabbed the handle to open his door, Marcia reached over and put her hand on his neck. He turned, and caught the look in her eyes. Leaning over, he gave her a kiss that threatened to blow her socks off.

-=#=-

Entering the house, they smelled the delicious aroma of bacon, coffee, and freshly baked bread. Mike was in his office looking at some figures for their business. Darryl made his way to the door and asked if he could talk to everyone after breakfast. They agreed, and Mike gave him a knowing look. He suspected what was coming.

They all gathered around the table and despite being full of butterflies, Marcia’s stomach told her it could hold more. Rather than take a full plate, however, Marcia took a smaller, dessert-sized plate, on which she placed the steaming heel of a loaf and slathered it with butter.

Thankfully, Gloria was prepared and made several loaves, and there were enough heels to go around, as it was the general consensus in the room that a fresh sourdough heel smothered in butter was the best way to eat of fresh bread.

Bacon, eggs, sausage, hash browns and coffee and orange juice were also served, and Marcia once again plundered her fiance’s plate. Once everyone was finished and the table was cleared except for coffee cups, and Amber was playing with Chris in his room, Darryl explained why they had wanted to talk.

Marcia was somewhat shy talking about their reasons, but the adults had been there; young and in love. In fact, it wasn’t very long ago that Mike and Gloria had made the decision to hurry their wedding along for the very same reason. While they weren’t in the same house while engaged, they spent almost all of their waking hours, except when Mike was working, together. In fact, Gloria had taken over the housekeeping and cooking in the Chatham house as her own once they were engaged. They understood perfectly.

“Not to be indelicate, Marcia,” Mike said carefully, “but can you handle… uh… I mean won’t it hurt for uh…”

“We could have a small ceremony on the twenty-second,” Marcia said looking at her phone. “That would be the four weeks that the surgeon said.”

“That’s the minimum time, Marcia.”

“I’ve got an appointment on the nineteenth, Daddy. I’ll make sure it’s okay.”

“What if it isn’t?” Mike saw the look on his daughter’s face, and gently said, “I understand your want to rush, and I’m fine with it, as long as you can handle it.”

“It’s not just the physical,” she said.

He sighed. He knew what Marcia was saying. Gloria was there all the time when they were engaged. In fact, he made a point of going to bed right after she left each night because of his own impatience. That was somewhat of a mixed blessing, however. He wanted what was to come in their bedroom each night, and he had to bury himself in a book or a movie each night until he could fall asleep. Melatonin pills had become his friend. Even sleeping with Gloria beside him would have helped immensely, but could he have resisted the urge? He had heard of the idea of sleeping with one foot on the floor to keep a non-married couple separated, but he felt that would have been short-lived, despite their moral compasses.

But the moral compass wouldn’t be a problem for Marcia and Darryl. If they had been married for awhile beforehand, or even sleeping together, he wouldn’t have any concern.

When they spoke to Darryl before, it had been without thinking of the minimum time stipulation the surgeon would place on intercourse. Once that had become a factor, he was still not opposed to the idea, but he wanted to make sure that Marcia was making a wise decision.

Finally, he told his daughter, “I’m okay with it as long as your mom is.”

Gloria nodded. She’d had a discussion with Mage, and felt more at ease now than she had before.

-=#=-

That evening, Darryl and Marcia had dinner with Chet, Mage, their kids, and Judge Matthews and Sylvia.

Once again, when the table was cleared, the kids went to play and the adults sat around the table with coffee.

“Judge,” Marcia said. “We’d like to ask if something can be arranged a bit early.”

“Ah,” Bill Matthews said. “I take it you are finding it necessary to move up the wedding?”

Marcia’s face went red as she ducked her head down.

“I understand, Marcia,” the judge said. “I’m assuming you need the court order?”

“That would be nice,” Darryl answered.

“I think that can be arranged.”

“Are you going for a smaller ceremony first, then the large celebration?”

“Yeah,” Marcia told him.

“Why?” Mage asked.

“Well, not everything’s ready.”

“It’s only two weeks before the ceremony’s supposed to happen. We could move things up.”

“What about the church?” Sylvia asked. “Is anything happening there on the revised day?”

Marcia shook her head. She’d already looked to see if their pastor would be free. “But what about Ricci, Carl, and Granny?”

“That’s easy,” said Chet. “I can make sure the North Pole office closed that day.”

“It’s a weekend anyway,” Darryl added.

“See?” Chet smiled. “Already done.”

“It seems kinda rushed,” Marcia hedged.

“Marcia,” said Sylvia. “You’ll have two mothers, a sister-in-law, and an old aunt helping you get everything ready.”

“Let’s make sure they can make it down from North Pole, and if they can…” Her voice trailed off as they heard a yell from upstairs.

“Mom, Dad!”

The yell sounded concerned, and Mage was on her feet instantly with Chet not far behind. They hurried up the stairs, and Marcia would have followed if Darryl hadn’t gotten in front of her and stopped her.

“Use the lift,” he said.

“But…”

“Foxy, use the lift. Chet and Mage are already up there. You don’t need to be running up the stairs.”

Reluctantly, she sat down in the chair lift and pushed the lever under the chair arm that would slowly take her up the stairs. It didn’t move fast, but she had to admit, it was much less painful than running up would have been.

When they entered the room, they saw what everyone was looking at.

Marcia’s eyes filled with tears as she looked at the wall.

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