After the Supreme Court’s historic decision on marriage equality, Loose Id issued a submissions call for stories involving same-sex wedding themes. I’m far too entangled in my current WIP to try and write something for said call, but it got me thinking about Lysander and Cai and whether they might ever take that step. Next thing I knew, I’d filled a page with the following snippet.

 

The day Cai proposed to me, I freaked the hell out.

Yeah, we’d talked about it, but only in very general terms – how we’d be stuck with each other for the rest of our lives anyway because Cai had too hard a time opening up to people and because I would never find anyone else who’d put up with my high-maintenance ass. We’d joked about being “so married” every time we bickered about doing the dishes – because I wouldn’t do them no matter how he threatened me – and that one time I confessed to him that I liked the idea of our dirty laundry getting all mixed up when it went through the wash.

But when he went down on one knee in the middle of our deck at our big Fourth of July bash, I wasn’t expecting it. Not even one little bit. I really should have known what was up the moment Cai had agreed to let me throw such a large party, because Cai hated large gatherings with a passion, but my self-absorbed brain hadn’t pondered the oddity.

I screamed and hid behind my dad.

“Lysander, get back over there,” Jarett ordered me as he poked my shoulder. Finn was less polite about it. He simply marched over to me, grabbed my arm and gave it a hearty tug. I stumbled sideways and called him an asshole.

Cai, who had been waiting patiently, down on one knee with his hand stretched out, raised an eyebrow.

“You about ready?” he asked.

“No!”

“Give me your hand.”

I gulped and did, mostly because I knew that as soon as I made any motion to flee the premises, I’d have at least three people who were more athletic than me ready to hunt me down and frog-march me back to Cai.

My fingers shook. Cai smiled when he noticed it, and gently ran his thumb across my knuckles.

“Lys,” he said, “I love you, I want to be with you for the rest of my life, and the court said it’s legal now. Marry me.”

I stared. “That’s your proposal?”

“Pretty much,” he said.

I chewed my lip. “You make a pretty convincing case, I guess.”

“I know.”

I tried to think about it, but… hell, who was I kidding? It was a done deal. I knew that, he knew that, and everyone else probably knew it too. We’d been going strong for three years now. And then I looked at Cai and saw his dark eyes gleaming with humor and love, and I choked up.

Gulping hard, I nodded. Through my tear-blurred eyes, I could barely see the wedding band when he pushed it onto my ring finger in front of our families, our friends, and our friends’ families too.

“Oh my god, I’m getting married,” I whispered. “I’m not even twenty-five yet!”

“Is that a requirement?”

“Jarrett told me that statistics show-” I started, and then started sobbing in earnest. Cai straightened up and took me in his arms, and I cried some very embarrassing happy tears into his shoulder. “You asshole,” I muttered. “You should have told me to put on waterproof make-up this morning. Now it’s streaking.”

“I don’t care,” Cai said. “You’re still beautiful.”

“But I’m more beautiful when my makeup isn’t washing off with my tears.”

“Shut up and kiss me,” he said, and for once, I did as I was told.