Based on a True Story

I was married in the backseat of a Honda CR-V. There were no rings, priests, or paper, but the hash browns we exchanged from Chick-fil-A felt symbolic enough. It was also my 23rd birthday. The sky was mesmerizing: a melted popsicle of pink, orange, and purple that cast a golden hue over everything. I felt like a child. Ridiculously happy. I guess that’s why I remember it so fondly. Like childhood, it was a time of innocence, sparkly lipgloss, and fairytales.

“We’re already married,” he said, and that was that. The day we met was almost the same. We split a pizza in the back of his car, and that was all it took to know we would mean something to each other. I drove home along the shore of Daytona Beach and thought, “I am either going to marry this man or he is going to break my heart to pieces.” What a shame it was both. 

We planned our future in South Carolina with my head on his chest, smelling his Nautica cologne from the little bottle shaped like a sailboat. I would teach and write. He would also teach while continuing his father’s moving company. We’d take Lucky, his sister’s Shih-Tzu, Pekingese mix. He was old and his bottom teeth stuck out of his mouth, but he was the sweetest dog I had ever met. She wouldn’t miss him. She never took care of him anyway. 

We discussed what products we’d use in the house: Dove soap because it is the only brand that doesn’t irritate me, and Colgate toothpaste because it’s what he grew up with. I came from a Crest household, but I could give up my toothpaste preferences for love. We agreed to take turns cooking and cleaning, occasionally working together. We planned a little garden to grow fruits and vegetables. He was good at gardening and even better at cooking, so I trusted him to know what to do. 

We would have two children––a boy and a girl. I won’t say the names we picked out because what’s the point? Our children that will never exist. I always found that crazy to think about. There was once a chance for there to be humans in this world, with my features and his, living and breathing, because one day, he decided we were married, and I did too.