Page 156 of The Rom-Commers

“Fine,” I said. “I forgive you.” And as soon as I said the words, I felt them.

Sylvie threw her arms around me.

“But if you ever say anything like that to me again, I’m moving to Alaska. And I’m taking Dad.”

It was that easy.

Because she was the only baby sister I had.

Anyway, we had a sudden surprise wedding to plan.

It gave us a project, honestly. Twenty-four hours to hang some twinkle lights and fluff some tissue-paper roses. Mrs. Otsuka offered to make Sylvie’s bouquet with zinnias from the community garden, and Sylvie cried and hugged her.

We got grocery-store cupcakes and sparkling cider and asked my dad to play “Here Comes the Bride” on his harmonica.

Sylvie wore the dress our mother had worn at our parents’ wedding—not a wedding gown per se, but a simple white dress she’d loved—along with her favorite cowgirl boots. Salvador wore a ruby-red tux they’d found while thrifting. We got Dad a little tweed driving cap to cover his surgical dressing, and he put a gray jacket over his hospital gown and tied a silk scarf like an ascot. Kenji arrived in a little suit and clip-on tie with an origami flower pinned to his lapel for a boutonniere, and Mrs. Otsuka wore a salmon-colored pantsuit that was the exact color of love. And I let Sylvie put me in a chiffon bridesmaid’s dress with bell sleeves she’d found for three dollars at the Salvation Army.

The hospital chaplain performed the ceremony—which was mercifully short and very sweet—and we lit a candle beside a photo of our mom on the hospital tray table. Our dad “walked” Sylvie down the aisle by joining the couple’s two hands together. Sylvie and Salvador wrote their own vows, and read them aloud… and I didn’t even judge them.

I just took the high road right past all those mixed metaphors and clichés.

Love is love, after all.

Even for nonwriters.

And as those two kids kissed each other and pledged an astonishing, gorgeous, hope-filled promise to take care of each otherfor the rest of their lives…even though I never cried at weddings, I wept like a deluge. I wept because it was all too much—but in the best way. I wept with gratitude and grief and joy all at once—and because my mom would have done the same, if only she could’ve been here. I wept because my sister had found a genuinely good-hearted man, and because Mrs. Otsuka sensed halfway through that my dad was thirsty and slipped over to bring him some water. I wept because there was nothing cuter than my dad in his jaunty little cap—smiling through his bruises like a man who’d never seen a day of sorrow. I wept because halfway through the vows, Kenji slid his hand into mine in that sweet, unselfconscious way that little boys do. I wept because the nurses were all weeping, and because it was such a miracle to have something to celebrate, and because we were at a wedding right now instead of a funeral. I wept for luck and for beauty and for kindness—and for the magic of being alive.

And then we had a dance party.

Right there in the hospital room.

It was all just starting to wind down when one of the nurses stepped out into the hallway—and started shrieking like a teenager at a Beatles concert.

And we all rushed out…

And I know you’ll never believe me…

But there, looking around the empty nurses’ station—in a pair of Levi’s 501s and a T-shirt that could just as easily have been body paint—was Jack Stapleton.

The guy on the billboard outside the hospital.ThatJack Stapleton.

I knew, like everybody knew, that Jack Stapleton lived on a ranch outside of town. And he had a well-publicized history of randomly showing up to serenade healthcare workers of all kinds in gratitude for the good work they do in the world. So it wasn’t an utterly impossible coincidence.

No more impossible than other impossible things, anyway.

Jack Stapleton randomly showed up at my sister’s last-minute hospital elopement. And then he stayed. He sang karaoke with every single person there, and he toasted the bride and groom, and he took a hundred selfies—even one with me.

He didn’t seem to remember me, but it was fine.

He might not’ve been quite as starstruck to meet me that day in LA as I had been to meet him.

And then, after Jack Stapleton had taken off, leaving a trail of swooning nurses in his wake, and after Mrs. Otsuka had taken Kenji home for bedtime, and after the bride and groom had waved and hugged their way down the hallway… just as my dad was about to turn in for the night, he squeezed my hand.

“That was fun,” he said. “Who’s next?”

“Not it,” I said.

“How’s your writer doing?”

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