Page 11 of Oh Holy Knight

“So, what’s the hold up? You need me to help you with the ring?” As soon as the words leave his lips, he inches up off the seat and reaches behind him to pull his wallet from his back pocket.

“Pop, I don’t need your money,” I say, exasperatedly. “I’ve got the ring covered.”

“Then what it is?”

“I just…well…I guess I was expecting it to be a quiet Christmas, you know—like every other holiday has been since Frankie passed.”

“What does that have to do with anything? We’ll all be together to celebrate when she says yes.” His voice trails. “She is going to say yes, right?”

I roll my eyes.

“Of course she’s going to say yes…”

“What if she doesn’t?”

Fuck.

Clenching my teeth, I grind out, “She will.”

I mean I think she will.

I really didn’t have any fucking doubts until he opened his mouth.

Lifting my chin, I stare into his eyes. I don’t know what I’m looking for—if it’s assurance or maybe forgiveness—something that tells me I’m doing the right thing. That it’s okay for me to live my life the way I want to even though my brother ain’t here to live his.

“Nico, son—”

I cut him off and shake my head.

“I want to marry her, Pop. I want to give Anna siblings, but I don’t want to dishonor my brother in any way and asking Carrie to marry me on Christmas—a holiday he loved—well, I don’t know if I’m doing the right thing.”

“I get it, I do,” he says as he leans forward and props his elbows on his knees. “I haven’t wanted to celebrate anything since Frankie died and I don’t know what’s changed this year. Maybe the guys are right—maybe I’m healing—I don’t know, but we’re gonna do it, Nico. We’re going to go back to basics and we’re going to celebrate the good. You and Carrie getting married, starting a family—it’s a good thing, son. A beautiful thing and you shouldn’t feel guilty.” He sighs, leaning back again. “I’ll tell you something else too—if Frankie were alive today, I don’t think he and Carrie would be together.”

It’s a bold assumption, one that takes me by surprise.

“I’m not saying there wasn’t love there,” he continues, shrugging his shoulders as he diverts his gaze to the table. “They were young and young love don’t always have the power to go the distance. Take me for example, a man with three ex-wives.” He shakes his head and laughs. “I loved them all and at the time I truly believed I could make it work with each of them, but it wasn’t until Maria came into my life that I knew for certain me and her were actually going to make it all the way to the end. I knew what I wanted in life and what I was capable of giving another person. There were no false pretenses and that’s rare. It isn’t something that can be taught but rather something that comes from experience. Frankie and Carrie didn’t have experience. They had forbidden love and a broken condom.”

“Pop—”

He drags his eyes back to mine and fixes me with a stern look.

“Listen to me, Frankie wouldn’t be with Carrie today. They’d be co-parenting, doing their best to give Anna a good life, but that’s about it.”

I shake my head.

“You don’t know that,” I argue.

As much as I may want to hear that, it doesn’t mean it’s the truth. Carrie and Frankie did love one another, and no one knows for certain what the cards held for them. We never will.

“I’m a lot wiser than you, kid. Trust me.”

I want to.

I want to believe that I’m doing the right thing.

That somewhere my brother is giving me his blessing.

I look my dad in the eye.

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