Page 52 of A Chance for Us
“No need for that, son. Linda and I would be honored to be their witnesses. Every part of this is so special to me.”
Oh fucking hell. I blink a few times, and Maren speaks quickly.
“Oh, no, Daddy, that’s okay. We’ll sign it later. I’m sure Mark wants to see his wife.”
Daddy looks to Mark. “You can’t wait three minutes?”
Mark opens his mouth a few times. “I . . . can . . . but—”
“Good, we’ll take care of it.” He turns to me. “And then we can give you two your wedding gift.”
Linda and Patrick head toward the back room, but Mark, Maren, and I stand frozen, not sure what the hell to do or how to get out of this. I can’t sign that piece of paper. I can’t actually be married to Maren.
Mark turns to us. “Now what?”
Maren shakes her head, her eyes wide with panic. “I don’t know. I don’t know what to do. Someone tell me what we do.”
I close my eyes and sigh. “We go, sign the thing, and figure it out afterward. If Mark never files it, then it’s not official, right?”
Mark shrugs. “Yeah, technically. I think . . .”
“Youthink?” Maren hisses. “What kind of ordained minister are you?”
He chuckles. “The kind who got certified online. Listen, I’m sure Oliver is right. We’ll just sign it, and I’ll shred it later. No worries.”
Patrick stops and calls our names, and all three of us turn like prairie dogs. There’s nothing we can do at this point other than see it through. I take Maren’s hand in mine and squeeze. “Let’s go.”
“We can’t.”
I turn to Mark. “Go stall and give us a second?”
“I’m on it.”
He walks ahead, leading Patrick and Linda into one of the offices down the hall.
“Come, let’s go. It’ll be fine.”
Maren keeps her voice low. “This wasn’t supposed to happen.”
“I know.”
“This is too much.”
I stop a few feet away, taking both her hands in mine. “What options do we have?”
“I don’t know.”
Maren looks like she’s about to have a full-on breakdown. “We just stood before our families and got married, so we’ve kind of gone too far to turn back now. In for a penny and all that.”
“And if you actually end up legally married to me?”
“Then we get a divorce and it’ll just be a funny story we tell down the line.”
I’m actually hoping that if Mark doesn’t file the thing it won’t be legal, but if that isn’t the case, then she and I will have the shortest marriage in history.
We enter the room, and Mark already has the marriage license on the table. “So, this is it. Oliver and Maren sign first and then the witnesses.”
Maren walks over, holding the back of her dress off the floor. “Right. I’ll sign here.”
