Page 98 of Resistance Training
After we’ve showered together, when we’re wearing matching hotel bathrobes, Vivian turns on the TV and gets comfy in bed with her paperback novel. I go to the closet and unlock the in-room safe, thinking about how much I love that she’s almost always got a book in her hand when she’s at home. I love being at her place, with all her pink Himalayan salt lamps and throw pillows and Hairy Styles. We also love being together at my place, with Bella and my bookshelves, and Vivian really loves it when I fuck her standing up against those bookshelves like Keira Knightly and that guy inAtonement.
I take out the velvet box, close the safe as quietly as possible, put the box in the pocket of my robe, and get into bed with her. I just love being around this woman. I love watching her do her thing while I’m doing meal prep for the week. She’ll haveCluelesson her iPad while she walks around with a paperback copy of whatever we’re reading for ABC that week, singing some ABBA song, and doing Kegels. She thinks I can’t tell when she’s doing Kegels, but I can tell.
Fluffing up the pillow behind me, I tell her again how great her toast was, how beautiful she was, standing there next toAubrey, and how mad I am that she made me do the chicken dance with her. Even though I loved it.
I tell her she was the perfect maid of honor because I know she has always had that little-sister syndrome.
“I guess I always will,” she says.
“You know where you’ve got her beat?”
“My boobs have always been bigger, and my booty is objectively more wowza than hers now. It’s more wowza than most people’s.”
“Yes, yes, and absolutely yes. And…she dated Eric for how long before he proposed to her?”
“Over three years.”
“Well. Guess how long you dated me before I proposed to you?”
Her face lights up. “Less than three months?”
I pull the box out of my pocket, like I’m offering her a midnight snack. “Yeah. Less than three months.” I’m not going to get on one knee because I know Vivian would rather I just stay by her side. I open the box, revealing the diamond engagement ring.
Cindy told me that the Aries birthstone just happens to be a diamond.
I wrote about my intention for today in my journal this morning:Lock that girl down.
I spoke to Mr. and Mrs. Sparks before the end of the reception and told them of my intentions. Mrs. Sparks burst into tears and hugged me, thanking me. Mr. Sparks asked me how much I spent on the ring.
Their daughter is just smiling at me, her eyes welling with tears and filled with all the love I can handle, maybe more.
“Vivian Elizabeth Sparks. I love you more than I have ever loved anyone in my entire life. Will you marry me, so I can love you for the rest of my life too?”
She nods. “Yes, sir. I’m going to marry you, Captain Coach Brad Bradley Alexander Mitch Mitchell. I’m going to love you forever and ever.”
Sliding the ring onto her finger, I say, with all the sincerity of a sparkly teenage vampire, “And so the lion fell in love with the lamb.”
She blows out a breath and says with a smirk, “Stupid, stupid hot lamb with womanly curves.”
“What a sick, masochistic, hot, physically fit lion.”
EPILOGUE - VIVIAN
My husband sparkles when he steps into the light.
And so do I.
It’s early evening in the middle of May. Almost exactly ten years since the day our friendship suddenly ended the first time around. This time around, we are best friends, lovers, workout buddies, Cheat Day artisanal-ice-cream enthusiasts, Asshole Book Club members, cat parents, housemates, and partners in marriage.
If only miserable eighteen-year-old me knew how happy Bradley and I would eventually be together and that we would have—objectively—the most perfect wedding ever.
Bradley had to talk me out of doing a destination wedding in Forks, Washington, or any of the filming locations forTwilight, which by the way, includes towns in Oregon, in and around Portland. But I have no complaints about the location of ourTwilight-themed wedding in Portland. At an evergreen-filled botanical garden wherein we recreated the forest-wedding scene inBreaking Dawn: Part One, and my dad walked me down the aisle to a quartet playing “A Thousand Years” by Christina Perri. My dress is a not-exact replica of the one Kristen Stewart wore in the movie, because that is still the prettiest damn weddinggown I have ever seen, but I am a grown woman with curves. My neckline plunges. My hips stretch the fabric like round yet firm divas. And speaking of asses—the open lace back of my crepe satin gown was tailored to ensure maximum booty sculpting.
My goal was to make Bradleyalmostjizz in his pants in front of all our invited family and friends, while also making him proud because he locked me downandcontinued to oversee my hourglass-shape workouts after we got engaged. If a bride can’t torture her groom with a boner-inducing dress on their wedding day, is it really worthnoteating banana cream pie for an entire month just so she could fit into said dress? I think not.
My husband wore a tux with a long jacket like the one Robert Pattinson wore in the movie, and he was not happy about it, but he did it. Because he loves me. And because I promised to let him do unspeakable things to me on our honeymoon if he did. Granny Sparks had a lot of complaints because she couldn’t see his butt while he was standing up there, and honestly, I get it.
But for the reception, we’ve recreated theTwilightprom.
