All those sweet memories had me in tears.
***
Lorie drove us back to Callahan’s apartment after sunset. Buddy padded in first, exhausted from too much attention, and curled up near the bedroom doorway with the deep sigh of a dog who had fulfilled all duties expected of him.
My sister hugged me hard at the door. “You deserve this, Merry,” she whispered. “I’m so happy for you, love.”
Then she left, and it was just my husband and me, and the first quiet of our marriage settling around us.
I guided Callahan to the bedroom by the hand. When we reached the edge of the bed, he turned toward me, and I was more nervous than I had been walking down the aisle.
Not because he could see me. Because he couldn’t.