Posted June 15, 2021 / Jacob Lutz

Clara was more holding Jacob's hand than the knife, he was the one with the grip on the handle. It was time to cut the cake and she whispered in his ear, "We better not mess this up."

“Well, if we do, we’ll just have to get married all over again tomorrow. And I wouldn’t mind doing that just one little bit!” he grinned at her as their two combined, entwined hands pressed the knife through Emeline’s light as a feather cake with absolutely no effort required at all.

She turned to Jacob and spoke softly so only he could hear, "So, how did you manage to accrue that ring?" She was truly curious.

“Oh, your ring is an old family heirloom.” He smiled. That sounded nicer than, I got Granny to take it off her gnarled and bumpy finger after sixty-five years using grease soap and cotton, last night. Both answers were equally true. To be fair, the old girl had been pretty good about it: especially as he’d made sure that she thought it was her own idea.

Well, turnabout was fair play. He twisted the silver ring on his own finger.

“And where did this come from?” he asked “It’s beautiful. And it fits perfectly.” He was 99% sure that was actually what she’d meant in the first place, where had the silver ring come from: asking her was a good way of saying ‘I don’t know, honest’ without actually having to say it.

“Oh, and another thing, Father said we can stay here for our wedding night. He and Wyatt will go camp out and sleep under the stars. Wyatt will love that. So it will be just us.” Her eyes lit up.

The prospect of spending their first night together in a bed, a real bed, alone, able to make love undisturbed and in warm comfort (with no mud!) was a wonderful, wonderful prospect that made Jacob grin ear to ear.

But… oh, it was the tiniest, littlest, most insignificant, miniscule but… but it was a but… he was male after all, and… he felt ashamed of the thought and pushed it to the depths of his soul, never to be thought about, and certainly never to be uttered… … but he kinda would have liked to have spent the night under the stars with Aurelian and Wyatt! AS WELL. Of course, as well as snuggling up with Clara, speaking sweet nothings to her and kissing her gently on the forehead and… hmmm, once she was a sleep and snoring, would it be too remiss of him as a husband to sneak out to the fellas and see how they were doing, under the Moon?

No! No, he would sleep with Clara until morn. There would be plenty of opportunities in the future for the camaraderie of hunting or fishing excursions with the fellers. It was the lie that every newly married man tells himself.

Posted June 17, 2021 / Jacob Lutz

"I honestly do not know, it is not from my family. Arabella gave it to me suddenly. Took me by complete surprise, I hope she did not steal it from that awful place she works," Clara sighed.

“Steal? Arabella?” Jacob shook his head. That was a terrible thing to say about someone, calling them a thief. He made, perhaps, a mental re-adjustment in his head. Clara thought even less of her bridesmaid than he had thought she did. He stored away useful knowledge like this. Remembering these things in future might lead to a quieter life.

:: A bit later ::

The dinner over, the cake cut and eaten, all the speeches over, why Clara had even thrown the bridal bouquet to the young umarried ladies, well not like there were many. Arabella, Jemima, and Bridget. Leonora was probably not going to chance it given her delicate condition.

It was sort of a moot point who caught it: Jemima saw it coming her way, but reacted far too slowly and it bounced off her head and flopped into Bridget’s lap. Arabella, once she’d stopped laughing, declared this a draw and that it meant both of them would get married, but both might have to wait a while – a pretty safe prediction, at the time.

Rev. Thomas approached the couple as things were winding down with that kindly smile of his.

"Sorry to interrupt." he greeted them both humbly. "Now that things are dying down a little, there is the matter of signatures..."

The reverend placed the certificate on the table in front of them.

"...to confirm union in the eyes of the law."

"Oh right of course, must make certain it is all lawful," Clara nodded and signed first, her penmanship very easy to read.

Jacob signed too, in neat controlled cursive copperplate. Wigfall signed last and, of course, had to make a meal of it, first lifting the certificate and jokingly looking underneath. He had heard, he said, of a hotel clerk who used carbon paper to get people’s signing-in signatures onto blank cheques. He then assured the Reverend Thomas that he was just joking, which, as nobody was laughing, was probably a much-needed piece of information. He then took out a fountain pen ‘I always use my own pen, it has a special gold nib’ he pointed out ostentatiously, before signing a signature of such size and squiggly fanciness that it would have put John Hancock himself to shame.

Wigfall then heartily shook the hands of Lutz and Father Thomas and taking Clara’s hand, gave her a continental sort of a kiss on it, ruminating to himself on what a lucky bastard Lutz was, falling on his feet with a peach like Clara Redmond.