"I will," Clara even emphasized the solemn vow with a nod. There had not even been the slightest hesitation, she was all in!
“I will,” Jacob almost didn’t hear Clara say it, their voices had chimed so in unison.
****
Meanwhile in the pew, Wyatt watched and listened and dearly hoped this wouldn't be as long as some of Parson Evan's sermons. Lot of fuss in his opinion. Besides, he was hungry.
As the ceremony trundled along, the brother-of-the-bride Wyatt’s alter ego, the sister of the groom, still half fainting with the shock of it all, tried to recall the events of the last twenty four hours. Leonora Lutz had been in the kitchen peeling carrots, wondering if Aurelian liked carrots. Probably. He had such strong, white teeth, like a rabbit, good for eating carrots.
Then Jacob came in and told her … told her that … oh God, she had trouble saying it even in her head, even though she was sitting in the hurried, tawdry ceremony that was the direct consequence of that terrible, terrible indiscretion on Jacob’s part. Oh God the SHAME. What must Aurelian think of them, what must Aurelian think of HER?!!
She twisted her hanky in her hand nervously as she watched Him standing at the front with the so-called happy couple. More like sinful, disgusting couple. What was she hoping for? That he would suddenly turn around, walk up to her sitting in her pew, and say ‘It isn’t your fault, Miss Lutz, it was their fault, you are totally innocent, in fact, you are so lovely I want to marry you.” She had to stop herself imaging that, it made her head swim and her heart palpitate and her fainting fits come on again.
Granny Miggins, next to her in the pew, gave her a sharp nudge. “Stop fidgitin’, girl!!” the old woman hissed to her granddaughter. What that girl needed, Nellie told herself as she rubbed the third finger on her left hand, was to marry some feller and get a damn good jump! She looked at the finger, and at the strange furrow at its base, where her wedding ring had rested for the last sixty-odd years.
Storyteller / Shared NPC
Thomas smiled as Jacob and Clara echoed their agreement with no hesitation or pause, as he had known they would.
He raised his eyes to the room at whole, picking out a few faces in the audience. Nellie Miggins, Clara's requested Emeline Blakesley, relations of the groom, Aurelian standing behind his daughter, even Marshal Guyer and Deputy Pike had taken the time to come and witness the event, alongside a few other folk whom he had not yet gotten to know.
"The marriage of Jacob and Clara unites their families, and creates a new one. Do you, who represent their friends and relations, rejoice in their union, and pray God's blessing upon them? Will all of you, by God's grace, do everything in your power to uphold and care for these two in their marriage?" he addressed them as a whole, to repeat the agreement that the couple had given.
Emeline bristled at the parson's question, even though it was a common one, although to her thinking, it was a moot point...of someone objected, they should have spoken up well before today....
Well, maybe in this case, there hadn't been time for anyone to really think on what was happening, or to object, but Emeline was thinking that if anyone caused a fuss, she'd likely deck them!
Finally, she realized that she was squeezing Barnabas' wrist, and she eased up, glancing at him with a small smile. 'Sorry," she whispered.
Maybe she'd ask their children to just elope and tell them later so she didn't have to endure the weddings!
Barnabas looked at Em, then to his wrist. and back to her. " 's okay, Em, just my wrist. What's he goin' on about? Don't remember none'a that when we was hitched." It was different than the ceremony that they had had in a couple of ways, which was fine, it was after all, their wedding and what was said an done was up to them, he supposed.
"Reckon we're to say 'I will,' that what he's after?"
"The law is the law."
"Mining's not everyone's choice of hobbies, it just happens to be mine."
Speed stood, seeing no need to take a seat at this late date. He had managed to slip in for the ceremony all but unnoticed, which was fine with him as the day was about the young couple, not him.
The priest was asking everyone, "Will all of you, by God's grace, do everything in your power to uphold and care for these two in their marriage?" Speed found that interesting, that he would task the people present with the care of the two in their marriage.
It must be some sort of tradition from another culture, other than the one he was familiar with. He looked on a marriage as the couple's responsibility, and folks butting in, well, not anything he would abide in his marriage, if he was too ever had one. He donned his hat and walked through the open door into the sunlight. It was none of his affair.
Aurelian was of course paying strict attention to every word spoken, though in truth his eyes remained focused on his beautiful daughter. If he was praying for anything now, it was that she and her painfully young husband would have good life. And well, for a healthy newborn.
When the clergyman asked them to acclaim their willingness to assent to the marriage and help the young couple any way possible, he did not hesitate.
"I will," he stated in a clear voice.
Wyatt perked up, it was Clara up there, he should probably say something, "Me too!"
"THERE'S SOMEBODY AT THE DOOR!!!"
“I might”
Jemima Wigfall had been born under a planet so dark, so slow moving in its ponderous path around the firmament, that astronomers here on Earth had yet to even anticipate its presence, let alone locate it in the night sky. And she thought about things like this. Deeply.
This ceremony was like learning those lessons by rote in the old schoolroom. You were just expected to remember and repeat whatever the person at the front told you to say, no matter what you thought of it.
The Capital of France is Paris
The Capital of France is Paris
The Capital of England is London
The Capital of England is London
The… Jemima Wigfall!! Go and stand facing the corner this instant, you STUPID GIRL!
Ha ha ha ha ha ha!
Why should she ‘do everything in her power to uphold and care for Jacob and pug-nosed pretty-pretty face in their marriage?’
Huh! She thought she knew him. How? Why? What had they ever done together? They’d done IT. Oh yes, no doubt… dirty, filthy IT. Hypocrite. She’d no doubt read his poems. She probably thought they were horseshit. His new poems were short. They were just words. One or two words, about her pretty-pretty face. Not those long, awful, heart-wrenched wails that he had written for the plain Wigfall girl. For what was the whimsy of Romantic Love compared to deep, lacerating, gouging, soul destroying, suicidal guilt?
The happy couple had probably walked hand in hand along country lanes, picking flowers for each other, looked up at the Moon together. She knew that they had danced together. She had watched them that night at the barn dance. So happy, so gay, so light. Her dark burning coal eyes had burned into them on that spit and sawdust barn floor.
But had he yet stained her lap with his tears? Had he yet ripped his heart up, torn it to shreds in front of her? She doubted it. Girls like that had expectations. Manly fortitude. A strong commanding presence. The Man, The Father of her Children, The breadwinner, The Brave, The Strong, The True. That part of him she would have.
She would have always the guilt-ridden, lost, lonely, motherless little boy, always.
“Arabella!” Bridget whispered excitedly at her side “Mopses!”
The nerveless Jemima did not jump at the sudden exclamation, she looked slowly away from Jacob and Clara to Arabella, who had pulled her hair behind her ears for the umpteenth time and had turned around, wiggling her eyebrows at Bridget in the congregation in the way that she knew would always make the simple girl laugh. Jemima’s face expressed not amusement, but deep approval.
“Yeah, Sister ‘Bella’s really … shining.” came the considered, contralto response.
Storyteller / Shared NPC
The vague smattering of 'I will' from the room might have been more indicative of the audience's inexperience with Methodist wedding customs than any ill-wishing, but at least two of them had echoed the sentiment, including Aurelian, and none had said that they would not, which was all that was needed.
"Er... very well." Thomas intoned, once the room had said their piece. "The Lord be with you all. Now, let us pray."
It was customary for a prayer at events such as this, but given that most of the audience had responded so indistinctly to their declaration of intent, he made sure to speak slowly, and not expect much by way of response to his words. He shut his eyes for a moment, hand on his bible at the lectern.
"God of all peoples, you are the true light illumining everyone. You show us the way, the truth, and the life. You love us even when we are disobedient. You sustain us with your Holy Spirit. We rejoice in your life in the midst of our lives. We praise you for your presence with us, and especially in this act of solemn covenant; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Eternal God, Creator and Preserver of all life, Author of salvation, Giver of all grace: Bless and sanctify with your Holy Spirit Jacob Lutz and Clara Redmond, who come now to join in marriage. Grant that they may give their vows to each other in the strength of your steadfast love. Enable them to grow in love and peace with you and with one another all their days, that they may reach out in concern and service to the world, through Jesus Christ our Lord."
He opened his eyes to the congregation, before finishing the prayer; "Amen."
He looked down at the couple at altar, letting them know that it would be their time. "Now, Jacob and Clara will say their vows, and bind each to each in matrimony."
The minister spoke a bit to the wedding assemblage then it was back to the bride and groom.
"Now, Jacob and Clara will say their vows, and bind each to each in matrimony."
Clara had been studying the copy of what she needed to recite, as if she hadn't had enough to do for wedding preparations considering the wedding dinner was at the farm and she was the one to prepare it. But Jacob wanted it this way so she made the effort. Hopefully she could get thru it without a stumble.
'In the name of God, I, Clara Redmond take you, Jacob Lutz, to be my husband, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, until we are parted by death. This is my solemn vow."
She pulled it off but then she had always been a good student when she was younger back East and actually had attended school. Still, it was a relief to have gotten thru it without incident. Hopefully Jacob could do the same, her eyes went him as he began.
"Everybody can feather their nest, but it's not just anybody that can lay an egg!"
In the name of God, I, Jacob Lutz take you, Clara Redmond, to be my wife, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, until we are parted by death. This is my solemn vow."
He had not only remembered it perfectly; he had said it with feeling; that’s what got Arabella. What she didn’t get was: why she wasn’t crying? She usually cried at the drop of the hat! She should be in floods by now, but instead she felt a sort of awe at it all. This felt … important. There they were, the two of them, like Adam and Eve, and already in Clara’s womb, the spark of new life to come.
If the two of them were a modern-day Adam and Eve, then who were they, they who stood and watched this blessed union take place? Arabella could only think of the Angels who had stood and watched God create the first two humans at the beginning of time. Those Angels were lonely, she supposed, they couldn’t marry, or ‘know’ one another: how awful, eternally alone.
Apart from Barnabas and Em, they were all of them alone, at least for now: Granny Miggins because she was old, Wyatt because he was young; Aurelian because he was widowed; Leonora because she was ill; Even Father Thomas seemed to be alone by choice, celibate, and Hector of course because he was, well, kinda unbearable.
And, finally, Arabella and her dear ‘sisters’; her dear sisters in loneliness: Bridget and Jemima. These three would never know this union of man and woman. That, more than just girlish friendship, was their peculiar bond.
Finally, watching the happy couple holding hands and making their vows, a tear sprang in her eye. Not a tear of pity for herself and the other lonely hearts here present, but of genuine happiness for Clara and Jacob, these two she had loved with all her heart.