Bouquets of Chocolate (manxman)

Fourteen

Who knew planning a wedding is this exhausting?

Jordie and I have been spending all morning sitting at the low coffee table Jordie brought with him when he moved in a few months ago, me looking at colour swatches for the reception venue like the ones they have in the paint shops for your walls, and Jordie scanning an insanely thick catalogue of flowers. When I asked him how many flower there could possibly be, he just handed me the book wordlessly. Turns out the answer is a lot. And a lot of flowers means a lot of combinations of flowers and bouquet styles and cultural approaches and I stopped right there.

The worst of it is the fact that even yesterday, on Valentine's day of all days, we spent most of our day preparing things and talking to our wedding planner, who was meant to make this whole ordeal a lot easier. Instead, we get constant emails and phone calls asking us to review this, have a look at that, decide the other. It's hell. In the end, we just about squeezed in a couple of hours of kitchen time, which resulted in less than satisfying results and none of the emotional pay off we usually get from it.

"Jordie, why the fuck are we doing this?" I whine his way.

"Stop moaning. It is what it is. It's not long now." Jordie answers in a tone that makes it obvious how little he actually means his words. But at least he is right, it's not long now. We've got another couple months or so and then we're finally married. Although the fact that we're more excited about not having to deal with the preparation anymore than the fact that we're actually getting married is slightly worrying.

"You love me, right?" the question is out before I can convince myself it's a bad idea. Because it is. Because now his look of pure bewilderment turns into a slow grin.

"Are you trying to seduce me, sugar daddy?" He's started calling me that since he stopped working and moved in with me. It's beyond annoying, but the more I push back, the more he uses it to tease me, so I've given up.

"No, you'd know if I was," I wave him off casually, which makes him chuckle thankfully, "Just feels weird that we're looking forward to this being over more than being actually married."
I sigh in defeat. A wedding is meant to be the culmination of one's love life and while I don't really buy into it that much, I do want it to be a perfect day, if only so we'll never have any sort of regret looking back at it.

"Well if you want to look at it from that angle, then just know that I'm really only bearing with all of this because I want to be married to you at the end of it." He shoots me a small smile, and even if his tone sounds jokey, I can tell he means it.

I sigh again, hanging my head a little, which unfortunately leads me to staring straight at the offending bunch of swatches I was looking at a minute ago. I close my eyes.

When I feel Jordie's hand resting softly on my knee, I tilt my head his way to look at him.

"A kiss?" he asks, smiling at me softly and moving his thumb back and forth right above my knee cap and it's strangely soothing. I can't say no.

So with a weak smile, I lean over and kiss him as requested. Immediately he lets go of my knee in favour or tugging at my arm, which of course puts me off balance and I end up falling into him. And going with it because this is Jordie, he falls backwards, narrowly misses the corner of his table, and lands on my fluffy rug on his back with me lying right on his chest.

He's laughing, but because I'm annoying, I lift my legs off the floor and rest my elbows underneath the far end of his collarbones to rest my head on my hands. Now all my weight is on him and he somehow groans and laughs at the same time.

His arms come around my lower back, holding me to him, even when I do end up trying to spare him from being crushed by getting up.

"Stay. I love you on top." he whispers, but even he can't keep his composure at his stupid joke and starts laughing even louder. After a few seconds, I crack up to, but decide to save some of my dignity by hiding my face in his neck.