Promise
They'd started small, so it made sense to continue the pattern. There was a church, a Good Book, and a few gathered friends. It may not have been the wedding that she'd dreamed of as a young girl, but she figured, under the circumstances, it was what she deserved.
Joey's friends took up most of the seats. She had no one to invite, except for Raphael and Valon, but their letters came back in mail, unopened, and Mai took the hint. She didn't even have her father to give her away, so she walked down the aisle alone, meeting her future in a brilliant white dress.
But that was fine. She was used to doing things alone, being herself by herself. Now she'd just be doing things alone with someone else.
Yugi was there, and his grandfather, with Téa, Tristan, Duke, Serenity, Ryou Bakura, a woman that introduced herself as Joey's mother – and a few others she didn't recognize, and likely wouldn't remember.
To think, if I'd told you we'd end up like this five years ago, you woulda slugged me, he'd said to her one night, a toothy grin stretched across his face.
She snorted, didn't comment, and fixed his tie.
After the ceremony, everyone gathered, shared hugs and well-wishes, and she noticed something.
She noticed Tristan and Duke, who looked as though they'd been through some sort of hell and back and lost something along the way.
She noticed Ryou, who shared glances with Yugi throughout the night, and did not say much, but looked down at his own chest quite often as if expecting something to be there, etched into his skin like a scar that wouldn't heal
She noticed Serenity, from whom she received many hugs, and whose face seemed to be the only one that she had truly remembered saying goodbye to the last time they'd parted, unchanged and forever young.
She noticed Téa, graciously sombre even as she offered her sincerest congratulations, who tsked and fretted over and encouraged the others while they ate, laughed, danced, but seemed to allow herself little time to do so herself.
And she noticed Yugi, the absent golden necklace leaving an empty space around his chest, who seemed as if he was looking over his shoulder for someone he knew wasn't coming back.
They were all so different than from the people she'd remembered meeting at Duelist Kingdom, the people she'd grown to love during Battle City, the people she'd come to eventually appreciate during that whole Orichalcos fiasco… There was a solemn, morose tone in the air that she couldn't understand, and knew that she probably would never, if they ever felt up to sharing it. But that was fine. For the first time in a long while, things were going her way. Things would be fine.
And now, whenever Joey grows distressed in the middle of the night, sobbing and yelling – I've got to save you, Mai, please come back, you mean too much, I'm so sorry, got to save you from Marik – she holds him, wakes him up, and he comes back.
She doesn't bother bringing up the Puzzle. She knows, just as surely as she knows they are safe and together, that the pharaoh is gone, as was told to her by a red-eyed Yugi Mutou during the reception. She knows that the evils of the Shadow Realm can't hurt her here, not anymore. She knows things will be fine.
But Joseph still wakes up in cold sweat, still clutches her tight underneath the sheets, as if waiting, expecting her to be gone when he wakes up. But she's done leaving people, and she's done leaving him. They've found their way back to each other for the last time, and though it's taken her years, ages, almost too long, she can recognize that he's the only one that's ever tried to come back to her in return.
He says they sound of cards clicking, shuffling, a Duel Disk humming, gotta save the world, Mai, I didn't mean what I'd said on the blimp. Just let me beat Marik, let me beat Dartz, let me beat you.
She shakes him, lays a hand on his forehead, slaps him if she needs to – and he comes back, back down to earth, back to their bed and home and her.
After they had slipped the rings on, he wrapped his arms around her tight, kissed her brow, kissed every inch of her; and she knew she had made the right choice.
She doesn't bring up the pharaoh, ever. She doesn't ask him about his nightmares, doesn't ask him about what he did while she was away, the time in between, after the Orichalcos and before she had come back to him years later with a wedding ring and a four-worded question – she doesn't ask, because she doesn't want to know. Let him remember the pharaoh, if he wants. Let him remember the times when the Shadow Realm hung over their heads like a thick, dark cloud waiting to descend. Let him think, and dream, and remember whatever he wishes. But let him know that she's there.
Sometimes, during quieter nights, she imagines the worst: she imagines Marik winning, thinks of an eternity trapped in his glass prison, and wonders if it even comes close to what Joey relives in his own mind. Her hands start shaking at the mere thought; she remembers how it had taken her two months to sleep without nightmares after Battle City, two months to find Valon and substitute one nightmare for the next. Sometimes, she thinks fiercely to the pharaoh, wherever he is, You're my friend, but I'm glad you're gone. And don't you dare come back.
But Joey is awake now. It's morning. He's groggy, sleepy, has dirty-blonde locks falling into his eyes; and as he smiles and reaches for her, she forgets her hate and her spite, and comes down to meet him halfway.
I do, they had both said, and they had kissed. Such an easy phrase to say, as if love could be summed up within those two words. She knows that they had never needed a wedding to know what they felt was real; but she had wanted one, had insisted, on making things official. Whatever had happened with the pharaoh was over. These are their lives now, for better or for worse. They have to move on. She helps him realize this, and sometime, between the first cheeky grins and the first "I love you"s under the sheet, he thanks her for it. Thanks her for being there, thanks her for coming back.
She'll always come back, she tells him.
He smiles lazily, asking if she promises.
I promise, she says. And it's such an easy one to make.