Chapter Nine
"Are you alright?" Steve asked, holding Jaime close. "Did he hurt you?"
Jaime shook her head. "I'm ok, but we're gonna be late for our own wedding."
Steve smiled, unable to resist kissing her once more. "There's over a hour left; besides, I have a feeling they'll wait for us." He started to lead Jaime back to the OSI car, but they nearly forgot one crucial item.
"My dress!" Jaime remembered. "It's in the limo." Together, still holding each other tight (not to rub it in Roger's face so much as to enjoy how it felt), they retrieved the dress, still safely in its bag.
"You know," Steve told Jaime when he spotted the little suitcase with its make-up, hot rollers and beauty supplies, "I'd rather see you leave that stuff behind." He cupped her face softly between his hands. "This is the woman I love – not the one behind all that gunk and paint."
"Steve..." She eyed the suitcase but left it on the seat.
"C'mon, Mrs. Austin," Steve said with a huge grin, "let's go get married."
- - - - - -
Every eye in the chapel shed a happy tear as Jaime walked slowly and radiantly down the aisle on Rudy's arm, carrying her bouquet of yellow roses. Their friends all knew how long Jaime and Steve had waited for this day, and how much they had been through to get here.
As Rudy gallantly placed Jaime's hand into Steve's, he clasped the two hands with his own for a moment and smiled. "I know you'll always take good care of each other," he told them softly.
"My friends," the minister began, unable to hold back a huge grin of his own. "I face an unusual dilemma here today. These two souls have been joined from the day they began life on this earth. Who am I to try and improve on what God and nature have already so perfectly wrought? Steve and Jaime have written their own words to share with you on their happiest of days, and I know they can express the unique quality of their love far better than I could." The minister, still smiling broadly, nodded at Steve.
Steve gazed deeply into Jaime's eyes, and the lump of emotion in his throat gave his voice just the slightest hint of a quiver as he began to speak. "Jaime, my life changed forever when I was only eight years old. That was when the tiniest five-year-old I'd ever seen, with freckles, blonde pigtails and overalls, dragged my to my own destiny, kicking and screaming all the way. I teased that little tiny bit of a girl mercilessly; I told you to go away – I pushed you away – but somehow you seemed to know even then that we were supposed to be together. You followed me, badgered me and pestered me until I finally saw that, too, and I have never forgotten it. You had possession of my heart before either one of us even knew what that meant, and never for one second has that flame that burns solely for you ever flickered or gone out."
Steve reached out to brush the tear from his bride's eye before going on. "Sweetheart, today I am promising you that I will never allow anything or anyone to threaten that flame or diminish my love for you. Come what may – richer, poorer, sickness, health or calamity – I will always love you exactly the way I do today, fully and with my whole heart." He smiled at his bride with every bit of his heart and blinked to force away his own tears.
Jaime smiled back, feeling their souls touch as their eyes held their gaze. "Steve," she began in a clear, amazingly calm voice, "if there's one thing I've learned in my life – and especially in the last few days – it's that together, we are an unbeatable team. There is nothing we can't face and overcome when we face life together. I don't know for sure what drew that little girl to that little boy who kept telling her to go away, but I know that every time life throws us a curve ball and pulls us apart, we've always found our way back to each other and landed on our feet. I firmly believe we were put on this earth to be two halves of the same whole, one soul in two bodies sharing everything that life gives us – the happiness and the pain."
"That's why today I am vowing to you that I will never forget that life has made us a solid team, and through richer, poorer, sickness and health, I will always belong where I am at this moment – by your side."
As they exchanged rings and the more traditional vows, Steve and Jaime's eyes remained glued only to each other. When the minister pronounced them husband and wife, they both glowed with inner peace and deep, abiding love. They were now officially joined together, bodies, minds, hearts and souls, but for them this was nothing new; they'd been that way all of their lives.
END