"Over the seasons, Luke and I had talked a lot about trying to get Shannen on the show [Riverdale.] The timing never worked out or the part was never quite right. When we were working on the episode, we knew that there would be some characters outside of our cast of characters that would be involved. We thought it would be nice if it was someone he cared for in real life. He cared so deeply about Shannen." - Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa, creator and executive producer of Riverdale
xx
She had been born the more independent of the Walshes.
It had been a title she carried proudly. She had relied on her ability to take care of herself, to leap to her feet after every heartbreak and disappointment that life boomeranged her way.
She had more or less been on her own since her move to London, and even before that.
It was, therefore, extremely difficult for Brenda to accept that she could not do everything herself whilst she continued to heal.
Valerie Malone used that to her full advantage when, in the heart of winter, she flew to London to help Brenda in her wedding shopping.
Donna had finished the dress.
Brenda now had to figure out the accessories to accompany the dress, which she soon discovered to be harder than she had expected.
"I'm not fragile, babe," she told Valerie in the fifth shop they had visited since Val's arrival the previous evening. "I can walk on my own."
"Bren, you were walking the staircase to the afterlife right before Christmas and now you're living with one kidney." Val left her arm hooked around Brenda's shoulder. "Just let me help you."
"Living with one kidney doesn't make me feeble."
"No, but it does make it crucial that you avoid stress so your other kidney doesn't give out, too, and you don't forget me again. Which reminds me." Val examined an emerald bandeau through a shop window, which Brenda shook her head at. "Okay, so I might need to hold off on the sex for a bit which will suck ass, but if you need someone to do it, then let me."
"Let you what?" Brenda cupped the doorknob of the shop.
"Carry your kid."
Brenda released the knob as if it had acted as a laser upon her skin. "What?" She stared at Valerie.
"Okay, so I've been reading up - yes, I read on occasion, don't give me that look - and I know you and Dylan want kids and you already weren't sure if you'd be able to have them and apparently your risk of preeclampsia just went up fiftyfold with the one kidney and there's no fucking way I'm losing my best friend to fucking preeclampsia -"
"Deep breath, Val." Brenda moved a hand to Valerie's shoulder.
"What I'm getting at is if you and Dylan decide on surrogacy, let me do it. It won't be like a Hollywood surrogacy because you already know I can be trusted around your man and I don't even want kids so I won't try to steal your baby or your life or anything."
Brenda stood stunned. "That's - that's really amazing of you to offer, Val. It's incredibly selfless."
"More like selfish," Valerie corrected. "Extremely selfish, actually. This is really just about me refusing to give up my best friend to the fucking Grim Reaper just so she can become a mother."
Brenda said that she and Dylan had talked it over, deciding to wait to see how her blood pressure levels held up and the results of her first urinalysis before they attempted to expand their family.
"But I can't tell you how much it means to me that you would offer something like that when I know exactly how many times you've said you never want to be pregnant," she added.
"Being pregnant with a kid I don't need to take home when it's done cooking probably wouldn't be so bad," said Valerie as she walked Brenda into the shop.
"And I'm sure you would look adorable with a bump stretched out to here," said Brenda, folding out her hands in the air.
"You're the one who should have the bump," said Valerie, "but not if it kills you."
"Increased chance of preeclampsia doesn't mean it will happen."
"It also doesn't mean it won't happen. And my beautiful niece or nephew would never know their mama."
Deciding there was no use in arguing against Valerie's intransigence, Brenda's gaze darted across row after row of European-designed shoes. "Fuck. I'm never gonna find the right bloody pair of shoes with this many to choose from. Maybe I should just wear my sneakers."
"Yeah, right. Brenda Walsh is not wearing sneakers on her wedding day."
"It's my wedding day, Val. I can wear whatever I want."
"Bren, your wedding's going to be on the fucking sand. Sandals, yes, fine, whatever; sneakers, no. The sand would be a bitch on your feet."
Brenda hesitated to admit it, but Val did have a point.
Sneakers might not be the best option for her chosen venue.
"Then help me find a pair of sandals that doesn't look like aunt Paula discovered them in the back of her closet."
"Are we looking at the same selection of fucking expensive, stunningly gorgeous shoes?"
"Then you buy them."
"Don't mind if I do."
Their shopping excursion turned out to be partly successful. Brenda had found all of her jewelry and hair accessories in a vintage boutique that she had instantly fallen in love with. Valerie had bought three pairs of shoes, and only stopped herself from buying a fourth when Brenda reminded Val of Val's limited suitcase space.
Brenda, however, had disliked every pair of shoes she had tried.
"It's a beach wedding," she told Val. "Can I just go barefoot?"
"If you don't mind getting sand all over the bottom of your magnificent dress," said Val.
"Dammit," said Brenda, turning the key into the knob of her flat.
"You're home." The door yanked open. "Were we successful?"
"Depends on what you call successful," said Brenda. She set her purchases down on the tablecloth she had brought out every winter since purchasing it in her first trip to Denmark with Dylan. "Val's going home with a bunch of new shoes, I got things for my ears and hair - also some things for Maddie; I think I'm gonna go barefoot, and oh, Val's offered to be our surrogate."
"Barefoot?" asked Dylan.
"Bren hated all the shoes we saw," said Valerie.
"They were either too ordinary or too expensive," explained Brenda.
"Too expensive isn't in our vocabulary," said Dylan. "What's this about our surrogate?" Had they not been engaged and she submerged in love, Brenda would have questioned how the sight of Dylan's lifted eyebrow could appear so alluring.
She questioned it regardless, until his hands looped around her lower waist and his lips danced across the nape of her neck.
"Honey, we have company," she said in warning.
"It's just Val," he said, briefly raising his head to glance at Valerie.
"I'd be concerned if Dylan wasn't hanging all over my best friend, considering you're marrying him in a month." Valerie flattened a hand against the wall to stretch out her calves barely hidden in skintight leggings.
Once a gymnast, always a gymnast, thought Brenda.
"Can't come fast enough," said Dylan. "We're going for surrogacy, Bren? Did I miss you talking about that before?"
"I haven't," said Brenda.
"Thought so," said Dylan. "I never forget what you tell me."
"It's true." She smiled at Valerie. "He doesn't."
"Although there are things I wish I could," he added.
"Dude, you got the girl. Unless you fuck it up again or Brenda moves on to less hairy pastures, pretty sure that other stuff can be left in the past."
"Less hairy pastures?" asked Dylan incredulously. "Excuse me? How do you know how hairy I am?"
"I'm just guessing." Val's shoulder slightly lifted, revealing the strap of the top she wore under her off-the-shoulder woolen sweater. "Dark hair, more hair; kind of goes with the territory. It's not exactly like you were Mr. Clean-Shaven when we were - when Bren was at RADA."
"Don't listen to her, babes," said Brenda with a glare to Valerie. "I love your chest hair."
"If my fiancée loves it, that's all that matters." Dylan nibbled at Brenda's ear. "That doesn't explain this surrogacy thing, though."
"Val's just worried about me dying in childbirth, that's all."
Her tone was meant to soothe, but Brenda could immediately tell it had done the opposite.
"Fuck." Dylan turned her around and concentrated on transmitting his fears into her eyes. "You're pregnant? And you're dying? Did something happen? The - the doctor said at your last appointment your recovery was going well…did I, did my uncontrollable passion for your body knock you up to your death?"
The look on his face entrenched a thousand skeans into her lungs.
"Woah," Brenda trilled. "Easy there, cowboy." She set both hands on his arms. "I'm not pregnant. And I'm not dying. Well, I mean, not technically speaking -"
"If you say we're all dying bit by bit every day -" he started, wagging a finger.
"We are, but that's not what I was going to say. We can't spend our whole lives worrying about what may or may not happen."
"I offered her a kidney," said Valerie. "Bitch knows she and Brandon are the only two people I would ever allow to have my kidneys."
"Am I a can of spam?" asked Dylan.
"What?" asked Valerie.
"Dylan's trying to make new idioms," said Brenda. "It's what he does when he gets in writing mode. Crush clichés and figure out how to say the same thing in a new way."
"Sounds like PR," said Val. "You ever consider going into PR, Dyl? You're good at spinning things."
"I go into PR and every company I work for will be taken down from the inside, Val," answered Dylan. "Way too much corporate greed. I should know. My father was one of the worst."
Brenda looked at him. Dylan didn't often speak on his father, the tyrannical businessman who knew how to be a father only in the moments that suited him.
He barely spoke on his brother, the man Jack raised whilst he allowed his firstborn to think him dead.
Brenda attempted to think positively of the twice-dead Jack McKay, but always found difficulty when she thought of how he had treated his son.
Fatherhood was not something to be picked up as an interest of the week. Jack had treated Dylan as a trophy to rebuild his reputation, telling Dylan all the sentiments he had always longed to hear from his father.
Brenda hadn't dared allow herself to think that way when they all believed Jack to be dead, but overtime she had thought it a convenient excuse for Jack to fake his death and through it abandon Dylan yet again.
She wanted Dylan to have his own shot at fatherhood. Short of suggesting he donate his sperm - Dylan would be infuriated at the suggestion and it sickened Brenda just to think of it - she didn't know if he would be able to have a child with his DNA.
Perhaps surrogacy was the route for them to consider. If Brenda trusted anyone to carry her child when she could not, Valerie would certainly be one of those few.
Donna would be another, but with three kids of her own and Donna only just beginning to heal from the miscarriage of her fourth, Brenda wouldn't even entertain the idea.
Katie would be the third, if Katie Wachinski wasn't adamantly against the thought of having children.
That went double for Lottie.
Brenda and Dylan had agreed on the wait. Brenda would follow through on their agreement and revisit the surrogacy option then.
She could be complete without children.
But that didn't lessen her yearning for motherhood.
"If you're compatible," Dylan said, having evidently decided a slight change of topic was in order that shredded Brenda's reverie, "that's great, but I'm definitely having my kidney tested against my wife's before anyone else's. Including Brandon's."
Brenda found herself torn between limitless love for both of them and irritation that they were jumping ahead to imagined scenarios she would rather not consider at that present moment.
"You don't even know I'll need a kidney transplant. My kidney seems to be functioning just fine."
"A month ago, we thought both your kidneys were functioning fine. Then you ended up in hospital for overworking yourself to the point of collapse." Dylan sat her on his lap. "I just want all bases covered if anything were to happen."
"Trust me, Shane's watching me way too closely at work to even let that be an option."
"Have I said lately how glad I am that you have Wachinski around?"
"I swear, if Shane wasn't married to our Katie, you'd be trying to hook him up with Lottie."
"He'd fit well with that side of the family, just saying," Dylan shrugged.
"Hell, if Shane wasn't married, I'd be hooking up with him," said Val. "You've seen those eyes, right? But don't worry. I don't hook up with married men." She hastened to add, "Anymore."
"Kenny and the diapers?" asked Brenda. "Classic. Wish I could've seen that."
"Me too," said Dylan.
"Asshole deserved it," said Val. "First and last time I get too attached to a married guy."
"Brandon made you give back the money, didn't he?" asked Brenda.
"You know your brother and his moral compass," said Valerie with a roll of her eyes. "Spoilsport."
"So that's where Bren gets her eyeroll from," said Dylan.
"Oh, Val wishes," said Brenda.
Dylan and Brenda both knew that Valerie would have monopolized their time together if she could, but Val remained a good sport when their quiet evening was crashed by the entire London crew and Theo Fletcher.
"It's not often Val's in town," said Levi in explanation. "Even less often when we get Shane and Bren both free for the night Val's in town."
"I brought the alcohol," said Vee. She hesitated, a rare emotion for Vee. "Fuck, can I bring alcohol?"
"Of course you can," said Brenda. "Dylan won't be drinking it."
"Neither will Bren," said Dylan. "She'll start drinking in moderation again."
"But not yet," said Brenda, partly to assure Dylan and partly because she didn't yet trust the response her body would have to a drink.
"Meanwhile, I don't know moderation," said Val, snatching the bottle from Vee. "If we were in Philly, I'd drive over to Wegmans and get us an eggnog. Spiked eggnog, obviously."
"What's eggnog?" asked Vee.
"Oh my God, you don't know what eggnog is?" asked Valerie. "Well, for starters, it's the first drink the twins and I ever had. Christmas of '86. Brandon got super sick that night and swore he would never drink again."
"He always swears that," said Brenda.
"Abby mixing it with the world's worst rum probably didn't help."
"Abby?" asked Vee.
"My dead mother," said Valerie bluntly.
"Fuck," said Vee. "I'm sorry."
"Don't be," said Val, who had moved past her initial shock over Abby's passing.
The two women walked away, leaving Brenda to converse with Dylan.
"Should I tell them to dump the liquor?" she asked worriedly.
"Would you believe me if I said seeing Val pour it didn't entice me at all?" asked Dylan.
"The meetings?"
"The meetings have certainly helped, but I think it's just everything, Bren. Being with you, getting to have you in my life. It doesn't keep me sober; I don't want you to think I'm only sober for you. But being with you does make it easier to want to stay sober."
Brenda pulled him into the kitchen to snog him in the same manner they would have if they didn't have a group of people waiting for them outside the doors.
An entire lifetime of memories giggled its way out of Brenda's and Valerie's lips before Valerie made her way out of their place on Theo Fletcher's arm just before dawn.
When Brenda's head lolled onto Dylan's shoulder, the rest of the crew took it as their cue to leave.
She awoke to see Dylan's eyes trained on hers.
"Did you call David?" she asked, in lieu of their typical morning greeting that they both knew by heart.
"Yes, while you were discussing kindergarten crushes with Val."
Dylan had faithfully stuck to a weekly check-in with David, at the advice of David's NA sponsor.
"You're surely not jealous?"
"If anything, Garrett Bradley should be jealous of me getting the ring on the finger of his kindergarten girlfriend," answered Dylan as he touched his lips against her ring.
At times, when she was alone on stage and the performance remained hours away, Brenda would catch sight of the jewel against the stagelight and marvel at the fact that she had been the one permitted her great-grandmother's coveted ring.
She liked to think it was her family's way of accepting Dylan as one of their own.
"I haven't talked to Garrett since we were seven," said Brenda.
"Is that because of him asking Val out, or because he asked Darla out?"
"You were paying attention."
"Kinda hard not to when Val starts talking about the guy who stole her primary school heart and then you learn he was her sister's ex."
"Except Val turned him down."
"And then he went after Darla?"
"Bingo. You and Garrett might actually have a lot in common."
"Very funny."
"I thought so. Primary?"
"Fuck, I meant elementary."
"No you didn't." Brenda unleashed a victorious grin. "You meant primary. Oh, it's happening."
"What's happening?"
"Your transformation. Say advertisement."
"Advertisement," said Dylan, pronouncing the word differently than he had before moving back to London.
"Oh, Shane's gonna love this! Change up enough of your words and he might actually let you come along to rugby."
"Did I tease you this much when you started sounding more like a Londoner?"
"Uh, yeah. All the time. Did you forget when you told my parents how often I used the word knackered?"
"You do use it a lot."
"Exhausted just doesn't sound as good. It doesn't convey the feeling half as well."
"Exhausted, knackered; I can make you feel both in however many rounds you want."
Brenda tried to rein in Dylan's ferocious appetite, though her own matched the furor of his.
"Weren't we talking about the Silvers?"
Dylan released an exaggerated sigh.
"If we must."
"So? What'd you find out? Is David using like Steve thinks?"
"Silver says he's clean. He's got a meeting tonight. But he wasn't too keen on talking about Donna."
"Oh no. I hope they didn't have another fight."
"You'll have to ask her."
"This is just a temporary roadblock for them, right?"
"Honestly, Bren, I don't know. They're great together when everything is going well, or when Silver's in a good place. Since the girls were born, it's hard for Donna whenever he crawls into that dark place I know way too fucking well."
Brenda wondered if the Silver spouses still discussed the more taxing topics, or if they brushed them under their checkered rug to deal with in a tomorrow that they never permitted to occur.
She hadn't any desire to judge anyone's marriage, but she did worry about her friends.
They weren't the only people she worried about.
There came more news from California in the form of Hannah Zuckerman-Vasquez's Skype call.
Steve and Andrea were moving in together, said Hannah, and she and Madeline were strategizing for the move to materialize into more.
Steve broke in to note the move as temporary whilst Andrea looked for a new apartment that hadn't been condemned, unlike her previous place. Hannah teased him he had found an acceptable excuse and had used it to his advantage.
Steve had ended the call by swinging the laughing Hannah over his head and closing the lid of Andrea's laptop.
Brenda temporarily placed the Silvers and Steve's love life on hold to check in on Dylan's own mental state.
"How are you doing?" she asked, drawing shapes upon his cheeks.
"Do you want the truth, or the answer of an optimistic fiancé?"
"What do you think?"
"Alright. The truth is, I've been calling Wachinski every day to check in on you."
"I know."
"You know? Did Wachinski tell you?"
"He didn't have to. I assume I don't need to tell you how well I know both of you?"
"I know how much you hate it when we -"
"No, it's okay. I understand. I'd be the same way if it had been you in my position. I know it helps him to look out for me and it helps you to know he is. But Dylan, if you want to know how I am, I'd prefer you just ask me."
"I thought you'd get annoyed if I asked too often."
"I mean, don't call me to ask when I'm in the middle of rehearsal or a performance, but if we're gonna do this marriage thing, then I suppose I can humor you. How long do you plan to keep checking in?"
On the odd occasion Dylan became vulnerable enough to display a sheepish appearance, Brenda thought him to be the most adorable man in the world.
Biased or not, she had certainly fallen in love with one incredibly attractive individual who managed to look appealing in every emotion.
Or perhaps he simply initiated a concupiscence in her that was difficult to satiate.
"I kinda hoped I could keep checking in until your urinalysis."
"A year? Okay, we have to dial that back. I'm gonna get hella annoyed at both of you if this goes on for a year."
"Yeah, thought that might be pushing it. Once a week?"
"How about once a month? Daily until we marry, once a week for a couple months after that, and then once a month for the rest of the year."
"I think I can handle that. I can't promise I won't be staring at you while you sleep, though."
"I can't promise I won't be doing the same."
"Guess neither of us will be sleeping much."
"I don't think most newlyweds do."
"I wouldn't know," said Dylan. "Ours will be the first time I actually get to experience married life. First honeymoon, first time with a first anniversary, first Christmas together as your husband. We've got a whole bunch of shared firsts in front of us."
She hadn't stopped to consider the idea, but now, as Brenda thought it over, they would have more firsts than she had planned. Dylan hadn't been able to have a honeymoon or anniversary with his first wife before Toni had been brutally murdered by the hit ordered by her own father on her wedding night.
Brenda didn't think it appropriate to label Toni as Dylan's first wife, even if that was precisely what Toni had been.
"Do you ever think about it?" she ventured.
"Think about what?"
"Your life with Toni. If you'd gone on a honeymoon. If you'd had a first anniversary. If you'd," she grazed her teeth over her lower lip, "if you'd had kids together."
"No," he said, and she could see the sincerity in his eyes.
"No?"
"No. I don't dwell on it. There was a time when I would've, but that was before the woman of my literal dreams decided she'd give me another chance. And another. And still another, when she beat kidney failure and defied the universe's desperate attempt to tear us apart." Bare abs against her silken stomach. Her shirt raised, his thumb pressed in a gentle circular motion along her side. "Truth is, Bren, I've probably spent more of my life dreaming about our honeymoon, our marriage, our family than I did being married to Toni or even being with Kel."
"You aren't just saying that because you think it's what I want to hear?"
"I'm saying that because I'm making sure our relationship, our marriage, our life together is built on nothing but truths."
He had said precisely what she wanted to hear.
"Then you've already planned out our honeymoon?"
"Well, sort of."
"Sort of?"
"I mean, half the places we went were fictional, so I doubt we can go off of that."
"I hope Oz was one of those places."
By the time she had entered the seventh grade, Brenda had read the entirety of the series by Frank L. Baum and liked to tease Valerie that watching the film did not count.
Even if Brenda agreed with Valerie's opinion that it was amongst the top cinematic films and one of the better book-to-movie adaptations out there.
"Obviously," said Dylan. "Besides the fact that you read all fourteen books in less than a year, you didn't think I'd forget your Wicked role, did you?"
"I was an understudy. You can hardly call that a role."
"Yeah, but when the lead got that bad case of pneumonia, you stepped in."
"Only for a dress rehearsal."
"And now you're the one with understudies, Miss Olivier."
She still couldn't believe that she had won an Olivier, even if it did display prominently on their headboard.
"How attached are you to this place, babes?" Dylan asked abruptly.
"This place?" Brenda glanced around, noting all the changes they had made to the bedroom since Dylan had moved in. "Our bedroom?"
"The whole flat. I mean, can you see our life in this flat?"
She knew that look, exceptionally well.
"Are you planning something?" she asked.
"Only if you've considered moving."
"I've definitely considered moving."
She didn't tell Dylan it was their new neighbor, a beauteous dancer with flaming red hair, that had sparked her interest in exploring other locations.
Secure in her relationship though she was, Brenda would rather the dancer not get a peek of Brenda's husband's ass every time he walked out of their flat.
"This place is great for two, but not for a dog," she said. "And you promised we'd get a dog."
"Can we get a dog that brushes itself?"
"I don't think that's a thing, Dyl."
Brenda had walked in to see Dylan brushing Sakura Sanders as he grumped about the weekly combing required for a cat such as the one Madeline had chosen.
Two days following his pleading that they send the cat to California, Brenda had come home from an audition to see the sleeping cat curled up on the chest of a sleeping Dylan.
"You know you're getting attached to Sakura."
"Sakura must take after her owner."
"Maddie? Yes, I think so."
"It's not the cat that I had the problem with, Bren. It's the type of cat. Couldn't you have talked Mads into getting a different breed?"
"She had her heart set on that one, Dyl, and Steve only agreed because I said we'd watch it."
"I think we need to learn how to say no to the Madster every now and then."
"Say no to your goddaughter? Can you do that?"
"I can try. Although I do owe her. If it weren't for Mads, I wouldn't've gotten you to ride a carousel with me."
Their exploration of San Francisco seemed a lifetime ago, as did Brenda's hesitancy to allow Dylan back into her life.
Had it truly been only the previous year when she darted off of Skype to avoid seeing him?
"You thought you were so sneaky," said Brenda.
"I was fully prepared to buy that entire carousel if I had to," said Dylan. "Hell, I would've bought you the entirety of Paris if there was any chance that buying you things could bring you back to me. But you never cared about the money, so I figured my best bet was getting you on the panda for you to remember how you feel in my arms."
"And how would that be?"
Dylan shot a coy glance in her direction and then looked down in a reminder to Brenda that she had, as usual, become entangled in his arms whilst they had talked.
"You tell me," he said.
"If you tell me how it feels for you," she said.
"You know when you were a kid, the first time you had ice-cream?" Brenda nodded fondly. "What'd you think?" he asked.
"That it was like tasting magic."
"Well, that's how it is for me. When I taste you, I taste magic. When I hold you, I touch magic. And when I'm inside you…"
"You're inside magic?" Brenda teased.
"I'm surrounded by more magic than fucking Merlin could've ever conjured," said Dylan as he burrowed into her.
They did not talk again until they were drenched from sweat and Brenda's legs had become sore, unless shouting their respective names for the entirety of Chelsea to hear counted as talking.
"My God, woman." Dylan lay back against their pillows and held Brenda closely to him. "You're relentless. I swear you won't stop until my assprint is permanently embedded in this bed."
"It takes two to tango," said Brenda as she tried to get up from their bed.
"Not so fast." He snatched her by the waist. "You never answered my question," he playfully growled.
"Question?" She put on her most innocent voice.
"Vixen," he said with a loving stroke of her hair. "You clearly know what you do to me."
"Perhaps," she smiled.
He wouldn't permit her to stand until she answered.
"Dyl, when you hold me, I'm embraced by pure joy. It's like I'm a kid and every day is a snow day."
"Today is a snow day," said Dylan, shrugging into his robe as he peeked through the curtain.
"Is it?" asked Brenda mischievously.
"Oh, I know that look," he said. "Before I cave to your snowball fight, can I just say that I haven't seen you that relaxed in a long time?"
"It's Val," said Brenda. "You know she loosens me up more than anyone."
"Gotta love her for that," said Dylan, "though I must disagree on the 'more than anyone' part."
"Oh baby, you know how much you wind me up."
"Is that a good thing?"
"It's a superb thing. In fact, if you want to get me wound up again right now, I won't object."
"Be glad to, my love, but first, did you ask?"
"Ask what?"
"You know what."
"Oh, did I ask about taking time off before the wedding so that my fiancé can take me surfing?"
"Surfing's only part of it."
"Yes, I asked." Brenda kissed the corner of his lips.
"And?"
"And they told me to take the whole month. I think they're worried about another emergency on-stage."
"As long as fucking Ringo is allowed in the theatres -"
"Dylan -"
"Bren, you can't honestly be defending the guy."
"I'm not. I just don't want to think about him. This time is all about us. I'd rather focus on that, and on how much I love you."
Dylan's frustration with Brenda's insistence on ignoring the Ringo problem was palpable, but he dropped the subject nonetheless.
After their wedding, she thought. They could deal with Ringo after their wedding.
"Then you'll agree to go away with me for the week?" he asked.
"I'll agree if you tell me where we're going."
"Not a chance."
She had expected as much, but hadn't seen any harm in inquiring regardless.
"I've been thinking about what to do for our vows," said Dylan.
"Oh?" Brenda asked as she purposely took careful pains to untie his robe.
Dylan helped her speed along in her task. "I want to try to write mine."
"Are you sure?" she asked. "I don't need you to be that open. I know you prefer to keep things less exposed."
Within Brenda's box of memories that Iris had promised to return to them lay the start of Dylan's poetry, written long before he had thought himself to be any kind of writer.
In it, too, sat Brenda's only attempt at songwriting, which not even Dylan knew about.
Mainly because the lyrics had been penned after listening to an R.E.M. song on repeat.
"I wrote an entire collection of poetry about the range of emotions our relationship lets me feel," he said. "Pretty damn sure I can write my vows and say them in front of everyone we love."
"Should I also write my own vows?" she asked.
"That's entirely up to you, mi corazón."
She considered putting her vows to music, a project David could easily help her with that would grant him a distraction from his inner turmoil.
Brenda didn't know if she could succeed in writing a song for Dylan, but with her history of musical performances, she at least had an idea of where to start.
They ended up, as promised, in their back garden, where Dylan tried to dodge Brenda's star snowball pitches and failed at retaliation.
She told him he would have to improve if he were to join in on a Walsh snowball fight, in which Bobby and Melody usually fought for first place and both of the twins came out on top.
At that, Dylan threw a snowball that would have met its target, if he hadn't snagged Brenda before it landed and kissed her until they both agreed to return to the warm interior of their place.
It had been her flat and then theirs, but not a home, which made it all the more easier for Brenda to look at possibilities in other neighborhoods of London.
Within no time, Dylan and Brenda had hired on an estate agent to help them find the home of their dreams.
In the middle of the week, they drove from the hubbub of London to the calmer atmosphere of Surrey, where Poppy Wachinski had agreed to watch Sakura.
Relieved to temporarily be without the cat Dylan wouldn't admit he had developed an affection for, he drove Brenda the rest of the way to Gatwick.
Dylan's name got them into the VIP lounge, but it was Brenda whom all eyes turned to when they entered.
One particularly enthusiastic gentleman came up to Brenda to confess that he had seen her play with Colin Firth no less than three times, and that he believed her to be among the more talented of her generation.
Brenda had thanked him.
She had next been approached by a woman in a pencil skirt and dangle earrings. The woman had overheard the conversation between Brenda and her admirer and asked if Brenda had considered working in television.
The woman, it turned out, was the producer of a BBC television program, had also seen Brenda perform, and encouraged her to audition for a new role in a theatrically-based program that she felt would suit Brenda perfectly.
Brenda discussed the offer with Dylan on the plane ride over, to a place he had continued to keep secret.
Dylan told her he would support her in any and all of her endeavors and that if Brenda had the slightest inclination to audition, then she should follow through.
Upon arrival in Lanzarote, she asked Dylan if they had reached their destination.
Dylan told her they hadn't and pulled her by their entangled hands into a taxi.
"This," said Dylan, as they stepped out of the taxi and his hands found their favored spot on her waist, "is our destination."
"Wow," Brenda breathed, marveling at the beauty before them.
"Now Bren, you gotta promise me that while we're here, you won't think about work or auditions or even wedding preparations. I'll bar Val from calling you, if I have to."
"Where's here, exactly?" she asked, the words tumbling out as she continued to gape at the sight.
"Only one of the best surfing spots in all of Europe," said Dylan with a kiss to her head and an ear-splitting grin. "Welcome to Arrecife, Bren. It'll help you to brush up on your Spanish and your surfing before we retake Baja by storm."
"Arrecife," said Brenda, letting the name melt on her tongue.
"Not the same dialect of Spanish, of course, but I figured it was better to make sure you could fly alright over here before we tried the longer trip to Baja. So time for us to have a little R&R, baby; just you, me, and one gorgeous beach."
Brenda looked at him and turned on her heel. "Race you to the hotel!" she called.
"Hey!" Dylan chuckled, hurrying to catch up with her. "You don't even know which one it is!"
That didn't matter, for the sooner they got to their accommodation, the sooner Brenda could begin exploring one of the most beautiful locations she had ever seen.
And she had seen an extensive amount of extraordinary locations.
-x
Spanish glossary: mi corazón - my heart
Thanks a million! Stay healthy and safe out there. xx