A/N: I apologize profusely for not updating this sooner. I had certain things that I wanted to hit in this chapter, and somehow I was having trouble getting it to flow. I still am not completely satisfied with it, and there is one part I kind of wish I had left out, but I left it, so I hope it doesn't suck. Let me know if you think it was good. Thanks!
Disclaimer: If it were mine, the timeline would make sense. Because I'm picky that way. Edwin couldn't have been ten in season one and almost thirteen in season two, though no one else had a birthday (Marti's "Like I'm six!" line was adorable, but unbelievable) and it had only been "a few months" since the wedding. And Derek the player wouldn't have had a LONGER relationship than Casey the steady one. Sorry, I, like some other fans are kind of bothered by that, please ignore my rant. The point is, its not mine, people.
Lizzie's POV
Casey had the oddest conversation with me this morning. She asked me if something I hadn't planned happened, would it bother me. I questioned what she meant. She didn't want to talk after that, so I said I didn't want anything embarrassing to happen. I'm not one of those super controlling brides, if something unplanned happens, I can roll with it. But yeah, that was weird. Mom walked in from the other room, dressed in a slate blue dress.
"So did you like my choice?"
"You look great, Mom."
"Hey Liz, help me adjust my boobs."
"Casey, honey, your chest looks fine."
"Maybe so Mom, but if I'm getting this dressed up I'm going to use it to its best advantage. Its kind of a last ditch effort to remind Derek what he has."
"So you're showing off your chest? How very feminist of you, Casey."
"Desperate times call for desperate un-feminist measures, mom."
"Whatever. Where's Marti?"
"I heard Sam caught her and Dimmy hiding in a corner somewhere making out."
"No, it wasn't Dimmy she got caught with, it was Dimmy who caught her with Sam's little brother, and got mad."
"Oh that's right. Well she better hurry and patch things up with him because she's supposed to be getting ready."
"Here she is."
"What's the matter, Marti?"
"I don't think Dimmy is going to talk to me for a while, which sucks, because we're sitting together on the plane home."
"Did he really catch you making out with Alan?"
"Yeah, so? It's not like he had any sort of claim on me. We're best friends, not lovers."
"Edwin and I were best friends."
"Yeah, but you and Edwin were best friends because you were avoiding being something more, pretty much solely based on circumstance."
"But you and Dimmy…"
"Are just friends. Why does everyone insist on my liking Dimmy? I just don't understand."
"Well I can't speak for everyone else, but as someone who is madly in love, I can see the same in you. Why avoid it?"
"Well I don't see it. I'm not avoiding anything, except Dimmy himself. It's exactly what everyone wants. I want to find my own love life. I want to meet someone who is mysterious. I want someone who my family doesn't know everything about. I want someone who I didn't share everything with, including three flu's and a case of the measles."
"So you turn to Sam's little brother?"
"What do you mean?"
"Well, I wouldn't call Alan mysterious, and we know a lot about him, too. True, you didn't share sick germs, but you shared a lot."
"Have you ever thought about butting out? This is no more your business than it is Dimmy's."
"Sorry!"
I still think she isn't telling us something.
Casey, perfectionist that she is, takes two hours to fix my hair. Meanwhile, a mini issue had been going on downstairs when Derek's shoes decided to fall apart. He ran to the nearest department store and bought some new ones, and then he confessed that he'd been wearing those same shoes since Mom and George's wedding to every dressy event. I have absolutely no trouble believing that either.
Also, after her fight with Dimmy, and then her fight with us, Marti hurried into her dress and then disappeared. Edwin found her charming cocktails from one of his friends down at the bar. She wasn't apologetic about it at all, though Edwin gave her a speech about respecting the two of us and waiting at least until after the ceremony to bum alcoholic beverages from the over twenty-one's, because a drunken bridesmaid is the last thing we need.
Casey was flipping out over these events, but I was laughing. It wouldn't be a MacDonald-Venturi wedding without a few mishaps. Or hormonal females apparently, of which there were several.
Speaking of which, there was one thing stressing me out. Vicky was here, obviously, and Casey was jealous. No one can figure out why. Vicky is engaged and hasn't even said more than two words to Derek. The kiss in the laundry room was eleven years ago, and Derek destroyed the videotape of it long ago, out of respect for Casey. Edwin told me about his conversation with her yesterday and I'm trying to keep her mind off Derek entirely. She isn't acting out like usual, out of respect for me, which is good. When she internalizes, though, she is a little snippy.
All in all, it was a rather eventful morning. As I put on my earrings and stepped into my dress, Derek knocked on the door and asked to come in. I was worried this had to do with Casey's running out ten minutes ago to "get some water", thinking she'd made a scene, but it didn't. He asked everyone else to leave, and when they were gone he spoke.
"You know, if I were just your stepbrother, I'd have a little to say. If you were just marrying my brother, I'd have a little to say. But as it is, both apply. Unfortunately, I'm not very good with words, so where do I start? He's a great guy. But I don't have to tell you that. He loves you, he respects you, and he'll be a great dad. You'll be a great mom. You guys will be happy. I know that because you were always the happy ones. Whenever you weren't it always had to do with the rest of us, almost never each other. And if he ever does something to make you unhappy, you come to me. I'll set him straight. And if you for some reason just need a break, you can always come stay with Casey and me. I'm probably leaving something out, but anyway. Now get out there and make me proud."
I grinned and as he hugged me, I couldn't resist saying, "figures you'd end your speech with a sports style pep talk. You couldn't get too mushy, huh?"
"You can never tell anyone I told you all of that. They might think I'm…"
"You're what?"
"So….so…soft."
It's been ten years, and sometimes I don't think Derek has changed a bit.
Minutes later, I was a nervous wreck. I was standing outside the ballroom waiting for the music to start. The familiar notes began to play. Gena began to walk down the aisle. Then Marti, followed by Casey and my flower girl. I followed, and when I got to the front, the ceremony took off. About five minutes in, some music started to play that I wasn't expecting. Was this what Casey was talking about? But those notes were familiar. It was one of my favorite songs, I'll Cover You from Rent. What was going on? Seconds into the song Edwin started to sing, and Casey joined in when needed.
Live in my house
I'll be your shelter
Just pay me back
With one thousand kisses
Be my lover
And I'll cover you
Open your door
I'll be your tenant
Don't got much baggage to lay at your feet
But sweet kisses I've got to spare
I'll be there and I'll cover you
Oh I think they meant it
When they said you can't buy love
Now I know you can rent it
A new lease you are my love
On life, all my life
I've longed to discover
Something as true as this is, yeah
So with a thousand sweet kisses
If you're cold and you're lonely
(I'll cover you)
With a thousand sweet kisses
You've got one nickel only
(I'll cover you)
With a thousand sweet kisses
When you're worn out and tired
(I'll cover you)
With a thousand sweet kisses
When your heart has expired
Oh lover, I'll cover you
(Yeah, yeah, yeah)
Oh lover, I'll cover you
I'll cover you, oh
By the end of the song, my jaw had recovered from the shock, my smile was back, and tears of happiness were threatening to make their way out of my eyes. This song was perfect for a wedding. And perfect for us.
Now we were moving on to the vows. We held hands. Edwin and I had each written our own, and he started his. First the preacher explained our reasons for writing our own.
"Edwin wrote his vows because the traditional ones, while even though he hopes husbands and wives truly mean them, are a bit like a national anthem. They become so overused that they lose some of their meaning. In that same way that marriage today seems to have lost some of its meaning. He also feels they don't say things that are an integral part of his relationship with Lizzie. She feels she wanted to express her own feelings, and to do that, she needed to write them down her own way."
"Lizzie, today I commit to you, before our family and friends, to hold you in the highest respect. I promise that I will always put your needs first. I will make decisions based on how they affect my family, even if what is best for all of us could be not so good for me. I promise to always act on love, even if I'm angry. I love you."
We'd decided to keep our vows from each other until now, and with something so sweet, the tears that were threatening to fall earlier were now cascading down my face. We'd promised to keep it short, because no one in our family had a very long attention span, and yet with so few words, he'd said a lot. It was my turn now, and I wiped my eyes and cleared my throat.
"Edwin, marriage is about commitment. My commitment to you is to always put you before anything else in my life. You and I have always been a team. We've teamed up since the day we met. I commit to making sure that team stays strong because it's the core of who we are. I promise that when hardships come our way to trust that we will stay strong, because doubt is the first step in a crumbling wall. I promise to put my family's needs before my own. I love you."
When I started talking about being a team, I noticed him squeezing my hand, and he also seemed to have a bit of a tear in his eye. As the ceremony wrapped up, the priest said, "you may kiss the bride", and I laughed a little, because we'd had endless discussions over this moment. Derek's PDA fear ran in the family, and eventually Edwin decided this was a good reason to make an exception.
A few minutes later, the party started up. Casey and I had once discussed the fact that some of this traditional stuff was a little awkward for children with more than two parents. Maybe I'd rather share my father daughter dance with George, while it'd be the right thing to do to share it with my father. And it'd be more than a little awkward on either of them no matter which choice I made. In the end, I decided the best thing to do would be to skip all that, and just have a dance with Edwin (and even that was at the prodding of Casey, I'm not a "spotlight" kind of girl). So we shared our dance, and then Derek toasted us. Of course, his short speech was nowhere as nice as the one this morning, but that was fine with me.
The party went quickly, and soon I was throwing my bouquet and Edwin and I were leaving. Things had gone well. Derek had, at my request, been at his absolute worst: fawning and bumbling over my sister as much as he was wont to do in public. He brought her drinks, asked her to dance cordially, held whispered conversations with her, and even bent his own PDA rule by whisking her off to a hidden corner for a passionate moment. Marti and I couldn't stop giggling at the way he was treating her, but I'd only asked him to do it to keep her from running off and hiding again. I could tell it had worked, too. Whether or not Casey thought her cleavage had anything to do with it, she had seemed placated in a way she hadn't been during my entire engagement. I left Derek with the advice to keep it up. I left Emily promising to keep her occupied for the week.
Once we said all our goodbyes, we were upstairs changing, and then in the taxi to the airport. Exhausted, I collapsed onto Ed. This day was entirely too long. Twenty minutes later, he was shaking me awake so we could get out. Now we were going through all the airport mess to board a plane to New York. And even though I had sworn to myself I would forget all about the Casey/Derek drama and let Emily deal with it for the week, I couldn't help but find myself hoping Derek's behavior and Emily's distractions could keep her at bay until we got back.