18. Sam

SAM

June 2023- Annie is 27, Sam is 28

Annie doesn't blink as she looks at me and I'm not sure what she's thinking. It's not like we haven't kissed before, we've kissed in the past. But this feels different because it is different. This will be our first kiss as husband and wife.

I swallow thickly as I lean in close to her and she shivers when my lips brush her ear. "We don't have to kiss if you don't want to."

"It"s fine," she says, her voice a little bit breathless. Maybe she isn"t as unaffected by all of this as she lets on. Maybe, she's not been completely truthful about her feelings. But I don't let myself cling to that hope, I need to remind myself exactly why she's marrying me and not expect anything more. I can't let myself want anything more or else I'll just be setting myself up for heartbreak.

I move slightly and Annie turns to me, our noses brush. She lets out a nervous laugh.

My heart thunders in my chest. Is she nervous because she has feelings for me?

The judge has already moved away, but the witnesses still have their eyes on us. Two older women who seem to be giddy about the fact that they just got to watch someone get married. I focus on Annie's pink lips—lips I've dreamed about kissing again a million times, but never like this. Never as my wife. I never let myself fall into that daydream because it always hurt too much.

I get to kiss the love of my life—my wife—today, I think as I pull Annie toward me. I'm not about to screw this up or skip out on the chance to do that.

I curl a hand around her neck as our noses brush again. Her eyes flutter closed and I close mine as I press my lips against hers.

Her hands fist my T-shirt as our lips come together and I pull her closer. She relaxes into our kiss, and I kiss her deeply. I may not ever get this chance again, and we may as well enjoy it in this moment. It feels so perfect to have her in my arms, to be kissing her like this. Everything about this feels right and normal. Like everything has finally fallen into place. Alarm bells sound in my head, reminding me of all the reasons why this is a bad idea—why I can't actually kiss her like this. They give me a moment of clarity and I pull away before I let myself fall too hard, but I think it's too late for that.

She is breathing just as hard as I am as we stare at each other. Her cheeks turn crimson as one of the witnesses claps and she turns away from me. I hold her hand as we walk back to the reception area where we have to sign more paperwork.

She refuses to look at me while we sign the rest of the paperwork and a woman tells us our marriage certificate will be sent to us in the mail in the next few days. But it's official, we're married.

"Annie," I say as hot June air hits us when we exit the courthouse.

She looks up at me. "I'll talk to HR tonight and get the paperwork moving so you can be on my insurance. We can go to the doctor tomorrow."

I nod, jaw tight. The pain in my back that I so conveniently forgot during the ceremony comes rushing back. So this how it's going to be then, no eye contact after we just became husband and wife. Purely business. I should have expected it, but her avoidance still stings.

"I've got work tonight, so I need to get ready," she tells me.

I grit my teeth. I know she's lying, she doesn't work on Tuesdays. She hasn't in months. "Okay," I say and we walk the rest of the way to our apartment in silence.

She disappears into her room as I ease myself onto the couch. My back hurts, but it doesn't hurt as much as the pain in my heart. I feel as though I just made the worst mistake I could have possibly made. I married my best friend, the woman I've loved for over ten years and she doesn't actually want to be married to me. She's only doing this so I can be out of physical pain. But none of the physical pain I feel even matters if she won't even look at me.

She murmurs a quick goodbye before leaving the apartment and I stare at the ceiling in agonizing silence. Annie Jones is my wife, something I never thought would happen. And it feels worse than I ever expected it to.

The next three weeks pass by in a blur. My surgery is scheduled for tomorrow now that I've been added to Annie"s insurance. I am still making money from my videos on YouTube, but I made a short video, explaining there wouldn't be videos for awhile because of my surgery and it's incredible how angry people are. How these strangers on the internet feel like they are entitled to new content from me even while I'll be recovering from surgery.

I mentioned the comments to Annie and she made me delete the app from my phone so I would stop reading them. It makes me wonder if I should simply quit for good. I've had the thought—just a passing one—a couple of times in the past couple of months, and now that I'm hurt and having to have surgery, it makes me want to stop even more.

I'm a married man now, and while that may not mean much to Annie, it means something to me. And the lifestyle I've been living since I graduated high school just isn't going to work for me anymore. It's not going to work for us anymore—even if the us part is only inside my head.

"You ready for tomorrow?" Annie asks me as she sits on the couch next to me, careful not to actually touch me. Things have slowly been getting back to normal between us and I'm thankful. It's still awkward in that she's stiff and refuses to touch me even accidentally, but we're talking like we used to.

"I think so," I say truthfully. I'm ready to be out of so much pain, but I know that physical therapy and all my recovery isn't going to be a walk in the park either. "I can still call Noah or one of my sisters to help with recovery and everything."

She shakes her head. "It's fine, Sam. I can do it. I went down to part-time hours, with full benefits still because of how long I've been working at Austen's. Plus this way, I have less of a chance of running into him."

Now, we both avoid saying his name. It never used to be like that, but that's how I knew it was the last time she'd leave him when I came back a few months ago. She never calls him by name.

"Is he still giving you trouble?" I ask and her mouth forms a thin line.

"I haven't seen him in months, but I'm just waiting for the fallout when he finds out I've married you."

"How will he know?" I ask.

"He's a control freak. He'll find out if he notices that I'm paying more for insurance," she says, and I reach out and squeeze her hand, letting her know that I'm here for her. She doesn't pull away.

"I'm sorry," I say, wishing I could do something.

"Why?" She looks at me. "You've been a better man with an injured back the past three weeks than he's ever been in all the time I dated him."

I swallow thickly, unsure of how to respond.

She reaches for the remote and turns on an old episode of Hell's Kitchen. "I'm sure your surgery will be fine," Annie says out of nowhere a moment later and I realize the words aren't to calm me down. I'm not worried about the surgery. I bite back my grin, because if she's worried, it means she cares. "The surgeon seems quite capable and he said it would be fine."

He did say the surgery would help with the pain, and I guess that's all that really matters.