Six Letter Word [Kaylor]

September 2016 (Part 5)

I woke up the morning after the wedding when the sunlight happened to fall right in my eye. Otherwise part of me thinks I might have slept forever, my head on my wife's chest, listening to her heartbeat as she slept. Slow, and steady, and dependable. We'd kept each other up into the night, enjoying all the benefits of the wedding night. One time we knew we wouldn't be disturbed, not by friends, not by family, not even by the cats or Joe Joe. No one wanted to walk in on that. And for a few minutes, I let myself lie there, pretending we could stay like that, the blissful newlyweds, forever.

I heard my phone vibrate next to the bed, bringing me back to the real world. With one last gaze at my wife's shiny abs, I gently pulled myself out of her arms to face whatever my phone had to say. It was nearly ten in the morning, they'd let us sleep in. More like they were afraid we might be having morning sex. Not a bad idea, except we were supposed to be joining all our wedding guests for brunch at eleven, and then I was going to have to bring the bliss of the wedding crashing down. Not high on my list of 'things I want to do with my brand new wife.' But I had to tell them. By the end of the day, Tree planned to have notified People and E! for their websites. By Monday morning, the story would be all over Good Morning America and Today. And I couldn't let my closest friends find out I'm sick from Robin Roberts and Matt Lauer.

She usually showers first, but she looked so serene I couldn't bring myself to wake her, so I took my turn instead. She was awake and lying on her side, looking at me when I emerged from the bathroom, a towel loosely wrapped around my body. The sheet had fallen away and I could see a smudge of my leftover eye makeup where my head had been on her chest. She looked every bit the angel she was once paid to portray, lying in a swath of sunlight, making heart eyes at me. Her voice was still husky with sleep as she told me I looked absolutely beautiful, silhouetted against the light from the bathroom door. I wanted nothing more than to fall back into bed with her for another round, but had to content myself with a soft kiss on her lips. Getting ready took longer than it should have, because we kept stopping to steal a glance at one another, or to sneak a peck on each other's lips.

Choosing outfits for the day, we'd joked about bringing back the Free People dress we both have, just because it's white and people always joke about us twinning. Most of the time it's unintentional, but we thought it might be funny to do it just once on purpose. But somehow it didn't seem right, leading with humor. Not with the real purpose of the brunch. Instead, I was going to wear a simple white wrap-style dress and Karlie had decided on a cropped pants/jacket combo that reminded me a little of the set Cara had worn as a bridesmaid, but in white. I hadn't bothered to wash my hair, when Karls had unpinned it the night before, it had looked remarkably like a deliberate style, the way the curls fell. Wouldn't everyone be surprised to see Red era length from my hair. Karlie's hadn't lasted quite as well, so it was up in her ballerina bun, a style that would always say 'Karlie' to me, almost more than the iconic haircut bearing her name.

We emerged hand in hand to climb up to the main house with ten minutes to spare, an impressive feat if I do say so myself. It was really chilly in the morning air, and I was inclined to hurry, but Karlie wanted us to take our time and really savor the first full day of our lives as wife and wife. I felt her squeeze my hand as we pushed open the door to the sunroom, and all our assembled friends and family burst into applause. We shared a kiss and I felt oddly inclined to curtsy, and then we were swept up in a sea of loved ones encouraging us to sample the breakfast buffet, but all we wanted was coffee. Warm, and strong. Eventually I let Karlie fill a plate for me with eggs and fruit, content for the moment to let the sounds of conversation wash over me. I loved watching Karlie flit from table to table like the social butterfly she is. I am usually right with her, I love inviting people over, and being the hostess and making sure everyone has a good time, but today I just wanted to observe. Aside from hearing tens of thousands of people singing the words I wrote back to me, I can think of few feelings as warm and comforting as being surrounded by people who love and support you exactly the way you are, and I got the chance to experience that that morning.