FWB Friends With Baseball

Married To Baseball.

Jailyn~

Four years, six months, and twenty-seven days all lead up to me standing here, sixty feet away from marrying the greatest thing that's ever happened to my life. Technically, sixty-five if we're counting the space between me and the door leading out to where he waits. Somehow, standing here waiting for my dad and I to get our cue, there's not even a glimpse of the nerves I'd felt earlier this morning. Short of the world burning beneath us, nothing else has the chance to ruin today.

Taking a breath, I watch as Sydney and Baker make their way down the aisle before meeting my dad's eyes. The two of us share a knowing smile with one another. As archaic as this tradition is, I couldn't take it away from him after everything that we've been through. Even if we're omitting the actual handing off, I wasn't going to take away his chance to walk me down the aisle.

"I'm proud of you," He tells me, moments after my attention was pulled to watch Maddy and Moose take their turn down the aisle. Looking back up at him, I smile as he wraps his arm around my shoulders, hugging me gently. "You nervous?"

Shaking my head quickly, "Honestly, I've never been more sure of something in my life."

"God, am I glad to hear you say that," he tells me, seeming elated by my statement, "Of all the hell you've been through, you deserve to have that certainty in Christian." Larissa and Ryan are the next two to make their way down the aisle as my dad continues on, "I'm proud of you, and as much as your mom and I didn't get along, I know she's proud of you too."

Taking a breath, I can't help but bite my lip as I nod, wishing more than anything that she could be here right now, or at the very least that she could've met Christian. Glancing down at the locket she'd given me eight years ago, I smile a little to myself, knowing just how much she would've loved him.

Carly and Tyler start their way down the aisle, and once the doors are shut behind them, my dad and I take our place, now only seconds away from the sixty-foot walk to Christian. My heart starts to pound in my chest, the sheer anticipation of what I'm about to do lingering overhead as the music starts to shift, our pianist transitioning beautifully into the bridal march. The murmur of our friends and family standing in anticipation of my entrance muted slightly by the door.

With one final breath, the doors are opened, and my eyes immediately fall onto the love of my life as he stands in awe, staring right back at me all of sixty feet away. Any little anxieties that I might have been holding melt as our eyes meet, both of us seeming to be fighting our own battles against the tears that threaten to spill. He's seeming to be able to hold his own a little better than me as it takes everything in me not to sprint down this aisle.

Sixty feet, a distance I'm very accustomed to, seems significantly longer now than it has in my entire life. The end of this particular sixty results in far more than just a base. The sixty feet here gives me my forever. Who'd really stop me if I wanted to run to him? I am the bride, after all.

After the agonizingly slow pace, I'm finally brought home to Christian, our hands finding each others almost instantly as my bouquet was passed off to Carly. The three words we mouth to one another, every one of the eight letters meaning the world right now as we officially commit to one another.

"Welcome," our officiant starts, neither Christian nor myself having our attention pulled from the other, "We're gathered here today to celebrate the love Christian Yelich and Jailyn James share with one another. You've all come here to share in this formal commitment they are about to make to one another and to offer your love and support of this union, allowing Christian and Jailyn to start their married life together surrounded by the people dearest and most important to them." Christian and I just smile at one another, neither one of us caring about the whole introduction.