"I love you Nate," Abel sighed.
"I love you too, Abel," Nate replied, putting his arms around Abel's solid, strong waist.
The Site of Least Resistance
Books, Books, Books, the local bookstore, was full to capacity. All of the chairs that had been laid out for the reading were occupied and people stood all around, slouching on bookstands and leaning on their partner's shoulders. Some of the patrons were Nate's students and some were curious browsers drawn in by the uncharacteristic busyness. Nate stood at the podium and exhaled gently, trying to get rid of the nerves that were bouncing around in his body. Some journalists from the local paper sat in the back row, taking pictures and notes.
From his position, he could see Bailey sitting on Joshua's lap next to Abel, who beamed with pride before passing Bailey an apple juice box. Cecily was sitting next to them with David on her left; she had her hand resting in his comfortably, circling her thumb into the skin of his palm. They looked flush with the dew of new and exciting love—they had found each other, even though they thought romance had passed them by. Nate's mother and father stood at the entrance with his Aunt Viola, who was practically shaking with anticipation. Nate was overcome with happiness and a real, deep peace that was even louder than his fraying nerves.
Looking out at the crowd, he was taken aback by the outpouring of love that was in the room; all of the people that he most cherished had congregated together with joy and support in their hearts. Throughout all of the drama and pain, they had found a way to form a family, to move past betrayals and scars to be a part of each other's lives. Nate had a life that he would not have dared to ask for two years ago, and it felt like a fragile miracle.
As Nate stood by himself in a busy room, he finally understood how precious happiness was to him, how much he had to embrace the things in his life that were good, how much he wanted to hold the things that he loved close to him. It felt like an epiphany, even though it was so simple. Nate realized that the things he wanted were worth fighting for, that he had a right to ask for the things that he most needed.
Charlotte Gray, the owner of the bookstore, smiled warmly at Nate and took center stage at the podium. The crowd applauded respectfully. Charlotte tapped the microphone gently to make sure that it worked. "Thank you, everyone, for coming. It had been quite a while since we have seen so many people in the store. To be quite frank, it's making me a little bit emotional. This is the thirtieth anniversary, to the day, that I moved to this little town and started a bookshop. It's been one of the true joys of my life and I can attribute that to the support of all of you. So, firstly I just wanted to thank you all for making my dream a reality." Charlotte quickly wiped a tear from her eye. "And I cannot think of a better way of celebrating this birthday than to have the first ever reading from Nathaniel Grace's newest book. He is a spectacular author and a spectacular testament to this town. So without further ado, here he is." Charlotte stepped back from the podium and embraced Nate.
Nate took a minute to compose himself before speaking.
"Hello, everyone. I want to thank Charlotte for letting me host this reading here. And to congratulate her on thirty years of passion and dedication and love. When I was a child, I would come to this place all of the time. In fact, my dad recently brought my son here for the first time. And a memory hit me, something that I had long forgotten. My dad would bring me here every Sunday to pick out a book. And it's strange that I buried that memory, because now it means the world to me. So thank you, Charlotte. Also all this great food is vegan, if you can believe it, and was provided by the stunning, glorious Emma Jones. Go to her café. You owe it to yourself." Nate started clapping and the crowd joined in with enthusiasm.
Nate started again. "So... I had trouble choosing a passage to read out because I don't ever show any of my friends my work, so I couldn't really get any feedback. But then I thought about coming back to this town and to this shop, and it made me think about new beginnings in old places. About becoming a new person by embracing the person that you used to be and this came to mind. So, here it is." Nate swallowed and began reading from his copy of the book.
'Everything happens for a reason. Every day is a classroom. You are never given more than you can handle. Every cloud has a silver lining. There are plenty more fish in the sea.' These are all things that we tell ourselves and other people, but they all mean the same thing. They mean that the thing you didn't want to happen, the thing that you least wanted to happen in the whole world, has happened. The shit has hit the fan. When this happens, all of the platitudes go out of the window—because when the chips are down it just doesn't feel like there is any reason to be gathered or a life lesson to be learnt. Because the pain feels just too painful to learn from; it feels too real to think of in the abstract. You sit and you cry and you get frustrated because all of the things that you believe to be true, all those little sayings that you put on your freezer, hold absolutely no value. Because you have been given more than you can handle, and there might be plenty more fish in the sea, but they're not your fish and you don't want to take the time and effort to hook another one just to discover that it's a tin can or an old boot. It feels like you are sitting in amongst rubble, rubble that eerily resembles the shattered remnants of the life that you had worked so damn hard to build for yourself.
When your heart is broken, when you have nowhere to turn, the easiest thing in the world is to fall apart. And that's okay; it is even probably necessary. It forces you to look inwards and live in the broken parts of yourself for a little while. But I think that it is important to remember that the broken parts are the exact same ones that have the potential to become the strongest. When you exercise a muscle, you create little tears in it. And then this miraculous thing happens, those tears fix themselves—not only fix themselves, they turn into something stronger. Your body literally becomes more powerful when it is broken down first. I can't help but think that is a pertinent metaphor for life; when the earth of your life becomes burnt, you really can still grow from it. You can become better in the worst of places. But only if you fight for it, if you climb off the sofa and carry your truth and walk into the world with the most open heart that you can muster, even if it is torn to shreds.
And you cannot be afraid of being alone, or being sad, or messing up. Because if you carry those fears around then you will be too scared to ask for what you need, you won't be able to rock the boat because the sea is too rough. You can ask for what you know you deserve, to wear your battle wounds on the outside. In fact, it is a moral imperative—because when you bring your bloodied, damaged self to the table, you allow people to see who you really are. And if experience has taught me anything, the moment when you are finally seen for who you are is the exact same moment that love begins to grow.
Nate closed his eyes for a second and inhaled. The crowd clapped and cheered, some of the high school students hollered loudly and stamped their feet on the floor. Nate opened his eyes and saw that Cecily and David were standing up. Bailey was on Joshua's shoulders, cheering. After a quick search of the throng, Nate saw that Bernard was hugging Ava tightly, and Nate felt a shower of happiness wash over him. He had never really seen his parents show affection and he felt incredibly honored and joyful to witness it; it felt like something was instantly healed inside of him. Abel was sitting down on his chair silently, shifting around nervously. He looked around the room like he was a spy in a bad movie, scanning for the exits, trying to formulate an escape strategy.
Before Nate could think about Abel's strange behavior, Charlotte took back the microphone. The crowd hushed quickly so that they could hear her words. "Now, does anyone have any questions for Nathaniel?"
Abel stood up alarmingly quickly and rubbed his hands on his jumper before he raised his hand into the air proudly. He bobbed his left foot up and down, a sure sign that he was nervous. A thin film of sweat bunched at his hairline.
"Yes, the man in the blue jumper at the front, you look like you have an urgent question." Charlotte seemed taken aback by Abel's intensity.
"Yes. I just wanted to ask something quickly. I just wanted to know whether Nate—I mean, Nathaniel—if he would like to become my husband. Whether he wanted to make me so incredibly happy by marrying me. I suppose what I really want to know is; would you like to be Mr. Captain Slower than a Toddler?" Abel looked at the floor quickly. Nate noticed the confused expressions of the crowd who didn't understand the inside joke.
Nate felt his knees grow weaker and felt the air vacuumed out of the room. He looked at the ceiling for a second so that he could savor the moment, to elongate the seconds so that they felt like hours. He swallowed down the emotion that had settled at the bottom of his throat and leaned in towards the microphone. "Yes. One hundred percent. Definitely yes."
Fin
About the Author
J.J. Bamber lives in the English countryside after an exciting and exhausting stint in London, where he got a first degree in English Literature and Film. He currently works in translation and is attempting to mount a play. He loves to write about people who are desperately looking for something, only to find out that whatever they were looking for was inside of them all along. He loves writing about people who find out that they are braver and smarter and cooler than they knew. He believes that the true happy endings are the ones that you fight for yourself and that is what he writes about.
He would like to thank anyone and everyone who takes the time to read one of his books and encourages people to contact him on twitter (https://twitter.com/BamberJay), Tumblr (https://www.tumblr.com/blog/marinfristlover) the handle of which refers to a beloved but long cancelled television show (RIP Men In Trees) or Facebook.
J.J. Bamber believes that libraries are the saviors (he was once a librarian), kale is nigh on magical, rainstorms trump summer days and in the healing power of hummus (he consumes a remarkable amount of hummus on a regular basis).
Happy endings and, perhaps more importantly, happy-right-nows to all.