- 3,5 YEARS LATER -

- Friday, July 22nd, 2022 -

I can not get over how busy I've been in the past months. I've finally managed to graduate from college, and surprisingly enough only took a year and a half more than I thought I initially would take.

I had to retake my first year, and couldn't start doing so until December, getting another half a year set back to graduate.

I recently started a job as an architect in the same company as my father, following in his footsteps, much to his surprise. I mean, he knew I was doing architectural studies, he just didn't expect me to go for a job in the same company and I did it without him knowing.

I didn't want him to step in and bias the outcome of my application. I wanted to do it on my own, and I succeeded. I'm working on a project with him and it is actually great to work with him.

Though I still dislike his stupid dad jokes, but thankfully he never makes those at work. In there, we're colleagues, not father and son.

And I didn't mind taking a bit longer to get there, because Finnley was right there with me, going through the exact same; retaking his first year, getting enough credits to move onto university and succeed in wrapping up med school in only four years. He isn't fully there yet, since becoming a doctor takes more than a couple of years in school, but he did land himself a great internship with opportunities to become a doctor in the hospital, now working as an E.R. doctor, looking hot as fuck in his scrubs.

The green ones make his eyes stand out that much more, causing me to fall in love over and over again.

But currently, he isn't wearing scrubs. He's wearing suit and tie, and he looks even more stunning.

But I might be biased because he always looks gorgeous to me, and I can only curse myself for taking way too long to make him mine.

But after today, we will be together forever, bounded by marriage and our promise to have and to hold, to love each other in sickness and in health, and all the other things in a vow that I just can't seem to remember very well.

I still have trouble with my memory, but it's a lot better than it was a couple of years ago, and I have Finnley's support to thank for it.

And now I'm watching him, stroll down the isle, his father right beside him to give him away, with a casual strut and a cheeky smirk as he looks at me daringly.

As if daring me to call him ugly – which I would never do.

Well, only as a joke.

And then my eyes follow Mila, who's cheerfully skipping in front of him, throwing rose peddles to the left and the right, in front of her, and even into the air, to twirl a pirouette and giggle as the peddles hit her little bright face.

In the front row, my parents are standing, proud, shining, happy. Mom pinking away a tear that slipped her eye. A happy tear, of course.

On their left, Finnley's mother is standing, trying to hide tears too, as Charlie is squeezing her upper arm and whispering something to her as her eyes are focused on Finnley fully. She's smiling, and her and James' presence here today, means the world to both Finnley and me.

To know they have fully accepted us, just the way we are, makes most of what happened unimportant. It took months, years, for the Lund family to get over everything that happened, but since they fought to overcome it all, they came out stronger.

And more supportive. Fully supportive.

And Jaimie is currently right by my side, as my best man, while Oliver is Finnley's best man. I contemplated on asking Stan to be mine, but Jaimie has always been my second-best friend. And since I'm marrying my best friend, it's only logical to have Jaimie here with me.

"Daddy look!" Mila's squeaky voice wakes me up from my thoughts, and I notice Mila is holding up the pink rose peddles I know Finnley hit in the bottom of the basket to surprise her.

It's her favourite colour, but since we picked purple, silver and white as our signature colours, she was disappointed because she wouldn't be able to throw around pink rose peddles.

"They pink!" She calls out, throwing them up in the air to watch them fall down with wide happy eyes.

"I think you wished hard enough, sweety." Finnley smiles, kneeling beside her to peck a kiss on her cheek. "Go sit with grandma, if you're a good girl, I'll let you get the biggest piece of cake."

"Is it pink?"

"It's strawberry flavoured." Finnley chuckles, and gently pushes her towards his mother, watching her skip to Eva, who lifts her up in her arms happily.

James hugs Finnley tightly, before he lets him close the distance towards me.

I can't fight back an even wider smile as he stands before me.

"Ready?" I ask him in a whisper.

"I was born ready." He chuckles, and we lock our hands, turning, ready to commit to each other for the rest of our lives.

We listen to stories about ourselves, to the jokes – since we requested a fun ceremony – and laugh over stupid things we did when we were younger, all the while holding hands, smiling at each other so much my jaws start hurting in the process.

And I allow memories of us together wash over me, savouring me because I can only feel happiness and warmth when thinking of the memories we do have, knowing how valuable memories are since I lost some.

I wake up from those thoughts as Finnley squeezes my hand shortly, alerting me we came to the vows, and our promise.

"Do you, Cristian Jacob Evans, take Finn Christoffer Lund to be your lawfully wedded husband. Do you promise to be true to him in good times and in bad, in sickness and in health? Will you love him and honour him all the days of your life?"

"I do." A tingly feeling is spreading from my stomach all over my body, warming me, causing me to feel giddy and excited. And most of all; honoured because I'm here with Finnley.

"Do you, Finn Christoffer Lund, take Cristian Jacob Evans to be your lawfully wedded husband. Do you promise to be true to him in good times and in bad, in sickness and in health? Will you love him and honour him all the days of your life?"

"I do." Finnley smirks, and I chuckle shortly, squeezing his hand to tell him to be serious for a second.

"You now may kiss each other."

And I do, pouring all of my love I have into it to make him feel how much I love him, and how happy I am we're finally married, he is finally truly mine. Even though he was always mine, I just realised a little late.

"I love you." Finnley murmurs with his lips still pressed against mine. "n=No PDA, Cris." He whispers, and I snort, sending Sam a look quickly.

"I love you too, now let's celebrate."

* * * * *

I can't remember any dance or date or party I ever went to, where I danced as much as I did tonight. Of course, I opened with Finnley, and then I danced with his mother while he danced with mine. I watched how he danced with Mila, who was giggling the whole time since I just gave her a pink rose – especially arranged for her, and because Finnley kept twirling her until she became a bit dizzy.

We cut the cake with the three of us; our little, now official family.

As Finnley and I married today, him accepting my last name, but sticking to his own too, Mila will now officially get my last name too, and that makes me happy even more, because she is a little light in our lives. She came in dark times, and she just caused an explosion with light that forced both of us to get over everything that happened and move on, for us, and for her.

I think she's his little guardian angel, and he is mine.

"Penny for your thoughts." Finnley hums, sitting down next to me with a sleepy Mila in his arms. As soon as he sat down, she slumped down in his arms, her head on his shoulder, her eyes half closed and her thumb in her mouth.

"You two, as always." I lean in, pecking a kiss onto Mila's forehead. "Is our little angel a bit tired?"

She sleepily nods and yawns, snuggling closer to Finnley.

"Mom's going to take her back home in a minute. She's saying her goodbyes to your parents and all." Finnley nods and I notice his mom standing with my mom. "Dad's going to stay because he's having way too much fun with your father."

I chuckle, watching the two men – a bit intoxicated – animatedly talking as always.

"We'll leave soon too." I remind him, brushing a strain of hair out of Mila's face. "Can't we just take her with us anyway?"

"No, even though I'm going to miss her a lot, we agreed our honeymoon is ours, and we will spend it in private and peace."

"Right." I chuckle again, as I notice Oliver walking over to us with a happy smile on his face.

"Hey there, handsome." Finnley smirks, Oliver chuckles – and his face slightly flushes – but than Alex shows up by his side and he smiles warmly towards him.

"Alex is worried you're going to take Mila with you anyway." Oliver sits down, leaning in to caress little Mila's head. "And we all agreed that we need to make sure you guys won't."

"We won't." Finnley chuckles and allows Oliver to take Mila from his hold. "I couldn't deny her 10 days of spoiling by her favourite uncle, huh?"

Oliver laughs as Mila allows him to cradle her like a baby, giggling as he tickles her stomach. "I thought you were a big girl now."

"I am!" She calls out, her thumbs still in her mouth. "Big people get sleepy too."

"True to that." Oliver nods. "Are you excited for our ten-day sleep over?"

She nods but looks at Finnley with sleepy eyes. "Gonna miss daddy."

"We all will." Alex smirks, watching amused as Oliver teases Mila. Oliver and Alex now officially are her godparents, and if anything would ever happen to us, they'll take care of her.

"We'll pick you up in the morning. Get some sleep because it's going to be a fun day." Alex chimes happily to her.

"O god, something tells me we're going to come home to an exhausted daughter." I whisper towards Finnley, who leans towards me and smiles as I peck a kiss on his cheek.

"I bet we're going to come home and be exhausted ourselves." He whispers huskily, smirking as my face flushes and the mere thought of exhausting him gets me a little turned on.

"Wanna go?" I ask him, entwining my fingers with his.

He laughs out, shaking his head. "We need to talk to more people still."

"It's our wedding. We don't have to do anything."

"Well, I wanna talk to Nate, because he's got news and he refused to tell me so far. You need to help me persuade him to tell me."

"Okay, fine."

"But first I'm gonna suffocate Mila in a smothering loving hug." Finnley extends his arms to take Mila back in his arms, and she instantly climbs back into his arms, hugging him – still sleepily.

"Daddy loves you." Finnley whispers to her. "Promise to be a good girl?"

She nods and presses a kiss onto his lips, before she leans towards me, and I hug her too, covering her face in tiny kisses, causing her to giggle.

"And I love you too, sweety." I tell her happily, savouring the warm feeling it's giving me to hug this little girl. "Be good, and listen to uncle Oli and uncle Alex, okay?"

She nods again, and then Eva is in front of us, smiling warmly.

"Shall I take her?" She lifts Mila from my hold, still smiling warmly towards us. "Now, both, be good, don't do any crazy things. And please..." She looks sad shortly but smiles again. "Come home safe again."

We both nod and get up to say our goodbyes to her, and then Finnley drags me towards Nathan, who's seated with Sam, Felix, Julia and of course Stan.

Jaimie is close by, talking to Liam, I think – as always – about sports, while Jason is talking to Arianna, Alex' sister.

"So, Nate," Finnley addresses him, sitting down in a chair opposite from him. "What was the big news?"

He chuckles and shares a look with Stan before he looks back at us again, this time a bit serious. "Another day, boys."

"What, why!?"

"Because this is your day. Not ours." Stan jumps in, putting an arm around my shoulders as soon as he stood next to me.

"Sharing is caring." Finnley looks up and backwards to look at Stan amused. "I have a hunch, but you need to confirm, now. Not in 11 days."

"What's the hunch."

"Well, since you guys are married for almost a year, live together for four, I think it's a safe bet to guess you're going to add a member to the family." Finnley looks back towards Nathan with a knowing smile.

"I told you he was onto us." Stan laughs a little, Nathan smiles, shrugs and then nods. "Yes, we're adopting a child."

"Girl or boy?" I exclaim excited.

"Boy." Stan pulls out his phone, showing a couple of pictures from a baby boy, smiling proudly. "We just wanted to keep you guys from freaking out because we didn't start looking to adopt that long ago..."

"And we've been planning it for a year now." Finnley shrugs. "We deliberately postponed, because we needed to graduate first."

"Yeah, college with one kid was hard enough as it is already." I agree with Finnley, smiling towards Stan. "Congratulations, guys."

"Thanks. There's one more thing, though." Nathan got up too, joining our little circle, accepting hugs from both me and Finnley. "We wanted to ask you two to be the godparents."

"Oh, yes!" Finnley smiles widely. "I mean, right?" He looks at me insecurely and I chuckle, nodding in confirmation.

"Yeah, we would love to."

"But first, enjoy your honeymoon." Stan pulls me in a hug again. "And take care of each other. Call if you need anything."

"We will." I smile happily, hugging Nathan again too, grabbing Finnley's hand with mine. "We'll be back before you know it."

- The End -