Chapter Text
It all started with one tiny innocent seeming suggestion. Well, as innocent as a suggestion about going to Las Vegas, Nevada could be. It was Sin City after all. 'Let's go to Vegas for your birthday!' was, in Amara's opinion, the worst thing she'd ever heard in her young life. So she was turning twenty-eight. She wasn't exactly young, but she didn't have death breathing down her neck either. Well, not age or health related anyway. Death seemed to come whenever he damn well pleased and so far she'd been lucky enough that he hadn't yet set his gaze upon her.
And she was getting off topic again. Her cynicism and jaded-ness creeping back up on her. No matter how much the curly-headed blonde sleeping next to her tried to keep her upbeat, as if she could be after everything she'd been through, and optimistic. Something else she'd grown out of at a young age. Who could be optimistic when the world was continuing its downward spiral into Hell and taking everyone along for the ride? Being cynical had gotten her this far in life. Why should she take chances and even for a split second try to be optimistic about something?
Although, she thought as she stared down at the sleeping blonde, maybe being cynical wasn't exactly the way to go anymore. Especially when it resulted in her getting married at some ungodly hour of the night to a man she'd only seen in passing until she'd been dragged out dancing by the two women she loved like sisters.
A few pre-birthday party drinks had already made her tipsy and when she'd seen him again at the club, dancing his heart out even though it only reinforced the stereotype about white guys not being able to dance; she'd been drawn to him. Just as she'd been drawn to him the two times she'd crashed into him at the hotel and if she could be honest about things, the two hours they'd spent together in the coffee shop the night before her party.
Maybe it was the constant sense of optimism that drew her cold jaded heart to him. Or maybe it was because his eyes were a clear ocean blue with tiny green and brown specks in them. Maybe it was the laugh lines around his eyes. Maybe it was the boyish grin on his perfect lips. The grin that turned to secret smiles when he thought she wasn't looking at him. Maybe it was because of the adorably awkward and lanky way he danced. Or maybe, and probably this was it, she was tired of being lonely, cold, and dark. Or it was just because he had the most perfect ass she'd ever seen.
She sighed heavily as she turned her gaze to the sparkling of the diamond wedding set on her finger. Fire shone from the stones with the slightest wiggle of her fingers and she again wondered how much he had paid for the rings and what had possessed him to ask her to marry him in the first place. Granted a lot of booze had played a hand in it, but she couldn't seem to get passed the feeling that he'd known what he was doing the entire time. More importantly though: What the hell had possessed her to say yes?
Yeah, he was kind and funny and highly intelligent and very beautiful. Those things didn't necessarily make someone husband worthy did they?
Cynicism at its best.
He reached for her in his sleep and she put her hand in his hoping he wouldn't wake up just yet. She wasn't sure she wanted to be there when he did wake. They'd only been married for eight hours give or take and while she was nursing one hell of a hangover that her heavy thoughts did nothing to appease, she was afraid of what he would do if he did wake with no recollection of what they'd done. She might be cynical and jaded but that didn't mean she wasn't a coward.
And all of this because of a stupid little suggestion that should have been meaningless. How the hell could seven seemingly innocent words turn her life into a dramedy of epic proportions?