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The last car pulls in, Elaine’s voice drifting from outside as she greets them, and Jared’s getting married. Like. Obviously. That’s a thing that’s about to happen. The guests are going to go sit down in the seats that got set up, and Jared will walk outside from the main house, and Bryce will walk outside from the bunk house, and then they’re going to get married.
Holy shit.
“You freaking out?” his mom asks him when he comes out of the bedroom.
“Just a tiny bit,” Jared says. “The tiniest. The merest sliver of freaking out.”
“Your dad spent the entire morning of our wedding day convinced I wasn’t going to show up,” his mom says. “You’re doing fine.”
“I didn’t really think that,” his dad mutters. “It was just a possibility.”
If Jared was marrying literally anyone else, that’d probably bring the freak out to a new height, except it’s Bryce, so it doesn’t.
There’s no walking down aisles or anything, but there is, you know, walking to the backyard, Jared’s parents on either side of him, figurative and literal support he’s grateful for, because his legs feel kind of wobbly. It’s not even nerves, really? Not nerves about marrying Bryce, at least. Mostly nerves he’s going to make a fool of himself in front of everyone.
Chaz does this goofy salute at him when Jared glances over the crowd of people ready to witness the inevitable mortification, and Jared smiles back weakly.
“Good luck,” his mom murmurs, squeezing his hand before going off to sit in the front row, and his dad offers his hand for a handshake.
“Just hug him, dad, god,” Erin says, and apparently that’s all the permission his dad needs to try to break Jared’s ribs.
“Ow,” Jared says weakly.
His dad’s shorter than him. It’s something Jared intellectually knew? But it’s weird right now, looking down at the top of his head while his dad does a clear last ditch effort at stopping the wedding via murdering his own son.
“Remember what I said,” his dad says, though it’s hard to with the crushing pain.
“I’m not hugging you,” Erin says, when his dad finally lets go.
“Didn’t ask you to,” Jared says, which apparently is the permission Erin needs to hug him. It’s less painful, at least?
“Still have the rings?” Jared asks, and Erin rolls her eyes at him, which Jared hopes is a yes.
“Cool,” Jared says, then, kind of under his breath, “Cool.”
“Totally not freaking out at all,” Erin says.
“You’re actually doing really well,” the officiant says, and Jared guesses she’d know. “Vivian.”
“Jared,” Jared says. “Uh. Thanks for marrying us? And the whole. NDA thing.”
“It’s fine,” she says. “And there’s your groom.”
Jared looks over, sees Elaine and Bryce coming out of the back door of the bunk house, their hair glinting gold in the summer light and Bryce’s tux tailored perfectly, some full on James Bond suave shit going on, and Jared just — he gets to marry him.
He’s pretty sure he’s grinning like an absolute lunatic right now, but nobody’s allowed to call him on it, so that’s just fine.
Bryce totally ruins the suave ass James Bond thing when he gives Jared a wave as dorky as Chaz’s salute was, and Jared grins wider.
When they’re about ten feet out Elaine gives Bryce a hug, and Jared’s faintly concerned she’s going to stop the wedding, because she doesn’t seem inclined to let go. She’s definitely crying when she does, and Bryce looks like he is too, and Jared has to swallow a few times, focus on how hot he is. Who thought tuxes in July heat were a good idea?
“Hi babe,” Bryce murmurs when he hits his spot.
“Hi,” Jared says back.
“You both ready?” Vivian asks, low, and when she gets nods, manages to impressively project her voice to this like, Super Official, Wedding Called to Order tone.
“I’ve been told you’ve prepared your own vows?” Vivian asks after the intro, which is his cue, since they agreed Jared would go first. Well, Jared asked to go first, and Bryce said that was cool by him, which was a relief, because otherwise Jared would have to try to compete after Bryce undoubtedly knocks his out of the park, and there’s absolutely no way he’s going to be able to do that. So it’s his turn. It’s honestly terrifying, everyone looking at him while he tries to gather himself, someone coughing. Jared feels like the cough is pointed. Who would dare pointed cough at him in the middle of his wedding?
It’s probably a Matheson. Or Julius. Jared bets it was fucking Julius.
“I’m going to mess this up so bad,” Jared says. “I didn’t take notes, because I’d probably forget to even read them, or like, have sudden hysterical blindness, or—”
Bryce is grinning at him, like he’s not word vomiting through his fucking vows. Or like he is but Bryce expected that. Probably that one. Bryce is pretty used to it by now.
“You know I’m shit — shit, sorry —” Jared says, and everyone’s laughing at him, which is terrific, and also totally to be expected. “You know I’m really bad about talking about my feelings, and especially talking about how I feel about you. And that’s probably because it’s just — it’s so much? It’s hard to put in words, because like, even thinking about it is so scary and huge and like — if I knew how much you’d mean to me, and how freaking obsessed with you I’d be I probably never would have gotten into that car with you the first time. But I’m really, really glad I did. Please stop crying.”
Bryce does this sniffle laugh, and Jared blows out a breath that comes out shaky. He can still feel everyone looking at him, almost this physical weight, them all watching him embarrass himself, but he’ll definitely chicken out if he glances over at any of them, and anyway, he doesn’t really want to look away from Bryce, even if his tears might end up being contagious.
“I know I always go on about like, how different you are from what you acted like when I met you, and it’s just — being with you has been this crazy thing where the more time I spend with you the more Bryce I get, or like, start to understand, and I like him so much?” Jared says. “And love him too, obviously, but I just — you try to hide it, but you’re pretty much the kindest person I’ve ever met, maybe besides like, your mom, who obviously had something to do with that, and you are so incredibly talented but you also work so hard, and you are just — the most thoughtful boyfriend, and fiancé, and like, husband, I guess now, that’s — a word I’m going to have to get used to, and that’s just, crazy, and weird, but like, in a good way, obviously in a good way.”
Who let Jared open his mouth, holy shit. Someone stop him.
“I really need to stop before I accidentally just start like, insulting you,” Jared says. “I mean, I probably have already, so—”
Bryce’s laughing head shake is a relief, but still. Jared is cut off from expressing his feelings.
“Okay, that’s like, it,” Jared says. “Except I love you. I mentioned that already, but I love you so fucking — shit, sorry — I love you a crazy amount, so that’s like, worth mentioning again. And now you can totally kick my ass at this vows thing.”
“It’s not a competition!” Chaz yells, which is rich for someone who helped Bryce with his but wouldn’t help Jared.
“When I met you,” Bryce says, voice catching, and fuck, if he cries through this whole thing Jared’s doomed to do it right along with him. He takes a second, and thank fuck, his voice is even this time. “The first impression I had of you was someone who was going to pull a muscle if he kept stretching the way he did. My second impression, after I told you that you were going to hurt yourself, was that you were really mean.”
This isn’t vows, this is a roast. Jared can hear his mom laughing loudest of all right now, this evil delighted cackle. Apparently Bryce is taking becoming a part of Matheson family seriously.
“And like, beautiful,” Bryce says. “I forgot that one. You were so beautiful, the most beautiful person I’d ever seen — you are, Jared stop shaking your head —”
He will not, because that is a ridiculous statement.
“— I just wanted to be around you, all the time,” Bryce says. “Even when you were mean. No matter what. And it wasn’t because you were beautiful, it was just — I knew that I’d kick myself forever if I didn’t try to get to know you better, even if you mocked me for it the whole time, which you totally did. Still do, sometimes. The day I met you I started falling in love with you, and I haven’t stopped since. I wake up every day loving you more, which I didn’t think was possible.”
Honestly, neither did Jared. Still seems to keep happening.
“I was such an angry person when I met you,” Bryce says. “Angry, and unhappy, and not — I didn’t want to be who I was. I didn’t like me. I didn’t like pretty much anyone. But god I liked you. And I wanted you to like me back so bad. And somehow you did, even though I wasn’t someone who even close to deserved you. And my biggest goal since I met you has been to become someone who does. And I don’t think I’m there yet, and I don’t know if I ever will be, but I promise you that’s going to continue to be something I strive towards every single day for the rest of my life.”
Who let Bryce say this complete bullshit. Doesn’t deserve him. If Jared was allowed to interrupt Bryce’s vows, he’d be arguing right now, and instead he’s just — his eyes are very itchy.
“Hey,” Bryce says. “Stop crying.”
Jared knows it’s a chirp, mimicking him, but it comes out just — soft. Bryce is too good to even chirp him properly, and he’s saying he doesn’t deserve Jared. Stupid — stupid earnest —
“I’m not,” Jared mumbles, swiping at his eyes with the back of his hand, swiping harder when Bryce takes the hand that isn’t busy getting rid of any of these supposed tears. Jared squeezes hard, and Bryce squeezes right back, mouths a question Jared can almost hear, want me to stop?, something Jared kind of wants to nod at, because he never cries in front of people, is embarrassed even when it’s Bryce, or his mom, and this is everyone he knows, or at least feels like it, but —
He shakes his head, because he knows Bryce worked on it. Draft after draft, probably, trying to articulate his feelings for Jared, managing to land on the most devastating words possible, because he’s devastating in the best way possible.
Jared inhales, exhales, tries to get his breathing under control. Bryce waits for him to try to put himself together, and if Jared hadn’t been sure he wanted to marry him before this — and obviously he was pretty fucking sure — that would have done it, all by itself.
“I’ve heard a lot of different answers on why people should get married,” Bryce says. “But for me, the biggest one, the reason I asked you to marry me, is that I can’t imagine my life without you in it, and I don’t want to. Getting to wake up beside you every day is something I want more than anything in the world.
“And obviously I can’t have that a lot of the time with us in different cities during the season. But just talking to you on the phone for a minute is enough to make a bad day better, just knowing you’re there, even if it’s a thousand miles away, just knowing you’re like, in the world, existing, that means everything to me. You mean everything to me. And I feel like the luckiest man alive right now, knowing that when you yell at me later for making you cry in public, you’re going to be doing that as my husband.”
It’s a really awkward feeling, laughing and crying at the same time.
“Still want to marry me?” Bryce asks, and Jared’s ‘yeah’ comes out more breath than anything else, but the way Bryce grins, blinding, he heard it. “Cool,” he says, letting go of Jared’s hand just long enough to lace their fingers properly. “Let’s do it.”