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“I’ve been married for over a year now”
Foolish laughed to himself and shook his head at the camera. Chat filled with emotes reacting and laughing at the situation but they didn’t know truly what Foolish had found funny.
Just over a year ago Foolish made a trip to Vegas that changed his life for the better in many unsuspecting ways. Before going he hyped himself up for the people he would be meeting for the first time. Some he’d talked to before, some he knew of and then the few strangers he’d never heard of before and all he knew about them was that they were also a streamer. Events like Twitch Rivals were weird to him. Everyone was talked about like a collective when in reality all they had in common was their job. Hardly anyone knew anyone else outside their little group but finding himself in the same hall as them all day forced him to talk to new people.
Meeting new people was a given and something Foolish expected. However he didn’t expect to get married and to get married to Punz was an even bigger surprise.
On the last night in Vegas, everybody got more than a bit drunk. But everyone already knew that thanks to Punz and Hannah’s giggle session during his ‘back from vegas’ stream. Viewers could piece the things that happened from different stories that had been told and the jokes made. However, there was one thing they didn’t know, not even their friends knew, so nothing was ever said on it.
After drinking for the whole night, Foolish made his way back from Punz’s room back to his own with the goal to sleep off the alcohol before his flight in the morning. However his plans were ruined by a simple text from Punz requesting Foolish to meet him downstairs asap. Apparently Punz felt the urge to go on a walk at midnight and didn’t want to go alone. Foolish wanted to complain and go back to bed, but it was Punz, so he couldn’t say no.
Stepping outside made his head spin, the alcohol mixed with the fresh air only made him feel worse, but he continued walking, swaying to the side and bumping shoulders with Punz every so often.
“Let’s get married!” Giggling, Punz pulled Foolish towards a building built to look like a church but had neon lights all around it.
“To who?”
“Each other, idiot. We have to get married, we’re in Vegas, that's what you do in Vegas.” Punz stopped in his tracks and looked towards Foolish with determination in his eyes.
“Is it?”
“Yeah we’ve already drank, lost money gambling and lost Twitch Rivals at the Minecraft part, in front of a crowd that knows us as Minecraft streamers. We need to leave on a high note and what’s more happier than having a wedding?”
“ You lost money. Don’t put that on me.” Foolish had yet to gamble and he had no plans to. He saw Punz’s losing streak and decided to stay well away.
“Whatever. We’ve not had a great time so let’s change that. Weddings are always a good time.”
“Well technically, weddings and marriages are different. We’re getting married, not holding a wedding.”
“Well technically, I don’t care. We’re getting married, c’mon.” Once again starting to pull Foolish towards the building. This time, Foolish went along easily. He was never going to say no to Punz, he just wanted to make a point first.
Giggling their way through signing the papers and the last minute vows, they eventually got married. Their laughter continued back up to their hotel rooms where they finally split and fell asleep.
Foolish woke up in the morning with his alarm blaring and head spinning. If the adrenaline of having to catch his flight didn’t kick in, he would have never made it out of bed. Making quick work of throwing everything as fast as possible into his duffle bag, he left the hotel and made it to the airport just in time.
It was a few days later that he finally unpacked his bag and found the crumpled up certificate of marriage. Skimming through it, blurry memories of him and Punz giggling and stumbling through the streets and making their way into the marriage building.
Panic coursed through him at the thought of being married already. Maybe a small part of him wouldn’t mind being married to Punz but the majority of his brain was screaming at him. How would he explain to his family that he drunkenly got married to a man he’s only met once in person and had barely ever mentioned before.
It was one thing to have a little crush on his friend but to marry him after meeting him once was a completely different thing.
Pacing his room trying to figure out a way to tell Punz what he discovered, he decided to just bite the bullet and phone him. They had spoken many times after getting back but never once was that night mentioned so he doubted that Punz remembered anything either.
“Hello?” His voice was raspy and tired sounding. Foolish realised he had probably just woken up and cursed the other’s terrible sleep schedule. It was mid-day and Foolish was having a crisis while Punz was peacefully unaware of their apparent amalgamation. Part of him was jealous of how oblivious he was of the situation while another part just unwanted to shake him and catch him up on the situation they were in.
“Hey. Uh we need to talk.” Foolish fidgeted with the helm of his shorts, nerves overtaking him as he thought of the different reactions Punz might have. If Punz reacted badly how would he be able to handle that, knowing his crush hated the idea of being married to him would kill his heart in a way he wasn’t prepared for.
“Damn, sounds like you’re breaking up with me.”
“I might be...” Trailing off, Foolish tried to decide the best way on breaking the news.
“What do you mean?” The question was accompanied with a nervous giggle and the sound of sheets rustling.
“I uh- I found a marriage certificate in my bag from Vegas and it has our names on it. Did we get married? I don’t think I’m ready to be married, Punz. What are we going to do?”
“What? Send me a picture.” Punz demanded sounding much more awake now.
Quickly taking a picture, praying his hands weren’t shaking too much, he sent it away to Punz. Holding his breath waiting for his reaction the last thing he expected was for laughter to fill the call.
“Stop laughing! This is serious. What do we do?”
“Foolish, did you even read this?”
“Yes!” He paused for a second as he thought back. “Well, I skimmed it.”
“It says our last names are ‘Punz’ and ‘Foolish Underscore Gamers’, you actually wrote out the word underscore. I don’t think any of this can be legally binding.”
Hearing that calmed Foolish enough to actually read through the document properly and with a clear head. With the adrenaline gone he found himself giggling along with the dumb stuff written down. “Apparently our witnesses were someone called Bacardi and Jack Daniels.” The two of them laughed as they read through the document and tried to remember any details of their apparent wedding.
A lull came as they got to the end of the paper and Foolish relished in the relief of not having to inform his parents of a drunk marriage.
“Did you really hate the idea of being married to me that much?” Punz broke the silence with the question sounding slightly hurt.
“I’d at least like to be taken to dinner first before the wedding.” Replying honestly instead of rejecting the other.
“So if I order you chicken wings to your house and we jump on a video call, would that count?”
“Yeah, I mean if you want it to.”
“Of course I do, I was the one that offered. Your wings should be there in around half an hour.”
“Thanks for taking me to dinner at one in the afternoon.” In an attempt to lighten the mood after the serious conversation, Foolish laughed quietly at his own joke.
“Shut up. It’s about to be my breakfast so don’t complain. Just get on discord already, I’m calling you.”
For the next few weeks the same thing happened, Punz would buy them dinner and they would call and eat together. It was a nice quiet time with just the two of them talking and eating and just enjoying each other’s presence. Foolish enjoyed what they were doing but at the same time it was confusing. They were nearly married, having weekly dinner dates, but were still calling each other ‘just friends’. By now Foolish was pretty sure they had crossed many lines of just being friends.
It wasn’t until a few weeks later that either of them spoke on the situation. They were once again sitting on call with dinner that Punz had ordered when Punz finally spoke up.
“Now that I’ve taken you to dinner a couple times now, will you accept my marriage proposal?”
Foolish had to stop himself choking on a bit of chicken. He had been wondering where this would all go but the mention of marriage again completely threw him off. “I don’t think marriage is the next step, Punz.” Foolish deadpanned.
“Fine. How about being my boyfriend?”
“Only if you’ll be mine.”
“Course I will. Why would I ask you to be mine but I wouldn’t be your boyfriends? How would that even work?”
“I don’t know! I was just making sure, I wanted to be on the same page, okay?”
“Okay, okay. We are boyfriends now, is that okay?”
“Yeah that’s good.”
“Good.”
From then, the two continued to have virtual dates. However, as a little reminder to what finally got them together, they celebrate their fake marriage date along with their dating anniversary. This year they met up and went out to a proper candle-lit dinner, telling everyone it was their one year wedding anniversary.
Despite their botched wedding being a drunken mistake and eventually turning into an inside joke for the two, the two were happy with where they are now and maybe one day they could have another wedding, this time done properly, more sober and with their friends and family there. Until then chat will remain oblivious to the joke and Foolish and Punz will keep celebrating the two dates.