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Tying a tie was never hard for Dream. Polished young boys were always praised when he was growing up, dressing to the nines with his large family in tow every Sunday to begin the week. After school, the ROTC group required he not look like a total slob every now and then. Proms and homecoming dances were easy for him to dress for. A line of all his friends on every sports team would form so Dream could do up their ties and clip their boutonnières onto pockets and lapels. Standing in a floor-length mirror by himself, Dream softly smiled as he fastened on his own red rosebud boutonnière. Funny how he was doing all of this again years and years later, though this time it was all for himself only.
Random rose petals littered the dressing room floor as the groomsmen and women ran in and out with last minute preparations. Dream’s mom was in the corner dishing out last minute seating instructions to his cousins. The lineup of those walking down the aisle began leaving the room in staggered pairs, women holding lively bouquets in their flowing dresses as red as wine and men in pressed black suits accented with dark red button ups and black ties.
Sapnap stood next to Dream in the mirror. “You clean up nice.”
“I could say the same for you,” Dream nodded, brushing off imaginary lint from his jacket sleeve. “I can’t remember the last time I saw you without a hat on.”
The two boys shared a laugh just like old times, Dream’s arm around his best friend’s shoulder. It stilled the fluttering butterflies in his stomach for just a moment, and in that short moment of peace did he actually feel ready.
“I’m not ready,” Dream blurted out suddenly, body freezing up as if he’d just been dipped in the Arctic.
“You know, that’s exactly what he said to me just a couple minutes ago,” Sapnap shrugged off Dream’s arm and opted for his own hands firmly atop the taller’s shoulders. He stared into Dream’s unsure clover eyes intensely. “If you both aren’t ready, then it cancels out. Like pemdas.”
“Are you seriously making a math joke at a time like this?” Dream ask incredulously, a slow smile beginning to tug at the corners of his lips.
Nodding feverishly, Sapnap grinned back even harder. “It made you smile, didn’t it?”
“I can’t go out there,” Dream shook his head, turning away from his friend and looking himself up and down in the mirror. He felt out of place in the suit, in the tie, in the room, in the chapel. His normally unruly dirty blond curls were tamed with hairspray and heat curtesy of a few of his friends lined up in pairs behind him. Doubt after doubt began to cloud ova body builer in mind likeder kicking a dead horse. “He’s going to kill me.”
Sapnap barked out a laugh, shaking his head as he glanced at the floor. “You were always one to catastrophize things. But,” he cut himself off, raising another hand to clap on his friend’s shoulder firmly. It jostled the elder man. “… you were also always the one who succeeded. No matter how hard it got, no matter all the chaos that was thrown at you, everything always turned out okay. Always.”
Never once did Dream regret any move he ever made in his career, for each step brought him to the next rung on the ladder of success. He was able to find financial stability, he broke records and put his name in the books, he found peace with himself and his past, he made friends and formed relationships with people he never thought possible, and he even met the love of his life. No feat was met without struggle, though, but Dream knew Sapnap was right. Everything turned out okay in the end. Hell, he could think of a couple places much more awful that he could be in at the moment. The dressing room of a chapel where he was about to marry the man of his dreams was a pretty okay place to be.
Dream was the first member of the party to walk down the aisle. Heartbeat roaring in his ears, sweat moistening his palms, footsteps echoing all around his skull, he felt anxious and lost. The pep talk in the dressing room helped momentarily, but as he parted the sea of the room where all his friends and family sat, all insecurities began rushing back to him. He glanced to either side, smiling at familiar faces and waving low to younger family members who tried to run into the aisle with him. It was cute, but no singular thought that crossed his mind aided in calming his racing heart.
He took his post beside the officiator, one trembling hand clasped over the other wrist. The chapel was beautiful from this point of view; bunches of poppies and roses cascaded down the sides of massive golden pots on stands on both parallel walls and the sunlight streaming through stained glass windows painted the attendees in rainbow. He had half a mind to smirk at such, for many churches would never allow a same-sex couple to marry within their walls. His family sat in the pew row closest to him, smiling with tears in their eyes as some took pictures of him with their phones. He held up a peace sign for a moment, immediately putting it down when his mother harshly whispered him to quit fooling around. How could he not, though, when fooling around was how he coped with situations as stressful as this for as long as he could remember?
It was a blur as the pairs of groomsmen and women walked down the aisle arm-in-arm, grinning big cheesy smiles as they saw Dream standing lone beneath the arch. Sapnap was his best man, of course. Karl was was his partner’s, so the two walked first up the aisle and split off just before stepping up the stairs to stand at their respective places. Siblings and the rest of their closest friends followed. Dream knew by heart the order of each and everyone who was to walk down the aisle. His mouth ran dry when the flower girl began tossing rose petals with the ring bearer in tow. All attention shifted away from him for a moment, and in that moment he closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and lowered his head.
Shuffling of those in the pews, quiet gasps, and the familiar tune on the organ commencing froze the blood in Dream’s veins. He found his place at the alter staring up the aisle at his partner for life, and suddenly the all the fog in his mind cleared as if he’d just found his lighthouse.
George was as handsome as the day Dream first saw his face. He was as handsome as the first time they spoke on online platforms, George’s camera on with low lighting accenting his beautifully soft masculine features. He was as handsome as the first time he saw him in person after all those perilous months getting him a visa to the United States. He was as handsome as the night Dream got down on one knee to propose in their back yard, confessing to him and him only that he wished to spend a lifetime and then some together.
The world seemed to move in slow motion as George walked down the aisle towards his future husband, practically floating down the rose petals as his mocha brown eyes were set on Dream and Dream only. A smile that could light up a whole city blackout was drawn across his face, and as he drew near did Dream see that pretty little sparkle in his eyes doubling. He looked phenomenal in his suit just as he did the first time Dream saw him in one during a Twitch stream all those years ago, but this time it was all too real. He seemed to go for a more stylish route, opting for an all-black ensemble from the suit jacket and pants, to the button up, to the long tie beneath his collar. Dream chose a black suit, a white button up, and a long silken white tie. It was just a little too perfect, though not as perfect as the magnificent man ahead of him.
George made it up the steps to stand squarely in front of Dream, the look in his eyes just as lovesick as Dream felt.
“Dream,” George said, though it was broken up by a laugh that Dream was happy to be able to hear for the rest of his life.
“George,” he replied with a blinding smile, immediately taking George’s hands in his own.
It was hard to listen to anything the officiator to his right was saying, for the only thing on Dream’s mind was George. It wasn’t uncommon for him to get lost in the warm chocolate pools of his partner’s eyes, though today he wished he could drown in them and only ever return to Earth to have George in his arms for the rest of eternity. It was mesmerizing to see such a beautiful blush creep over the apples of his cheeks as Dream traced a thumb over the top of his hand slowly; no matter what step in their relationship the two reached, he always knew George’s cheeks to flush at even the simplest acts of love. He found it unbearably endearing.
No matter how many times one may think he ran out of things to be infatuated with about his partner, Dream would always love George. Undying love, affection, and appreciation would always exist between the two. Was there anything else more perfect? Dream couldn’t think of a more perfect life partner than George, and though George may have his own more subtle way of showing it, Dream knew he’d always feel the same. They knew, for forever and always.
“Do you take this man to be your lawfully wedded husband, to live together in matrimony, to love him, to comfort him, to honor and keep him, in sickness and in health, in sorrow and in joy, to have and to hold, for as long as you both shall live?”
“I do.”