Noah was curled on a couch.
Mia was asleep against his shoulder, still wearing the necklace.
Adrian stood in the empty ballroom beside Clara.
"I've been thinking about something."
Clara looked suspicious.
"That usually causes problems."
"I'm serious."
"So am I."
He smiled.
Then his expression softened.
"For a long time, I thought getting you back meant putting everything back the way it was."
Clara didn't speak.
"But there is no way back."
"No."
"We're not twenty-three anymore."
"Definitely not."
"We have two children."
"Very observant."
"We've hurt each other."
Clara looked at him.
"You didn't hurt me the way you think you did."
"I still did."
"Sometimes."
Adrian nodded.
"And you've yelled at me."
"You deserved most of it."
"Most?"
"Almost all."
He laughed.
Then the room became quiet again.
"I don't want the life we were supposed to have."
Clara's expression changed.
Adrian stepped closer.
"I want this one."
She stared at him.
"The complicated one."
He gestured toward the room.
"The one where Noah thinks I'm terrible at baseball. The one where Mia reports me to a photograph of my mother. The one where you make me return expensive gifts."
"You needed that lesson."
"I did."
"The tablet was ridiculous."
"I understand."
"It was seven hundred dollars."
"Clara."
She smiled.
Adrian continued.
"I don't want to replace the years we lost. I can't."
His voice lowered.
"I just don't want to waste the years we still have."
Clara's eyes filled with tears.
Adrian did not pull out a ring.
He did not kneel.
He had learned something from the first wedding.
Promises meant very little when they were designed for an audience.
So he simply held out his hand.
"Can I keep choosing this?"
Clara looked at his hand.
Then at him.
"For how long?"
"As long as you'll let me."
She placed her hand in his.
"Start with tomorrow."
Adrian smiled.
"Tomorrow."
They married eleven months later.
There were twenty-three guests.
No ballroom.
No orchestra.
No thousand-dollar flowers.
The ceremony took place in Clara's backyard beneath an old maple tree.
Noah carried the rings.