The Vows


    Keats, Wordsworth, Dickinson, Byron.


    The ssic romantic poets are strewn before me, their most poignant words on love highlighted, tabbed, screaming out for me to analyze. Except, I have read through these. I’ve read the most arresting, adoring, angsty passages out of all of these.


    Still.


    I have no clue what to write.


    Getting to my feet, I make an espresso, and while the machine works, I make a phone call.


    “Sutton? Are you okay?” my Uncle Ford asks, the sound of booming bass and soft chatter filling in the line around him. He’s likely at one of his bars, and while it’s only going on noon, time and day of the week doesn’t really matter to high end club clientele.


    “I’m good,” I answer, sliding the demitasse cup onto a saucer, walking back to where my notebook and pencil are lying helplessly at my kitchen ind.


    “But you’re calling me on a work day. In the middle of a work day, in fact,” Ford says, his voice filled with curiosity. At just thirty-five years old, I’ve managed to build a reputation as a man who never stops working, not unlike my Uncle Ford, or even my father.


    I pinch the bridge of my nose as I settle into the stool. “I took today off to get things done for the wedding.”


    “Oh?”


    I let out a long, heavy sigh, but I don’t feel any better after. “I’m working on my vows.”


    Despite the fact that my Uncle Ford is and has been single for some time, he was the poster boy of a happy husband years ago, before my aunt passed. Uncle Ford and my Aunt Katherine adored one another, and I remember, even as a kid, when my aunt passed, wondering how Uncle Ford would ever move on with his life. He loved her so much–I think collectively, most people worried more for him than his kids. Kat–short for Katherine, after her mother–and Cade were just four and six when Katherine lost her fight with cancer. I’ve never seen or heard of my uncle being in a rtionship since, and that was many, many years ago.


    A man who loves that hard is a man to ask for wedding vow advice.


    “And I’mpletely lost,” I add, waiting for Ford to jump in.


    Finally, heughs. “Shut that door for me, won’t you sweetheart?” he says, voice muffled from his hand over the receiver. A door clicks closed somewhere in his setting. “Struggling with your vows, eh? We wrote ours, too.”


    I sip the espresso, enjoying the immediate jolt of focus that hits my brain with the first taste. “I didn’t know that,” I admit.


    “Yeah, we did. Katie–” he pauses after speaking her name–her nickname. Only Uncle Ford called my Aunt Katie. We all called her Katherine, like Katie was only for him to use. It’s not like the nickname was special or created in a moment of hrity—still, Katie was just what Uncle Ford called her, and hearing him speak her nickname aloud gives us both pause.


    “Katie wanted to write our own vows. Since we weren’t active in the church, repeating church vows felt disingenuous to her,” he remembers aloud.


    “How’d you know what to write?” I ask him, staring down into thest few sips of caffeine. I may feel more alert, but I’m no closer to vows. It may be time to switch from caffeine to booze. “Becuase I took today off to get my vows done, and to finish unpacking the rest of Avery’s stuff. I’ve already unpacked everything the movers leftst weekend, cleaned the house, and gone for a run. It’s noon and my mind is nk.”


    Fordughs. “You can’t force it just because you want to make the most of a vacation day, Sutton.”


    I sigh. “That’s my fear.”


    “They shoulde from the heart, be honest and real. It should be whates into your mind when you think about Avery, andmitting to her forever.” He pauses. “You went to the bookstore and purchased the romantic ssics, didn’t you?”


    I look at the pile of books with the most popr parts highlighted. “No.”


    Heughs. “Yes, you did.”


    I sigh. “Fine, I did. And not only do I still not know what to write, but after reading some of these, I’m starting to wonder if I can even write vows myself.” I flip open the Emily Dickinson book to a neon yellow tab ced there by the girl working the bookstore counter. I’d purchased these booksst week, and paid her extra to tab everything that may help a person write wedding vows. I drop my finger to the line and read it aloud. “I think of love, and you, and my heart grows full and warm, and my breath stands still.”


    Ford chuckles. “You’re not a Dickinson man, Sutton. You’re not a Lord Byron man, and you will not find a single line in anything Shakepeare has written that you can truly identify with. The vows need toe from you. You’re oveplicating it.”


    I scratch my head and get to my feet, abandoning the books in favor of pacing the length of my living room. “I think you’re probably right.”


    My uncleughs. “My best advice is to close your eyes and imagine Avery in that gown, standing in front of you, every whispered dream in the dark stretched out before you. What do you want to say to her?”


    I close my eyes, and do what my uncle suggests, imagining Avery in a white gown, roses in her hands, blinking up at me, my name on her lips. I would want her to know that I love her more than I’ve ever loved anyone, more than I thought I could love anyone, in a way that I didn’t think existed until I met her. I want to promise her a life of guaranteed happiness—because I vow to work as hard as I can every single day to make sure she’s happy.


    “Well slow down now, don’t say everything at once or you won’t remember,” Ford jokes.


    Iugh too. “No–I actually think that helped me. I may have been overthinking it.”


    “I’m positive you were overthinking it, Sutton, that’s what you do.” He sighs. “Did you ask George for advice with this?”


    “No,” I reply, shoving my free hand in the kangaroo pocket on my hoodie, I pace across the length of my living space, approaching the window facing my private drive. Two cars are heading up, and speak of the devil, I recognize one. From the side table near the couch, I grab my baseball hat and tug it onto my head. “Actually, my father is just pulling up with someone else. I don’t know why he’s here. I’ll have to call you back, Uncle Ford.”


    “Hey–” my uncle’s voice rises, and I stop near my front door, focusing on him.


    “What?”


    “Ask Geo about your vows. He and your mother wrote theirs, too.”


    I think about that. Did I know that? Maybe. Maybe not. Either way, I have zero ns to ask my father for advice rted to weddings or rtionships. “He’s thest person I’m asking for advice.”


    “Sutton–” My uncle interjects but my father’s car door opens, and so does the door of the vehicle who came with him. A tall man with silvering hair and broad shoulders, wearing what I recognize to be Kiton Italian cashmere suit, steps out of his vehicle—a brand new Bentley Bentaga—and shakes my father’s hand.


    “I have to go, Uncle Ford. Thanks for the advice. I’ll call youter.”


    “Talk to your father, Sutt. Okay? Promise me?” Ford asks before I offer him an empty “sure,” and end the call.<hr>


    Thankfully I went for a long run today, and have a reason to be wearing track pants, sneakers, a hoodie and baseball cap in the middle of a Tuesday. I may be out of office today, but a vacation day does not typically equate to not getting properly dressed. Today was a special exception–stress. I’d nned to finish unpacking Avery, have a run, finish my vows and then put a few unexpected hours in at the office.


    Normally I do not care for pop ins, but anything to give me momentary respite from these vows.


    I love Avery. But finding the words for that love, in front of our friends and family, is where I struggle.


    I pull open my back door and take the few steps down to the drive, adjusting the Giants baseball cap on my head.


    “Sutton,” my father greets, adjusting the tie at his throat as he approaches, suited man in tow.


    I nod my head at my father, and reach past him, extending my hand to the other man. He reaches, and shakes hands. The man looks familiar, like someone I’ve seen on Extra after the news is over in the evenings. “Sutton Mercer,” I introduce myself.


    “Quincey Parker,” he greets, and the fancy suit and gleaming clip on his tie suddenly click in ce. He’s an attorney—a famous divorce attorney for jilted wives in the greater San Francisco area. I have in fact seen him on TV, when he won arge settlement case for a socialite just a few months ago.


    “Quincey, this is my son, the top sales agent at Mercer,” my father says, shoving his hands in his suit pockets as he stands between us. “Sutton, this is Quincey Parker, he’s an attorney at Parker and Pen, here in the city.”


    I nod my head. “I’m familiar. I think I just saw you on Extra a few weeks ago.”


    He rolls his eyes. “I fucking hate that shit. Those faux gossip news shows that highlight the worst parts of total strangers’ lives. It’s sick.”


    I nod my head again. “I agree.”


    “Anyway,” my father wastes no time, and I never had a question as to why he showed up here. Property. A Sale. Money. That’s the only thing between my father and I, so when he brings a client here, I know it’s because he needs the keys, code, information or something property-rted. “Quincey is interested in one of our properties in the FiDi,” my father says as I pull open the back door and guide the two men inside.


    We end up around my kitchen ind—which seems to be a central hangout spot for the floor n. When I purchased this a few years ago, I knocked down a few non-load-bearing walls to make the main living space and kitchen run together, with private formal and semi-formal dining adjacent. The open space brings a ton of natural light, and allows for informal meetings, like this.


    “Can I get you a drink, Quincey?” I ask, knowing full well that the girl was here this morning, restocking the fridges with everything Avery likes. Now that she’s officially moved in and unpacked, tonight is our first night together without boxes and a to-do list lingering. I thought we’d celebrate with a nice meal in, maybe some time in the jacuzzi, all with her favorite things–the fridge stocked with her favorite sparkling waters, fresh sliced peaches (her favorite snack), her favorite Lush shower and bath products beneath every sink in the house, and a grossly oversized Voluspa candle in the center of the ind, next to, of course, two dozen long stemmed red roses.


    Quincey, his hands in his suit pockets, stares at the roses on the counter for a moment, seemingly dazed. My father clears his throat, which breaks the trance, and he shakes his head. “No, nothing to drink for me.”


    I take my espresso demitasse cup and ce it in the sink basin, and adjust the hat on my head. “FiDi–Kat not around?” I ask my father, because my cousin holds the listings to all of our properties in the financial district, which he is fully and wholly aware of. I don’t wear the face of confusion, not to cause concern for Quincey or the sale of the property, but instead ask, “Is she already working a deal today?”


    I don’t get the answer to Kat, not right away, because Quincey narrows his gaze, nodding toward my notebook, pen and the ssics strewn about. “Your father tells me today is one of just a few days in thest few years that you took vacation.” He looks pointedly at my vow prep and asks, “what are you working on, if you don’t mind me asking?”


    Quincey Parker is here because he’s going to buy a property that is in the multi millions. As much as I’d like to tell him that talking about writing the most personal thing I’ve ever had to write makes me want to stick that pen through my eye, I don’t, because Mercer Properties wants his business.


    I look down at the paper, nk except for an address—the location where Avery and her team are working today. I look back up at Quincey. “Wedding vows. I’m getting married in a month and we decided to write our own vows.”


    “Congrattions on the engagement.” Quincey smiles, and not a typical millionaire smile either–it’s genuine and warm, and he even reaches out, collecting the Best of Lord Byron from the counter. “I got marriedst year,” he says, flipping through the clerk’s noted passages in the book. He peers up from the pages, eyeing me. “You gonna use any of this?”


    I shake my head. “Doubtful. I’ve been advised to write from the heart,” I tell him, shoving my hands in my pockets.


    My father, a man that cannot stand a conversation taking ce without his two cents, says, “the most rewarding feeling in the entire world is giving the person you love everything they want.”


    My father, the very same man who has spoken myte mother’s name less than a handful of times since I was a fucking child, who has fucked more women than a rockstar on a world tour, who at age fifty-eight still gets regr blood tests for STDs, decides to chime in with marriage advice.


    Geo Mercer should be grateful that Quincey Parker has thoughts to add to that. Because I’m about to counter my father’s im with a dose of reality, when Quincey speaks up. “Everything meaning, emotional fulfillment?”


    “Of course,” he replies, smiling at Quincey.


    “I n on only giving my wife everything she wants, not every woman under the sun.” As soon as the snark hits, like allments, I feel worse. Not because the pathetic lilt on my father’s face at thement makes me feel guilty. I do not feel guilt over speaking truthfully or how that truth makes him feel, but I do feel regret appearing unprofessional in front of a client.<fnbf2a> ???s ??????? ?s ?????? ?? ?ovelFind</fnbf2a>


    “Well,” Quincey buttons his coat, smiling a bit awkwardly. “Good luck on the vows and–” he turns to my father. “I’ve got about an hour left before I’m due back. Can we get those keys?”


    My father pulls his phone out, taps around a bit then hands it to me. “The keys are in your safe.” Years ago, we decided to putmercial keys in my safe, residential spare keys in my father’s, and the codes to the pad locks in the Mercer Properties safe. This came as a direct result of an angry man who lost his home at auction after a painful divorce. He stormed down to Mercer and demanded the keys, said he was taking the property back. When we told him no, he took all the keys, and eventually found the key to his former property. He used them to terrorize the new family who had just moved in.


    It was a whole fucking thing, but it led us to moving the keys to safes outside of Mercer, for everyone’s safety.


    We’ve never had to ess these, because most properties have a key in a lockbox on the door. Sometimes, though, the boxes malfunction or are stolen and we’re forced to use the spare.


    “Excuse me, I’m just going to get the keys,” I tell Quincey before dipping out to my office upstairs to retrieve the key. On my heels, my father follows me, and closes the office door once we’re both inside. The only reason I regret myment is this–having to handle whatever he’s going to say next. After opening the safe and finding just what we need, I close it and turn, letting out an exasperated sigh, holding the keys in a man envelope, FINANCIAL DISTRICT #22 written in Sharpie on the outside.


    “What?”


    “After I’m done with Quincey, I’d like toe back and talk to you.” His voice is unwavering and calm.


    “About what?” Sweat forms under the baseball hat, and I have the strongest urge to yank it off and waffle my fingers through my hair for a second, just to cool down, to breathe. But I don’t. I stand there, the folder in my hand, and stare at the man who created me, whom I have nothing but real estate and DNA inmon with.


    “Will you be here? If Ie back in an hour or so?” he asks, his eyes not wandering around the room.


    I shrug. “Yeah, I guess. I’m working on my vows before Avery gets back.”


    He reaches out and takes the man folder without another word, and then I follow him back downstairs, where Quincey is waiting at the ind, flipping through Emily Dickinson.


    “It was nice meeting you,” I tell Quincey, shaking his hand.


    “You too, Sutton. And congrattions again on your engagement.”


    I nod. “Thanks.” I nce at my father, and find his eyes already on me, tired and heavy. “Thank you son.”


    Quincey turns around. “Good luck with the vows. And you’re right—from the heart, that’s all she wants–to know what’s in your heart.” He nces at my father then me before adding, “But spoil her, too, because that never hurts.”