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As I came through the door, I received my first glimpse of the magic Adam had created in the relatively short time I’d been gone. It was so spectacular that I stopped dead and just gaped.

The entryway had been made into a tunnel of fairy lights and pine garlands. It ended at the living room, which had been transformed into a beautiful sanctuary. All the furniture had been removed and folding chairs had been set up in a semi-circle facing the huge windows. In the center of the windows a Christmas tree had been set up and decorated completely in gold and white. All the other decorations in the room carried on the simple, elegant theme: gold and white bows were fixed here and there with sprays of pure white lilies; white pillars held gold candles that had been set up inside frosted glass globes with wreaths for bases. The result was stunning.

Adam was putting some finishing touches on the tree and didn’t hear me come in.

“Adam, this is—incredible.” I gasped.

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He spun around and a wide grin quickly spread across his face. “Do you like it then?” he asked eagerly.

“Like it? Are you kidding? I love it! It’s absolutely perfect.”

“Good, I was hoping you’d approve. Aidan hasn’t even seen the finished results yet. You’re the first.”

“I’m honored. Where is Aidan?”

“He’s in his room, working on his vows.”

“His what?” I asked in panic. “We were supposed to write our own vows? Why didn’t anyone tell me?”

“Aidan just decided a little while ago. But don’t worry, I’m sure Bryan will have some vows for you to use. Bryan is the minister I told you about; he’s at the local Metropolitan Community Church.”

“If Aidan’s writing his own I have to write my own,”

I wailed. “I’d better get to work.”

I dashed back to my old room and threw open the door to find it packed full with the furniture from the living room.

“Whoa!” I exclaimed.

Aidan opened the door to our bedroom across the hall. “You’re home!” he said with a grin.

I closed the door and gave him a kiss on the lips. “I can’t believe you decided to write your own vows without telling me!” I whined. “Now I have to hurry up and write mine.”

“You don’t have to,” he said. “I just had so much that I wanted to say I decided to write my own.”

“Well, I want to do it, too.”

“Then you’d better get to work. Time’s running out and it isn’t as easy as you’d think.”

“No kidding! I never thought it would be easy; you started this,” I said as I slipped by him. He followed me 333

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in and quickly scooped up a notepad that was lying open on the desk. He ripped off the top page and tossed the notebook to me.

“Get to work. I’ll go see if Adam needs any help.”

He left, shutting the door behind himself, and I set to work.

Several hours later, the door opened again. A small pile of crumpled false starts and frustrated attempts surrounded me. I turned expecting to see Aidan, but it was Adam. He was holding a white bundle in his arms.

“Sorry to interrupt,” he said, “but it’s almost time to start. Your guests will be arriving soon and I have a surprise for you. I know I told Aidan to just dress casually, but I thought of this today and got your sizes out of your closet and well—here.”

He held out his bundle and I saw now that it was clothing. White chinos and a white chamois button-up shirt that was as soft as velvet. I accepted with a hug.

“Consider them a wedding present,” he said. “Now get dressed and get ready. Bryan is here already. I’ll send him back with Aidan in a minute.”

I quickly pulled on the clothes Adam had bought me and found that they fit perfectly. I was reading over my completed vows when a soft knock came on the door.

“Come in,” I called.

It opened to reveal Aidan and a young man who appeared to be not much older than Aidan and I.

“Will, this is Rev. Cairbre,” Aidan said.

“Please, call me Bryan,” the minister said as he held out his hand for me to shake. He was a stocky guy with brown hair and eyes and an athletic build. He looked like he would be more at home on a football field than in a pulpit. He was wearing a simple black suit and tie.

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“Thank you so much for doing this on such short notice,” I said.

“Oh please, thank you for the privilege,” he said with a warm smile. “I don’t get to do nearly as many of these as I would like. Besides, I owed Adam a favor. He designed our church’s website and wouldn’t let us pay him for it.”

“I’d like to come to your church sometime,” I said. “I haven’t been to church in months, since I admitted that I was gay. My dad’s a minister—” I choked up and couldn’t go on. Aidan was by my side in a flash with his arm around my waist.

“Hey, say no more,” Bryan said sympathetically, mis-understanding my emotion, “so was my dad. It leaves its share of scars. If you want, after the wedding and all the excitement has settled down, get up with me and I can give you some material on recovering from Bible abuse.”

“Bible abuse?”

“Yeah, that’s the term for how religion has twisted and used the Bible to hurt people like us, and others.

Come in with an open mind and you may just find some healing. I know you’ll find God’s love.”

I nodded uncertainly, but I already knew I wanted to know more. Now wasn’t the time though, our wedding was getting ready to start in fifteen minutes.

He asked for our rings, we were using the rings Aidan had bought, and then quickly ran over the order of the ceremony. It was short, simple, and very elegant. I loved it. I found myself getting truly excited about what we were about to do. There had been so much going on that I hadn’t really had time to think about it. But now my heart was racing and I felt a growing anticipation.

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After that, it was just a matter of waiting. Adam was greeting the guests as they arrived and making the big announcement. Steve, who had been in on it all from the first, was filming everyone’s reactions so we could watch it later.

Finally, after enough time had gone by for me to develop a severe case of butterflies, a soft rap came at the door. Adam popped his head in.

“Bryan?” he said. “We’re ready.”

Bryan slipped out and Adam stayed in the doorway.

We could easily hear Bryan as he addressed our small group of friends. “Friends, we are here this day to share with Aidan and Will a most important moment in their lives. They have learned to know and love each other and now they have decided to live their lives together.

I would like to thank each of you on their behalf for being here. You have each been invited because you are important to them and they wanted you to share in this moment with them. I would like to start by reading a passage of scripture that I find very appropriate for such a time as this. It’s from 1 Corinthians 13: 4-13.

“Love is patient and kind; love is not jealous or boast-ful; it is not arrogant or rude. Love does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrong, but rejoices in the right. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends; as for prophecy, it will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. For our knowledge is imperfect and our prophecy is imperfect; but when the perfect comes, the imperfect will pass away. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now 336

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we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall understand fully, even as I have been fully understood. So faith, hope, love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.”

As his last words faded away, music started as if on cue. I quickly recognized the opening of *NSYNC’s

“This I Promise You.” Adam signaled to us to come.

Aidan offered his arm, which I took, and together we walked down the hall and into the living room. As we entered, everyone stood up and I got my first glimpse of who had come.

There, beaming back at us was everyone in my life that mattered to me. Killian and Asher were the first faces I focused on. To their right stood Kane and beyond him, Caitlin, wearing a slightly stunned expression. Behind them stood Ilana and Lysander. Gabe and Laura were there, and Nikki with her boyfriend, Sam.

Steve was across the room aiming a camcorder in our direction. Bryan was standing in front of the Christmas tree. To my surprise, I noticed it was snowing outside the windows. It couldn’t have been more perfect.

Then I noticed the final touch. Mom stood at the back of the room, just inside the door. She looked worn out, tired beyond measure, but she was there and she was smiling with tears in her eyes. Aidan squeezed my hand and I realized that he must have had something to do with her being there.

We turned finally to face Bryan as the last notes of the song faded away. Adam took a seat next to Kane as everyone sat down and looked at us expectantly.

Bryan spoke again. “Will and Aidan, all of us know that you are deeply in love. But beyond the warmth and glow, the excitement and romance, what is love, really?

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Real love is caring as much about the welfare and happiness of your partner as about your own. Real love is not possessive or jealous; it is liberating; it sets you free to become your best self. Real love is not total absorp-tion in each other; it is looking outward in the same direction together. Love makes burdens lighter, because you divide them. It makes joys more intense, because you share them. It makes you stronger, so that you can reach out and become involved with life in ways you dared not risk alone.

“Aidan, do you find within you a love that united you and Will?”

“I do,” said Aidan.

“Do you find within you the courage to resist the many deaths by which love can die? Are you willing to love Will into his unique fullness, and to take the risk and the vulnerability of love again and again?”

“I am.”

“Will, do you find within you a love that united you and Aidan?”

“I do.”

“Do you find within you the courage to resist the many deaths by which love can die? Are you willing to love Aidan into his unique fullness, and to take the risk and the vulnerability of love again and again?”

“I am.”

“Aidan and Will, as you have affirmed your willing-ness to join together, I now invite you to make the promises of your covenant together. Aidan?”

“Will, these past few months have been so difficult for both of us. There were many times when, if you’d told me this day would ever come, I would have laughed 338

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in your face or cried because I wanted it so much. But here we are and I can’t even find words to say how happy I am. I have been so blessed to find you. I now join you to share all of life with you, its responsibilities and freedoms, its joys and sorrows, to love and care for you. As we continue to grow in our love for each other, I will always love you, and listen to you, and speak the truth to you, and try to be the best person I can be for you. I look forward to spending the rest of my life with you, as long as God gives us together.”

I took a deep breath and tried not to cry. “Aidan,” I started and then realized I was going to have to read my vows if I ever hoped to get through them. I pulled them out of my pocket and tried to ignore the sniffling coming from the rest of the room. “Aidan, when I met you a few months ago, I never in my wildest dreams thought I would be standing here now, doing what I am doing. I didn’t even know I was gay then. And in reality, my love for you goes so far beyond labels or gender. It doesn’t have anything to do with being gay or straight; it just has to do with the fact that you are a beautiful person and I love you. I love you with all my heart and with all my soul. You’ve been there for me so many times, even to the point of saving my life more than once. Now I give to you that life that you saved. I look forward to living that life with you, sharing all that life brings, and celebrating each day as a gift from God, as long as we both shall live.”

Bryan reached into his pocket and pulled out the two rings. He held one up for everyone to see. “These rings are the symbol of the vows just taken, a circle of whole-ness; an unbroken, never-ending, perfect form. These 339

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rings mark the beginning of a long journey together filled with wonder, surprises, tears, laughter, celebra-tions, grief, and joy. May these rings glow in reflection of the warmth and the life which flow through the wear-ers today.”

He handed the ring to Aidan. “Aidan, place this ring on Will’s hand and repeat after me, I give you this ring as I give you my love and faithfulness.”

We repeated the process with me placing the ring on Aidan’s hand.

“Let us pray. Our Father, we rejoice with Aidan and Will. We thank you for their families and friends who have helped to shape their lives. We thank you for the opportunities and events which challenge them to their life’s work. We thank you for their ever-deepening relationship and their decision to share the future together.

We pray that we may be responsible witnesses to them enabling them to share their lives for the sake of all people.

“Aidan and Will, go into the world and fulfill your lives. Hold fast to your ideals. Give one another new experiences of joy. Challenge one another that you might grow together. May this love now sealed with your mutual covenant mature and enrich the experiences of you both. May your home be a happy one and your lives fulfilled. Amen.

“Aidan and Will, why don’t you seal your vows with a kiss?”

He didn’t have to ask twice. We stepped forward and kissed softly.

“Ladies and gentlemen, it is my great honor to pronounce Aidan Michael Scott and William Spencer 340

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Keegan joined before God. May your lives be blessed together.”

With that, everyone rose to their feet and began to applaud as one.