Finding Lost Loves

Epilogue- 50 years in future
Taylor's POV

"It's been so long since all of that happened," I said, finishing the story I hadn't thought of in almost fifty years. Shay was sitting next to me, holding my hand.

Shay and I are still together. All of our family is still together and happy. Someone's always coming to visit since we've got such a huge family.

Emma and Mallory got married and adopted eight kids, then they grew up and had kids. Same with Gracie and Danny. Katie's been married forever and they travel all over, but they always come back and tell Shay and I stories. Allie and Linnie started a LGBT center and it seems like they're the parents of every kid who walks through the doors. Maybe it's just because they all end up at our house.

"Why didn't anyone ever tell me this story?" Lucy asked. Lucy's my fifteen year old great-granddaughter.

"You didn't ask," Shay said, still as gorgeous as ever even though we were both getting a bit old--Okay, a lot old. Old enough that Shay's been entertaining himself by sitting in a rocking chair on the porch for hours at a time. He says he just goes out there to humor us, but we don't buy it. He's still a teacher and a football coach, by the way. I don't know how he stands teaching high school students all day, but he's been all the student's favorite all this time. Shay's always going to be the most hyper person I know. I figured that out last week when I stopped at the school to bring Shay lunch and he was racing one of the football players across the school grounds. He lost, but it was funny watching him.

Lucy glared. "What was I supposed to ask? Did you and Great-Granddad here-" She says it's too hard to call us both Great-Grandpa. "-ever break up, so you could marry a crazy lady, divorce her, and get back together? Who comes up with something like that?"

Shay smirked. "Good point."

"I still can't believe you guys have been married for 50 years," Lucy said. "Oh…Happy anniversary, by the way. Mom wanted me to tell you that, but I forgot. I remember now though, so that's all that matters, right?"

"Sure," I agreed, laughing.

"Time for cake!" Emma's daughter screamed from the kitchen. Lucy flinched. "Mom didn't make it, right? If she did, I vote we throw it away and go find real food."

"She didn't," Shay said, pushing Lucy towards the door. Then under his breath, "Actually, she did, but if I told her she wouldn't eat anything. Then, I'd have to eat more. I'm going to feed it to the dog."

"Don't that to the poor dog…plus I already tried with dinner. He tucked his tail and ran away. I think he's under the bed," I told him. "Maybe if we walk slow, it'll all be gone?"

Shay rolled his eyes at me.

"I'm sorry, Shay. Walking slow to avoid bad cake and to annoy people who are trying to walk around are some of the fun things about being old and I'm going to use them," I informed Shay. "We've got to keep things interesting."

"The damn school made the math classes play Bingo. Jake Adams told me I made it up and that I just like to play Bingo and was taking it out on him. I hate Bingo," Shay whined. "Not all old people like boring games that make you want to shoot yourself."

I snorted. "I agree. Linnie sent me to a senior center as a joke and I wanted throw myself down the stairs but then they would have known because they have these weird safety stairs. This weird lady came up and tried to talk to my about my feeling and I really thought she was an escaped crazy person and then I realized she was a counselor."

Katie poked her head into the living room. "We all know you two can walk fine. This slow excuse isn't going to work. If I've got to eat that cardboard cake, then so do you," she said.

Shay sighed. "It was worth a try."

We walked into our gigantic dining room that was overflowing with our family. We all got a piece of cake and choked it down, talked, and watched the little kids run around, but eventually everyone had to go.

I had to say "Bye!" and "See you next week!" about fifty million times. I don't know why they all couldn't leave at the same time and save my poor voice.

Finally, the house was empty and it was just me and Shay. Not to be mean, because I love my family, but I really love my time alone with Shay. We've never once ran out of anything to talk about, but we don't always have to talk. It's just as comfortable to just be together. I really do love him and that's never going to change.

"Let's go out on the porch," Shay said, randomly.

"Okay," I said. "I don't have anything better to do."

"How romantic," Shay said, sarcastically. He was laughing though. He dragged me outside and pushed me into the chair next to his rocking chair, before he plopped down in his chair and started rocking back and forth, faster and faster.

"You're going to flip that thing over," I told him. "It wasn't made for that."

"I will not," Shay said, tucking his legs under him and rocking faster. "I can make it jump. See?" With one last rock, the thing with Shay in jumped about two feet forward, before Shay turned back to me grinning. "Who needs skateboards when you've got one of these things?"

"At least you probably won't hurt yourself this way," I said, then immediately doubted it when I saw him jump again, laughing like a four year old. "You're so strange." He bounced around for a couple more minutes while I watched him.

"Taylor?" Shay was suddenly standing right in front of me. "I want to tell you something."

"What?"

"I love you, Taylor."

"I love you too, Shay." My husband curled up in my arms and we sat in silence as we watched the sun go down. We did have our forever together after all.