Fools Rush In

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I stared at Declan in shock. He was staring out at the ocean making me think I was hearing things.

“What?”

Declan looked over at me with those piercing light eyes of his.

“Why don’t we just get married?”

My mouth opened in shock and I felt my eyes widen. I looked away then looked back at him. He was watching me intently but I didn’t know what to say.

“Have you lost your fucking mind!?”

Well except that

Declan just shrugged his shoulders, “Maybe but it seems to be our only option left”

“Are you high?”

Declan laughed, “No I stopped doing that shit a while ago”

“You’re insane. We can’t get married”

“Why not?”

“Because we just can’t”

“We can do whatever we want Anberlin”

I licked my lips and looked away at him. I didn’t know what to say. This was so sudden and was he being fucking serious? Did he REALLY think that getting married was the BEST thing for us to do?

I stood up and brushed the sand off of my shorts. Declan stood up too and did the same thing. I looked at him and I couldn’t stop myself. My emotions were going nuts and I just couldn’t keep them under control.

“We CAN NOT get married Declan!”

“Why the hell not!?”

“I don’t love you Declan!”

Well shit

Declan looked at me before looking away, “I don’t love you either Anberlin. But I’m not thinking about that”

“Then what the hell are you thinking about?”

He looked back at me, “The baby”

I looked down at my feet and sighed, “I’m thinking about the baby too Declan but…wouldn’t it be bad for it to grow up with parents who are married but don’t love each other? How messed up would that kid be?”

“We could grow to love each other?”

I couldn’t help but laugh, “Declan please we’re COMPLETE opposites”

“Opposites attract”

I shook my head and started to walk away, “You’re insane. That’s an insane idea Declan. I DON’T love you!”

Declan just started to follow me. He didn’t say anything just followed me. Before I knew it we were back at the Starbucks and I was walking to my car. I could still hear his footsteps following me. I stopped at my car and went to get into it when Declan’s hand came out of nowhere and slammed the door of my car shut.

“What the hell!?”

I looked at Declan to see that he was mad. It honestly scared me a little bit there.

“It’s the only thing that makes sense Anberlin”

“Declan…”

“No DON’T Declan me! Think about it Anberlin! We can share a room this way and the baby can be in the room with us. You won’t be with your parents and have them breathing down your neck! Frank can move out if he has a problem with it! I have a steady job and I’ll get a second one if need be! Getting married seems to be the ONLY option left so that we can BOTH be there for the baby 24/7!”

I looked away from him and silently cursed. Everything that he had just said made sense to me. Getting married did seem to be the only choice left to us. It was what made sense to us. Getting married would get me out of my house and moved in with Declan. We would share the room and the baby’s crib could be in our room. If Frank didn’t like it then he could leave. The apartment is in Declan’s name too if I do remember correctly.

I sighed and looked at Declan.

I can’t believe I’m going to do this

“You’re right. Everything you just said makes perfect sense. It seems to be the only logical thing to do: get married”

Declan smiled at me before getting serious again.

“I know that this isn’t what we both really want but I’m thinking about the baby right now. What’s best for this baby. We both want to keep it and raise it. It really only makes sense that we just go ahead and get married.”

I nodded my head before I felt tears coming. Declan saw me and immediately pulled me into a hug.

“Hey it’s gonna be okay. We’re going to figure this all out together okay? Everything is going to work out in the end”

“What are we going to do now? How are we going to tell everyone?”

Declan pulled back and cupped my face in his hand, “Hey it’s all gonna be okay alright? We’ll figure this all out alright?”

I just nodded my head and attempted a smile, “It’s just a lot you know? It’s a lot for me to take in and everything. There’s so much for us to figure out and now we have a wedding to plan. I mean, God, what should we do first?”

“I think that we should figure out if we want to get married before or after the babies born. Then we can figure out how to tell everyone”

“Ugh this is going to be so complicated”

“And we will get through this together”

“I’m really glad that you’re here now. I’m really glad that I’m not having to go through this alone”

“Hey I’m here for you Anberlin. I mean hey I’m your fiancé now!”

I couldn’t help but laugh at that.

Good ‘ol Declan

“You can always make someone laugh when they just want to cry”

Declan laughed and hugged me again.

“Come on we should go figure out some things before we start telling our families what’s going on. We can go back to my place? You can drive there yourself so that you don’t have to double back once we’re done talking and stuff”

“Sounds good but we need some food I’m starving”

“You got it”

I went over to my car while Declan got into his. We headed for the local McDonald’s to get some food real quick that we took back to his apartment.

I was sad to see that it was still a big fucking mess. But what could you do?

He cleared a space for us to sit down in his living room. We spread out our food on the coffee table and started to dig in. I had gotten way more food than Declan but I was fucking starving for some reason. Well maybe I knew the reason I had a baby in my stomach that wanted food.

“Okay so how are we going to afford this wedding?”

“I don’t know yet. My parents have some money they might be willing to contribute. Um I have some money saved up for college but that can go towards the wedding and the baby”

“Well if my parents ever decide to speak to me after this they might be willing to contribute some money too. I can tell you right now they won’t be very happy about all of this. But you’ll have to worry about my brother most of all. But don’t worry I’ll try to get him to not kill you”

Declan’s eyes went wide and I saw the fear in them, “What?”

I couldn’t help but laugh.

“Relax you’ll be fine. Okay so what now?”

“Well we should probably tell our folks. And I need to tell Frank soon so that he can decide if he wants to stay or not and I have to tell Tristan, because he’s one of my best friends.”

“And I have to tell my parents, Matt, and my two best friends: Grace and Isabella”

“Do you want to tell your parents together?”

“It would probably be the best thing to do don’t you think? Having the father/fiancé there”

“Yeah probably”

“Do you want to come over on Saturday and we can tell them then?”

Declan smiled at me, “Yeah sounds great”

“Okay. Do you want me to come with you to your parents to tell them?”

Declan rubbed the back of his neck, “No this is something I need to do myself. My…well my parents aren’t too fond of me most of the time. I don’t want you to get mixed up in that if we get into a fight. They always tell me that I’m a bit too reckless and that I need to get my head out of my ass so to speak”

I reached out a hand and placed it on Declan’s arm, “I’m sorry your parents feel that way”

“Yeah well…maybe this will show them that I have a clue and I’m not just trying to get out of everything all the damn time”

I smiled and him before removing my hand and finishing up my food.

By the time I left later that evening Declan and I had figure out when we were going to tell everyone and how. We also figured out that we wanted to get married before the baby was born so that there wouldn’t be any stupid crap to go through to get my name changed on the birth certificate and such. Of course the baby would have Declan’s last name since I would be taking it once I was married to him.

I was getting ready to leave when Declan surprised me with what he said.

“Do you want an engagement ring?”

I looked at him in shock, “What?”

“Do you want an engagement ring to wear?”

“We…you can’t afford that though. They’re expensive and we’re gonna have a hard time finding the money for everything else right now”

“I know but still…you deserve to be able to wear a pretty ring”

I smiled at Declan and kissed his cheek, “I’ll be fine without one Declan. Save your money for other things”

I left then and headed on home. I was glad that no one was home when I got there so I went straight up to my room and collapsed onto my bed.

I had lied to Declan back there. I wouldn’t mind an engagement ring but we really didn’t have the money for it. HE didn’t have the money for it.

I held up my left hand and looked at the bare ring finger.

If only I could…