Chapter 49 Chapter 25 (i)
FAE
So we married.
After the marriage, I reflected on myself.
I searched for those uneasy doubts I felt about my impulsive decision—because it was. I knew it. I tried to find any feeling of disappointment or dismay for what I had done. But whenever I looked at Jigo, those feelings disappeared. They were replaced with wonder. Because I still couldn’t understand how a man known to be commitment-phobic and someone I could never imagine would ever pay attention to me convinced me to marry him so quickly.
We had become lovers for just barely a month. Definitely carried away by our feelings.
I thought we were supposedly a bit smarter than anyone I knew.
Unfortunately, time would tell.
We had gone over expectations and rules a day after I agreed to marry him, to be written in a contract we both would sign. I video-recorded it, too. Yes… he’d indulged my lawyer-side. Quite relaxed, even, because he already got what he wanted. He knew I wouldn’t back out.
I didn’t think he would let me, anyway. But we could pretend.
He agreed to let me make decisions about my career, but we would discuss all decisions that would affect both of us and our marriage. There were a few more important things that we discussed as seriously as we could.
And then I proposed a prenup. His family was extremely wealthy. While I was well-off, it was very far from how wealthy they were. Although Grandma Leah was kind to me, many of Jigo's relatives had not yet met or spoken to me. The quickness of our marriage was suspect enough. That I was known to still be in love with a man who had recently married would garner a lot of wild speculations.
He agreed right away after carefully listening to my reasons behind a prenup, and it surprised me since there was a lot of jaw-locking in the beginning. But he had a condition that his personal Last Will was outside the conditions of the prenup, arguing I only needed to have others know there was one so they would not speculate I only married him for money.
That’s stupid. Many women would still want to marry him for so many other reasons if he didn’t happen to be as wealthy as he was. But at that point, I was kind of exhausted from all the arguments and mind games. It felt weird that just a month ago, we weren’t even close enough to be considered friends. But now our story involved a Last Will and Testament.
But the argument wasn’t even remotely finished at that point.
“What about annulment?” I asked, expecting this point to be quick so we could move on to happy times.
“For fuck’s sake, Fae?!”
“What?” I asked, a little shocked. I had never heard him swear like that. In fact, I’d only heard him use the f-word when we were in throes of passion and his dirty talk, of course, I liked.
He stared at me, jaw clenched and lips in a straight line. He looked so adorable, I had a hard time holding back my laughter. “I just found out that prenup and annulment are my most hated words, so please tell me this is the last time I’m going to hear them from your lips.”
I crossed my arms and pouted at him. “You want to marry a lawyer, Jigo. Of course, I will articulate my conditions for this proposed marriage.”
He calmed down. “Alright… in regard to or in spite of an annulment, you will receive everything I will give you in my Last Will. But right now, I’m telling you—I am not entertaining the possibility of it in our marriage, Fairy.”
Did he just call me Fairy now? I smirked. “Of annulment?”
“Yes, goddammit!”
I almost gave in then. I didn’t know how I managed to swallow my laughter. My boyfriend wasn’t chill all the time, and I knew that now. When he really wanted something, he was very emotional about his feelings. “Okay. Put it on record that I feel the same.”
“Sure. With conditions that we will undergo marriage counseling and stay on the island resort for a year, just the two of us on the whole island, if you ever ask for an annulment in the future.”
That’s when I laughed. “Jigo!”
He shrugged. “I will put in writing the minutest details of our conditions to remind you that it will be next to impossible to annul our marriage. So forget the word altogether. Understand?”
God, he is so cute, and I might really, really be in love with him!
But he was serious about the conditions. He outlined them in a draft we both signed, notarized, and sent to his solicitor. Then, satisfied, he slid the diamond engagement ring on my ring finger that he pulled out of his pocket after saying—declaring—“This woman is going to marry me.”
“Don’t be so sure. A lot can happen before you get a marriage license,” I joked while admiring the expensive ring on my hand. It was so beautiful. I held it out to get a better look while he stood there, silent.