Epilogue

Seven months later…

“So, you’re getting married in five months…” Mom began as she took a bite of fresh strawberries. “How are you feeling?”

We were having our regular mother-daughter bonding/picnic in the park. The last time we had this was years ago, and it felt like a lifetime to me. The sun was high in the sky and our blanket was sprawled on dried grass. It was summer, but it wasn’t that hot. It was actually a perfect day for a picnic.

“Oh heavens,” mom said as she started to laugh. “It feels like just yesterday that we were talking about books and stars. Now we’re talking about your wedding!”

“Are you not okay with it?” I nervously said.

“At first, I wasn’t. I mean, you’re getting married at twenty?” she said while shaking her head. “I thought you didn’t have any plans or something. That you were just doing it at the spur of the moment.”

She took my hand and gave me her warmest smile.

“But then you said that you do have a plan. Law school? I never thought someone in our family would become a lawyer!” She said as tears formed at the corners of her eyes. “You told me that you really love this man with all your heart, and these past few months, I've seen that he loves you more. What more could I ever ask for?”

“Thank you so much, Mom.” I said as I gave her a hug while crying.

“Oh, my little pumpkin, all grown up and getting married.” She cried as she stroked my hair. When we parted, she kissed my forehead and wiped the tears from my eyes.

“What I really want to tell you today is that marriage is a big commitment.” She said in serious tone. “You will have to grow with each other, nurture your love. Don’t get stuck in the past. And if you find yourself questioning your relationship, think back on why you said yes to him.”

“Remember to keep your love for each other alive and growing,” she said as if she already knew the fears that I had been having for the past few months leading up to my wedding.

“H-How did you know that I was—?”

“Your fiancé may read minds, but I am your mother and I don’t need a DNA mutation to know when my daughter needs me,” she reassured me. “Soon, you’ll know what I’m talking about—once you become a mother too.”

“Oh, that’s going to take a long time,” I said with a grin, which made my mom chuckle.

….

In his 23 years of being alive, Clark had never been out of breath except now. He had been literally running all around the hotel to do this and that for Andrea, the “official” wedding organizer for Cali and Professor Alexander.

It was all good and fun at first, but her dozen orders came even before he finished the first one. Clark wanted to complain, but every time he felt the need to, he reminded himself that he loved that woman and someday it would be their turn. And on that day, he would make sure that Alexander and Cali suffered when planning their wedding.

“Do you need anything else?” Clark said with a forced smile.

“Actually—” Andrea began, but her words were cut off by Gemma, one of Cali’s childhood friends.

“Guys, we have a problem,” she said with a panic-stricken look on her face. “Alexander said to look for Felix, but he’s not here?”

“Yeah, he picked up Cali’s—I mean, Lilian’s—Aunt Tilly from the airport,” Clark answered. “Why do you need him?”

“Well...I think Lilian’s having a...er…um… a nervous breakdown?” she nervously answered after looking sideways to make sure that nobody was listening. “Clarisse and I tried to calm her down, but she’s throwing things and making them fly all over the room.”

“What?!” Clark and Andrea said in unison.

“How did that happen? She seemed okay when I last spoke to her.” Clark said, his face wrinkled with confusion.

“I don’t know, one minute we’re talking about our childhood memories and the next she’s worrying about Alexander not showing up and leaving her forever. We tried calming her down, but then like I said, she went all berserk and started levitating everything in the room.”

“How is she? Is she hurt? How about the two of you?” Clark worriedly asked.

“We’re fine. But I don’t know what to do, we’re really scared. We have never seen her like this,” Gemma said, trying to hold back her tears. “I know she’s been through some stuff, but it’s like she… like she’s a different person in there.”

“Okay, I’ll give Felix a call and tell him to hurry up.” Andrea declared, dialing his number on her phone.

“No, babe, he won’t make it in time,” Clark said, placing a hand on Andrea’s so as to stop her from calling him. “Besides, Cali wants her Aunt Tilly for the wedding. If Felix is not there, who knows what’ll happen to her?”

“Then what do we do?” Andrea bluntly asked. Clark only stared back at him, and after a few seconds, it finally hit Andrea.

“No! No! Babe!” Andrea protested with a livid expression on her face.

“Babe, it’s the only way.”

“No! It’s not! A groom should not see the bride on the day of the wedding! It’s tradition!”

“As Cali always says,” Clark confidently said while preparing to run. “We have no choice.”

….

“Monroeville, Pennsylvania?” James said in mocking disbelief as he paced Alexander’s hotel room. Alexander, who was fixing his necktie, paid no attention to his friend’s mockery.

“You’re going to move there after the wedding? What about the academy?”

“What about it? You’re now the elected headmaster, right? What do you need me for?”

“Professor Grant, are you hearing yourself?” James said with a scoff. “You’ve gone mental! You started that academy years ago when you saw how people like us were being unfairly treated and killed by society! Now you’re just going to leave that all behind for some girl?”

“James, first of all, I’m no longer a professor, so stop calling me that. And second, when I started that academy, I didn’t think that I would be living there for the rest of my life.” Alexander lied with a smirk. “It was time for me to retire.”

“Oh yeah and who have you convinced with that lie? Your family? That girl? Or yourself?” James sarcastically said. “I heard you say years ago that you would help mutants like us, provide sanctuary for them, until the day you die.”

“James, all my life I have done nothing but help others, save them from others and themselves,” he said with a heavy sigh. “But now, for the first time, I actually want to do something for myself.”

“Professor Grant—”

“Look, yes, I may be lying when I say that when I started the academy, I didn’t see myself doing that for the rest of my life, but James, I have a dream. A dream of starting a family in the suburbs with the love of my life beside me. Before, I thought that was impossible because who would want to be in a relationship with someone who can read minds?”

James gave him a slight nod in agreement.

“I thought that was just a dream, something that would only happen in a parallel universe where I was not a mutant. But now, it can happen. The journey may be hell, but it was all worth it, knowing that Cali is on the altar waiting for me.”

The two old friends stared at each other for a while before they were disturbed by a loud knock on the door. Clark opened the door before he could be let in.

“Professor—I mean, Alexander—it’s Cali,” that was all Alexander had to hear before he dashed out of the room to his future wife.

….

Andrea, Clark, Gemma, and Clarisse had no idea what Alexander did, but two hours later, minutes before the wedding ceremony, Cali was back to her old self. It was like nothing had happened.

The only evidence that she had had that breakdown was the small cut on the waistline of her wedding gown, which she got from throwing all those things in the hotel room.

“I don’t know what the hell he did to calm her down,” Gemma whispered to Clark, who happened to be her partner for the procession. “But it made me believe even more that they’re meant to be with each other.”

“I agree,” Clark nodded.

“I just hope that Alexander is loaded enough to pay for all the damage,” Clarisse whispered back.

“Oh, don’t worry, he is,” Clark snickered. “His family owns this hotel.”

“What?”

“Yup and several others around the city,” Clark said with a grin. “They also have an airline and a cruise ship.”

“Enough chit-chat, we’re about to start,” Andrea shushed them as she took her place beside Clark.

The ballroom ceilings and walls were all white with intricate lines of gold, which matched the theme of the wedding. The chairs were all gold and the aisle was formed with big glass vases with white roses and orchids. The floor of the aisle was artificial white rose petals leading up to an altar adorned with white curtains with gold lace and real roses.

The massive glittering gold chandelier at the end of the aisle was what the guests adored the most. But when the live band started playing an instrumental version of I Get to Love You, a song by Ruelle, the guests knew they were about to see something even more worthy of their adoration than the chandelier.

Alexander walked first wearing a neat black suit with a white undershirt. His eyes were already beaming with joy and hints of nervousness. He was followed by his parents and then their closest friends, who all had big smiles on their faces.

Kyle walked teary eyed with his girlfriend while their mother, who had been crying since this morning but still looked beautiful, followed them. Cali’s father waited at the middle of the aisle where she would meet him later.

The big door opened and it revealed Cali wearing a white backless tulle ball gown with a plunging neckline, a lace bodice, and long satin sleeves. Her brown hair was tied up with pins of gold with white flowers underneath a long white veil. And she was holding a bouquet of soft pink orchids with white roses. On her neck was Alexander’s gift for her, a necklace with a rose gold orchid and a dangling pearl pendant. She never took it off. Even during the entire year they didn’t see each other.

Alexander’s tears were streaming down his face as Cali walked down the aisle of white rose petals towards him. Before her dad gave her away, he whispered in his ear, “Take care of my Lilian.”

Everyone who knew what these two had gone through just to get here couldn’t help but cry. And James, who was against this union until two hours ago, also cried silently on the side.

When the pastor told them to say their vows, they faced one another with tears in their eyes.

“I wish I could say what most grooms do, that when I first saw you, I already knew you were the one I was going to marry,” Alexander started with a shaking voice. “I didn’t.”

Cali rolled her eyes before chuckling at him.

“What I did think when I first saw you was that you were another person that I had to help, that I had to provide sanctuary to. I never thought that you would be my sanctuary. I felt safe, happy. I'm my best self when I’m with you. You made me feel okay to be selfish and not think about what others would think or feel when I did things. And so, when I lost you the first time, that’s when I realized that I would never find peace without you.”

“I know it is too selfish to say that I asked you to marry me because I couldn’t live without you, but it’s true. I can’t live without you, Cali, because I love you. And I vow to protect you, to take care of you, and to love you every second of my life until the day I die—and even after.”

By the time he was finished, Alexander was crying so much he couldn’t see Cali’s reaction to his vows.

“When I was young, everyone used to call me a hopeless romantic. I would read books, novels, and fairytales and be entranced by the prince charming or the knight in shining armor who always came in at the end to save the damsel in distress. And with everything that has happened to me in the past five years of my life, one would think that the man I'm about to marry is that prince charming, that knight in shining armor, who saved me from it all.”

“No, Alexander didn’t save me,” Cali firmly said, which caused a wave of confusion in the crowd. “Nobody could’ve saved me because I was in a position where only I could save myself. Despite this, Alexander still changed my life because he helped me save myself. He made me feel worthy to be alive. He made me feel that I was someone worth fighting for. He made me feel loved and enough. He made me feel that I was someone worth saving, so I did. And I love him for it.”

“And that’s the exact same thing that I vow to you, Alexander. I vow to make you feel loved. I vow to make you feel worthy enough to be saved during your darkest time, when no one can help you but yourself. I vow to be there by your side until the day I die. And I vow to love you forever. My love for you will surpass me and you, it will surpass generations. That is my vow to you.”

The guests started applauding and wiping away tears of joy for the couple, and their cheers grew louder when the pastor said, “You may now kiss the bride.”

At that moment, Cali only felt two things: happiness and hope. Things that Lilian never thought she would feel again after being kidnapped from her own house when she was fifteen.

She wasn’t a girl cruelly played by fate. For fate had something better in store for her the entire time.

**The End**