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“Album drops in June. I’ve already got calls from Lollapalooza, Austin City Limits, and a few others. Everyone wants the couple that got married on stage in Vegas.”
“We didn’t get married on stage,” I correct him.
“Details,” Liam waves me off. “The story is what matters, and your story is bloody perfect. Star crossed musicians, whirlwind romance, Vegas wedding. It’s like a modern fairy tale.”
He’s not wrong. Our story has captured people’s imaginations in a way that still surprises me. The wedding photos that Chandler took and Paige posted on social media went viral within hours, and since then, we’ve been featured in magazines, interviewed on talk shows, and had our music streamed millions of times.
The wedding itself was perfect in its chaos. Elle managed to pull together a ceremony at the Little White Wedding Chapelin four hours, complete with flowers, a photographer, and a minister who didn’t dress like Elvis. My entire family was there. Parents crying, JD livestreaming against Elle’s explicit instructions, the babies fussing.
“Plus,” Liam continues, “the new material is your best work yet. That song about the power outage, ‘Blackout Serenade,’ is going to be massive.”
“We wrote that one together,” Justine corrects. “Actually, most of them we did together. That was the biggest adjustment, learning to create as a team instead of separately.”
“Even better. The fact that you two write together, perform together, live together. The audience feels that connection. It’s authentic in a way that’s rare in this business.”
Out on the water, Eden catches another wave, and this one is even better than the last. She hits a series of critical turns that have the crowd on the beach cheering, and I find myself on my feet, shouting encouragement.
“Go, Eden!” I yell, cupping my hands around my mouth.
“Sit down, you lunatic,” Justine laughs, tugging on my arm. “She can’t hear you.”
“She knows I’m here,” I say, settling back into my chair. “That’s what matters.”
Eden’s heat ends, and we watch as the judges tally the scores. When her final number comes up, a 9.2 that puts her in first place overall, the beach erupts in cheers. She’s done it. She’s won.
“She did it!” I shout, jumping up again. “She fucking did it!”
“Language,” Justine chides, but she’s crying happy tears. Two or three months ago, she would have been more hesitant to correct me in front of family. Now she does it automatically, the way a wife should.
Eden paddles in, and the moment she reaches the beach, she’s surrounded by coaches, officials, and media. There was atime when she’d tell me her news first, but now it’s Rush. He’s there, waiting for her, right along with her parents.
They finally make it where we’re all sitting. “I made it!” she shouts, throwing her hands in the air. “I freaking did it!”
“Eden Davis, Olympian!” I say it loud for everyone to hear.
As Eden gets swept away by interviews and photos, the rest of my family disperses to do whatever it is people do. I have zero desire to move from the beach, wanting to soak it all in before we have to get back to work.
Justine and I find ourselves alone again.
“Penny for your thoughts,” she says, settling back into my arms.
“Just thinking about how much has changed,” I say. “A handful of months ago I was miserable, heartbroken, convinced my life was falling apart. Now I’m sitting on a beach in Bermuda with my wife, watching someone I consider my family compete in the sport she loves, and you and I are getting ready to release an album we made together.”
“Funny how life works out,” she muses.
“Sure is.” I hold my wife close and think about the road that brought us here. All the heartbreak, all the wrong turns, all the moments of doubt. They were just part of the journey. The real destination was always her, always us, always this moment of perfect contentment on a beach in Bermuda with our whole future spread out before us.
“Ready to go back?” she asks as the beach starts to empty.
“In a minute,” I say, not wanting to break the spell of this perfect evening.
“What are you thinking about now?”
“That song we’ve been working on,” I say. “‘Forever Starts Tonight.’ I think I know how it should end,” I say.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. It should end with a promise. Not just to love each other, but to keep choosing each other, every single day, no matter what.”
She smiles and looks exactly like she did that first night on the tour bus when she offered to help me with my broken heart. “I like that,” she says. “I choose you, Quinn James. Today and always.”
“I choose you too, Justine James. Forever and always.”
The road to forever led me to her, and now forever is just beginning.