“Are you fucking kidding me?”

“Shhh, keep it down!” Justin said, pulling Daphne aside. “Brian will kill me if it gets out.”

“You’re getting married?” Daphne squealed. “Tonight? Seriously?”

“Seriously,” Justin said. His grin was so wide that Daphne thought it might actually split his face in two. It brought Daphne back to when they were kids, when Justin was giddily telling her all about meeting Brian and how they were going to spend the rest of their lives together.

And now they were.

Well, they already were. Brian and Justin had already been living in New York together for a decade. Everybody knew they’d be spending the rest of their lives together. But to get married?

Justin was always right. That jerk.

“I knew you wouldn’t just have a party to celebrate ten years of not killing each other,” Daphne said.

Justin laughed. “But it got you all here, didn’t it?”

“I’m not about to turn down an open bar,” Daphne said. “So who knows?”

“Just you,” Justin said. “We want to make it a complete surprise, and our friends aren’t exactly known for their discretion.”

Daphne flushed. “I told you, I didn’t realize you didn’t want people to know you were in Pittsburgh last month.”

“That’s not what I meant,” Justin said, waving his hand. “But we wanted to tell you because… we want you to marry us.”

Daphne felt her jaw drop. “Me?”

“You’re still ordained, right?”

“Well, yeah, but --”

“Then you’ll do it?”

Justin’s enthusiasm was contagious, and Daphne could barely hold back a giggle at how he was nearly bouncing like an exuberant puppy. To be fair, she probably was, too. But still, this was her best friend. It was a huge honor, and she needed to do the event justice.

“I don’t have anything prepared!”

“That’s okay,” Justin said. “We don’t want anything really sappy anyway.”

Daphne slapped his arm. “I wouldn’t have written something sappy!”

“Daph, I’ve sat through enough rom coms with you, I know your idea of ‘not sappy’ is.”

“Why you --”

“So, has she said yes yet?” Brian came up behind Justin, wrapping his arm around his waist as he kissed his cheek. As Justin nearly hummed with pleasure, curling up into Brian’s touch like a satisfied cat, Brian turned to Daphne. “Hello, darling. You grow more stunning with each day.”

“I’m still trying to convince her,” Justin said, glancing up at Brian.

“She feels ill-prepared.”

“What’s there to be nervous about?” Brian asked. He tightened his hold on Justin. “We make our grand entrance, we’ll make our way to the front of the room, where you’ll be standing, of course, we’ll thank everybody for attending our wedding, and then you launch into your ‘dearly beloved’ routine.”

“Oh, that’s all?” Daphne asked with a laugh. She still couldn’t quite believe what was happening. To hear Brian and Justin so easily talk about getting married… it was surreal, to say the least.

“We can take it from there,” Justin said.

“Yes,” Brian said. He pulled away from Justin, but then reached to take both of his hands in his own. “We’ll stare deeply into each other’s eyes and declare our undying love for each other.”

“Are you --” Daphne paused.

Brian’s words seemed joking. And perhaps that’s the way Brian initially intended them. He and Justin weren’t sappy, as Justin had reminded her, and making light of the situation was one way to take some of that emotional heaviness off of the moment.

But when she looked at them…

When she saw how Brian looked at Justin with the utmost tenderness, that slight smile on his face, seemingly unable to take his eyes off him.

When she saw the look of pure joy on Justin’s face and how he seemed to practically be vibrating with excitement, his entire being alight with happiness.

She knew.

This was the real deal.

This was really happening.

“So, what do you say, Daph?” Justin asked. And while his words were directed at her, his gaze was still locked on Brian, who had removed one of his hands from Justin’s grasp so he could use it to gently stroke Justin’s hair.

She didn’t mind.

“Yes,” she said. “Yes, I will marry you.”

“Fantastic,” Brian said, and leaned down to kiss Justin.

Daphne smiled as she took in the sight of her best friend and the man she came to love as a brother, lost in their own bliss, thrilled to start the next chapter of their lives together.

Fantastic.

Yes, it really was.