Twins. Double trouble.
Noinin’s weird way of speaking starts to take over again, somehow making the four of them stop talking and look our way like she called them. And then she does. “Now, Ronin or…”
She trails off as she races us across the yard toward the guys, which is in the opposite direction of my cousin and everyone else outside.
“What the flipping hell, Noinin?” I hissed, trying to fight out of her hand, to no avail.
Which is how I ended up in an empty corner of the garden, surrounded by the four guys she pointed out. She clenched herteeth, snarling the longer she and her brother had a silent argument.
I made the mistake of laughing under my breath, and she threw her angry eyes my way. For a kid, she had the presence of an elephant.
I threw my hands up in surrender immediately. “Hey, I’m not the one giving you grief.” At the same time, chick to chick, I had to give her a bit of push back, or she’d be running circles around me.
Her lips pursed, and she was winding back up to fever pitch again. I had to distract her, defuse the situation.
“Wow, would you look at the time?”
Then her eyes flared and she reached over and grabbed her brother's arm, checking it for herself. Her chin wobbled as she stared at her brother.
“Ronin,” Rafferty said. And in one word, I knew we were going ahead with Noinin’s harebrained scheme. Not only that, but in one word, I think I half fell in love with him. His voice was deep—melodic, almost.
Ronin kneeled in front of his sister, opening his arms, giving her a place to fall into, and she looked snug as a bug, glowing in happiness. I couldn’t hear what they were talking about, but the affection between them was obvious.
When they turned to face us, clearly Noinin was getting the ending to whatever fantasy she had spent all day setting up.
“Rafferty, you do the words, and Noinin will do the bindings,” Ronin said. The seriousness in his voice was at odds with his hesitation only minutes ago.
Noinin’s arms disappeared inside her wraith-inspired costume, and from inside, she conjured up “ribbons” that looked suspiciously like shoelaces. No one said a word as they shuffled around me, getting close enough our shoulders were touching.
And the expression she was giving me, like “please don’t be a Ronin and try to mess this up for me,” meant I did whatever she wanted.
Her small hands placed the ribbon on top of our hands. Once she was satisfied they would stay, she nodded at Rafferty.
Noinin’s arms blasted upwards, and it was Rafferty’s cue to keep up. He snake charmed me into a hypnotic state with every word that flowed out. I was completely under the spell of how he spoke. The words he said barely registered as they wormed their way inside my consciousness.
“May the meaning of this hour be fulfilled through the days and years to come. May the love of these men and this woman, their unity of spirit, grow deeper and stronger in the uncertainties and changes of life they will share.
“Loving each other, may they love all persons. Trusting each other, may they learn to trust life. May their love reach out to the love of all, that their lives may bless all whose lives they touch. May they find comfort together in shared hours of shadow, as well as in the bright sunshine of joy.
“May they be to each other both strong and gentle. May all who follow their lives with interest and affection have cause to rejoice, not alone in their happiness, but in their brave and generous living, which makes life beautiful and significant.”
I don’t know how, but the shoelaces dangling down were blown by a sudden gust of wind that pushed the five of us together while the “ribbons” got caught in a gust of wind, somehow falling like someone had tied them.
“Now give her the ring, Ronin,” Noinin insisted as she started spinning in a circle with her arms out wide.
He dug into his pocket and pulled out a ring. A thick gold band folded into two hands holding a heart with a crown on top of it.
“Whoa, whoa… I can’t take that.”
That stopped her.
“And why not? No one stole it, no one paid a pound for it. I found it, which is the sign I was waiting on, plus you. I knew we had to do the ceremony today. Come on,” she implored, her voice pitching up again, full of emotion and urgency.
Admittedly, the wind was starting to blow a gale again, pushing us into each other and making everything hard to hear.
She took the ring out of her brother's hand and looked at each of us, a strange, knowing smile blazing over her face. I couldn’t pull my hand out of the binding, and she used that to her advantage, wrestling my finger into compliance. Then she spoke.
“Hark, O Spirit, and hear us now. We swear by peace and love to stand, heart to heart and hand to hand, confirming this our Sacred Vow.”
