A Wedding in a Castle

A few months had passed without incident, and Whisky and I had started talking about our up-and-coming wedding. I’d joked about having a wedding in a castle, which, of course, he just ran with. One minute, we were joking about getting married at Ibrox; then, the next thing I knew, we were looking at brochures for Scottish castles, working out prices, and planning a wedding that I wasn’t even sure I wanted.

Still, it was fun to flick through magazines and shop for dresses when everyone else wasn’t going full Bridezilla on my behalf. I just floated along, letting everyone else guide me. It was all so… theoretical to me. I knew it was happening because we were planning it, but nothing about getting married seemed real. We were looking at venues for two years in the future, at a minimum, as we’d both agreed to have a long-ish engagement. Lots could go wrong in two years. I loved Whisky, but did I think we were actually going to get married? No, of course not. It was just an engagement. Something to think about. You know? I honestly didn’t think that either of us were taking it that seriously.

One day, though, Whisky came home with a very serious look on his face.

“What’s wrong?” I asked, my heart sinking to my feet. His expression did not look good.

“The military have brought everything forward,” he explained. “I’m moving in three months.”

“Moving where?”

“Deutschland.”

I laughed. “You’re not moving to Deutschland. Stop it.”

He nodded. “I am, and I want you to come with me.”

I snorted. What was he talking about?! I couldn’t just up sticks and leave. What about my family, friends, job, The Flat…? I had two cats to think about, and a Bestie that couldn’t stay in our home if I left. Whisky was batshit insane, clearly. I told him as much.

“Why can’t you, though?” he asked, repeatedly, throughout the evening. “You don’t have a mortgage or kids. No real responsibilities. You could leave right now. We could get married and go together.”

I laughed every time he said it. We’d barely been together long enough to get engaged, let alone get married and consider moving to a foreign land together. Literally everyone would tell us that it was a bad idea.

Whisky wouldn’t stop, though. He knew what he wanted, and he was stopping at nothing to get it. He’d made some really good points, too. Hadn’t I been desperately looking for a way out of my hometown, and away from my mother? My whole family, in fact? Hadn’t I been dying for an adventure? Wasn’t this what I’d been saying I wanted all along?

The more I thought about it, the more promising his invitation seemed. It really was a ticket outta there, and I wouldn’t have to pay for a single thing. The military would cover it – flights, visas, shipping my belongings, the lot. What did I actually have to lose by saying yes?

One week after he’d first brought it up, I said yes to bringing the wedding forward and moving to Deutschland with Whisky. That’s all it took him: one week. He’d offered everything I’d been looking for on a plate, and after a couple of brief conversations with my mother (in which she was as selfish as I’d expected,) the deal was done.

From the moment I said yes, everything about my life was turned upside-down… and it wouldn’t right itself again for many, many years to come.

The next blog post in the dating timeline is this one: Here Comes the Bride.