She is standing on his feet.
The room is loud with things nobody will remember: the caterer's forgotten spoon, the aunt who came in the wrong shoes, the cake tilting a half-inch none of them can see. Everyone is fretting. I want to hold their fretting faces in my hands. Fret. Fret over the flowers. What a rich thing, to have an afternoon worth ruining.
But the girl in white has given up on fretting. She has climbed onto the man's shoes, both her feet on both of his, the way a child stands on a parent to be waltzed across a kitchen, and he is walking her slowly in a circle so she does not have to think about her own steps.
Her cheek is against his lapel. She can feel his heart doing the thing hearts do, that dumb reliable knocking they never once thanked it for. His hand is flat on the small of her back and it is warm. I remember warm. I remember the exact weight of a hand there, how it said stay without a word, how I leaned into it and thought about the seating chart instead.
They think this is the important part, the vows, the ring, the paper. It isn't. The important part is that she is heavy on his feet and he does not mind the weight. The important part is that they are bored, later, cutting the cake, and neither notices.
Dance longer than the song. Let the cake tilt. Stand on his feet until your own ache, and then keep standing there.
You have so much left to take for granted.
Take it, take it, take all of it.