“I see a red door and I want it painted black,” she complained. “But just red. It makes me so angry.” She turned to look at me. “That’s why I dressed like this, to face my anger.”

 It seems like the best epics never go into detail about the flaws of humanity. Even the most legendary of romances had to have had relationship issues. Romeo sure didn’t like Juliet’s family. And these, while not exactly heroic, are the most human and thus beautiful of interactions.

 Well, probably from the outside. Inside, relationship problems are a real bitch. Especially when you met the girl an hour ago.

 ”Listen, I get it. You’re crazy! And I don’t give a damn!” That still didn’t shut her up. I decided to see how John was doing.

 As it turns out, watching your best friend stuff his head up his bride’s dress and remove her garter makes you feel very dirty inside. And the last thing you want to do is catch it. But you know how in school, whenever you didn’t want the teacher to call on you, she’d lock onto your fear like a barracuda?

 My barracuda landed right on my face. John’d never told me he was a champ with those rubber bands back in school.

 I never really paid much attention to the whole wedding tradition thing. I knew the woman who caught the bouquet would get married next, so that’s why the girls would fight over it, but Ihad no idea what the garter was for. I think if you look back a few centuries, one groom just got a little drunk and frisky and threw his blushing bride’s unmentionables into the air. Since all the men were probably drunk anyways, it was funny as hell.

 I heard someone smack their head on something. Jalapeno strikes again. A reception area with such a low ceiling would spell disaster anyways.

 You remember how in school, whenever you noticed someone who didn’t want the teacher to call on them, you or someone else would latch onto their fear like a bloodhound?

 Anita’s bouquet followed my nose right into my lovely pepper’s arms. She cursed and smacked me with it. The happily married couple gave the two of us a big thumbs-up, while we returned the gesture with some less honorable fingers.

 The rest of the reception was suffered through in a haze. I believe I took the term “open bar” a little too far. I can remember John putting me in his car and driving me to the hotel where he an Anita would consummate their marriage. Again. And who else but my giant jalapeno would follow us?

 The next morning, I woke up next to Anita, and John was on the couch with Perturbo Via. Yes, her name was litteraly “Troubled Road.” As it turns out, that fits Quisnam Rebellis perfectly in thirteen thousand years.

 But again, I am getting ahead of myself. I took my beloved Perturbo out to the hotel’s pool while John waited to attack Anita. Via is much less impressive now, in a simple tank top and one of those swimming-suit wraps. She’s actually a few inches shorter than me, although she still towers over both John and Anita. 

 I always forget to tell others about my nearly nonexistant swimming abilities. I give Via credit for trying not to laugh, but little, six-foot seven Quis can’t do much more than stand in this 5-foot deep pool. The very deep end has been cordoned off as a result of some poor child drowning, I am certain.

 I still wonder if Odysseus was believed by Demodocus and the others, feasting and living merrily as they were, as he was wracked by shellshock and the absense of his family for all this time. Certainly having a legend in your midst would inspire awe.

 I hope they laughed in his face.