Tomorrow.
Aye. Tomorrow. Harold could calculate the hours, minutes, seconds, if he cared to.
The kilt Scotty had put together for his fiance was pretty much all laid out. Kilts in general weren't easy to put on, though they were decently comfortable to wear. But he intended to make this was easy as possible, and was putting a light stitch to hold the folded pleats.
He couldn't quite quit grinning about it. Just over half a day, and they would be married. By this time tomorrow, they would be married.
Harold couldn't stop grinning either. Edgy with butterflies, though they were somehow far more contained than he ever expected. He'd finished his vows. He'd worked so hard on them that they'd long since been committed to memory, almost like a tune he could hum.
Truth be told, the kilt intimidated him. Scotty was an excellent teacher, and Harold knew academically that he could very well put on and wear the thing, but it was still a kilt. He didn't exactly look Scottish, he wasn't really born to wear the thing. Except he was, apparently. Because he was born to marry this man.
At once it seemed like there was an insurmountable number of things to do to prepare and nothing at all left, but in his delighted scatterbrained state of mind, he had neglected to look at the little parcel delivered by the mail. He had taken it for a few seed packets he'd ordered, not looking at the label very closely, and set it aside.
For now, he looked over his kilt. He looked over his fiance. He looked over himself, and thought maybe he should have tried to work out for the wedding or something. He looked, and he grinned.
"I'll have t' draw ye a diagram, in case ye get lost puttin' this on." Scotty grinned, not looking up from where he was stitching pleats. "I dinna wanna be responsible for ye hangin' yerself in tartan."
"Blueprints for blue tartan," Harold muttered, laughing. He held their camera in his grasp, and sat back taking pictures of Scotty stitching. It was their last day as fiances; he thought it was worth documenting. "Maybe I'll be able to get it off you better once I've worn one." He snapped a picture on the black and white setting, marveling at the preview shot before putting the camera back in his lap.
"Aye, no doubtin' that one." Scotty chuckled at having his picture taken, moving onto another little holding stitch on yet another pleat. "I'm nae even sure I'll be able t' sleep tonight."
"Me either." Harold flipped the setting to color, and turned across the bed to lay on his belly, snapping another photo from the slightly different angle. "...I should just take a picture for every second we're awake all night. Look at 'em one day and go, 'This was 10,234 seconds before you were my husband. This was 5,329 seconds before you were my husband...'" He laid the camera on the bed in front of him, taking up his little parcel and shaking it. Huh. No satisfying little cascade of seeds.
He slipped a finger into the envelope flap and lazily began to tear it open.
Scotty watched for a moment, grinning, then looked back down at his stitching. "More seeds?" He had, over the past few days, been gathering up starter pots for Harold's little garden and orchard project. They were going to have a heck of a spread.
"...supposed to be." Harold shook it again, before finishing off the envelope flap, tearing into it.
No, what he closed fingers around was not a pack of seeds. It looked like a handwritten letter.
Oh yeah. He knew that handwriting even backwards and through folded paper. Harold choked on a sharp breath, looking up at Scotty with wide eyes as he pulled the little sheet of paper from the packet. It... wasn't empty. There was something still in the mailer, and Harold was honestly a little frightened to pull it out.
He unfolded the sheet of paper, not quite reading the tilted, distinctive black scrawl just yet. "---not. Seeds. At all."
His mother was always eloquent in writing, seeming at once to be her voice and something entirely other. Something old-fashioned, and to Harold's mind, less personal. More formal, more considered in writing than anyone could be in speech. She wrote as though her letters would be read through the ages. Where she had learned it, Harold never knew.
When Harold could finally focus on the letters to make words, he trembled. Sandra Lee's letter would read as follows.
Harold,
I confess that I don't know my mind to write to you, son. I have no pretty words, no wisdom, no answer for this, the strange life that you've always led. I'm sure you understand how difficult this is to fathom.
I believe you. I simply have no answer yet; for you or for Mister Scott. Only love.
You are my son, and I had to write to you both in hopes this would reach you before the wedding, even if I had nothing else that bore speaking. The ring you'll find enclosed was always meant for the girl you would marry. I'm sure you'll recognize it. You twirled it around my finger often as a little boy.
I don't suppose it will fit Scotty, but it belongs to him all the same.
I love you. One day soon, I will send you a more considered reply.
All my love,
Momma
Harold recognized the joke; he had learned to read his mother's affection between the lines, and were he not breathless, would have laughed. What was more, was that there was another slip of paper that was bowed to the side of the envelope. He didn't trust himself to pull that one free yet.
Scotty was still watching him, and he must have figured that it was serious and good. "Harold? What is it?"
Harold simply, silently, handed over the tiny note, notched between his fingers. With his other hand, he tipped up the mailer, spilling out the contents. Out slid a little black box, flat, and beside it landed another letter, the handwriting showing through the back of the paper far more neat and clipped, like Harold's own. He couldn't touch the box, but he was honestly spooked by the second letter.
Two possibilities for someone with handwriting close to his own, and he was a little apprehensive of either.
It wasn't the other Harold, though.
Harold-
I don't believe that I have wrapped my mind around your letter or its implications, but I am prepared to give you the benefit of the doubt. If I turn out wrong, then little is lost; if I turn out right, then I have gained much.
Congratulations, my son. May your marriage bring you the joy and warmth my own has brought to me.
I love you.
-Father
...not a single admonishment or angry thought or-- Jesus Christ. Harold Lee was marrying a man, and it had passed without a single comment aside a joke about the engagement ring.
"Pod people." Harold blinked, staring at the letter. "Rhy'din post delivered my letter to the universe of the f*cking pod people." He stared a moment longer, eyes narrowed in confusion, before huffing out a laugh.
"Maybe nae." Scotty watched Harold, after he had read the letter, looking entirely too touched and probably somewhat blown away. "That other... yer twin. My twin. Ye told me it smelled like they were headin'... home. T'New Jersey." A pause. "If they landed, it woulda been months ago, aye? Fer them?"
"Yeah. Smelled like. Felt like something getting fixed. Something all wrong, too." Harold was still staring at his father's letter when he picked up the little box, passing the note over to Scotty as he flipped the top off it.
Sat nestled inside was a gold engagement ring, three stones, the center one a bit bigger. It had always been just big enough on his mother's finger for him to spin, nudging a fingertip at the biggest stone. Harold slipped it down his own middle finger, the second knuckle preventing it from sliding further.
"...but they weren't that far along yet..." It was muttered as he spun the ring on his own finger. After a moment, he slid it off, offering it to Scotty. "This is yours, love."
Scotty read the note, then reached out and took the ring. Just... looking awed. Touched. "I... have t' write yer mum again, an' thank her." His voice sounded a little strained. Like he was about to get misty-eyed.
Harold was shaking his head, smiling an unsteady smile, his lip quivering some. "I'm gonna have to deluge her with pictures of you. And our wedding. And just f*cking everything."
He couldn't understand it. It had been months, and his mother could smell it when he was mooning over someone, so if she met Scotty she'd probably figured it out, but. But. He just couldn't wrap his head around it. This comparatively easy acceptance of a husband over a wife.
"...hah. Oh dude, I'm such a smug prick." Harold looked up. "I'm just thinking that if I got this ring, it means I got to propose before the other one did." He beamed and rolled his eyes at himself, laughing.
"I suppose, dependin' on when he does, it might be graceful t' send it back t' him." Scotty held it in the palm of his hand, looking at the little halo and the small pinpoints of reflection off of the diamond. "Kinda like a good luck thing."
"'s yours, love. You'd probably need to send it to the other you." Harold took up his camera again, breathing out a slow, staggered sigh, and he snapped a photo of Scotty with that ring in his palm. "You're so beautiful," he muttered, looking over the camera. "I'm really, really lucky. I can't-- really believe how much." Aye. It was apparently time for awe on Harold's part, his parents' letters giving him a new wave of appreciation for what he'd found. That little ring that he'd known all his life, glinting on the palm of his fiance.
Scotty held the ring for a bit longer, gently, then pulled out the blue ribbon with the coin, the pin and the button on it. "I'll wear it tomorrow, I think. If ye dinna mind? I mean, mine or no, it's yer history."
"I'd be really honored if you did," Harold answered quietly, head tilted. Watching with a disbelieving sort of glow as Scotty pulled out that little token he'd made. He, himself, would be carrying both letters with him to his marriage, likely tucked in his sporran. Setting his camera aside, he rested his chin in his hands, just watching.
Scotty carefully looped the ring onto the ribbon, and let it settle. "We ever have a daughter... if we dinna..." He chuckled quietly, and shook his head. "If th' other never asks, we should save it."
...oh.
Harold had nothing for that save a soft, touched little sound and a gentle nod.
"We should get ready fer bed," Scotty finally said, gently replacing the ribbon on the nightstand. He looked back at Harold with a warm grin. "After all... tomorrow, aye?"
Aye. Tomorrow. Harold could calculate the hours, minutes, seconds, if he cared to.
The kilt Scotty had put together for his fiance was pretty much all laid out. Kilts in general weren't easy to put on, though they were decently comfortable to wear. But he intended to make this was easy as possible, and was putting a light stitch to hold the folded pleats.
He couldn't quite quit grinning about it. Just over half a day, and they would be married. By this time tomorrow, they would be married.
Harold couldn't stop grinning either. Edgy with butterflies, though they were somehow far more contained than he ever expected. He'd finished his vows. He'd worked so hard on them that they'd long since been committed to memory, almost like a tune he could hum.
Truth be told, the kilt intimidated him. Scotty was an excellent teacher, and Harold knew academically that he could very well put on and wear the thing, but it was still a kilt. He didn't exactly look Scottish, he wasn't really born to wear the thing. Except he was, apparently. Because he was born to marry this man.
At once it seemed like there was an insurmountable number of things to do to prepare and nothing at all left, but in his delighted scatterbrained state of mind, he had neglected to look at the little parcel delivered by the mail. He had taken it for a few seed packets he'd ordered, not looking at the label very closely, and set it aside.
For now, he looked over his kilt. He looked over his fiance. He looked over himself, and thought maybe he should have tried to work out for the wedding or something. He looked, and he grinned.
"I'll have t' draw ye a diagram, in case ye get lost puttin' this on." Scotty grinned, not looking up from where he was stitching pleats. "I dinna wanna be responsible for ye hangin' yerself in tartan."
"Blueprints for blue tartan," Harold muttered, laughing. He held their camera in his grasp, and sat back taking pictures of Scotty stitching. It was their last day as fiances; he thought it was worth documenting. "Maybe I'll be able to get it off you better once I've worn one." He snapped a picture on the black and white setting, marveling at the preview shot before putting the camera back in his lap.
"Aye, no doubtin' that one." Scotty chuckled at having his picture taken, moving onto another little holding stitch on yet another pleat. "I'm nae even sure I'll be able t' sleep tonight."
"Me either." Harold flipped the setting to color, and turned across the bed to lay on his belly, snapping another photo from the slightly different angle. "...I should just take a picture for every second we're awake all night. Look at 'em one day and go, 'This was 10,234 seconds before you were my husband. This was 5,329 seconds before you were my husband...'" He laid the camera on the bed in front of him, taking up his little parcel and shaking it. Huh. No satisfying little cascade of seeds.
He slipped a finger into the envelope flap and lazily began to tear it open.
Scotty watched for a moment, grinning, then looked back down at his stitching. "More seeds?" He had, over the past few days, been gathering up starter pots for Harold's little garden and orchard project. They were going to have a heck of a spread.
"...supposed to be." Harold shook it again, before finishing off the envelope flap, tearing into it.
No, what he closed fingers around was not a pack of seeds. It looked like a handwritten letter.
Oh yeah. He knew that handwriting even backwards and through folded paper. Harold choked on a sharp breath, looking up at Scotty with wide eyes as he pulled the little sheet of paper from the packet. It... wasn't empty. There was something still in the mailer, and Harold was honestly a little frightened to pull it out.
He unfolded the sheet of paper, not quite reading the tilted, distinctive black scrawl just yet. "---not. Seeds. At all."
His mother was always eloquent in writing, seeming at once to be her voice and something entirely other. Something old-fashioned, and to Harold's mind, less personal. More formal, more considered in writing than anyone could be in speech. She wrote as though her letters would be read through the ages. Where she had learned it, Harold never knew.
When Harold could finally focus on the letters to make words, he trembled. Sandra Lee's letter would read as follows.
Harold,
I confess that I don't know my mind to write to you, son. I have no pretty words, no wisdom, no answer for this, the strange life that you've always led. I'm sure you understand how difficult this is to fathom.
I believe you. I simply have no answer yet; for you or for Mister Scott. Only love.
You are my son, and I had to write to you both in hopes this would reach you before the wedding, even if I had nothing else that bore speaking. The ring you'll find enclosed was always meant for the girl you would marry. I'm sure you'll recognize it. You twirled it around my finger often as a little boy.
I don't suppose it will fit Scotty, but it belongs to him all the same.
I love you. One day soon, I will send you a more considered reply.
All my love,
Momma
Harold recognized the joke; he had learned to read his mother's affection between the lines, and were he not breathless, would have laughed. What was more, was that there was another slip of paper that was bowed to the side of the envelope. He didn't trust himself to pull that one free yet.
Scotty was still watching him, and he must have figured that it was serious and good. "Harold? What is it?"
Harold simply, silently, handed over the tiny note, notched between his fingers. With his other hand, he tipped up the mailer, spilling out the contents. Out slid a little black box, flat, and beside it landed another letter, the handwriting showing through the back of the paper far more neat and clipped, like Harold's own. He couldn't touch the box, but he was honestly spooked by the second letter.
Two possibilities for someone with handwriting close to his own, and he was a little apprehensive of either.
It wasn't the other Harold, though.
Harold-
I don't believe that I have wrapped my mind around your letter or its implications, but I am prepared to give you the benefit of the doubt. If I turn out wrong, then little is lost; if I turn out right, then I have gained much.
Congratulations, my son. May your marriage bring you the joy and warmth my own has brought to me.
I love you.
-Father
...not a single admonishment or angry thought or-- Jesus Christ. Harold Lee was marrying a man, and it had passed without a single comment aside a joke about the engagement ring.
"Pod people." Harold blinked, staring at the letter. "Rhy'din post delivered my letter to the universe of the f*cking pod people." He stared a moment longer, eyes narrowed in confusion, before huffing out a laugh.
"Maybe nae." Scotty watched Harold, after he had read the letter, looking entirely too touched and probably somewhat blown away. "That other... yer twin. My twin. Ye told me it smelled like they were headin'... home. T'New Jersey." A pause. "If they landed, it woulda been months ago, aye? Fer them?"
"Yeah. Smelled like. Felt like something getting fixed. Something all wrong, too." Harold was still staring at his father's letter when he picked up the little box, passing the note over to Scotty as he flipped the top off it.
Sat nestled inside was a gold engagement ring, three stones, the center one a bit bigger. It had always been just big enough on his mother's finger for him to spin, nudging a fingertip at the biggest stone. Harold slipped it down his own middle finger, the second knuckle preventing it from sliding further.
"...but they weren't that far along yet..." It was muttered as he spun the ring on his own finger. After a moment, he slid it off, offering it to Scotty. "This is yours, love."
Scotty read the note, then reached out and took the ring. Just... looking awed. Touched. "I... have t' write yer mum again, an' thank her." His voice sounded a little strained. Like he was about to get misty-eyed.
Harold was shaking his head, smiling an unsteady smile, his lip quivering some. "I'm gonna have to deluge her with pictures of you. And our wedding. And just f*cking everything."
He couldn't understand it. It had been months, and his mother could smell it when he was mooning over someone, so if she met Scotty she'd probably figured it out, but. But. He just couldn't wrap his head around it. This comparatively easy acceptance of a husband over a wife.
"...hah. Oh dude, I'm such a smug prick." Harold looked up. "I'm just thinking that if I got this ring, it means I got to propose before the other one did." He beamed and rolled his eyes at himself, laughing.
"I suppose, dependin' on when he does, it might be graceful t' send it back t' him." Scotty held it in the palm of his hand, looking at the little halo and the small pinpoints of reflection off of the diamond. "Kinda like a good luck thing."
"'s yours, love. You'd probably need to send it to the other you." Harold took up his camera again, breathing out a slow, staggered sigh, and he snapped a photo of Scotty with that ring in his palm. "You're so beautiful," he muttered, looking over the camera. "I'm really, really lucky. I can't-- really believe how much." Aye. It was apparently time for awe on Harold's part, his parents' letters giving him a new wave of appreciation for what he'd found. That little ring that he'd known all his life, glinting on the palm of his fiance.
Scotty held the ring for a bit longer, gently, then pulled out the blue ribbon with the coin, the pin and the button on it. "I'll wear it tomorrow, I think. If ye dinna mind? I mean, mine or no, it's yer history."
"I'd be really honored if you did," Harold answered quietly, head tilted. Watching with a disbelieving sort of glow as Scotty pulled out that little token he'd made. He, himself, would be carrying both letters with him to his marriage, likely tucked in his sporran. Setting his camera aside, he rested his chin in his hands, just watching.
Scotty carefully looped the ring onto the ribbon, and let it settle. "We ever have a daughter... if we dinna..." He chuckled quietly, and shook his head. "If th' other never asks, we should save it."
...oh.
Harold had nothing for that save a soft, touched little sound and a gentle nod.
"We should get ready fer bed," Scotty finally said, gently replacing the ribbon on the nightstand. He looked back at Harold with a warm grin. "After all... tomorrow, aye?"