Because I am an engineer by bent, I have to get things just right … in retrospect, it took a lot longer to marry Khadijah Biles than it should have.
Part of the reason was that I felt I had to lay up all the money myself to have the wedding in the gardens of the Nozame.
The Nozame are an ancient people, so ancient that the legend goes that the third garden God made (because if you read the Scripture carefully into the Major Prophets, Eden was actually second). When both angels and men fell, the Nozame were next … or at least, thus goes the story.
In reality, the Nozame are relatively few in number, on a vast tropical planet still not fully settled … but the Nozame are just enough to keep their world as a vast, glorious series of gardens.
The Nozame are not eager to allow their world to be overrun by tourists – one has to invest in the maintenance of the world to visit, and the price is steep … nonetheless, they have mores reflecting the heavy influence of the Looking community of their world, and encourage marriage. So, they offer layaway packages for people who wish to celebrate their nuptials on the planet from all over the near-Earth region.
Khadijah had no idea how much it cost to be married on Nozm, but that was a wish of hers from childhood days that she gave up immediately once we researched the costs.
“That will take years, Rufus,” she told me. “I want you and our family, not a marriage fantasy.”
“Well, see, now, I really have to figure it out for you,” I said.
At about that time, my best friend and business partner Capt. Marcus Aurelius Kirk went out to take my place at our frontier post for Kirk and Dixon Shipping on Ventana 5 to support my getting ready for my marriage, and started landing contract after contract … the company revenue started going up and up and up.
“Man, look,” he kept saying as he sent the extra he could have made to put on the Nozame account, “you put up with my carrying-on, trying to catch a whole admiral when our company was new and I could have blown up the whole thing. This is your repayment with interest, and the gift from all seven of us Kirks!”
Mrs. V.T. Kirk, still full fleet admiral Vlarian Triefield at work, quietly mentioned one of my engineering patents to the fleet to fix some trans-warp problems … it turned out that my ability to patch regular warp drives to get an extra level and a half (say, from Warp 5 to Warp 6.5ish) applied. The fleet leased that from Kirk, Dixon, and Oahuapedal Solutions, and not only did Mark put his portion of that increase on the Nozame account, but so did our tentaculous partner Mr. Oahuapedal!
Art by the author, Deeann D. Mathews
“You gave me a chance as an engineer when other human beings wouldn't,” Mr. Oahuapedal said. “This is how I am repaying you!”
Khadijah's parents had been killed in an accident, but her bachelor uncle and my mentor, Capt. Benjamin Banneker, tipped in all the money he planned to pay for a whole Earth wedding.
“I'm only doing this,” he said, “because I know you and Khadijah plan to stay married, and she would go to the courthouse with you. I trust you with my niece, Rufus, and this is what you want for her.”
Capt. Banneker had founded Sable Captains and Commanders – the whole association matched and tripled his gift.
And then, the Nozame called me and said it was all paid up and I could come at any time … Dr. Shaaka iMaru had kicked in the last 10 percent, on behalf of the surviving Uppaaimarn who had chosen me as Key Bearer.
“See, if you had told me what you were doing,” the prince of the Ninth Majestical House said to me, chiding me gently, “we could have put all of that on the still-impeccable Uppaaimarn credit, which is still good across the galaxy. But, as it is, this is the gift of the iMaru to you, for your marriage.”
I was so flabbergasted by all this that I had to take a weekend off.
“See, Rufus,” my bride-to-be said to me, “you've worked hard all your life, and you have a hard time recognized how much you are loved not because of your work, but because of how you use your work to show love for so many others.”
“It is a good thing you have really been helping me to separate those two things,” I said. “It's hard as a man to receive when you are so used to working and giving. But you have really been helping me grow in this area, and I appreciate it.”
“Have you thought about this just being the beginning?” Khadijah said. “You are only 43 years old!”
“Yikes, Khadijah – it's the final frontier,” I said, and she cracked up laughing. “Let me go on and find something else to do real quick, because that is just scary.”
“How about making our reservations to Nozm?”
“Yeah, I guess I should do that,” I said, and we laughed and set the date.
That date came soon enough, and my bride got both the wedding and the husband of her dreams. We chose the temperate zone because of the famous peacock grass that grew up among the conifers, one version growing up into the air with its many flower “eyes,” and another spreading across the ground. If you look carefully, you can see a Nozam standing at the base of the peacock grass in that picture. The picture is to scale, as those grasses and the nearest surrounding trees stretch up around 150 feet, and the silver-leaved trees we walked among were only about 30 feet high.
The Nozame are a humble humanoid people, kind and generous, and made us three gifts of their own. The first were cones from trees on Nozm that were fitted to temperate zones on earth, with ripe and ready seeds for Earth's springtime, some of which were sprouting.
Art by the author, Deeann D. Mathews
The second was a symbiotic temperate-climate epiphyte – like an orchid of Earth – that would grow upon Earth-conifer wood until the Nozm trees were grown enough, floating like a blooming curtain …
Art by the author, Deeann D. Mathews
… and the third was all the money that had been paid for us to be there.
“Be also blessed by us, O couple, greatly beloved by your friends, and our friends the Uppaaimar, and receive back all that you have given and was given for you.”
Today, when Mrs. Dixon and I look at the strong Nozm saplings, and the Nozm orchids growing on the wooden garden wall, we are reminded of our love, surrounded by all the love of all the people around us... and that keeps us secure and eager to build upon that love, with our children.
