They would not sleep apart again for forty-two nights – when he left for Brown.
On fall break, she’d take him to Yazoo to meet her parents. That Thanksgiving, she met his.
They would be engaged that winter and married by the following year.
The wedding took place in her hometown church in Yazoo Mississippi. Jess, Kat, Miyuki, and her older sister were her bridesmaids.
They never did decide who had won their debate, Winnie was going to bring it up the very next day but somehow forgot when the movie on the sofa turned into passionate lovemaking. Rowe thought about bringing it up the following week when they went to the library, but they were distracted by books on birdhouses because she wanted to build one in the perennial garden outside her window.
If either were asked who won, of course, they would each stubbornly declare complete and total victory, but though the subject arose from time to time, the debate never rekindled.
Winnie did become an art therapist at a church, and while their children never did embrace her faith, they were quite active in the church youth group where they met their closest friends. But in terms of arguing the existence of God, the question just faded away. They were busy with wedding plans, building cribs, and choosing schools for their children. They were busy with career changes, walks through the woods, games of scrabble on the porch, helping their daughter plan her wedding, preparing meals for family reunions, watching movies on the sofa late at night where their clothes ended up on the floor. The fire of their lives was too bright to see anything else.
One thing was certain, however; they both believed in magic. And they knew, beyond the shadow of a doubt, this was real. For they were the ones who had created it.