A/N: This is a piece from my ‘Writing the Self’ portfolio. My lecturer asked us to write a story from our lives, and rewrite it in a traditional fairytale format. I thought long and hard about the parts of my life that warrant a fairytale retelling, and my wedding was the most obvious choice. So, here you go.

As is usually the case when Brits go on tour, the first thing to hit us when we stepped out of the airport was the heat. But this was nothing like the moist, BO-laden, climate-change-induced summers of the UK or the pleasant and desirable Alicante sunshine. This was a heat that sucked the air out of your lungs and the moisture from every pour, turning your lips to stained glass and your septum to dust. What a surprise that the desert is hot. 

“Oh, that’s good,” Alexei exclaimed in relief a few hours later. The air-conditioned corner of the anonymous bar, somewhere in the bowels of the MGM Grand’s casino floor, was of apt discreteness for him to penetrate his blistered right nostril with a length of yellow chapstick. I giggled, watching over the palm frond sticking out of my pina colada as Bruno feigned retching. 

“This is what the word hellish was invented for,” Anoushka, Alexei’s girlfriend, observed, scrutinising her Weather app. Fifty-four degrees Celsius. So hot she didn’t mind the fact that she’d never be able to use her Burt’s Bees balm again. 

Thankfully, everywhere in Las Vegas is pumped with cold air that, in comparison to the fire outside, feels positively arctic. The casino floors are also filled with a vague perfume to cover the smell of cigarettes and the festering corpses of gambling addicts, slumped in leather-lined chairs as their favourite slots continue dinging and flashing over them. We favoured ‘the lucky penny,’ a two-screen one-arm bandit that featured a heavily stereotyped Chinese money-keeper complete with a Fu Manchu moustache. It had already paid out $236, enough to pay for this morning’s breakfast buffet, at which were consumed heaping helpings of beef ribs, mashed potato and gravy, and would next pay for our trip to the gun range. 

Watching your wraith of a fifteen-year-old sister empty a submachine gun into a poster of a caricatured alien an hour after she’s lovingly braided your hair is enough to push you off kilter. But there’s nothing like firing a Mauser yourself to tear the already raw nerve endings. I’d recommend it to any anxious bride who wants those perfectly rosy red tear-stained cheeks in her wedding photographs. 

That night, I knew I was going to cry before we’d even left the hotel room. My mother, forcing a quesadilla into me, noticed something was wrong but I managed to hold off the tears through the prolonged are-you-okay-based interrogation. My fake eyelashes had cost as much as the security deposit, so I wasn’t going to risk it, even if Awen’s touch on my scalp as she gently undid the braids she’d worked so hard on brought my canthi to the brink. Eventually, I relented, slightly, and expressed that I was only nervous about walking through the hotel to the Uber pick-up point in my £300 ASOS wedding dress. 

It turned out though, that this was to be the least of my worries. 

At every wedding I’ve attended, the bride has never been on time. Something about sipping Prosecco in a country cottage surrounded by your best friends erodes time management skills. But when your chapel of choice has imposed on you a 15-minute time slot and a promise that if you’re late you won’t be getting married at all, military-like punctuality is compulsory. But, Las Vegas traffic doesn’t always play along. 

As I sat in the back of the black Mercedes waiting for every single stop light on our route to turn green, I looked over at my mother with an expression she surely recognised after raising my panic-prone past self. 

“We’re not going to make it,” I mouthed. 

“Yes, we are.” She nodded determinedly. 

She was right, as always. We made it with approximately thirty precious seconds to spare and finally, I could cry. 

I barrelled through the door of the chapel, an unassuming flat-topped building on a Fremont side street, pushed passed the Elvis that was about to marry us and flew into Stink’s arms. Stink, so called because he is a stinky boy, the stinky boy who was about to become my husband, brushed the flowing tears from my twitching cheeks and called me an idiot in the most flattering way anyone has ever commented on my intelligence. A chorus of ‘awwws’ went up around us from everyone except the Elvis, who was understandably dismayed that the first thing I’d blurted at her upon entering was “Jesus fucking Christ.” 

I hyperventilated through the whole ceremony. Not those sweet nervous breaths that make your cleavage look exceptional, but the gasps that scolded children emit after they’ve had a public crying fit. Somehow, in between the spasmodic hoots, I managed to get my vows out.

“I was going to write them on the way here but I was a bit stressed,” I explained to our audience of eight, which drew a significant laugh.

After a slew of puns, ‘Do you promise to stay stuck-stuck-stuck on him and never take him to heartbreak hotel’, I was officially Mrs Sheehy. Bruno, in a crisp white suit a la Brad Pitt in Inglorious Bastards, leapt from the front row and produced the ring my mother had pushed onto my dad’s finger three decades earlier. I donned my stepmother’s own ring from her first failed marriage. I vowed to myself that, unlike my parents, we’d never be taking ours off. 

Rowdy bunch that we were, I don’t think the decibel level reached upon the call ‘I now pronounce you husband and wife’ will ever again be reached in that chapel. My mum put away her phone, tasked with filming the ceremony as she had been, and leapt up the aisle to welcome Stink to the family. After a slew of photos and thrusting a $50 tip into Elvis’s waiting palm, we emerged back into the desert’s heat as husband and wife. 

Unwilling to let the night end, we elected to walk the strip while the rest of our party climbed back into Ubers. As we dodged various escort cards fluttering through the air, no less than twenty-five groups congratulated us in various ways, a rate of one a minute, to the extent that I began to feel a little bit better about not being able to convince many of our friends to shell out five grand on a Vegas trip. A particular favourite was the stout, Latin man who looked at me and then looked at Stink disapprovingly while wagging his finger. He clearly thought one, or both, of us could do better, but we disagreed. 

Our wedding meal was had at two in the morning in the MGM Grand’s food court. A three-tiered burger from Rocket Joes, complemented by the faint smell of chlorine emanating from the pool complex and washed down with ever-more pina coladas brought to us on silver platters by angels I swear I’d seen on those X-rated promotional flyers. 

“We should get divorced,” I said, finally serene as I noticed the rim of grey dirt on my train and felt a bead of sweat run down my spine. 

“I’d like to do that again. ”

Far, far away from here, in the furthest corners of an arid, orange land, there sits a lush oasis. Teeming with shaggy palms, fizzing violet flowers and untouched pools, the kaleidoscope captures the imaginations of beings and beasts the world over. It’s been the subject of such a myriad of scrolls, each espousing its distinct capacity for frivolity, that even the angels have been known to descend from the heavens and spend their weekends there. 

But, in order to reach the oasis, intrepid wanderers must first endure searing heat that burns from within and without, the throbbing yellow sun beating down hour after hour, imprisoning them. No matter how much the peacocks fan them with their tail feathers in attempts to cool the sojourners, or how far the pelicans fly ahead to gather water in their gullets, the only shadows in sight for those most daring and desperate desert-crossers are their own. 

But, for the small caravan of animals who had finally spotted an emerald ripple on the horizon that was not produced by the heat or their imaginations, the wedding of the scholar’s eldest daughter and the blacksmith’s youngest son was to be worth the two-week trek. 

Some of the beasts had been honoured beyond belief to receive their invitations, handwritten in the girl’s own font. Others had asked to attend purely for a chance to see the oasis. But, the young couple didn’t mind, for they believed in the rejuvenating magic of the oasis, how it caused love to blossom like the daisies that lined its banks. They welcomed everyone and everything. 

Though it was an honour, however, some of the animals had spent a long while rethinking and regretting and sweating their decision to attend. But, as soon as their paws, hooves and snouts touched the vast lakes, the arduous journey was all but forgotten. The tabby cat had struggled in particular. His thick, red fur, though it worked well for camouflage, had kept him complaining the entire way. His beloved applehead now sat at his side, swiping her rough tongue along his pink nose, and comforting him in a silky whisper. 

As the thick, dry air of daytime dissipated, and stardust began to float around them, the wedding party turned their attention to games and fermented fruit. The boy, who was not shy of his abilities, laid down three perfectly round, golden coins to try his luck against the local moneykeeper. The girl beseeched him to be smart with their money, for that would have to buy them a cottage on their return home, but the boy would not be swayed. Fortunately for both the girl’s idealisms and the boy’s hearing, he won, and the only shouts heard were the celebrations of the party. With their money multiplied, the couple and their guests sat down to a delectable meal, gorging themselves on a feast that filled five tables.

The following morning, the group was treated to a show by the locals, a procession of warriors who passed their spears through the crowd. The beings had seen fighters like this before, they sometimes visited the cities of home, but these were polished and pernicious. Their garb was sleek, its colouring a swirl of sage and apricot, protecting them as they moved through the desert toward their enemy. The oasis was so peaceful, however, that they instead allowed the visitors to show off their fighting skills.

The slender and beautiful ferret, though she possessed sharpened teeth and had been quick to anger in her youth, spent much of her time teaching her pups to protect themselves instead. Still, everyone present was mystified by how she managed to throw a spear into the centre of a tree trunk a hundred feet away, and even more astonished by her smallest pup, who threw the biggest spear available, splitting a nearby palm down the middle. Slowly, their stunned silence turned into stunned smiles and claps, even the warriors ruffling the fur behind their ears.  

Though she was pleased her guests were indulging in the oasis, the girl had begun to feel queasy. The ferrets being at the centre of attention had reminded her that soon the subject of their gaze would be her. Though she’d spent her childhood desperate to impress her father, learn all of his knowledge and even surpass it, earn praise from her teachers and strangers alike, for some reason she could not bear the thought of it now, on her wedding day. She wandered for so long, the beautiful ferrets at her side, that she failed to notice the sun slowly sinking in the sky. 

As the echidnas sharpened their spines so that they’d sparkle in the moonlight, and the rosy egrets preened and puffed their necks, the girl and her guardians were nowhere to be found. The animals attempted to reassure the boy, but he did not need reassurance. He knew she would be there. Still, the great basset hound was impatiently tapping her paw, continuously reminding the boy that she had other ceremonies to officiate after this. 

Just as he was beginning to question her, the girl appeared, two, grey ferrets trailing behind her. She bounded toward him and wrapped him in her arms, and the boy thought that even though they had yet to exchange rings, they were already married. The girl vowed that she would be his best friend and lover forever. The boy vowed that he would never abandon her. The basset hound howled surprisingly tunefully into the night sky, and with that, the eight animals erupted into cheers so loud that the girl was grateful that she could no longer hear her thoughts through the noise. All they had to do was cherish the moment and the people who had made it.  

Wandering back through the oasis, each local wished the married couple well, offering them exotic fruits as a parting gift. The journey back to the lush fields and forests of Gwalia would be equally as arduous as the one made to get here, especially knowing that nothing like the oasis was awaiting them. But, they both felt they would appreciate it all the more, for even though the oasis was magic, that was only because it was uncertain whether they would see it again. Their lives were changed by everything that had happened there. And yet, they were resoundingly the same.