It was that moment that was supposed to define the rest of one's life.  From now until death do us part, and all that good stuff.  Yep, I was getting married.  It was all very story-book like, you know, marrying one's childhood sweetheart.  Well, high school sweetheart.  You get the idea.  And if things hadn't always gone like the fairy tales say they should, well, this is reality, after all, whatever that's supposed to be.
	Was I nervous?  Oh yeah, you'd better believe it.  I'd been having a lot of doubts about...well, everything.  The wedding, the marriage in general, and my feelings in specific.  I mean...I thought I loved Megan.  It's complicated, and I don't like complications.  So I just didn't think about it.  I ran from it into the much more comfortable complication of booking a band and hiring a photographer and sending out invitations and getting a damn tux that wouldn't itch like a horde of starved mosquitoes had been after me.
	Of course it was stupid of me.
	So there I was, standing at the altar in stupefied wonder, like someone beamed aboard an alien vessel wondering where the hell I was and what was going to happen to me.  Granted, this alien vessel had stained glass windows and Gothic architecture, a long white carpet, lots of flowers, and was filled with a few people I knew (and a great many I didn't), but it might as well have been packed to the gills with little gray men as far as I was concerned.  I watched Megan's dad walk her down the aisle towards me somewhat detachedly and I waited.  
	I know I had this sensation that I was waiting for something.  What for, I couldn't have told you then.  Waiting for Megan.  Waiting for the ceremony to be over.  Waiting to get out of this damn tux.  Waiting to get Megan out of that dress.  Waiting to begin my life all over again.
	I guess, in the end, I was waiting to wake up.
	Now see, if this was Hollywood, all of what happened next would've been postponed until the "Does anyone here know of any reason why this couple should not be wed?" bit.  You know, the whole Graduate thing.  But it's not Hollywood, and it's not a story-book, and it sure as hell isn't normal.  But then...I've learned one thing, if nothing else: reality was not meant to be normal.
	Megan and her father stopped and they were just getting ready to do the "Who gives this woman in marriage?" thing, when, I swear to God, a girl appeared out of nowhere in the middle of the aisle.  I mean dead center of the cathedral, behind Megan and Mr. Thompson, so they had to turn around when they heard everyone gasp and saw the priest's eyes bug out.
	The girl just materialized out of thin air it seemed, glowing at first, then dimming a bit, like turning the brightness on your computer screen down to normal from ultra-high.  She was down on one knee, hands on the ground to steady herself, head bent.  She had long hair, light purple, like lilacs.  Damn good dye job, I guess; it looked like her hair was naturally that color.  It was hard to tell what she was wearing, but she definitely had some pretty kick-ass combat boots on.  She raised her head and ungodly green eyes fixed right on me, immediately.
	She rose to her feet in the most dignified manner I've ever seen.  She was wearing a black sort of corset-y thing over a shimmering silver shirt with long billowing sleeves, and dark blue shorts.  There was some sort of...weird key on some leather strands wrapped around her neck like a choker, and she was wearing black fingerless gloves.  She stood there in defiant strength and never took her eyes off of me.
	"My name is Reina Ir Errant, and I've come to claim what is mine," she said in thickly accented English.  Her voice rang, like a guitar string about to break, and that accent was utterly untraceable to any language I'd ever heard.  And I grew up in New York - I'd heard them all, just about.
	But that name...that name and those eyes...they seemed familiar somehow.  Like maybe I'd grown up with her or something?
	"Claim what's yours?" Mr. Thompson broke in.  He was the first one to come out of the shock trance.
	"Yes."  She unfastened and pulled off her left glove to reveal a small thin gold ring.  "I have come for my betrothed, Nathaniel Baker."  She said the name strangely, like "Naa-thaan-ee-ell Bay-keer."  Of course, that wasn't the strangest thing. 
	The strangest thing was that it was MY name.
	It just hung there for a moment, and no one moved and no one so much as BREATHED.  Like a freeze frame of shattering glass...and then God, someone, whoever, hit the play button and the glass fell and you could actually hear it all break and hit the ground tinkling.
	Megan was on Fully Pissed mode as she swung back around to me.  "NATHAN?!?!"  The various parental units all seemed to be in some state of confused-angry-upset.  The guests were just shocked as all hell.  Kinda like me.  I believe the word is "poleaxed."
	I shrugged defensively.  "I don't know who she is!  I mean...I might...the name's kinda familiar but I certainly don't think I ever promised to marry her!"  My eyes shot to Reina to see if she'd be pissed in her turn now (if there's one thing worse than one girl pissy at you, it's two), or if she'd, you know, maybe EXPLAIN?
	She just shook her head.  "Of course you do not remember it, Nathaniel," she was still saying it weird, "We expected that might happen.  We hoped it wouldn't, and you were so homesick, I had to let you return.   But you have stayed too long.  The doctor is worried.  All of your friends are worried."  She paused and added significantly, "I was worried.  I do hope 48 hours is enough for you to pack and say your good-byes.  I do not believe that I can stay longer than that."
	"Pack?  Good-byes?! Where am I going again?"
	"Yes, just where IS he going?" Megan demanded.
	"Home.  With me."
	"And...ah...where is....?" I ventured.
	"Jonril."
	"Jonril?" I asked.  What country is that?  Some sort of political tectonic activity spit out another country while I was in the hospital?  
	"Yes.  It is several dimensions from here.  It is our version of what you call Earth."
	I just stared at her.
	"Oh my god...she's crazy," Megan murmured.  "Call the cops!  Daddy, call the police, she's ruining my wedding!..."  Megan kept babbling angrily to her father, but I barely heard it.  Part of me, a good chunk of me actually, said, yes, Meg's right, this woman's a loonie or something like it, and she should be taken away back to her medication, but there was something small and quiet in the back of my mind.  It didn't speak louder than any other part of me, and it was a definite minority.  But it had a voice of authority, and it said that Jonril and Reina were important to me.  Had been important to me.  Had been...my life.
	"Stop, I think we should hear her out.  Ah...in private, of course."
	"WHAT?! Nathan, have you gone mad too?? Don't tell me you...you..." She was doing that trembly-lower-lip thing, getting the tear-lights in her widening eyes.
	"No, I don't remember promising to marry this Reina girl, but...I just...I think I need to hear what she has to say."
	Reina seemed to ease down a little, and it was then I realized that she'd come prepared for a fight.  She was willing to fight someone to have me.  It was a little flattering.  I took a second, more appraising look at her.  She wasn't as built as Meg, but then Meg WAS a C-cup at least.  Mystery-Girl-From-Another-Dimension had a bit more meat on her, but that was good.  I was always teasing Megan about her diets and workouts.  Still, this Reina girl was far from fat.  She was taller than Megan, but not by much; she was barely shorter than I was in those boots, but they didn't add that much height to her.  She was tanned, with some definite muscles but not disgustingly so.  I could see myself telling this girl I'd marry her if I was drunk and had forgotten about Meg entirely or something like that.  Not that I'd have to be drunk to be attracted to her, that was for sure.
	And then Reina smiled at me.  She eased down out of fight mode, and she smiled.
	And that was what told me she loved me.

	We settled in as comfortably as we could get in Father McDonnell's office.  Megan was still rather put out about this whole thing but had decided she could deal with it based on her Ceremony theory, told to her by one of her bridesmaids: the more that went wrong during the ceremony, the better and stronger the marriage would be, and the longer it would last.  
	At the rate we were going, we'd be married for 100 years, at the minimum.
	"So...you wanna explain all this to me, Miss Reina?" I asked. 
	She smiled.  "Of course, Nathaniel."  Her accent was some strange lilting mix of Irish and Spanish.  That's what it sounded like to me, anyway.  She sounded uneasy with it, as though almost every statement was a question, and the question was, "Am I saying this right?"  Some statements came across hard and firm though, and even some questions.  Such as,"How much do you remember?" which was the next thing she said.
	I tried.  But it was like the harder I tried to call up any sort of information about her, the further away it got.  I shrugged and admitted, "Nothing."
	She sighed the sigh of the terminally laboring and ran a hand back through her hair.  "On Jonril, you are a hero, a..."  She stumbled over the word, "...a prince?," she looked at me for verification.  I shrugged, and she continued,"...and a god."
	"A god?"  It was a hell of a thing to say to someone.
	"How does anyone marry a god?" Megan asked.  She was trying to understand this madwoman's world.  Knowing her, she was probably hoping to find some way of dealing with the loonie on her own level.
	Reina smiled a grateful smile at Megan, which was odd.  "Yes, this was also my own question.  I had fallen in love with you, Nathaniel, and had resolved to keep my love a secret.  You did not believe you were a god then, but I knew that you were one.  To love a god is to have a pure, chaste love, a love of dutiful worship."  Her smile shifted into a grin, and she aimed it straight at me.  "I am not the best at dutiful worship.  So I kept quiet.  Nothing could come of my loving you."
	"But then you found me and you told me of your own love for me.  It shamed me some, for I had always been forthcoming, and was not good with secrets.  You told me you loved me, and I protested that I could not marry a god!!  It just wasn't done."
	Her tone was now far away, but her gaze was locked into mine.  I remembered those eyes.  They were warm and familiar to me as she continued, "And you said to me, in Jonrin, the language of my world," and here her voice solidified, became less uncertain sounding, "'Qua nath Nira vette tu laina?' which means..."
	"'Cannot a God do as he pleases?'"
	There was a moment of silence, and I looked around.
	Megan was staring at me in shock.  
	Reina was beaming joyfully at me.
	And that was when I realized, I said that.  I knew what she was saying when she spoke those words...
	"You do remember Jonrin then, or at least, you remember that.  Yes, that is what it means, and that was when truly you claimed your right.  Then it was that you were able to save us all.  It is my honor to have been part of such an..."  She took on a truly perplexed look.  "...an...the word you used for it...was...epi...eh-piff..."
	"Epiphany," I supplied.
	She nodded, growing more pleased by the moment.  "Yes, thank you.  It is my honor to have been part of such an e-piff-a-nee, and my pleasure of course.  You gave me this ring," she held up her hand again, "and we were to be married as soon as the offensive was over.  But you became homesick.  We agreed that, although dangerous, we would allow you to go home, we, that is, myself and your friends on Jonril.  We knew that you had come back to us once, and you would come back again."
	"What do you mean 'come back to us once'?" Megan asked.  She was utterly flabbergasted, but getting interested in the story in spite of herself.  She'd always gone in for those romantic fantasies.  Me, I liked a good action movie, myself.
	"On Jonril, when you die, you go...," translator's pause, "...to the Other Plane.  This is our 'Other Plane'.  Some of the people who live on Earth were originally born on Jonril.  Most were born here, but Nathaniel was not.  He was born a prince on Jonril."
	"And he died, and came here...then went back again?"  Megan was on the verge of a derisive snort.
	"Oh my god..." I was rising to my feet, staring at Reina like she'd just told me the meaning of life was nothing more important than "Eat More Pudding."
	"Nathan, you should know better than anyone else..."
	"Meg...come here a moment, huh?  Sorry, Reina, just give us a moment, hmm?  We'll be right outside in the hallway and be right back, okay?"
	"Of course."
	I grabbed Meg's arm and all but hauled her out into the hallway.  I had to catch her when she tripped over her skirt.  Wedding dresses were made to look pretty, not be walked around in.  At least, Meg's was made that way.
	"What are you doing, Nathan?"
	"Meg...this is uncanny.  I mean...you know my history.  Seriously, this plugs in all the holes!"	
	"Look, sweetie, maybe it does but..."	
	"Maybe?!  I was found on the street at 3 years old, babbling gibberish.  They assumed it was baby-talk, that I was developmentally stunted or something.  When I was at the orphanage, I didn't have any sort of learning disabilities though.  I picked everything up right away."
	"That's a coincidence."
	"And I just spent 6 months in a coma, Meg!"
	"You were in a car accident, Nathan!  A very bad one!  You nearly died!"	
	"No, no.  What if I DID die?"
	"And you went to this fantasy place of hers?  Look, I'll admit she's made up a wonderful little idea, if it was a book, I'd love to read it, but Nathan, you can't honestly BELIEVE..."	
	"How did I know what she was saying?"
	"What?"
	"That 'Qua nath Nira vette tu laina?' line."  The alien words just rippled across my tongue, like I'd been speaking it my whole life.  And maybe I should've been.  "I knew it.  I knew what she was saying.  I didn't have to try and figure it out, I just knew it, as sure as if she'd said it in English, Meg.  And I keep...feeling like some of what she's saying is true."
	"Nathan!  This is supposed to be our wedding day!  How can you....?"
	"Megan...I just...it feels right.  If she's a loonie, she's been able to do a damn lot of research on me in that asylum.  And why would anyone do any sort of research on me?  I'm just your Joe Average guy."
	"Nath..."
	"I have to know, Megan.  This..."  I took a step back, mentally.  "Look, I know it sounds crazy.  I KNOW.  But...it fits.  Megan, she can plug up the two big blank parts of my life."
	"Will you please think this the rest of the way through?  You have to DIE to go to Jonril, and she wants you 'to go back' with her!!  Nathan..."  She fell to her knees, tears welling up.  Ah, shit.  "Don't leave me for some lunatic girl you just met!"
	"Look, Megan...I...ah..."  I pulled her into my arms and tried to be objective while I stroked her veil-covered hair.  "Honestly I...I think I was just going through the wedding because...I didn't know what else to do, Meg.  I felt...different after I woke up from that coma.  Like my world wasn't the same anymore."
	"Are you saying you don't love me anymore?" she asked, looking up at me.  "Do you really love that girl?"
	"I don't know if I love her or not.  She...she herself isn't any more or less familiar to me than when she first appeared.  But...what she's saying makes a very very strange sort of sense in the back of my mind.  And...I do love you, Meg, just...not the same way anymore.  Does that make sense?"
	Guys, take my word for it and know that the truth HURTS.  You could hear that slap throughout the entire church, I was fairly sure, and Megan stomped off, hurt and angry and feeling betrayed, I was sure.  I...it really was stupid of me to just agree to a marriage for lack of anything better to do.  I really owed Megan and everyone else a huge apology.