act four: what really matters most
I've always been told that I'm a planner, that it's just a part of my nature that I can never get past. I plan for everything from a simple vacation, to every match I enter, to my career paths and my future. Champion once told me he feared I had some sort-of control fetish, as though I absolutely had to have everything go according to plan in order for things to please me in the end. Granted, he put it in much... cruder terms than that, but the idea's still there, and truth-be-told? It's... not all that far from the truth.
No, I don't have a fetish over it, but I'm certainly fixated on making sure things go according to plan. I give my best to make things work out as well as they can, and in doing so I oftentimes put together plans to fix any possible errors along the way. I hate to see things go awry because I've seen it all-too often in my own life, and considering the severity of some of those times when things went awry... it was, in my eyes, for the best to work to keep things from reaching that point again.
I'm man enough to admit that when it comes to pivotal moments in my life, moments that shape the path of my future in the blink of an eye... I try my damndest to plan it out and have contingency plans ready in the event of partial-failures along the way. Yet despite this being such a major trait of the person I am... there have been on two ocassions where things went so perfectly without any real planning on my end at all.
"I'm proud of you, son... and I want you to know that."
I remember my father's voice, strong and bold and filled with that very pride he spoke of as he held me in a vice grip of a hug that day. I remember him fighting back the tears that stung his eyes and threatened to fall, a smile playing across his face as he stepped aside for my mother to step in and get her own hug as well. His voice was shaken by the emotion of what was happening, but it seemed to carry the same power it had carried before... the same power it had always carried in the past.
"Somehow, your mother and I knew this day would come... we knew the two of you were meant to be."
It was a day that had been a long time coming, a day that had been planned for by many and a day that had gathered together people from various corners of the nation and, in all truth, the globe as well. Close friends of past and present gathered together, families remembered the days long passed, and above all else... the focus of their attention was upon two particular people: Myself... and Suki Minamoto.
That day was our day to take, a day that we have now came to cherish today in fond memory, and a day that several months ago we were able to celebrate for the first time.
September 6th, 2007.
On that day... Suki Minamoto and I were married before an audience of our family, friends, and colleagues. For me, it was a day that even despite all my planning, still managed to surpass all of my expectations and simultaneously throw all planning entirely out the window. The whole affair was incredible, a beautiful set-up for such a large audience and with more than enough room to accomodate everyone. I saw and shook so many hands on that day that it almost felt as though I was at an autograph signing, sans the official booth and the compulsary act of signing whatever was presented to me with my name. I met up with everyone from old friends of my past, to family I'd not seen in ages, to my friends within the NLCW and even some older friends from the HWF.
"Ah, Angelo! Was wondering when you'd make it in today, big guy."
Laughing on his way up, I remember Champion making his way through the mostly empty hall and shaking my father's hand. After the greeting, he then gave my mother a hug and greeted her as well, before stepping back and smiling at the two of them. With the pleasentries out of the way, however, Champion was quickly back to business and turned his focus towards me, his eyebrow quirking as he crossed his arms over his chest.
"Well, Percolator? Nervous?"
"Of course I'm nervous... I'm nervous as all hell, Chris. This is... this is huge!"
Champion's eyebrow only seemed to quirk higher, and he lifted his fist up into my line of sight, showing his own wedding ring in the process and letting a low laugh escape his lips. He shook his head and lowered his hand, and that eyebrow of his lowered as he let out a sigh from his amusement.
"Preaching to the choir, Percolator, I've been through this song and dance already once before."
Always strong in the face of any emotionally trying situation, Champion stood in front of me on that day with full confidence in my ability to get past the typical pre-marriage jitters assaulting me just hours before the big event. Of course, I had that same confidence in myself... but when faced with the reality of forever, I'll have to say that it becomes pretty difficult to focus on much else. I wasn't scared of what was to come, by no means at all actually-- if I was afraid of committing to Suki I'd have never asked her to marry me-- but what I was afraid of? In many ways, I suppose it was just what that future of ours had in store for us.
In many ways, my relationship with Suki was something that had been building up over the course of our entire lives, and now a single day was about to mark the culmination of all those years of repressed feelings, second-guesses, and self-doubt in the face of a potential romance between us. She had always been there for me, as a best friend to rely on while I was with Crystal throughout my teenaged years to something far, far more to me as the years passed on. She was there for me after Crystal's death, she prayed for me throughout the entire endeavour and refused to simply let me go and fade away after it all.
She always pushed me to be better, believed in my abilities with all her heart, and... she just...
She was always there for me, even when others would leave me behind.
That thought alone would be enough to drive those jitters away and give way to the excitement I was meant to be feeling in the first place. Sure, this was the culmination of all those years of effort between the two of us, but more than that... it was the marking of a new future for the two of us. On that day, the proverbial foundation was finally laid down to begin our family together, and... that wasn't something for me to be afraid of.
That was something for me to embrace with open arms.