Carry the Bow
Carry the Bow Against conventional wisdom the groom entrusted him the real thing—Eumaeus, a boy in a Tennessee church, in his pocket both the rings. He spent all afternoon thumbing the promise, that smooth curve final and firm as his name, his own name , printed in the program, but all the same he thought it would never come. Then suddenly it was time. The doors swung wide. From both sides suitors leered, smiling sweetly as they willed him to trip and toss the band so their fingers could go plunging in. He shot straight ahead, remembered what he’d been told. He couldn’t see the face but knew it was him, backlit gold.