What happens when your fake marriage becomes legally binding? #storytime #shorts — Transcript

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1. 0:00What happens when your fake marriage
2. 0:01becomes legally binding? Two years ago,
3. 0:03I signed a marriage license to keep a
4. 0:04stranger alive. His name was Sam. We'd
5. 0:06met exactly twice. Once at a friend's
6. 0:07cookout, once in a cardiology waiting
7. 0:09room. He had a failing heart, a
8. 0:10five-year-old daughter named Ellie, and
9. 0:12no insurance that would ever approve the
10. 0:13transplant he needed to survive. My
11. 0:15employer's plan would. All it required
12. 0:16was one word on the enrollment form,
13. 0:18spouse. So we got married at a
14. 0:19courthouse on a Tuesday. No rings, no
15. 0:21guests, no vows, just two signatures and
16. 0:23a stranger's life hanging on them. We
17. 0:25wrote our rules on the back of a
18. 0:26pharmacy receipt and taped it to the
19. 0:27fridge. Rule one, separate rooms. Rule
20. 0:29two, this is paperwork, not a
21. 0:31relationship. Rule three, the day Sam
22. 0:32gets his new heart, we quietly divorce.
23. 0:34The insurance company sent an
24. 0:35investigator within the month. Spousal
25. 0:36fraud is a felony, and they wanted proof
26. 0:38we were real. So we moved in together
27. 0:40and learned to lie convincingly. I
28. 0:41memorized his medications. He memorized
29. 0:43my coffee order. We hung photos we
30. 0:45staged in a single afternoon. Pretending
31. 0:46to be a family, it turned out, is just
32. 0:48doing the things a family does until
33. 0:50they stop feeling like pretending. Ellie
34. 0:51was the part I never had to fake. She'd
35. 0:53crawl into my lap during her cartoons.
36. 0:54She started hiding the blue gummy bears
37. 0:56in my coat pocket because I once
38. 0:57mentioned they were my favorite. One
39. 0:59night, she had a nightmare, walked right
40. 1:00past Sam's door and knocked on mine
41. 1:02instead. Can you check for monsters? I
42. 1:03checked for monsters. I checked every
43. 1:05single night after that. On the hard
44. 1:06days, I'd come home to find crayon
45. 1:07drawings waiting on my pillow. Lopsided
46. 1:09hearts with my name spelled wrong inside
47. 1:11them. Sam got worse before he got
48. 1:12better. Some mornings I'd find him gray
49. 1:14and gasping on the kitchen floor, and
50. 1:16I'd drive him to the ER at speeds that
51. 1:17should have gotten me arrested. I
52. 1:19learned the night nurses by name. I
53. 1:20learned to fill out his intake forms
54. 1:21from memory. I learned that the man I'd
55. 1:23married as a favor had a laugh that made
56. 1:25the whole apartment feel warmer, and
57. 1:26that I had somehow started living for
58. 1:27the sound of it. We still slept in
59. 1:29separate rooms, still called it
60. 1:30paperwork, still joked about the divorce
61. 1:32we'd file the second he was well. Then
62. 1:33the call came at 2:00 a.m., a donor
63. 1:35heart, a match, surgery in the morning,
64. 1:36everything we had been praying for. That
65. 1:38night, Sam knocked on my door for the
66. 1:39first time. If I don't make it, he
67. 1:41started. I told him to stop. He didn't.
68. 1:42If I don't make it, the marriage makes
69. 1:43you Ellie's legal guardian. I filed the
70. 1:45paperwork last week. I need her to have
71. 1:47someone. I need it to be you. I didn't
72. 1:48sleep. I sat on the floor outside his
73. 1:49room until sunrise, listening to him
74. 1:51breathe, terrified of the silence that
75. 1:52would mean it had stopped. The surgery
76. 1:54took 11 hours. When the surgeon finally
77. 1:56pushed through the doors, she scanned
78. 1:57the waiting room and asked one question.
79. 1:58Which of you is the spouse? He's asking
80. 2:00for someone and I can only allow next of
81. 2:01kin. I stood up so fast my chair
82. 2:03clattered to the floor. That's me, I
83. 2:04said. I'm the spouse. And I had never
84. 2:06meant three words more in my life. He
85. 2:07was alive, barely, but alive. When they
86. 2:08let me into recovery, he was buried
87. 2:10under a dozen machines, pale as paper,
88. 2:12and he found my hand before he even
89. 2:13opened his eyes. You stayed, he
90. 2:15whispered. I signed the consent form, I
91. 2:16said. The fake marriage just saved your
92. 2:18real life. He almost laughed and winced.
93. 2:20Nothing about it was ever fake to me. A
94. 2:21week later he came home. I found the
95. 2:23divorce papers in the kitchen drawer.
96. 2:24The ones he drafted the very week we
97. 2:25married, dated, and never filed.
98. 2:27Underneath them was a second envelope.
99. 2:28The guardianship forms signed, making me
100. 2:30Ellie's mother if the worst had ever
101. 2:31come. He had chosen me twice. Once to
102. 2:33live for, once to leave her with. I tore
103. 2:35the divorce papers in half over the
104. 2:36sink. Rule three is cancelled, I told
105. 2:38him. Ellie was standing in the doorway
106. 2:40in her pajamas. Does that mean you're
107. 2:41staying forever? She asked. I looked at
108. 2:43Sam. Sam looked at me. Forever, I said.
109. 2:45Last month we got married again. Same
110. 2:46courthouse, same Tuesday. Except this
111. 2:48time there were rings and a
112. 2:49five-year-old scattering flower petals
113. 2:51down the aisle, and two people finally
114. 2:52signing their names for the only reason
115. 2:54that was ever real.