Chapter 20

Don and Lanh were studying in the cafeteria near the end of the day in the corner where the outcasts sit in silence, at the table they call “our table.” Rosa and Sydney were also there, quietly making their plans for the wedding when the guidance counselor/athletic director, Mr. Mach caught up with them. “I’ve been trying to get ahold of you Miss Nguyen, can we talk?”

“We need to finish up here before we head out to work,” said Lanh, not looking up from the paper she was writing. “We don’t have much time.” Don had a shift at her parents’ restaurant, and she promised Don’s dad that she would help with calf inoculations right after school.

“I’ll just make it quick,” he said. He sat down in a chair and said, “At the graduation, the school board has said that they won’t let the principal introduce you as Mrs. Donovan Campbell if you’re not married yet.”

“So?” Lanh was confused. That never came up as a request on her part, and Don wouldn’t have requested that, would he? Their wedding is planned for three days after the graduation ceremony, not before.

“So, instead the principal is going to have to introduce the class valedictorian as Miss Lanh Nguyen.”

“Hmmm? Ok.” Lanh clearly didn’t get it. But Don picked up on it right away. With a loud whoop, he jumped up and scooped Lanh out of her chair and spun around, holding her tight.

“You did it em yêu! You did it!” he cried.

To be honest, there was never a question about who was going to be the valedictorian at the graduation ceremony. Lanh Nguyen’s GPA was perfect, the real battle was for salutatorian. There was not a stain on her academic record, and she had two letters, one for the debate team (captain), and one letter for swimming when she became the timekeeper for the swim team. Her only regret was that Don was not in the running for salutatorian, but he had a disastrous freshman year, so his graduating in the top ten percent was quite an achievement. Lanh was so happy for his academic turnaround that she reveled in his accomplishments and standing, and almost completely ignored hers.

She honestly didn’t know where she stood in the academic race for top honors, and unlike her siblings, she didn’t care. Tutoring Don was the most important academic achievement to her. Suddenly, realizing what Mr. Mach said, Lanh laughed and hugged Don in the cafeteria. A photographer for the school paper who was alerted to Mr. Mach’s plans captured the moment on film.

The position of valedictorian was completely forgotten by Lanh. School, work, swim team, debate team, and wedding plans, so much to do, and then trying to find time to be alone with Don! so the announcement came as a complete surprise. Lanh wasn’t sure if she was more excited by the honor, or by Don’s excitement in her receiving the honor. He spun her around and held her tight before he set her feet back on the ground and gave her a gentle kiss.

Mr. Mach caught sight of the gold on Lanh’s finger. “You guys are really going to do it, aren’t you?” She showed him her engagement ring, and he asked, “When did you start wearing that?”

“Christmas eve,” she said.

“You didn’t notice?” asked Don.

“I guess not...” sputtered Mr. Mach.

“Wait a minute, we have something for you,” said Lanh and she threw her bookbag on the table and opened it. “I couldn’t find your address so I couldn’t mail it,” she muttered as she rifled through her bookbag. She finally produced a white and gold envelope and handed it to Mr. Mach just as the dismissal bell rang.

“Sorry sir, gotta go,” said Don as he and Lanh collected their papers and books, “Gotta drop her off at my farm where my dad is going to put her to work, and I have to report in at her restaurant for my job.”

“By-ee!” cried Lanh as the two hustled out the door.

Mr. Mach smiled and carefully opened the ornate envelope; a wedding invitation decorated with gold flowers and dragons. He’s never received a wedding invitation from two of his students before, at least not while they were still his students. He shook his head and smiled, then went to find a phone. His wife, Leann, is going to want to hear this new chapter in the saga of Don and Lanh.

As they rattled out to Campbell’s farm in Don’s beat up old GMC pickup truck, Lanh was running down her list of things to do before the wedding, which now included writing a valedictorian address to the graduating class. “I don’t know how to write a valedictory!” she complained. “what do I say?”

“You have five older brothers and sisters, you probably sat through five graduations,” said Don. “what did their valedictorians say?”

“There was only four, Bao and Kim-ly graduated together. They went something like this: Blah, blah, blah, our best years are ahead of us ... yadda, yadda, yadda, don’t ever forget our years together ... blah, blah, blah, we’re going to change the world, yadda, yadda, yadda, I owe it all to my parents and my teachers. Amen.” While she recited her memories of forgettable valedictory speeches, Lanh had stripped down to bra and panties and was folding up her nice slacks and blouse. She put her tiny foot up on the dashboard and rolled down her thigh-high stockings one by one and coiled them all up and put her clothes in the gym bag that was left in the pickup.

“God, your feet are cute, hey ... wasn’t Tam her class valedictorian?”

“Yeah,” said Lanh as she dug her blue jeans and t-shirt out of her gym bag. “So was Huy and Trung.”

“Why don’t you ask them?”

Lanh turned to Don, her eyes wide in shock that he would say such a thing. “Because I want to make a GOOD speech!”

“Awwwww, you wore a bra,” complained Don once he finished laughing. “Why did you do that?”

“Because this happens whenever I see you!” she complained and lifted her bra cups to expose her delightful, firm teacup size breasts with prominent, and erect, dark pink nipples. Without her bra, her nipples would have been clearly on display. “They are for you to see, not the entire school.” She put her bra back and unfolded her blue jeans. It had taken her forever to find a pair of jeans that looks good on a tiny pair of hips like hers. Don swung into a neighbor’s field access driveway and stopped the truck. As soon as Lanh heard the ratchet of the emergency brake pedal, she launched herself at Don.

They ended up stretched out on the front seat, Lanh wearing only her panties, laying on Don and kissing deeply, her bra now on the dashboard. Their hands roamed over each other’s bodies, and Lanh’s entire left breast ended up in Don’s mouth. He suckled at the trembling eighteen-year-old’s flesh voraciously. Finally, she pushed up, reluctantly pulling her breast from its delicious trap with a pop. “Stop,” she gasped. “I still want to wear white at our wedding.”

“You keep rubbing against my crotch like that and we’ll both be wearing white in a few seconds,” he said with a lecherous grin.

She gave him a playful swat on the arm. “Work first, then reward.” They will have time for rewards later tonight after work.

“You only say that because you know I’ll do anything for you,” sighed the young man as he pulled his tiny fiancé close. He had opened his shirt so he could feel her warm skin pressing against his.

“Say it,” she whispered into his ear as she snuggled as close as she could. “Tell me again.”

Don knew exactly what she wanted to hear. “I Donovan Aloysius Campbell, take you, Nguyen Huong Lanh, to be my wedded wife, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better for worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, ‘till death do us part.”

Lanh ran her hand on his chest under his shirt and hummed her approval, then “I, Nguyen Huong Lanh, take you Donovan Aloysius Campbell to my wedded husband, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better for worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, ‘till death do us part.” They kissed and wished that this was the last time they had to say these words. Just a few more weeks!

Finally, Don asked, “why don’t we say, ‘all the days of my life’? ‘Till death do us part’ is so morbid.”

“Because what if one of us dies?” Lanh looked shocked. “All the days of my life means that one of us ends up a lonely widow. I don’t do well on my own, I bored six goldfish to death, my poor little goat runs away when I talk to her. If you go before me, I’m going to go find one of the frat boys that Kim-ly tosses aside and make him buy me a new farm.”

“Fair enough,” smiled Don. “Nothing to worry about, I plan to live forever. What does your middle name Huong mean?”

“It means I have a big penis,” she said with a straight face. “It’s where the English phrase ‘well huong’ comes from.” She held her serious expression long enough for Don to think she truly was serious, then she started laughing.

“No, serious.”

“I do! Like yours!”

“If you had a penis, I would have seen it by now,” said Don.

“I gave it up for lent,” she insisted, then she started giggling and rubbing her crotch against his hardening cock.

“Seriously, what does it mean?”

“Huong is a flower, a pink rose. That’s why rose quartz is my favorite mineral.” Which explained the samples of pink rose quartz rocks she showed him on the one time she allowed him in her room to meet her goldfish, Marissa. “Your turn,” she countered, “what does Aloysius mean?”

“It means Famous Warrior.”

She kissed him one last time before they had to get going. “What are you famous for?”

“I don’t know, I think it’s one of those names you have to aspire to.” Then, thinking ahead to his upcoming enlistment, he said, “Hopefully, I will become famous for not getting blown up.”

Don dropped Lanh off at the farm and she dashed to the pen where the new calves were being held for vaccinations. Lanh loves calf vaccinations because she gets to comfort the calves, even though they’re bigger than she is. After the last calf was vaccinated and the calf returned to its mother, Lanh was going to head up to the hayloft to pull down a few bales for the evening milking when she noticed a wire broken on the barbed wire fence near the barn. She headed over to the tractor shed for the fencing tools and found that the coffee can that held the soft metal crimps was empty. The soft metal crimps make repairing broken barbed wire fences easy. “Don must have been working the fence line again,” she muttered. The pasture fence had several breaks from the winter that they’ve been repairing as the snow melted.