how it works

the couple behind blake and gina at the registrar's office couldn't speak any english. they had a friend with them, or maybe someone they had hired, to help translate. they were young and tiny, clutching each others hands and keeping their arms bent as if in mutual prayer. she was wearing a beautiful but tattered green beaded dress and he was in a suit, except instead of a typical tie there was just a colorful ribbon tied in a bow. the man with them, taller and heavier, sweating, coached them in a language that wasn't familiar to gina.

where were they from, gina wondered, and how did they end up the east los angeles registrar's office on a wednesday afternoon? although she supposed the same question could have been asked about any of them in that interminable line, winding around metal posts that were half outside, exposed to the naked sun, and half under a concrete ceiling where the row of clerk's windows were. the line would take you underneath the ceiling, then back out. people shuffled along as if waiting for a boring, scary roller coaster, one that required seeing all of your most personal and sacred documents before you could ride.

not everyone in line was trying to get married. the sign above the clerk's windows said "birth, death & marriage records," so gina assumed that the babies on the hips of their mothers or waiting in the shaded area with fathers and grandmothers were there to become official, there to be registered as real. and the older people, in line alone or with a much younger family member, there to make official the end of a life. check this box if your husband died.

gina and blake, of course, were there to get married. or at least get the necessary paperwork in place so that they could get married tomorrow. their understanding, after speaking to their lawyer and reading endless websites about the process, was that to get married you had to file a petition and then have a judge or priest marry you within thirty days. they were on a road trip across the country, had started in the south, and had planned the trip around having the ceremony in los angeles. they didn't want anything fancy or big or traditional, just a courthouse wedding, just make it official and lets drive back across the country and start the next round of paperwork to get blake's green card. they were in love and they were excited, but they couldn't know what it would mean, nor did they attempt to figure it out beforehand. it was the way to get him to the united states and they wanted to be together, so they were getting married in a courthouse in la with two old friends as witnesses, and that would then be their story.

they drove in from san diego, where they had stayed with the family of gina's friend sally, straight to the address they found online for the east los angeles registrar's office. they needed a prenup too, just because of the nature of this marriage they figured, and hoped there would be a lawyer somewhere nearby that they could pay to notarize they most basic version they had found online and printed out yesterday at sally's parents house. in retrospect of course, years later, they would marvel at the terrifying simplicity of it all, they would remember how they went from one dot to the next, connecting each one, creating a map as they went. people had asked if they were scared and they told them the truth, neither one them had felt any fear. you can only be scared if there is something unknown, blake said just a few days before, and they knew all along that being together was the only right and good thing for them. if the paperwork wasn't in perfect order then they would have to go back and fix it, and then get married on another day in another place. the plan would be disrupted, and that would rattle gina, but they knew they would always, eventually, be able to get married and the ultimate promise, the promise of blake's forever life in the united states, was a guarantee. they anticipated some things not going exactly as they had imagined, but couldn't imagine that creating any fear in them, knowing that the final prize, being together, couldn't be denied to them forever.

tan from san diego, and palm springs before that, they put their arms out and took pictures together, holding up the packet of papers that would grant them the ability to be married. no one else in line was taking pictures.

when they finally reached the front of the line, the discussion amongst the couple and their companion behind them became more frantic. the young woman in the green dress closed her eyes and began mumbling something under her breath, over and over and over. her partner, her husband to be, released her hands for the first time gina had seen in the hour or so they had waited in line together, and wrapped his arms sideways around her teenage waist. the translator, using his hands wildly, was speaking to them at a frantic pace, speaking so quickly gina wondered if he was also reciting some prayer over and over, something memorized it was so fast. but it wasn't the calming rhythmic ebb and flow of a prayer, it was didactic and pointed, a coach's last words before a big game.

when gina and blake arrived to the window a clerk, a middle aged black woman wearing reading glasses attached to a metal necklace, asked them "marriage?" they said yes and handed her their birth certificates, information about their parents births and deaths and addresses, their passports and IDs and social security cards and the application for a marriage license that they had filled out with their lawyer's help. she began processing it and asked them when they were planning to get married.

the triad behind them were now at a window beside them. the translator, the coach, was explaining some missing paperwork, in a much calmer voice than he had been using just seconds before.

blake told the clerk that they would like to get married tomorrow and were told they could make an appointment for a ceremony here.

the tsunami, gina heard him say. everything was lost in the tsunami.

the clerk looked at them over her glasses with a sideways smirk on her face. "you wanna get married tomorrow in los angeles? and you haven't scheduled an appointment for a ceremony yet?" blake and gina looked at each other. "yes. we were told that this is how it works."

and though if you had opened gina up, and dug past the tan and the prenup and the lawyer and the form 230A, you would have found the calm and the absolute knowledge that everything was going to be ok, resting on top of it all like an oil spill was fear. she repeated what blake had just said, "we were told that this is how it works. we have to fill out this information with you before we can schedule a ceremony, so how could we have scheduled a ceremony yet?" her voice broke.

blake reached down and squeezed her hand and looked and her and said, "its going to be fine."

and the ones next to them, the woman, the tiny little girl, now speaking to the clerk in a language she doesn't even expect to be understood, and the large man speaking over her in broken english: "there has to be a way! don't you hear what i am saying! they are refugees!"

blake and gina's clerk continued to look at them over the horizon of her eyeglasses. her smirk was now just a fault line. "the beverly hills courthouse has been booked for months. you do know that gay people can get married now?"

"well i'm sure there are other courthouses in the los angeles area," blake said, "and i'm sure there is a way to get a short ceremony in one of them scheduled for tomorrow. please." she kept her gaze on them, somehow the two of them at once, for a few more seconds and then rolled her eyes and said without turning her body or her head, "rafael! get me norwalk on the phone."

gina breathed. the situation next to them was looking bad. all three of them were in tears now, different styles and different measures but tears nonetheless. a manager had come, bent down to the level of the clerk's window. "there isn't anything we can do here. you will need to take that up with the office of refugee resettlement. we can't grant you a marriage with no paperwork to prove you exist. that's just how it works, and i'm very sorry. truly."

the translator said one word, loudly, and the couple collapsed into each other, a bouquet of sobs that might, from a distance, look like joy.

rafael came back with a piece of paper and blake and gina's clerk dialed the phone next to her and said "marie? its diane. do you have anything open tomorrow? uh huh.... yeah. ok i'll tell em. you too hon. thanks now."

gina clutched blake's hand, her fingertips digging into the valleys of his knuckles. its going to be fine, she said to herself. its going to be fine.

"you are pretty lucky today i have to say. we got you one at 11:30am at norwalk." she pulls out a piece of paper from a shelf underneath her desk. she highlights the address, writes the time and writes "30 mins early" beside it. "you better get there by 11:00am though. i'm telling you these courthouses are booked because of the gays getting married. just get there early is all i'm saying." diane slips them the paper with the address, and another piece of paper which they are to give to the people at the norwalk courthouse tomorrow before they get married. "any questions?"

"no, i don't think so," blake said, looking at gina. "thanks a lot, diane. we really, really appreciate it."

"uh huh. congratulations," diane said, and beckoned for the next person in line to step up to the window.

blake and gina hug and she started to cry, and diane said, "i know you're emotional but you could you just kindly step over to the side so the next person can be helped? thanks now."

so they walked back out into the sun, and hug and cry for a little while there, the paperwork allowing them to get married in blake's hand. "what if..." gina started to say, and blake shook his head and said, "there was never anything to worry about."

but she knew then, in the blinding heat of the sun at the east los angeles office of birth, death & marriage records, that there always was, and there always would be.