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2019
“Foolishness,” says Miles.
Phoenix laughs, draping his arms around Miles’s stomach from behind, and rests his chin on Miles’s shoulder, turning his head just a little bit to press a kiss to his boyfriend’s cheek. Boyfriend still sounds weird in his head—not for any gross internalized homophobia reasons, mostly just because they’re grown men and not high schoolers necking in the back of a car on prom night. “You sound like Franziska, you know,” he said. “The Fey spirit mediums are all foolish fools fooling fools—”
“I’ll thank you to not make fun of my sister,” says Miles, but Phoenix has known him long enough to know that the light bite to his words is—if you’re talking about Miles Edgeworth—an expression of resigned yet genuine fondness.
“I’ll thank you not to make fun of my sister,” Phoenix counters. “That Magatama saved my life more than once. And you used it, remember? Shouldn’t you know for a fact that it’s the real deal?”
Miles leans back into Phoenix’s arms, taking a sip of his coffee, and says, “Scientifically speaking—”
“Oh, fuck you.” Phoenix nips a little at Miles’s neck; he can feel Miles’s badly stifled giggle in response. (The poor guy is insanely ticklish.) “You’ve seen spirit channeling in action, how can you say—”
“Phoenix, the only available data you have involves what you yourself have witnessed. If you cannot explain how spirit channeling is possible, how do you expect me to believe you when you say that it is?”
“Objection!” says Phoenix, but it’s more of a laughing whisper against Miles’s skin—which in turn sneaks another giggle out of Miles, who has to set his mug down before he spills it. “The defense would like to pose a question to the prosecution—”
“—oh, lord, this never ends well,” says Miles, turning a little awkwardly in Phoenix’s arms to rest their foreheads together.
Phoenix steals a kiss (he can’t help it, Miles always looks so sweet in the mornings), then grins a little, because he’s pretty sure he’s figured out a way to trip Miles up. “You’ve got a lot of solid evidence that I love you—”
“—namely,” says Miles dryly, “that you tell me every five minutes—”
“—but are you gonna be able to look me in the eye and explain exactly why?”
Miles gives Phoenix a withering look. The strength of this look is significantly diminished by the fierce blush spreading across his face. “Phoenix, this is juvenile,” he says.
“Is it?”
“The prosecution would like to point out the weakness of the defense’s counterargument!” says Miles with genuine exasperation. Phoenix has to stifle a laugh of his own, there, because the thing that’s upset Miles isn’t anything contained in Phoenix’s argument—just the fact that it isn’t a logically sound argument to make. “Spirit channeling and your love for me are in no way comparable! Though I myself am easily thrown off by the many reasons that you have for loving me, that doesn’t mean that they don’t exist—and reasons that support the plausibility of spirit channeling most certainly do not!”
“Prove it.”
“Wh—oh, for heaven’s sake. We’re not in court.”
But Phoenix is in a mood today, a warm, sunshiny kind of mood that’s set off by Miles’s bedhead and the gentle way they’re holding each other. One of Miles’s hands rests absently on the small of his back; the fingers of his other hand tenderly trace Phoenix’s jaw. This is a line of questioning he’s determined to continue. “If you’re making claims, you gotta back them up,” he says, soft and low, and steals another, slower kiss from Miles for good measure. And whoops, now it’s just devolving into kissing his boyfriend—boyfriend, boyfriend, there has to be a better word for this than boyfriend. Boyfriend really doesn’t cover the way Miles kisses.
If you had asked the Phoenix Wright of years ago what he’d imagine kissing Miles Edgeworth to be like, Phoenix is pretty sure that that guy would have been way off base. Years ago, Phoenix had imagined Miles shoving him up against the wall, heated and angry like in court, and kissing him with a kind of ruthless, passionate focus that would have ended with Phoenix breathless and Miles smiling that cold, clear smirk. But their actual first kiss had happened in an airport after Miles had said, awkward and stilted, that Phoenix was the best man he’d ever met—and then a very stupid Phoenix had surged forward and kissed Miles, who had melted against him like they were in some kind of rom-com.
Which is to say: Miles kisses with extraordinary tenderness for one of the most meticulously guarded guys that Phoenix knows, and this moment is no exception. He gathers Phoenix close and kisses him, slow and soft, like they’ve got nowhere to be for the rest of their lives. (This is not true. They’re both pretty busy guys.) Pulling back just a little, he says very softly, “I know you love me, darling. I know you love me.”
Oh Mother Of God, thinks Phoenix, who still cannot handle it when Miles brings out the pet names, and somehow manages to accidentally put his elbow directly into Miles’s coffee. Lurching forward with a yelp, he falls into Miles, who steadies them with amused patience. “Don’t do that!” he says, blushing furiously.
Miles kisses him again. Phoenix feels the muffled laugh against his mouth. When he pulls away again, he says, “A key piece of evidence in my argument that you love me—”
“No, you have to explain it,” says Phoenix petulantly.
“This is ridiculous,” says Miles.
“You’re blushing again,” says Phoenix, grinning a little.
“You’re blushing. What does that prove?”
“That every time you call me darling I’m pretty sure my heart explodes?”
“Darling,” says Miles, but he’s glowering at Phoenix in a stubborn, indignant way that makes it more funny than gut-punch romantic. Phoenix snickers. “Darling,” says Miles again, with the confusedly irritated air of someone flipping a broken light switch.
“Honey, it doesn’t work like that,” says Phoenix, rubbing his nose against Miles’s. “C’mon. Explain why I love you or we count this one as a win for me.”
There’s the key phrase. Miles’s eyes narrow. Rapid-fire, he says, “You love me because I—” and then stops, his eyes widening in a kind of strange, terrified panic. “I-I—”
“There are reasons, right?” says Phoenix innocently, but he’s already reaching up to rub reassuring circles on Miles’s back. If this game goes too far, he knows he can always bring out the big guns: he can come up with a pretty long list of all the things he loves about Miles, after all.
“Yes,” says Miles, his voice a little clipped.
“You’re not really going to let me beat you, are you?” says Phoenix, but there’s no bite to his words. He leans in, pressing a kiss to Miles’s temple. “C’mon, babe. I know you know this one.”
Miles looks up at Phoenix, the small smile on his face directly in contrast with his stiff, awkward nervousness, and says with deliberation, “You love me because I am…brave and compassionate, even after the horrors of my childhood. You love me because I am intelligent, relatively witty, reasonably attractive—”
“Throw out the adverbs, hon. Too subjective.”
“If you were saying this, Phoenix, you’d say that I’m exceedingly attractive and phenomenally intelligent!” says Miles, rolling his eyes a little.
“I never said I was good at being subjective,” says Phoenix, draping his arms around Miles’s neck and batting his lashes.
Miles’s smile grows, his eyes locked on Phoenix’s. Absently, he says, “You love me because…because you knew me at my best and at my worst, and you see how hard I try to be a version of myself that I can be proud of. You love me because I am quite a lot like you: when I set my mind to something, I persevere until it is accomplished in full. You love me because—because you are a fundamentally loving man, and I see the face you are making, Phoenix, this is not a way for me to devalue the way you choose to love me. I know I’m important to you; I’m not being modest about that.” He rubs his nose against Phoenix’s, his eyes fluttering blissfully shut. “I only mean that you have a tender and compassionate heart, and you see the good in people before they themselves realize it is there. It’s what I love about you.”
“Huh,” says Phoenix.
Miles opens his eyes to give Phoenix a quizzical look. “What is it?”
After a moment of consideration, Phoenix says, “It’s just that you left out—I don’t know. I love how you really love the Steel Samurai,” (Miles goes pink) “and I love how you kinda don’t know how to talk to kids but that doesn’t mean you’re not nice to them, and I love how much you care about making the world a better place, and—”
“Phoenix,” says Miles. “Is my answer sufficient enough?”
Phoenix has no idea what Miles is talking about. “For what?”
Miles gives Phoenix a look that’s more affectionate than anything. “For our philosophical debate,” he says.
“Wh—oh, forget about that, no one’s gonna convince anyone. I want to talk about how much I love you.”
“Phoenix—”
Rolling his eyes, Phoenix says, “The defense begrudgingly concedes that the prosecution has proven his argument for spirit channeling entirely unrelated to spirit channeling.” And then, because suddenly it seems very important, “And the defense really loves how the prosecution is able to stay focused. ‘Cause the defense gets distracted by pretty much everything, but the prosecution—”
“Phoenix,” says Miles very tenderly, and kisses him again, and again, and again, sunlight shining through the curtains and into their cozy little kitchen.
Boyfriend, Phoenix thinks, doesn’t sum it up as well as he wants it to. Maybe something that implies a little bit more, like…lover. Partner.
(Husband.)
2026
Two days after the trial’s results go public—after the entire world becomes glaringly aware of the fact that Kristoph Gavin ruined Phoenix Wright’s life out of a desire for petty revenge—Apollo gets a staticky call from an international number. Of course it’s Apollo who gets it, because no one else answers the fucking phones in this office, because Mr. Wright says that anyone who’s anyone knows to call his cell and Trucy says that answering the phones is obviously the junior partner’s job. So Apollo picks up the phone—largely because whoever’s calling is going to be the one saddled with the ridiculous international phone call bill—and is greeted with static, then a cut off voice saying, “—Wright?”
Sounds high-end, whoever it is. Cultured. “Uh, Wright Anything Agency,” says Apollo. “How can we—”
“—need—to—Wright.”
“Your connection is really bad,” Apollo observes with polite bemusement. “Have you tried purchasing a better phone plan?”
There’s an exasperated huff of breath and the call cuts out.
Well, that was weird. Hanging up the landline, Apollo goes back to his paperwork and very nearly misses it when Mr. Wright’s cell phone starts ringing. Mr. Wright, who seems to be playing a game of “How Many Cheese Balls Can I Throw Directly Into My Own Mouth While Lying Down,” accidentally rolls off the sofa in his haste to answer the phone. “Miles!” he says, sitting up on the floor and fumbling a little with the phone as he holds it to his ear. His entire face is lit up in a way that Apollo hasn’t seen since—god, those old photos from decades ago, like that one taken right after State v. Edgeworth or maybe State v. Engarde. “Hey, I—hey. God, your reception must be shitty. Are you—” A tearful laugh. “Don’t you dare do this over the phone. Come on.” Another laugh, closer to a joyful sob this time. “Yeah. Yes. Of course the plan’s still a go. Why the hell would it change? Unless it’s changed for you—” He presses the phone to his ear, his smile widening. “Goddamn, I’ve missed you.”
Apollo dutifully pretends he isn’t listening. Trucy, practicing tricks in the corner, has no such qualms. “Daddy, is that P—” She cuts herself off, flushing with a kind of resigned sadness that seems almost habitual. “Is that Uncle Miles?” she corrects herself.
Mr. Wright looks towards Trucy with this big, bright smile. “Call him Papa, Trucy, the deed’s done,” he says. Then, to whoever the hell is on the phone, “Of course. I’ll pick you up at the airport. Yeah, I love you too.” He hangs up, pulling himself up off the floor. Pocketing his phone, he opens his arms to Trucy, who lets out a sobbing laugh and runs at him like she’s some grade-school kid. She throws her arms around his neck and he spins her around and around, both of them laughing and crying at the same time.
“Papa,” Trucy’s saying, louder and louder. “Papa papa papa—”
Not entirely understanding this weird little ritual of Trucy and Mr. Wright’s, Apollo goes back to his papers. But he looks up again, one more time, because the incandescent joy radiating out of the Wrights’ embrace is like nothing he’s ever seen before on either of them.
Something has changed, Apollo realizes, a small flutter of warmth in his chest as he watches the tears spill down Trucy’s face. Something wonderful is about to begin.
2019
“OH MY GOD,” yells Maya over the phone. Phoenix, who thankfully had the foresight to yank the phone away from his ear half a second before she started screaming, winces a little anyway, because dear god is Maya loud when she’s excited. Or angry. Or any time, really. “ARE YOU SERIOUS, NICK?”
“Have I ever not been serious when it’s Edgeworth?” says Phoenix with a nervous laugh. “If we’re being honest, I’ve been building up to this one for a while now.”
“Don’t have to tell me twice,” says Maya smugly. “I called it way back in 2016, Nick, remember?”
Phoenix grins a little wryly, leaning back against the file cabinets and very nearly losing his balance. Steadying himself as quietly as he can—he knows Maya will give him shit if she hears him tripping over his own feet—he agrees, “You definitely did. In the most annoying way possible. Didn’t you write Mr. Nick Edgeworth in cursive on a legal brief you knew he’d asked me to give to him?”
“In my defense,” says Maya, “I really didn’t think you’d check it before you gave it to him.”
“What—how is that in your defense? That makes you sound worse!”
“My point,” says Maya, “is that I’m really happy for you two crazy kids! You’d better let me be best man. Or, ooh, there’s a legal loophole that means I can officiate if it’s in Kurain! Or—”
“Uh, Maya?”
“If you’re about to say that you ‘haven’t asked him yet’ or ‘don’t know if he’ll say yes’ or some dumb shit like that—”
“—as a matter of fact, I am—”
“then can it, dorkus,” says Maya firmly. “Miles is crazy about you.”
Phoenix laughs softly, a warm flutter in his chest. It’s not like he doesn’t know this well enough—you don’t fly halfway across the world to break the law for a guy you’re interested in casually dating, after all—but it’s still so crazy and strange to realize that he’s living his college dreams. Dollie’s Feenie would never have been able to admit the secret reason he chased Miles down so determinedly: the memory of a boy who was his knight in shining armor so long ago.
“I’m crazy about him too,” he says. “I want to marry the hell out of him.”
2026
“Apollo, watch the office, will you?” says Mr. Wright the next day, breezing in with a delighted fire in his eyes.
“Yeah sure thing Mr. Wright AAAAAH,” screams Apollo, finally looking up from the legal brief he’d been going over and getting a good look at Mr. Wright. “AAAAAH,” he screams again, just for good measure, because what the actual fuck.
“See?” Trucy giggles, pressing her hands to her mouth with sparkling eyes. She’s wearing a new costume—her hat and cape now a deep, dark magenta instead of their usual soft blue. “Told you Polly’d blow a gasket!”
Just as further proof that the entire world has been turned upside down, Mr. Wright (clean-shaven, beanie-free, wearing a blue-and-white striped button-down and a nice pair of jeans) strides over to where Apollo has dropped the legal brief, scoops the papers up, places them on Apollo’s desk, and presses a piece of paper into Apollo’s hand.
“What,” says Apollo hoarsely, staring down at his first actual paycheck.
“I figured I should stop dodging the subject,” says Mr. Wright. “You’re an incredible employee, Apollo, and you deserve to be fairly compensated.”
“You’re just covering your butt so that when Papa comes in he won’t prosecute you for breaking like ninety worker-compensation laws,” Trucy observes, leaning against the doorframe.
Mr. Wright laughs, soft and bright. “Yes and no,” he says. “Didn’t know how far Gavin’s reach extended, you know? I needed him to think that losing at his little game had broken me beyond repair. Now that I’ve got the opportunity to pay my employee fairly, you can goddamn bet I’m gonna take it.”
“And you don’t want Papa to prosecute you.”
“I don’t know,” says Mr. Wright. “He is pretty prose-cute when he’s prosecuting.”
“Daddy I am going to throw this latte at you I swear to god—”
Apollo looks down at the paycheck again, then back up at his neatly-coiffed, well-dressed, brightly smiling boss. “Okay NO ONE has answered my QUESTION!?!?!” he yells. “WHAT IS GOING ON?”
“All will be revealed in due time, Apollo,” says Mr. Wright cryptically, which makes Apollo feel a little better about the entire situation. “Do you want to come with us to the airport?”
“Do I. Do I what.”
“You heard him, right, Polly?” says Trucy, looking genuinely concerned for Apollo’s hearing abilities. “Daddy and I are going to the airport and we want you to come!”
“It is a Wednesday,” says Apollo, who’s not sure why he’s trying to bring up the concept of a regular work week to Mr. Wright and Trucy. One time he came in after lunch on a Thursday and Mr. Wright was just lying on the floor watching Trucy build a Lego house.
“Excellent, he knows the days of the week,” says Mr. Wright, clapping Apollo on the back. “Have you had breakfast already, Apollo? I can buy you something from Eldoon’s if you want.”
Apollo does not want that at all, but the fact that Mr. Wright is willingly offering to pay for anything is bewildering enough to knock him speechless. As he stammers out a non-answer that mostly sounds like “Why,” Trucy hooks her arm through his elbow, yanking him in the direction of the still-open door. “Come on, Polly!” she says with giddy delight. “You’re going to get to meet my papa!”
“Wait, how many dads do you have?” Apollo looks desperately towards Mr. Wright. “How many dads does she have?”
“Oh, just two,” says Mr. Wright. “There’s me, and there’s her papa. Those are all the dads we count.”
“All the dads we count,” Trucy echoes, a grim, angry spark in her eyes that flares up sometimes when the conversation veers too close to Zak Gramarye.
Mr. Wright seems to pick up on this. “Sunshine,” he says, “what do you think you’re going to tell papa about first, when we see him?”
Trucy blinks, the spark of fury extinguished by the tears welling up in her eyes. “He’s here,” she says. “He’s here and we’re going to get to see him and daddy he promised me when I was ten, he promised that he’d never leave me again once Mr. Gavin was behind bars, never—”
Is this Zak Gramarye she’s talking about? Apollo mulls this over as he’s towed out of the Wright Anything Agency, trying to puzzle this one out. But no, the voice on the phone yesterday was labeled as Miles, a name that sounds vaguely familiar in conjunction with Mr. Wright’s but not familiar enough to ring any bells. Maybe it’s a fake name, another stage name, some strange, implausible way for Zak Gramarye to still be alive—but that would be bad, wouldn’t it? Kristoph has only been officially convicted of Zak Gramarye’s murder, hasn’t he? If Zak Gramarye’s alive, then—
“Polly?” says Trucy, tugging gently on his sleeve. “You are, without a doubt, overthinking it.”
With a resigned sigh, Apollo lets the Wrights lead him into the great unknown.
2019
“Oh, for—” Franziska throws up her hands. “You are going to do it no matter what I say, Phoenix Wright, so why go through this pointless and ridiculous charade?”
“Because you’re Miles’s family, and your opinion means a lot to me,” says Phoenix. “And even independently of being Miles’s family, you’re someone whose opinion means a lot to me.”
“Defining your decisions by the opinions of other people is a fool’s game,” says Franziska, but Phoenix can see the way her eyes are softening just a touch. “Does Miles Edgeworth know you are in Germany?”
“No, I—no.” Phoenix grins a little sheepishly. “I scraped together some funds and bought myself a plane ticket. Thought I’d surprise him.”
“And how do you propose to work within the distance?” Franziska queries. Phoenix gets the distinct sense that he’s being tested. “Though you two have worked admirably to maintain your romantic connection over the course of the last year, a long-distance marriage is quite different than a long-distance relationship.”
Phoenix considers the question, then says, “Well, first of all, he hasn’t even said yes yet, so that’s kinda premature—”
“He will say yes.”
The certainty in Franziska’s voice takes Phoenix off guard. It’s one thing for Maya to encourage him with determined romanticism, but Franziska von Karma looking him dead in the eye with genuine conviction and telling him that? “Wait—wh-what?” he stammers, his heart flipping over.
“He will say yes,” Franziska repeats with a touch of exasperation, as though somehow Phoenix is the one who’s being ridiculous here. “I know my little brother, and he loves no one so much as he loves you. He has wanted to marry you since we were children. He will say yes.”
“Since you were what now?”
“Do you not know what children are, Phoenix Wright?” says Franziska condescendingly.
“No, I just—I—I wasn’t expecting you to say he’d want to marry me,” Phoenix stammers. “I don’t know what I thought you’d say, to be totally honest.”
Franziska’s entire face softens. It is somehow five times as scary as when she brings out her whip. “Phoenix Wright,” she says, in a tone of voice that’s almost gentle—at least for Franziska. “My little brother has loved you since the day he touched back down in America. I have it on excellent authority that he will say yes.”
“O-okay, well—”
Briskly, Franziska says, “Which means that you are dodging my question. How do you propose to work within the distance?”
Talking to Franziska sometimes feels like playing a game of table tennis where the other person is really just repeatedly hitting Ping-Pong balls at you hard enough to hurt. “Uh, um, the—” Phoenix stammers before he finally manages to gather his thoughts. “I feel like that’s something we’ll have to talk about,” he says truthfully. “But I’m a flexible enough lawyer; I can move to Germany and figure out something to do with myself here if Miles doesn’t feel like moving back to California. And if Miles does feel like moving back to California, then he can. It’s not like it’s all-or-nothing with me, you know?”
Something in Franziska’s face relaxes. Crisply, she says, “You have it.”
“Um, what?”
“What you came here to request,” says Franziska. “My blessing. You have it.”
It slowly begins to register with Phoenix that proposing to Miles Edgeworth is a thing that’s really happening. A small, stunned smile flits across his face. “Oh yeah?”
“You two are…good for each other.” Franziska very nearly smiles. “You have my blessing.”
2026
The Wrights set up shop in baggage claim, right next to the luggage of a whole bunch of people coming in from Germany. As a suitcase the same color as Trucy’s cape rounds the carousel, she jumps up with a delighted laugh, sprinting over to tug it down to the ground.
“Trucy!” Apollo calls, alarmed. “You can’t just—”
“It’s not stealing if it’s her papa’s,” says Mr. Wright, who’s turning a sparkly silver ring over and over on his left ring finger.
Though Apollo’s bracelet doesn’t tighten—which is good, because he doesn’t think he can handle his boss tacitly endorsing his daughter’s potential life of crime—the motion catches his eye regardless, and he realizes that he’s never seen Mr. Wright wearing that ring before. The finger upon which the ring in question sparkles is traditionally where a wedding ring’s placed, too, which is also strange, because Apollo’s almost one hundred percent certain that Mr. Wright’s not married. All those jokes from Trucy about Mr. Wright finding her a “new mommy” don’t seem like something she’d do if they both already had a Mrs. Wright in mind. “Mr. Wright—” he begins.
Mr. Wright looks towards Apollo like he already knows what he’s thinking. Honestly, he probably does. “All in due time, Apollo,” he says again, then goes back to looking towards baggage claim.
And then Apollo catches sight of the man heading towards them and his jaw drops.
Apollo followed Phoenix Wright’s trials pretty religiously back in high school, and part of that was because of State v. Edgeworth. He pretty much decided to go to law school because of State v. Edgeworth. The Demon Prosecutor, son of a famed defense attorney, groomed and manipulated into being framed for a murder he didn’t commit? The whole sordid scheme orchestrated by the man who really did kill his father? It’s the kind of crazy soap opera stuff you eventually get used to hearing about in tandem with Phoenix Wright’s name, but it was the first case of Mr. Wright’s that really caught Apollo’s attention.
It was largely because he’d paid special attention to the little things about that case, bitten-off pieces of transcript and testimony almost deemed unimportant. Witness accounts of Wright gripping Edgeworth’s elbow ever so briefly before the grim, foreboding man was dragged off to the defendant’s chair. Legal experts talking about how every other defense attorney was counting Edgeworth’s defeat as a win—one less morally bankrupt prosecutor winning trials by any means necessary—but Phoenix Wright’s intervention and steadfast belief in his client led to Edgeworth becoming one of the most well-renowned prosecutors in the country. And not for being a demon, either.
Miles Edgeworth, Apollo realizes, and suddenly everything does make sense, just like Mr. Wright said it would. Miles Edgeworth, the one who cropped up over and over in records of Mr. Wright’s earliest cases—the one who returned from a strange absence only to face Mr. Wright again in court and win. Miles Edgeworth, the one who—Apollo’s noticing it now—is wearing a travel coat that’s the exact same color as Trucy’s new magician’s costume.
“PAPA!” Trucy screams at the top of her lungs, so loudly that Apollo can hear it even from far away. Half the airport turns to stare, but Mr. Edgeworth’s attention is only on Trucy—and Apollo’s heart jumps, because Trucy is in tears. “PAPA,” she yells again, and runs half-blind at Mr. Edgeworth, letting the suitcase fall to the ground as she flings herself violently in his direction. Mr. Edgeworth is sobbing just as viscerally as he wraps Trucy up in his arms.
Apollo hears Mr. Wright’s jerky intake of breath as he watches the two embrace. Turning to look up at his boss, he sees tears in Mr. Wright’s eyes as well. “Fuck me,” Mr. Wright whispers. “I didn’t think we’d ever get here. Jesus.”
“M-Mr. Wright?”
Mr. Wright turns to Apollo, a wobbly smile on his face. “That’s—that’s my fiancé,” he said. “Secret fiancé. Miles Edgeworth. Trucy’s other papa.”
“B-but—” Apollo has no idea how to respond to this.
“Kristoph would have hurt Miles,” says Mr. Wright. “Disbarred him. Exploited him. Left a black mark on his reputation that might have made it impossible for us to adopt Trucy. There was nothing that could be done for me by the time we figured out Kristoph’s game, but—” He swallows, his smile growing into that same bizarre beacon of joy that looks so strange on cynically-cheerful Mr. Wright. “But Trucy and I could protect Miles. Keep his role in our lives a secret, even if his continued association with us wasn’t.”
“He’s—your—” Apollo has no idea how to respond to this.
“He’s mine,” says Mr. Wright, and this seems to be what finally propels him into action. Trucy and Mr. Edgeworth are still hugging and crying like they haven’t seen each other in years—maybe they haven’t, Apollo realizes—and Mr. Wright all but runs to meet them, wrapping the both of them up in a hug of his own.
“POLLY!” Trucy yells. It’s so strange to hear Trucy yell like that. Usually she’s right at his elbow, speaking at normal volume in her usual happy chirp. “COME OVER HERE!”
Apollo wavers. “SOMEONE NEEDS TO WATCH THE BAGS,” he yells back, then winces. That’s such a stupid excuse.
And then Mr. Wright pulls back a little from the hug to look directly at Apollo. Wordlessly, he beckons him over.
Apollo takes a few hesitant steps forward, then a few more, until he’s standing right next to the hugging family. Up close, he can see that Mr. Edgeworth looks a lot different from the old photos taken during State v. Edgeworth—his face is softer, even tear-streaked as it is, and he’s wearing glasses. A ring similar to Mr. Wright’s adorns his left ring finger.
He fits, Apollo realizes. He’s the missing piece of this puzzle. He’s the reason why Mr. Wright floats aimlessly around the office and Trucy refuses to talk about her feelings and neither of them ever talk about anything that isn’t solving the case or getting to work on the Gavin conspiracy. He’s the reason why Mr. Wright’s clean-shaven today, why Trucy’s crying and crying and doesn’t seem to be able to stop—Miles Edgeworth is the final part of Trucy and Mr. Wright’s happy little family.
“I am so,” Apollo has to swallow, a lump in his throat, “so, so—” uh oh, here it comes, “—h-happy—”
Mr. Edgeworth gives Apollo this kind of wryly amused smile before turning back to stroking a sobbing Trucy’s hair. Trucy, who would usually sweetly encourage Apollo not to cry, is too busy bawling into her papa’s weird ruffly cravat thing to even notice that Apollo’s crying. But Mr. Wright looks up, and then—in an act of grace so thoroughly unlike the Mr. Wright that Apollo has gotten to know—tugs on Apollo’s elbow until he’s smack-dab in the middle of the family hug. Apollo, self-consciousness outweighed by emotions, tries his best to hug everyone before realizing that he’s doing a kind of awful job and should maybe probably stop.
Somehow, at the end, he ends up hugging Mr. Wright. Which…isn’t as bad as he expected it to be, actually, because Mr. Wright hugs him back and says, very gruffly, “You did good, kid,” in a way that feels a thousand times more real than anything Mr. Gavin has ever said to him. And then Mr. Wright pulls back, dusts off Apollo’s shoulders, and looks him in the eye to say, “I haven’t been at my best, Apollo, but I can promise you that things are going to get better from here on out.”
“You gave me forged evidence,” says Apollo. It’s probably not the best time to bring it up, but he feels like maybe this version of Mr. Wright might understand why that’s a fundamentally fucked-up thing to do. “Can we talk about that a little bit before you start talking about how things will be better?”
“Phoenix,” says Mr. Edgeworth behind him, reproving and exhausted all in one. Apollo notes with some surprise that Mr. Wright looks uncharacteristically chagrined. “I understand the gravity of the situation—”
“He was going to get away,” says Mr. Wright, but his voice sounds a little shaky. He doesn’t look quite as convinced as he did when Mr. Edgeworth was on the other side of the Atlantic. “He wasn’t going to be as messy as this next time, and I wasn’t going to wait any longer to catch him.”
And now that Apollo knows Mr. Gavin, has seen him rabid and unhinged on the witness stand, he thinks he understands what was at stake. But because it needs saying, he turns to Mr. Wright again and says, “You could have told me, you know. Worked with me.”
Mr. Wright swallows. Nods. “Yeah,” he says. “But I can promise you I’ll never make the mistake of not trusting you again, Apollo. Especially considering—” He catches himself, smiling a little nervously. “Well.”
“Considering?” prompts Apollo.
“Not in the middle of the godforsaken airport, Phoenix,” says Mr. Edgeworth. Trucy, whose sobs have finally slowed, is clinging to him like a limpet, hat askew, face still buried in his ruffles. “I am exhausted. Can we all go home and talk about it there?”
Trucy snuffles, raising her head. “Papa,” she says in this tiny little voice, “you’re never going to leave again, right? Never, right?”
Mr. Edgeworth tilts Trucy’s chin up with his finger. Eyes on hers, he says, “Darling, I am never going to leave you again. Auntie Franzi is going to send all of my things in from Germany, you and your father are going to pack up all of your things, and we are going to move to my lovely house downtown with plenty of room for you to do all of the magic tricks that you want. And I am never—” he kisses the top of her head, and only Apollo’s heightened senses manage to pick up on how badly the man’s hands are shaking, “—I am never going to leave you again. Not for a second.”
Apollo is half-expecting Trucy to start crying again, and is therefore a little startled when she simply lets out a long breath and settles herself more closely into Mr. Edgeworth’s arms. Mr. Edgeworth lets out this little sobbing laugh, burying his face in Trucy’s hair. Feeling oddly like he should be intruding, Apollo turns to Mr. Wright and says as politely as he can, “Mr. Wright, not that I don’t appreciate being invited, but don’t you want this to be more of a family-only kind of gathering?”
“We-ell,” says Mr. Wright, dragging out the words, but then Mr. Edgeworth says very loudly, “FOR ONCE IN YOUR LIFE, PHOENIX WRIGHT, HOLD YOUR TONGUE,” which pretty effectively shuts him up.
“O-kay,” says Apollo, sneaking another look at Trucy. Usually Trucy’s very busy making sure that everyone in the room is sufficiently entertained—a fact that he hadn’t entirely realized until now, seeing her curled contentedly in her other papa’s arms. “Trucy?”
Trucy raises her head and gives Apollo a wobbly smile. “Polly, this is my papa!” she says, her voice a little shaky. “I met him when I was eight, and Daddy said I could call him Papa if I wanted to, and of course I wanted to, because who wouldn’t.” (Mr. Edgeworth smiles.) “He’s been living in Germany for the last seven years, and usually he makes monthly visits, but for the last year he hasn’t been able to visit at all. Mr. Gavin started keeping tabs on us more than usual about a year ago, seeing as my first daddy could resurface at any time, so—” Her smile trembles. “So I haven’t seen Papa for real since then. We couldn’t even do video calls—we got one phone call a month on Daddy’s old brick of a phone and that was it.”
Suddenly, the intensity of this reunion makes a lot more sense. “I’m…so glad,” says Apollo. He’s a little overwhelmed too, to be honest, but he thinks it’s understandable. “For both of you. For all of you. I can’t even imagine how hard these last seven years must have been.”
“They were certainly…taxing,” Mr. Edgeworth agrees.
“And speaking of taxing,” says Mr. Wright. “Can we get a taxi? There’s one more thing we have to do before we go home.”
Trucy’s eyes light up. “Do you mean—”
“I did say it was going to happen as soon as I got back,” says Mr. Edgeworth. “We’ve been waiting long enough.”
“Too damn long,” says Mr. Wright, and a look passes between him and Mr. Edgeworth that makes Apollo feel very much like he’s intruding. “We ready to roll?”
“To where?” says Apollo.
“All in due—”
“OKAY FINE I GET IT,” yells Apollo, which makes Trucy start laughing.
2019
“Miles?”
Miles looks up from his papers. The shock quickly dissolves into a kind of incandescent happiness. “Phoenix darling,” he says, all but leaping up from his desk to hurry across the office and take Phoenix’s hands in his. Tenderly, he kisses him, pulling back to more closely examine Phoenix’s face. “What on earth are you doing here? You look well-rested enough, have you been here long? Do you want tea, or—”
Being in love with Miles Edgeworth has been a part of Phoenix’s life for a very long time, but having Miles Edgeworth be so visibly and publicly in love with him is something that might never lose its novelty. “No tea, just you,” says Phoenix, and kisses him again. “I came here to surprise you, if that’s not too—”
“Oh, it’s not too anything,” says Miles happily, bumping their foreheads together. “I have missed you! I was expecting to see you a few weeks from now, and this is much better than that.”
“God, you’re so happy to see me,” Phoenix observes aloud, a little startled by it.
“Well, that’s—” Miles blushes, grinning in a strangely furtive way. “I suppose I’ve had you on my mind, these last few days.”
“As opposed to the other days, when I’m not on your mind?”
“You’re always on my mind.”
“What’s gotten into you?” Phoenix says with a surprised laugh. “Not that I mind—”
Miles kisses him again, draping his arms around Phoenix’s neck. “Walk with me,” he says when he pulls away. “I’m on my break anyway, and there’s a lovely bit of countryside just a car ride away.”
“Oh yeah?”
“Yes,” says Miles. “There’s something I want to ask you.”
2026
The taxi pulls up outside City Hall. “Just one quick stop,” says Mr. Wright to the driver. “Trucy, you can stay in the car if you want, we’ll just—”
“Oh no,” says Trucy, who clearly also knows what’s going on, because of course she does. “No no no. You two are not going in there without me.”
“Trucy, no one said we’re going in without you—” Mr. Edgeworth begins, clearly surprised.
Trucy, however, has already gotten started on her tirade, and doesn’t seem to notice that it isn’t actually necessary. “I’m your daughter!” she informs her confused fathers. “I know you want this to happen as fast as possible, but you know that I’m a part of this too!”
A suspicion is beginning to take root in Apollo’s brain. The way Mr. Wright is fiddling semi-obsessively with his ring, the way Mr. Edgeworth is sliding his ring a millimeter up his finger and then pushing it a millimeter down, the way an unusually emotional Trucy is pressing them to let her go with them—
“I think she should go with you guys,” he says carefully, certain that he’s making the right choice. “If you’re getting married, she should be there, right?”
Mr. Edgeworth looks genuinely startled. “How did you—”
“It’s a Gramarye thing,” says Mr. Wright, and then winces. Apollo’s bracelet tightens. “Goddamn it—”
“A Gramarye thing?” Trucy echoes, eyes widening. “Why would Apollo have a Gramarye thing?”
Even his newfound talent isn’t enough to piece this one together. “Why would I have a Gramarye thing?” Apollo asks, more curious than accusing.
Mr. Edgeworth gives Mr. Wright this exhausted look, then says, “You know what, you tell them. I’m going to go get the suitcases out of the back, because clearly this entire affair is going to take a bit longer than just a quick stop.”
“Daddy,” Trucy persists. “Why would Apollo have a Gramarye thing?”
As Mr. Edgeworth and the taxi driver get out of the car to deal with Mr. Edgeworth’s suitcases, Mr. Wright hesitates—not guiltily, just like he’s trying to figure out how to phrase what he’s about to tell them. Then he says, “Truce, you know how you asked me why I wanted Apollo to come with us to the airport and I said I’d tell both of you later? This is later.”
So Trucy didn’t know why he was there either. Bemused, Apollo files this intriguing information away.
Now Mr. Wright is starting to look a little guilty. “Trucy—Apollo—your mother contacted me,” he says. “Relatively recently. She asked me to keep her identity a secret, and I think I do need to respect her wishes, but I do feel like I at least need to tell you that she’s alive.”
Something about that sentence doesn’t make sense. “Both of us with only one mother between us?” says Apollo somewhat pedantically. “Mr. Wright, that makes it sound like Trucy and I are—” And then the penny drops, and he jerks his head up to look at Mr. Wright.
Mr. Wright is smiling. Not his usual flatly knowing smile, but a nervous, hopeful little grin.
Trucy is staring at Apollo like she’s seeing him for the first time. “Apollo,” she says in a small voice, and tugs at his bracelet, slipping her fingers underneath to press them against the cool metal. “Apollo, my mommy—my mother—” She’s beginning to sniffle. “I didn’t remember ‘till just now, Polly, you gotta believe me, but she had a bracelet just like yours.”
Apollo is face-to-face with his little sister. He doesn’t need Mr. Wright to confirm it with more explicit words, doesn’t need to spend hours trying to figure it out, he just knows that Trucy Wright is his little sister. Without a word, he unbuckles his seatbelt, lurching forward to pull Trucy into a fierce, almost bruising hug. She squeaks, then hugs him back, letting out a teary laugh as she wraps her arms around his neck. “Polly!” she whispers, and it’s different now, because for the first time in his entire life Apollo Justice has a little sister.
He thinks that they’re both crying again. Whoops.
“How did it go?” asks Mr. Edgeworth quietly in the background.
“Good, I think,” says Mr. Wright. “Pretty good. We’re gonna have to bring our kids in when we get married, huh?”
That gets Apollo’s attention. “Our kids?” he repeats, fixing Mr. Edgeworth and Mr. Wright with a reproving stare over Trucy’s shoulder. “Plural? Mr. Wright, Mr. Edgeworth, I will have you know that I’m a twenty-three year old defense attorney in the state of California and am in no way a child! If anything, the child in this car is the guy who doodled all over my legal briefs that one time I left them out on the desk! And for that matter—”
And then the penny drops again. This isn’t just any old agency outing—this is Mr. Wright piecing his family together. This is Mr. Wright inviting Apollo into that big, warm family hug so that all of them can cry together. Mr. Wright isn’t exactly good at what he does—hasn’t been, these last few months Apollo’s worked for him—but for the first time, Apollo is starting to feel a little bit like maybe Mr. Wright wants to get better at this kind of thing.
“TH-THANK YOU FOR INVITING ME TO THE WEDDING, MR. WRIGHT!” says Apollo a little more loudly (and tearfully) than he’d meant to. “I PROMISE THAT I WON’T LET YOU DOWN!”
“Duly noted,” says Mr. Wright. He and Mr. Edgeworth are both smiling. “You kids gonna get out of the car now or what? This thing’s been seven years in the making and I think it’s killing me not to be married to this man.”
Trucy sniffles, giggling again. “They’ve been planning this since I was ten,” she says. “Papa said that the first thing he was going to do when he touched down for good was make an honest man of Daddy. I didn’t really think they were going to do it!”
“When have I not followed through?” says Mr. Edgeworth. He raises a blushing Mr. Wright’s hand to his lips, pressing a kiss to the knuckles.
2019
It’s just barely spring, so the countryside is still a little frozen over in places. Even wrapped up in Miles’s extra winter jacket, Phoenix can’t help but shiver—he’s more used to the comfortably dry California heat, after all. Miles, however, seems positively chipper in a way that seems entirely out of place in this kind of chill, holding Phoenix’s bare hand in his gloved one to keep it just that much warmer. “It’s a bit prettier closer to April,” he informs Phoenix. “Loveliest in the summertime, though. The flowers blooming, the sun shining down—”
“Miles, what is up with you?” says Phoenix with an incredulous laugh.
Miles turns to Phoenix with a bright, shy smile. “You’ll have to excuse me,” he says. “It’s simply that I promised myself that the next time we saw each other, I would ask you to marry me, and this bit of countryside seemed the perfect place to do it.”
The laugh freezes in Phoenix’s throat. Actually, Phoenix himself freezes in place, staring at Miles with a stunned smile. Weakly, he says, “Come again?”
With his free hand, Miles pulls out a ring—god, Phoenix, you dumbass, you forgot to buy a RING of all things—and gets down on one knee in the melting snow, looking up at Phoenix as though he’s some kind of fairytale prince. “Phoenix Wright,” he says. “You are the best man that I have ever known. You are determined, loyal, and you have the rare but gorgeously important capacity to see good in even the worst of humanity. It’s because of you that I no longer count myself in that undeserving number.”
Oh, this is not how Phoenix saw this walk going.
“Forgive me for using such dreadfully overblown clichés,” Miles continues steadily, a nervous certainty in his eyes, “but you are everything to me, and I cannot imagine what my life would look like without you by my side. I do not want to imagine it. Ever.” He squeezes Phoenix’s hand a little as if to steady himself, and then says, “Phoenix, will you—”
Surprising both of them, Phoenix bursts into tears.
“—oh darling!” says Miles, somehow understanding why Phoenix is crying even though Phoenix himself really doesn’t, and jumps up from the snow, pulling Phoenix into a fierce hug. With a tearful laugh, Phoenix hugs him back, burying his face in Miles’s scarf. “Oh, I didn’t mean to make you cry!” Miles strokes his hair. “I simply mean to express that I want to marry you. Quite badly, as it happens.”
Phoenix begins sobbing more.
“Yes, I suppose I should have expected this,” says Miles with a soft laugh.
Still in tears, Phoenix pulls back to look at the man who is going to be his husband. Without a word, he tugs the ring carefully from Miles’s hand, letting Miles help him put it on his finger.
Miles doesn’t look too surprised. “Is that a yes, then?”
“Yes,” says Phoenix breathlessly. “Yes, yes, I will marry you yes—”
Miles’s effortlessly calm veneer vanishes in the blink of an eye. Letting out a sobbing laugh of his own, he grabs Phoenix’s face and presses a series of fervent kisses to his mouth. “My Phoenix,” he’s saying, practically in tears, “and I’m yours, and you’re mine—”
Phoenix laughs and cries and kisses him again. Trust Miles to beat him to the punch.
2026
Mr. Wright and Mr. Edgeworth seem almost frustrated at the length of the boiler-plate ceremony. The justice of the peace seems a little bewildered by the impatient grooms, and Apollo can’t blame her; they seem a little more like they’re waiting for a deli order than vowing to love each other till death do they part. When the justice tries to add something a little more romantic—some extra “cherish” somewhere, Apollo honestly can’t keep track—Mr. Edgeworth says very loudly, “Madam, that is NOT in the SCRIPT,” and Trucy buries her face in her hands with a little teenage groan that very clearly communicates oh my god, my dads are so embarrassing.
But then the justice says, “I now pronounce you husband and husband,” and Mr. Wright lets out this little sobbing scream and throws himself at Mr. Edgeworth, literally knocking his husband to the floor in his determined fervor to kiss every inch of Mr. Edgeworth’s face.
“Oh my GOD,” yelps Apollo, covering Trucy’s eyes with his hands on instinct before fiercely squeezing his own eyes shut. “WHY.”
“DADDY AND PAPA, PLEASE GET OFF THE FLOOR,” says Trucy at the top of her lungs. She sounds like she’s done this a whole lot. “DON’T GET US BANNED FROM CITY HALL. WE’RE ALREADY NOT ALLOWED BACK AT MY FAVORITE STARBUCKS IN GERMANY.”
“—been waiting literally twenty-five years for this, I love you so much—” Mr. Wright sounds like he is actually crying. Apollo has literally never heard Mr. Wright babble like this before, and opens his eyes to get a better look. This is a mistake. This is definitely a mistake. “God, you’re my husband, you’re my husband and we have kids and you’re going to be in the same country as me and we’re not gonna be living on borrowed goddamn time and I love you—”
Lowering his hands from Trucy’s eyes, Apollo makes exhausted eye contact with the justice of the peace, whose face is actually beginning to soften a little as she watches Mr. Edgeworth pull himself awkwardly up to a sitting position and lean against a wall. (Mr. Wright has attached himself to Mr. Edgeworth like an octopus.) He kind of thinks that being one of Mr. Wright’s kids might end up being more trouble than it’s worth. “Mr. Wright,” he says, “if I’m your kid, does that mean that you’re going to give me an actual regular paycheck?”
Mr. Edgeworth places a hand on Mr. Wright’s chest and fixes Mr. Wright with a truly terrifying look. “Phoenix,” he says. “Is Apollo saying that you haven’t been paying him?”
“Look, I’m working on it,” says Mr. Wright. “Now that I’m not running myself into the ground trying to get Kristoph behind bars—and now that I’m back to running the agency like an actually normal human being, y’know, with work clothes and everything—I think I could end up being an actually okay boss.”
“I hope to God you’re an ‘actually okay’ husband,” says Mr. Edgeworth. “Please get off my lap so I can call an Uber.”
Apollo genuinely has no idea how Mr. Wright ended up with someone as sensible and levelheaded as Mr. Edgeworth, and accidentally says this out loud. This sends Trucy into a fit of laughter, inspires Mr. Wright to grin hugely and say that he has no idea how Mr. Edgeworth puts up with him but he thanks his lucky star every day, and elicits this wry, happy little smile from Mr. Wright’s husband, who doesn’t seem to mind that Mr. Wright very clearly has no intention of getting off his lap. “I really will have to keep an eye on the agency,” Mr. Edgeworth informs Apollo, even though this wasn’t what they were talking about. “I at least can promise you a steady paycheck and a less deranged work day.”
“Maybe I’ll quit and become a prosecutor,” says Apollo.
“Oooh, you could spend some quality time with Prosecutor Gavin!” singsongs Trucy.
“HAVE YOU BEEN READING MY PRIVATE TEXTS???” demands Apollo, realizes that he has inadvertently incriminated himself, and goes scarlet.
“What’s this about you and Prosecutor Gavin, Apollo?” says Mr. Wright with interest. “Do I need to give him the shovel talk?”
“You are in no way qualified to give a shovel talk,” says Mr. Edgeworth. “Klavier Gavin is two inches taller than you and he works out frequently.”
“Yeah, if those abs are any indication,” Trucy agrees.
“Please stop talking about Prosecutor Gavin’s abs,” Apollo begs them. “Please.”
“No, this is exactly what I wanted to be talking about on my wedding day,” says Mr. Wright seriously. “Down to the letter.” And as if to punctuate his statement, he drapes his arms around Mr. Edgeworth’s neck and kisses him on the cheek. “Twenty-five years of fighting tooth and nail to keep you,” he says, soft and low, and Apollo probably wasn’t supposed to hear this part but he can’t help picking up on it anyway. “Worth every damn second.”
“Sentimental idiot,” says Mr. Edgeworth, and bumps his nose companionably against his husband’s. “If it had been up to me, you’d never have had to fight a day in your life.”
“It was up to you, you asshole, you weren’t answering my letters—”
“You know what I mean, Phoenix.”
And judging by the soft smile that spreads across Mr. Wright’s face at that, Apollo gets the sense that Mr. Wright absolutely does.
2027
The wedding—the real one, the one with guests and decorations and a scarily childish spirit medium officiating—takes place in the spring, in the Kurain mountains, with Mr. Wright in a blue-and-white tux and Mr. Edgeworth in a black-and-red suit complete with that weird frilly ruffle thing. Trucy says it’s a jabot, and some cursory Google searches do seem to support this hypothesis, but Apollo can’t help but be suspicious of any information given to him by Trucy. Tricky little sisters are not the most trustworthy source.
There are a lot of people at this reception that Apollo doesn’t know—but there are also people he does. Like Ema, who’s apparently really close with Mr. Edgeworth—and wow is it weird to see her fangirling over Mr. Wright and his husband like they singlehandedly invented romance. Not that she’s wrong, just that Apollo never imagined Ema as the fangirling type—though he will definitely concede that Mr. Wright and Mr. Edgeworth are a pretty stunningly romantic love story.
There’s also Wocky Kitaki, whose family’s bakery is apparently responsible for the delicious-looking wedding cake that Apollo picked up last week. Trucy was the one who invited him, saying cheerfully that he “adds a little spice to every social gathering, Polly!” This seems to be a literal interpretation of the situation, because Wocky has brought an actual spice rack and has forcibly sat a handful of guests down to explain—in detail—the Kitaki Spice Theory. Whatever the hell that is.
Vera Misham was invited by Mr. Wright, and right now, she’s drawing portraits of interested guests along with another artistically gifted friend of the happy couple. Larry Something-Or-Other seems extremely impressed by her talent, and Apollo’s Gramarye gift catches him mimicking the way she holds her brush more than once. He can’t blame the guy. Vera was talented enough to bring down the Turnabout Terror at twelve; at nineteen, she’s a total powerhouse.
And then there’s Klavier.
“Schatz, how is my hair?” says Klavier somewhat anxiously.
“For the fifth time, it’s fine,” says Apollo, catching Klavier’s hands in his to steady them. “Stop freaking out. Unless I really missed a memo, you’re not the one getting married, right?”
“Ja, ja, but this is still—” Klavier attempts to jerk his hands free, remembers belatedly that Apollo is still holding them, and lets out an embarrassed laugh. Even as stressed as he is, it’s clear he’s still trying to lighten the mood. “There really is no appropriate way to attend the wedding of the man whose life you ruined, Forehead. I feel as though you should have picked another plus-one.”
“Oh, god, don’t make me say it,” mutters Apollo.
“Was?”
“I,” Apollo forces it out, “like spending time with you, okay?”
“—!!” says Klavier, the polished smile dissipating. He looks like he’s seen some kind of miracle in action.
“Keep it up, kids, and you might be married in the next twenty years,” says Mr. Wright as he comes up to them, his husband on his arm.
“Ooooh, Polly,” sings Trucy from behind her parents. “Do you li-ike Prosecutor Gavin?”
“I just said that,” says Apollo, turning almost as red as his courtroom suit. He feels glad that he’s wearing a tux; crimson from head to toe is not the look he’s going for. “Stop teasing me—”
“Play nice with your sister, Apollo,” says Mr. Wright in an annoyingly dadlike kind of way.
“Yeah, Polly. Play nice with me.”
Helplessly, Apollo looks to Klavier, hoping that Klavier will somehow either distract the Wrights or distract him. Klavier, however, seems to be mouthing “married” to himself with a very big smile on his face. “Oh, nice going, you broke him,” says Apollo to Mr. Wright. “Really great. What am I supposed to do now?”
“I don’t know,” says Mr. Wright, gesturing exaggeratedly around at the guests and the music. “Dance? Sing? Talk to someone that isn’t your prosecutor boyfriend?”
“Phoenix, from what I remember, you spent those parties in Germany glued to my side,” says Mr. Edgeworth innocently, raising a hand to straighten his glasses. The new golden band on his ring finger sparkles in the Kurain sunlight. “Is it really fair of you to chastise Apollo for following your example?”
“Okay, that’s a low blow,” says Mr. Wright with an easy grin, turning to drape his arms around Mr. Edgeworth’s neck. Mr. Edgeworth smiles languidly, twining his arms around his husband’s waist. “I mean, c’mon, no one there spoke English—”
“Franzi did.”
“Excuse me if I don’t want to be whipped on my time off—”
“Your time off from what? You were disbarred!”
“I was working on taking Gavin down from the inside, you know that—”
Mr. Edgeworth closes the distance between Mr. Wright—which, during their argument, had grown smaller and smaller—with a tender kiss. Apollo waits patiently for them to pull away. They don’t. “Um, Mr. Wright?” he tries. “Mr. Edgeworth? You guys know we’re still here, right?”
“Aww, give them a break, Polly,” says Trucy, who’s watching her parents kiss with stars in her eyes. “It’s their wedding day! Don’t you think it’s kinda romantic?”
“When we get married,” says Klavier, whose attention very clearly left the conversation after Mr. Wright’s little quip, “I will want a Vegas wedding. No—Milan.”
Trucy snickers. Mr. Edgeworth, however, pulls away from the kiss to study Klavier and Apollo with a fond little smile. “Don’t waste time, you two,” he says. “Lovely as the drawn-out romance may be, I can definitively say that my life would have been a lot simpler had I come to terms with my feelings a bit sooner.”
“I don’t know,” says Mr. Wright. “I kinda like that I had to fight to keep you. Makes me feel like some kind of knight in shining armor.”
“My knight in shining armor,” says Mr. Edgeworth, practically sighing it, and rests his cheek against Mr. Wright’s just as a slow song starts up.
Did they time that? Whatever. Turning to Klavier, Apollo has to grin a little; the guy looks a lot less like a poised yet flirtatious rock star when he’s very clearly thinking about holy matrimony. Don’t waste time? Got it. “Hey, Klavier,” he says. “Do you want to dance with me?”
Entirely startled by the question, Klavier answers in breathless German. Whatever he says makes Mr. Edgeworth choke on a giggle and bury his face in Mr. Wright’s shoulder. “Hey, honey, what did he say?” says Mr. Wright, his own voice bubbling over with anticipatory laughter. “C’mon, you have to tell me, we’re married. What’s mine is yours, remember?”
"W-willst du mich heiraten?" chokes out a laughing Mr. Edgeworth.
"Okay, I know that one. Miles, we literally just got married, you don't need to ask again—"
“U-um,” says Klavier, uncharacteristically flustered. “That is—I admire you greatly, Herr Justice. I hope you know that.”
“O-kay,” says Apollo, bemused. “But that still doesn’t answer my question.”
“Oh wow, this really is like us when we were first starting out,” says Mr. Wright admiringly. “Miles, do you remember that one time after the trial, by the vending machine—”
“—yes,” says Mr. Edgeworth idly, “when you bought two candy bars by accident and I just happened to be coming out—”
“—and I ran up to you, like, sprinted, and shoved them into your hands—”
“—and you said—”
“—sweets for the sweet!” finishes Mr. Wright with a helpless laugh. “God, it’s a rollercoaster when you’re young and in love.”
“Okay, pump the brakes,” says Apollo, heat rising in his cheeks again. “We are not—”
But the newlyweds don’t seem to be paying a lot of attention to them at all. “Do you miss that?” says Mr. Edgeworth, in a way that suggests that he already knows the answer. “Being young and in love?”
Without hesitation, Mr. Wright shakes his hand. “Even back then, all I wanted was this,” he says simply.
“Oh?”
“Yes. Wanna go cut a rug?”
“When you call it that, I absolutely do not,” says Mr. Edgeworth, but his steely demeanor lasts less than half a second. He’s laughing again as Mr. Wright pulls him joyfully towards the dance floor, the tails of his long coat flying out as a fast song starts up.
“I’ll leave you lovebirds to it!” chirps Trucy, already on her parents’ heels.
Apollo turns to Klavier, who has a funny little grin on his face. “Mein Bruder would have hated this,” he says, almost to himself. “Seeing them so happy…he never did like things that were so uncomplicatedly loving and good.”
“Like you?” says Apollo before he can really think about it.
Klavier blinks, a soft blush rising to his cheeks.
“Like you,” says Apollo a little more decisively.
Ducking his head, Klavier smiles. “You…are like no one I have ever met, Apollo Justice,” he says simply.
“Likewise, Klavier Gavin,” says Apollo, and as Klavier takes his hands, he finds himself grinning too.
2031
Years later, Apollo will go back and watch the wedding tape, fast-forwarding until he reaches his very favorite part. Just after he and Klavier stumble by the camera, still finding their footing as a fast song plays, Mr. Wright and Mr. Edgeworth take center stage. Mr. Wright is leading for half of the dance, Mr. Edgeworth for the other half—paradoxically, perfectly in sync—and as the song winds down, Mr. Edgeworth dips Mr. Wright and pulls him in for a perfectly graceful kiss. Mr. Edgeworth’s attempt at romance does not account for Mr. Wright yanking him down to kiss him harder, sending them both tumbling to the floor in a laughing heap.
Apollo will press pause exactly when the camera angle changes to a close-up shot of the grooms—both of them still shaking with giggles as their laughing daughter runs to help them—and remember again the first time he witnessed what it looked like when the Wright-Edgeworth family was really, genuinely happy.