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A young man who dreamed of changing the world and making something of himself set out on a journey from his parents' home in Mint Hill to a faraway country on the west coast of Africa.
He was 27 and, while high school and college friends had settled into marriage and fatherhood and professions, Aaron Forbes was still searching.
Now he was off to join the Peace Corps in a sliver of a country called Benin, where he hoped to do some good.
The experience, he also thought, might teach him leadership and management skills, perhaps help him figure out his way in the world. He never imagined he would fall in love so far from home and finally want to settle down.
He said goodbye to his family and flew to Benin in July 2007.
He traveled by bush taxi on red clay roads to the farming community of Agbangnizoun, where he would spend the next two years. The villagers welcomed him.
Aaron felt a connection. Thousands of Africans were shipped from Benin beginning in the 18th century to work as slaves in Louisiana, where he once lived. He was familiar with their culture - their music, food, the voodoo. And he could speak a little French, which most people there speak.
But during his entire stay, he said he remained an outsider, blond-haired, blue-eyed, in a country of dark skins.
"Yovo," the adults called him in their Fongbe language - "Foreigner."
Big brother Aaron
He lived in a small concrete block house and worked in a home for children who had been rescued from child-trafficking rings, forced marriages and malnutrition.
He spent much of each day in the fields, tending plants and animals, and he taught the children about ways to farm without hurting the environment.
His first year passed quietly. Other than an occasional trip south to the capital city of Cotonou, Aaron was content to remain in the village and be with the children. He played soccer with them, and taught them to play baseball.
"Fofo Aaron," they called him - "Big brother Aaron."
He decided he would travel through the rest of Africa and Europe after he finished his two years with the Peace Corps. While some volunteers were eager to return to the States, Aaron still had a bit of wanderlust in him.
After all, he had no reason to settle down.
Aaron falls in love
Then one weekend in May 2008, Aaron met someone.
He went with his American friend David to a festival at the beach town of Grand Popo. They were eating at a restaurant, waiting for David's date to arrive, when Aaron commented on their waitress.
She's pretty.
Why don't you ask her out? David suggested.
I will.
Five minutes passed. When are you going to ask her? Ten minutes. When? Fifteen. You better ask her!
When she brought the bill, before Aaron could say anything, David invited the woman to join them. Nadege was her name. She was 29 and had a beautiful smile. She agreed to go if she could bring along her older sister. And so they all went out for drinks.
She told Aaron she just happened to be in Grand Popo, helping at her cousin's restaurant during the festival. She lived in Cotonou, but her family came from the region where Aaron lived. She would be traveling there soon, she said, and promised to call him.
One visit led to another and, within two months, Aaron confided in David that he hoped to marry Nadege.
Aaron was in love. Inconceivable! Aaron wanted to settle down.
Will she marry him?
Nadege (pronounced Nah-dedge) had seen Americans before in the hotels and restaurants where she worked. But Aaron was the first American she ever got to know. She thought he was handsome and liked how he treated her with such respect and kindness.
But she wasn't sure of his intentions, whether she was just a flirtation that would end when he left the Peace Corps.
Aaron spoke fluent French by the time they met and had picked up some of her Fongbe language. They got to know each other well and she introduced him to her family. Nadege, he realized, was everything he wanted in a wife. She was not only beautiful with a graceful, elegant bearing, she was kind, calm, patient, a hard worker and independent, too.
One night in March of last year, as a late Valentine's present, he hired a bush taxi to drive him five hours to the capital. Friends there let him use a straw hut in their backyard and he decorated it with a white tablecloth and red candles. He bought a bottle of red wine and cooked shrimp etouffee.
While Aaron served Nadege dinner, David serenaded them on his saxophone.
After dessert, Aaron brought out four tiny packages. He had helped a Nigerian jeweler design a jewelry set for Nadege. He had wrapped each piece in origami paper and on each piece of paper he had written love poems.
One by one, Nadege opened the presents. One by one, she put on the silver jewelry. Earrings. Necklace. Bracelet.
As she unwrapped the last package, Aaron knelt down on one knee.
Inside was a silver ring set with her birthstone, a ruby.
"Tu veut te marier avec moi? (Do you want to marry me?) Tu veut passer ta vie avec moi? (Do you want to spend your life with me?)"
"Oui!" she said and she kissed him.
A royal bloodline
Getting married in Benin, Aaron learned, involves much more than going to a justice of the peace.
According to custom, the groom pays a "bride price" to his bride's family during a traditional ceremony with singing, dancing, feasting. The groom is not allowed at the ceremony and instead sends a representative to "negotiate" a price. These days the price usually is settled beforehand and the negotiation symbolic.
Aaron sent David and two Beninese friends. His bride price included 15 bottles of palm liquor and whisky, kola nuts, a pack of cigarettes and about $200.
A group of men and women, paid to lead the ceremony, brought Nadege into her uncle's house with her head covered by a cloth. They clapped and sang, then threw kola nuts onto the floor, the traditional way of asking the ancestors for permission for Nadege to marry Aaron.
Aaron said that during the ceremony, Nadege's uncle confided in David: You do know Aaron is marrying a princess?
You didn't tell me you're a princess! Aaron said afterward to Nadege.
"Oui," was all she said. It wasn't something she would flaunt.
Aaron realized her family and friends probably assumed he knew because of her family name. Their royal bloodline, he discovered, traces back to the 15th century when Benin was a prominent West African kingdom called Dahomey. Though it is a democracy now, the people still recognize royal families.
Nadege is the niece of the King of Alladah, which makes her a princess.
In the town of Alladah, she is called "Ahoui" - "Child of a King." Or "Nan" - "Princess."
Two days later, Aaron and Nadege said their vows in a civil ceremony. She wore a white wedding gown. Aaron wore the suit he wore in 1998 as homecoming king at Northlake Christian High in Covington, La.
A king and his princess
Aaron's time with the Peace Corps ended and in November they flew to Charlotte.
They are living with his parents and grandmother in Mint Hill. Nadege is studying English and learning to braid hair. Aaron tutors after school four days a week, and works one shift a week at a Wendy's restaurant.
He hopes to find a full-time teaching job. He and Nadege are ready to settle down in a home of their own.
In Benin, Aaron said, there's a saying: Every man is a king of his house. Their house will have a beautiful princess, too.
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