The arranged marriage of the DUP and Sinn Féin is scheduled for March 26th, but nobody yet knows if it will actually take place. Dr Paisley's party is playing hard to get, while the "Shinners" are holding a ballot paper in one hand and a wedding ring in the other, writes Deaglán de Bréadún, Political Correspondent, in Belfast
Calling the election was equivalent to publishing the banns of marriage. The voters were asked, in effect: "If any of you know cause or just impediment why these parties should not be joined together in a powersharing executive, ye are to declare it." The answer at the ballot-box was summed up by the seven-column front-page headline in yesterday's Belfast Telegraph: "Now Get On With It."
Gerry Adams was speaking at a press conference at the Falls Road Culturlann, known to taxi drivers from the other community as "Cultureland", when Martin McGuinness's mobile phone rang.
Gerry quipped: "Is that Ian?" It's not the first time he has used that line.
But Paisley insists he doesn't take to Sinn Féin, although Adams and McGuinness have both indicated recently that the DUP had an input into the controversial policing motion for the special ardfheis in January.
Arranged marriages are usually made with an eye to the accompanying dowry.
Whereas the DUP and Sinn Féin might disagree on loyalty to the crown, the necessity of securing the half-crown is something they both appreciate.
Last November, a cross-party delegation met chancellor Gordon Brown to squeeze some extra cash out of him for Northern Ireland. They were apparently unimpressed with the £50 billion offering he came up with, claiming there was little or no new money in it. It's a safe bet that Brown himself felt he was being quite generous under the circumstances.
In the immediate aftermath of the election, we are seeing the inevitable displays of triumphalism.
Dr Paisley, unrivalled showman that he is, was in full flight at the Seven Towers Leisure Centre in Ballymena after topping the poll on Thursday night.
But this, remarkably, was the nearest thing to a bread-and-butter election in the North for years. The threat of additional water charges concentrated the minds of the electorate to a considerable extent.
If the parties can present a united front to the British government and the world, demanding extra cash as the price of sustaining peace, it will be hard to say no to them.
The corollary, of course, is that if there's no powersharing, the Scotsman will tighten his purse. Likewise Dublin's offer of up to €1 billion from the National Development Plan will be less easily attainable.
Though clearly tuckered-out after a disappointing election, SDLP leader Mark Durkan retained his talent for phrasemaking when he accused the DUP of "date-defying politics". But if moderate nationalists and unionists performed below par, the electorate showed little interest in the politics of rejection, as exemplified by dissident republicans on one side and Robert McCartney's UKUP on the other.
The post-election mood could be described as one where the marriage of convenience on March 26th is seen as just about achievable.
Like their DUP counterparts, Sinn Féin activists are cock-a-hoop over the party's showing at the polls, particularly coming so soon after the painful transition to a new approach on policing.
A Paisley-McGuinness partnership at the head of a cross-party administration just may be within the bounds of possibility but when, in the fullness of time, the DUP leader steps aside for, say, Peter Robinson, then it is expected the trouble will start inside the party.
The arranged nuptials may prove to be only a "starter marriage" after all.