How to Ruin a Wedding(71)

Taina leans back on her hands. “And? You think people only fall in love once they’ve got health insurance and a 401(k)?”

I shoot her a glare.

“I’m serious,” she goes on. “You think Anders is gonna look at your credit score and think ‘Wow, deal-breaker.’ That’s not what love is.”

“You’re using a pretty strong word that I never said.”

She rolls her eyes. “Don’t be dense. Love. Like. Crushes. It’s all the same. And you shouldn’t look at them like they come with prerequisites.”

“I don’t know; it feels like they should.”

Taina frowns. “You keep waiting for this perfect version of yourself before you let anyone in, and I’m telling you, you’ll be waiting forever. You don’t have to be fully healed, or fully successful, or fully anything to be loved.”

I stare at the floor. My throat tight.

Taina lowers her voice. “People love each other at their messiest, their ugliest, their lowest. You don’t have to earn that. It just comes with the territory.”

“I don’t know how to believe that.”

“You don’t have to yet,” she says. “You just, I don’t know, have to stop running from the chance that it might be true. Just let things run their course. Stop cockblocking your own life.”

I laugh. “Wow, you sound filled with wisdom right now.”

Taina grimaces. “I know, don’t get used to it.”

Another laugh tears from me, and I feel just the tiniest bit lighter.





23.


Taina has been doing an almost good job the past week. I’ve stayed at her waterfront rental, overlooking a long, peaceful creek. It’s been home base while I spent time visiting Sora, joining Valerie for some wedding planning, and narrowly avoiding questions about Anders while dodging his calls.

Taina hasn’t brought up Anders again, but has given me lots of raised eyebrows, asked “Who keeps texting you?” when my phone vibrates, and when we’re watching a show with any kind of romantic element, her gaze is pinned on me for some sort of reaction.

The first day I left, that’s when Anders called the most. I only texted that I was staying with my sister after Taina mentioned how often the phone was ringing. The next days the calls were fewer, but that’s because he knew Valerie and I were out picking the floral arrangements with Bethany and Olive in tow, or finalizing centerpieces, or having tea.

Today, nothing.

It’s already three, and Anders hasn’t messaged at all. Granted, I left, so of course, it would be entirely hypocritical and unreasonable to care at all about that. I’m the one ignoring his questions on why I left, why I’m being so cold. Me. I’m the cause of it.

Yet I feel a vibration in my shorts pocket for the twelfth time and check the screen only to find a picture Taina sent of the beach, glistening under the sun.

“Earth to Lucy.” Valerie holds up the barcode scanner to my face so the red light momentarily steals my vision. “Are you even paying attention here? You almost scanned the red plate set. I’d rather see my own red blood in the kitchen cabinets than red dishware.”

“Graphic”—I bring myself back to attention—“and noted.”

“Come on.” She nudges me. “Let’s look at some machines. Scan anything that does the work for me. Rice cookers, egg cookers, anything that cooks so I don’t have to.”

When Valerie called me painfully cheerful at six in the morning, telling me, not asking, to come join her shopping as she picks out gifts for her wedding registry, I thought we’d be finished by early afternoon. Instead, we’ve been at several stores, hours at each, and my stomach is gnawing.

We’ve been in this store for just fifteen minutes, and she’s already scanned an ungodly amount of overpriced goods.

All items are set on the thinnest glass shelves, and I keep my shoulders straight the way my mother would demand when walking down aisles. Don’t touch anything you can’t buy. Which in this store would be legitimately everything.

“You could have done this online,” I say, as she scans through a new aisle, “but I’m learning you’re more hands-on than you seem.”

“Meaning what? You think I would have paid some planner to pick out everything that will be in my house?”

“More like, you’d do this online, add things to a cart immediately instead of going to a bunch of stores.”

Valerie nods. “True, it would be easier. But I wanted to get out of the house a bit. Get my steps in.”

“Just a couple more months to the wedding,” I say, and hearing it aloud makes my nerves avalanche. Though I’ve been asking calculated questions, pointed out very obvious differences between her and John, played up her desire for fun and expression, the progress isn’t where it should be—even with this tight deadline. “Will people have time to buy everything?”

“They better.” Valerie scans some machine I can’t recognize, but mimics a tiny washing machine. A high-speed microwave? I have no clue. “I need this.”

The quick addition of desperation at the end of the sentence captures my interest. “You need what? Gifts?” When she stiffens, I know this is a good thread to pull. “Valerie, respectfully, you’re rich. I didn’t think you’d even have a registry.” I pause a moment, then add, “You didn’t, did you? This is a last-minute idea.”