“They’ll expect a gift.”
Oliver smiled. “Then get them a toast rack and put a note in it asking when he’s going to pay back the fifty thousand pounds he owes you.”
I enjoyed seeing Oliver’s mean side. It didn’t come out very often, but when it did, it was usually on point. “I might do that. If I go.
Should I go?”
“You know I can’t make that decision for you.”
“Why not? It would be super convenient. You could just say, ‘Sorry Lucien, I’m wildly jealous, and I refuse to let you go to Miles’s wedding.’”
“Sorry, Lucien,” repeated Oliver obligingly. “I’m wildly jealous, and I refuse to let you go to Miles’s wedding.”
“Oh, that’s rubbish.” I gave him my best sulky face. “You clearly don’t mean it.”
Oliver cast me a look of mock contrition. “I know, I’m an inadequate boyfriend and I don’t know why you put up with me.”
“You must have a preference, though?” I wheedled.
For a moment Oliver thought about it. He was never a man to give a hasty answer to an important question. “Well, I’d be lying if I said that attending the wedding of a total stranger was my idea of a fabulous night out. And you don’t owe Miles anything so neither he nor JoJo should be a factor here.”
“I feel like you’re about to drop a massive ‘but’ on me.”
“I was heading that way, but now I feel you’ve cut my ‘but’ off at the pass.”
This was a very serious conversation about very serious things, and Oliver was taking time out of his evening to boyfriend at me, but there was no way I was letting that go without comment. “Oliver, I would never cut your ‘but’ off.”
“Lucien”—his eyes had gone all soft while his mouth was trying really hard to be severe—“you’re making it very hard for me to finish my sentence.”
“Sorry. Sorry.” I paused. “‘But’ me.”
“But,” said Oliver carefully, “just because Miles is behaving selfishly, that doesn’t mean that going to his wedding wouldn’t be good for you. If going along and drawing a line under the past would make you feel better, you shouldn’t not do it just because it might make him feel better too. Does that make sense?”
It did. Kind of. “But what if knowing it’ll make him feel better makes me feel worse?”
“Then maybe you need to revisit the does-he-have-power-over-you question.”
Oh. Right. My shoulders drooped. I was supposed to be…not like this anymore. “Why do people keep having power over me?”
“Well, one of them was your father, so power is rather a given.
And the other is someone you were in love with who betrayed you.”
“So I have to go to the wedding to prove—”
I had no idea where I was going with that, but thankfully Oliver interrupted me. “You don’t have to do anything to prove anything. To anyone. Not Miles, not me, and not even yourself.”
That’s what he thought. He wasn’t me.
“In any case,” he went on, “you have time. You can think about it.
And if you want to go, of course I’ll be with you. And if you don’t, I’ll…
still be with you. And we’ll do something much more interesting than watching your ex-boyfriend and somebody you’ve met once throw a massive, expensive party in celebration of a relationship that doesn’t mean anything to you.”
I blinked. “Wow. That’s a cynical take on marriage even for me, and my dad was a junkie arsehole who walked out on my mum before I could talk.”
“I’m not opposed to marriage in general.” Oliver gave a tight little smile. “I’m just not the sort of person who can get invested in the trappings if I’m not invested in the couple.”
I didn’t think I was either, really. I’d only agreed to help organise Bridge’s wedding because she was my best friend and I was pretty sure she’d do all the important planning herself. Of course, part of it was that for most of my life it hadn’t looked like marriage was a thing I’d ever be able to do. And in some ways it was nice to think if I was growing up today, I’d be able to be one of those kids spending his days planning his fantasy wedding to the man of his dreams. But in other ways, it felt kind of like I’d missed out. “I get it. And just to be clear, I’m not invested in Miles at all. Like not at all. Not even a little tiny bit.”