Page 67 of The Best Worst Thing
Wedding Day
Logan, settling into a white folding chair, squinted as the slanting afternoon sun gleamed into his eyes, then put his hand on Nicole’s back and passed her a flute of champagne.
“Sorry about that,” he said. Somehow, he’d gotten caught up fixing the frozen lock screen on Benny’s great-uncle’s phone. Seven minutes into what had devolved into a full-on technology lesson, Nicole slipped away to save them two decent seats. “You have my sunglasses, right?”
“Yeah,” Nicole said, grabbing them from her bag while he took a long sip of his drink, then leaned into her. His jaw, scraping against the shoulder of her dress—shocking coral and skintight, with a slit up to her thigh and bows for straps.
“You good?” he said.
Nicole nodded, smiling as the music started and a few stragglers scurried to their seats.
The truth was, she’d expected the weekend to gnaw at her, to remind her over and over again that her marriage had been real.
That her decade with Gabe wasn’t something she could repress or reverse or run from forever.
But no. She was fine.
She was Logan’s, and she was absolutely fine.
“Thank you,” she said, dropping her head onto his shoulder as the ceremony began.
As Benny, his brothers, and four corresponding, very shimmery bridesmaids glided barefoot down the aisle.
As two comically rigid ring bearers and a grape-juice-soaked flower girl two years too young for the task followed not far behind.
“For what?”
“For everything.”
“You’re welcome,” he said as they stood and turned and watched the beaming, gleaming bride sob her whole way down a petal-dusted swath of sand.
Logan squeezed Nicole’s hand. Nicole, eyes wet, squeezed right back.
Logan was a fantastic wedding date.
He was also, quite predictably, a very enthusiastic dancer.
All evening, between dinner and father-daughter foxtrots and five-too-many drunken toasts, Logan was dragging a laughing, eye-rolling, hands-all-over-her-man Nicole into the center of the party; his shirt untucked, his tie loose, his forehead glistening.
The night, loud and bright and buzzing. They exchanged numbers with the bride’s cousin who lived in Studio City, they managed to teach Benny’s great-uncle how to FaceTime, and then—because Nicole had decided that watching Logan play Genius Bar in well-tailored pants was somehow the sexiest thing she’d ever seen—they ducked into the photo booth and made out like teenagers for two minutes straight, silly hats and mustaches-on-sticks and all.
About thirty minutes after the cake had been cut, Logan—by now downright drenched in sweat—had gotten caught up talking Big Ten football with an old friend on the still-crowded dance floor.
Nicole had kissed her shouting-over-the-music, never-not-moving boyfriend right on the lips, then floated toward the bar to grab them another couple of beers before the night wound down.
She was shifting from heel to heel, trying to keep the pressure off her aching feet, waiting for her drinks when a woman—brunette, cute as a button, a zillion months pregnant—slipped next to her, ordered a club soda with lime, and smiled warmly.
“You must be Nicole,” she said.
Nicole’s throat went dry. “I, um … yeah. Are you—”
“I’m Kara. It’s really good to meet you. I’ve heard a thousand amazing things about you.”
Nicole nodded. She could not stop staring at Kara’s stomach.
“Y-you too,” she said as the bartender slid them their drinks. Another deep breath, and she was fine. She could do this. “Did you just get in? I heard you had to change your trip last minute.”
“We barely made it in time for dessert. The only flight I could get today changed planes in Dallas, and we ended up diverted to Springfield, where I don’t think I’ve been since I went to Jewish sleepaway camp in the Ozarks when I was, like, ten and—”
“Wait,” Nicole said. “I went to Jewish sleepaway camp in the Ozarks.”
“Did you really? Which one?”
They confirmed the camp. It was, indeed, the same.
“This is objectively very funny, right?” Kara said as Logan, from across the dance floor, spotted the women midchuckle.
He waved at Kara, then tilted his head, bit his lip, and stared right at Nicole as the party, in that moment, blurred around him.
Kara, glowing, took in the whole thing. “I mean, I was this close to being a counselor there when I was nineteen. I backed out at the last second for this internship in DC. And you’re what, in your early thirties?
I could’ve had to check you for lice. You could’ve been my camper. Can you imagine?”
“While you were dating Logan?” Nicole said, laughing.
Kara was lovely. All that panic, and she was great.
“You could’ve written him to say, this uptight child from Saint Louis won’t stop washing her hair because she’s afraid of getting lice a second time, and it’s just making everything worse, because they prefer a clean scalp.
And never known it was me. It’s legitimately very funny. ”
Kara smiled again.
“You’re fun,” she said. “You sure you guys wouldn’t want to make the move?
We’re all nearby, do all the things—Fourth of July on the lake with everyone’s kids, that kind of stuff.
And houses are still affordable, at least in the suburbs.
Plenty of space for all the boring stuff Logan’s always wanted: two-point-five kids, a Labrador in the backyard, a thirty percent larger Subaru … ”
Nicole stared at her.
Everything, spinning.
Everything, falling apart.
“M-move back to Missouri?” Nicole said.
“No,” Kara said. “To Chicago. For the new job.”