They were seated at a booth in the corner, and Dean felt butterflies in his chest as he looked across the table at his beautiful fiancée. He could hardly believe that he was going to get to marry her soon, and happiness thumped around in his heart like a brass band.
Once they’d ordered their food—Dean ordered his sudden craving and Noelle ordered crepes with strawberries andwhipped cream along with a side of sausages—Noelle leaned back in her seat and sighed. “It feels like we’re reaching the end of a marathon. You know that feeling you get when it’s been a long day at work, and you absolutely cannot wait to come home and put on comfy clothes and curl up on the couch and chill? That’s how I feel.” She laughed. “I feel like you’re the prize after a lot of work, and I can’t wait to just settle into our cozy new life together. I know it’s going to be challenging but amazing, and I’m so impatient to be your wife and wake up next to you every day.”
Dean grinned at her. “I feel the same way.” He reached for her hands across the table, feeling overjoyed that his hands felt good and pain-free. “It’s been a long time coming, and I can’t wait to reach our destination with you. Although the wedding day itself doesn’t feel like the last hurdle, it feels like the beginning of our goal.”
“I know what you mean. That’s why I’m so happy we can afford all the things we wanted for our wedding. There’s something about really being able to celebrate something that means so much to you. I almost feel like I’m shouting my love for you from the rooftops with all the little details, even the floral arrangement. All the care that went into this wedding is my way of showing everyone how much I love you.”
Dean could only stare at her and smile sappily, wondering how on earth he got so lucky.
Noelle laughed, seeming to understand that he was just speechless. “It’s going to be like the most beautiful party ever, with all the people we love most in the world there with us.”
“It will be. You’ve picked out so many beautiful things, like those centerpieces with the lanterns.”
“Hey, you’ve been helping me out a lot, it’s not just me. And your sisters have helped so much too.” She grinned. “I think the best part is our venue, though. It makes me feel like I’ve traveledback in time to a castle, or a mansion in the eighteen hundreds or something like that. It’s quaint, but it’s just breathtaking.”
“I can’t wait to be there with you. I’m probably going to have the wind knocked out of me when I see you in your dress for the first time. Hazel told me it was absolutely perfect.”
“It feels that way.” Noelle’s eyes took on a dreamy look.
“So, what makes it so perfect?” He grinned slyly.
“Oh, no.” She shook her head, laughing. “You are not getting any hints out of me, mister. You don’t get to know what my wedding dress looks like before our wedding day. Not one single thing.”
“Well, I already know something about it.”
“What?” Noelle crinkled her nose, seeming to be wondering which one of her future sister-in-laws had let slip a detail about her wedding dress.
“It’s white,” Dean said, grinning.
Noelle started laughing, shaking her head. “You don’t know that. Maybe I’m getting married in pink.”
Dean’s eyebrows lifted. He knew that some women were wearing wedding dresses in colors other than white sometimes, and he wondered for a split second if Noelle was serious. He knew she loved pink, and he thought she was gorgeous in it, but he felt a trifle disappointed that she wouldn’t be wearing the color he’d always envisioned her in.
“I’m kidding.” She threw back her head, laughing. “You should have seen your face. You really want me to get married in white, huh?”
Dean made a silly face. “Yes, I do. I also really care about whether or not the skirt is all big and fluffy or if it’s got one of those mermaid style skirts. So you should tell me what it looks like.”
Noelle took a triumphant sip of her coffee. “Not a chance. Sorry, pal. You’re just going to have to wait.”
Dean sighed dramatically, but at that moment their food arrived. Soon they were digging into their delicious meals, and Noelle wasn’t saying anything besides, “Mm,” and “Oh, wow.”
Dean’s heart felt full as he watched her with affection, thinking about how excited he was to finally see a clear path to making the remarkable woman in front of him his wife.
Hazel Owens glanced up at the rearview mirror, smiling as she saw how animated her daughter Samantha looked. Granted, Samantha usually looked animated, but at the moment, she was literally wriggling in her seat. Hazel chuckled, glad that the start of Samantha’s adolescence hadn’t brought about with it the angsty teenager drama that she’d dreaded ever since she’d first become a mother. Samantha was prone to bursts of emotion, sometimes tearful, but she wasn’t going around slamming doors and wanting nothing to do with her parents. For that, Hazel felt like the luckiest mother in the world.
“It’s honestly just the most fun,” Samantha said, leaning her head back and sighing. “Doing flips like that—I mean, you definitely have to trust your teammates, but I totally do. And it’s like dancing, but it feels like more fun than dancing because it’s just more… I don’t know, wild, you know?”
Hazel grinned. Samantha was prone to outlandish, imaginative statements, so this one doesn’t surprise her. And in a way, she understood what her daughter meant, especially considering Samantha’s experience in dance consisted mostly of the ballet classes she’d taken during elementary school. “Sounds amazing, honey. And I know you’re doing really well. Your coach told me.”
“Ahh, I love Mrs. Peterson,” Samantha said. “She’s really tough on us but she’s never mean, somehow. We were at that camp, though, the cheerleading camp, and this other coach was really mean to Willow. She started crying and everything. I wanted to go give her a giant piece of my mind—giant and with spikes on, if you know what I mean—but Mrs. Peterson just stepped in and said something to the other coach I couldn’t hear. She looked really polite while she said it but the other coach seemed mad anyway. And then I figured it was my job to comfort Willow, so I did.”
“Sounds like you did the right thing, sweetheart,” Hazel said, not liking the idea of a coach yelling at her daughter’s friend or anyone else. Privately she thought to herself that Mrs. Peterson had probably done the right thing as well, saying something firmly but without any nastiness. Sometimes mean people reacted badly even when they were treated fairly, sometimes even when they were treated kindly. Hazel felt thankful that Samantha had such a good coach to look out for her.
Hazel smiled at her daughter through the rearview mirror again, treasuring the time she was spending with her. Samantha had been so busy with school that they didn’t get to spend as much time together as they used to. Since Hazel now had a husband to share her time with, in many ways that worked out well, since it gave her and Jacob plenty of alone time. She missed spending time with Samantha, however, and she was looking forward to all of the hiking and cookie baking that they planned to do together over the summer.
“How’s Dylan doing?” Hazel asked, her tone slightly gleeful. She wanted to make sure that Samantha felt as though she could talk with her mother about her boyfriend. Hazel felt confident that Dylan was a great kid, but Samantha was still very young for a boyfriend, and Hazel wanted to be a safe space for her daughter so that Samantha felt free to tell her everything. Sheknew that at some point she might have to put her foot down about certain things, like not going out alone with Dylan in a car once either of them got their licenses, and then might come the rebellion and the door slamming. But for now, at least, she wanted Samantha to feel as though she could tell her anything and everything about her relationship. Hazel felt sure that was the best way to watch over her daughter, rather than interrogation and helicopter parenting.
“He’s good,” Samantha said, and her tone was exactly as if she was talking about one of her friends. No smitten, love-struck madness had come over her yet, it seemed, and Hazel breathed a sigh of relief. “We’re going to go bowling with Willow and Steve on Thursday after school if that’s okay.”
