Rome is a smart man, sharper than most. But Rome is also deep in his own life with Erin these days, and people in love tend to look inward before they look around. I'm counting on that. I hate that I'm counting on that.
It's Saturday afternoon, late January, and my apartment has been taken over by wedding planning.
There are fabric swatches on the couch, a laptop open to a venue site, three glasses of wine in various stages of completion. Poppy is cross-legged on the floor with a binder thick enough to be classified as a weapon, flipping through tabs like she's defusing a bomb.
The wedding is late May. I've done the math more times than I'd admit, calculated and recalculated the timeline until I was certain. I'll still be here. Whatever happens with acceptances, whatever city calls my name in the spring, I will be in Harbor Hill for Poppy and Ramsey's wedding. I told her so the day the date was set, and the relief on her face made me cry in the bathroom afterward.
"Okay." Poppy flips to a tabbed section and squints at it. "Bachelorette, it says here. If we really must, I want something here. This town. Our people."
"I love that," Erin agrees from the couch, tucking her feet under a blanket and settling deeper into the cushions.
Poppy has a hard time planning her wedding. She gets overwhelmed quickly, distracted easily, paralyzed by too many choices. Ramsey knows this about her, loves this about her, and hired a wedding planner with strict instructions not to overwhelm his bride.
So now we have a binder we need to check through, decisions pre-narrowed to manageable options, and two best friends ready to point at things and say yes so Poppy doesn't have to.
I love how Ramsey loves her. I love that he knows her well enough to smooth the path before she even has to walk it.
"A weekend at the compound," Erin continues, warming to the idea. "We kick the men out and take over. Gran is invited. Beth and Vera are invited. Ruth is absolutely invited because she'll die if we leave her out and I'm not dealing with that guilt."
"Ruth will bring information we didn't ask for," I grin. "It'll be fun."
"Fun until you become the information," Poppy mutters with an eye roll.
She has a somewhat cooler relationship with Ruth than Erin and I do, years of history I'm not fully privy to, but I know she adores the woman underneath the exasperation.
"That's her love language and I accept it," I tell her, and Poppy snorts, but doesn't argue.
We work through the details: food, music, whether Gran can be trusted with a karaoke machine. The answer is a unanimous and clear no. Poppy wants it simple and personaland full of the people she loves, and that's exactly what she's going to get.
I'm reaching for my wine when Erin sets hers down with suspiciously deliberate care.
"So," she says.
I look at her. She's looking at me. Poppy has stopped flipping pages.
"So," Poppy echoes, and there's something in her voice that makes my stomach drop.
"No," I say immediately.
"We haven't said anything yet," Erin points out, her tone mild and completely unconvincing.
"You're about to, and the answer is no."
Poppy closes the binder, sets it aside, and gets comfortable. She has been waiting for this conversation and she is not leaving without it.
"Erin and I have been thinking about this curious thing," she muses, her voice light and dangerous. "Every time you leave town, Cal leaves town."
"What a crazy coincidence," I manage.
"Every time," Erin repeats. "Same days. Same duration. You went to Stanford for four days in October. Cal told Ramsey he was visiting his aunt. For four days. In October."
"He has many aunts. One lives in Connecticut."
"Are you really still trying to deny it?" Erin asks, and there's no judgment in her voice, just gentle, inexorable patience.
I pick up my wine and take a very long sip.
"And Columbia?" Poppy continues, relentlessly. "You were in New York for three days, but I am pretty sure youdidn't even apply there. Cal told the firehouse he had a personal thing. Three days. In New York."
