"It's your wedding, you ugly fuck," I tell him, which only makes him laugh. "Go be with your wife and leave me alone."
"My wife is currently teaching Gran how to do the Macarena and they're both failing spectacularly and it's the best thing I've ever seen." He shifts his weight, settling in. "Talk to her, Cal."
"And say what?"
"You know what."
I take a drink. Still nothing. Still tastes like absolutely nothing.
"She's moving across the country in a few weeks," I mutter. "What's the point of saying it now?"
Ramsey fixes me with the kind of impatience that only a man deliriously in love can muster for a man too stupid to figure his own shit out.
"The point, man, is that you're both standing sad and alone on opposite corners of my wedding like it's already over. You're mourning before it's even ended."
He claps my shoulder hard enough to rattle me. "You'reboth miserable. It's bringing down the aesthetic. Fix it. That's an order from the groom."
He walks away before I can respond. Probably for the best.
But he is right. I can't stand it. I can't stand across a room from her and watch her be sad and do nothing about it. I can't keep pretending that distance is the noble choice when all it's doing is making us both miserable.
I can't be this man anymore. The one who watches. The one who waits. The one who loses everything to the right thing.
I'm moving before I've made the conscious decision to move. Rome sees me coming. One look at his sister's face and he's crossing to her, stepping into my path before I can reach her.
“Not right now." His voice is low, meant only for me. His eyes flick to Lily and back. "She's upset. Leave her be, Cal."
"I'm not asking you," I tell him through gritted teeth. I know I come on too strong, but I'm past deferring to his judgment, past treating his approval like something I need in order to love her.
Rome is one of my best friends. Rome is family, but he's standing between me and the woman I love and I would ruin this whole goddamn wedding just to get to her right now.
He must see it in my face, what I can't shove back down. He steps aside with one last glare, a warning I'm choosing not to hear.
I stop in front of her, close enough to see the way her eyes widen when she realizes I'm there, the way she's holding herself together by sheer force of will.
"Dance with me," I say, and hold out my hand.
She sets her glass on the bar with a sad smile and takes it.
I lead her to the floor. The upbeat song is fading out, and a hush falls over the speakers as a woman steps up to the microphone at the end of the small stage. The first notes come in slow. Piano only, sparse and fragile.
(My mother said I'm too romantic…)?*
I pull Lily in and she comes without resistance, her body fitting against mine like we were designed for exactly this. Like every other way of standing is wrong. I am happy the music is just enough for us to sway together.
(I'd like to think it's how you lean on my shoulder. And how I see myself with you…)
Her forehead presses against my chin. I can feel her breathing, trying so hard not to shatter.
The singer's voice is wrecked in the way only live voices can be and I can only hold my girl as we keep swaying. I pull her closer because closer is never close enough and I'm running out of chances to prove it. I close my eyes and let myself have this.
(Fire on fire would normally kill us. With this much desire, together, we're winners…)
She makes a sound against my neck. Then her shoulders shake once and I feel the first tear soak through my collar.
"Please, don't cry," I whisper into her hair, because I can't survive her face right now. "I can't stand it when you cry."
She shakes her head, but doesn't answer. She presses her body harder into mine like she's trying to disappear into me, like if she gets close enough maybe she won't have to leave.
