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I met his eyes across the candlelit table covered in rose petals. “I get nervous when I talk to big groups of people.”
“You did fine when we were at the university.”
“The university?” his mother asked, looking between us.
I nodded. “We basically fought over which is the better career path: art or the sciences. I won.” I grinned.
He scoffed. “If anything, it was a tie, but that is only because you brought up the 'you need me and I need you' argument. I’m pretty sure I got at least a few of them to see reason and come over to my side. Remember how kinda cool I am?”
I clapped slowly for him. “I tell you that you are a decent doctor one time and—”
“It sounded more like amazing to my ears.” He drank his water.
“And it goes to your big, egotistical head. Sorry, Mrs. Davenport,” I said to her. After all, the fathead was her son.
“No.” She smiled, looking between the two of us. “It actually reminds me of when I met his father. The man could praise himself. 'Meryl, you should have seen me today, I’m telling you there is no better doctor than me in this state. Meryl, did you see how fast I laid that stitch?' Oh, gosh. I didn’t call him egotistical, I called him Dr. Brainiac.”
I thought about it for a second. “Isn’t that a super-villain in the DC comics?”
“That’s why it annoyed him so much.” She giggled.
So did I. I didn’t know why it was that funny, but just seeing her laugh so happily at her memories felt nice. Wasn’t that what was normally supposed to happen at weddings?
“What did he call you back?” Eli asked softly, watching her as he drank his scotch.
Leaning over, she put her hand on his arm. “You know, I never found out. I’m sure he called me something in his head, but no matter what, when he was cross he would just say Meryl, like I exhausted him and he couldn’t even put up any more of a fight.”
“My father just makes faces.” I ran my hand over the rim of my water glass. “My mother would get upset about something he either forgot to do, or something he totally messed up, and he would just sit in his chair and watch her as she tried to fix it, which made my mom angrier, and then he would look to me and start making faces. He could even guess what her next words were. When I was a teenager, I would wonder, 'Why is he just sitting there? Mom's gonna lose it.’ Then I realized he just knew her too well. My mother likes things to be done a particular way. The best help he can offer is to keep his hands off and wait until she actually gives him directions.”
“Where are your parents now?” Mrs. Davenport questioned.
“Cypress, Alaska,” Eli said in a strange voice.
“Is that a real place?” Logan asked beside me.
“It’s the home of the best wild salmon in the country,” Eli and I said at the same time, though he was a lot less serious than I was. I could only give him a look from across the table.
He shrugged.
“Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome Mr. and Mrs. Nathaniel Van Allan,” the announcer said, and we all stood, clapping.
I clapped as loudly as possible, not caring who saw me.
Logan joined in, raising his glass.
Eli
After everyone settled down and the champagne was brought out, Guinevere walked to the front of the ballroom. The lighting changed slightly, focusing on her. She didn’t look nervous at all to me, but maybe she had just gotten used to covering it up. She moved to the side, and an old picture was projected onto the wall, showing two little girls dressed in jean jumpers, their hair in pigtails and their arms around each other. Little Guinevere made a peace sign as young Stephanie appeared to be squeezing the life out of her.
“The day I met then Stephanie Murray was the first day of kindergarten. The first grade boys had decided to mess with us, and I, being the rebel I always was, was not going to have that. No one backed me up.”
Stephanie and her parents groaned together, trying not to laugh, when all of a sudden the picture changed to one of them sitting on two boys and high-fiving each other.
Oddly, she took a long pause as if considering something before blinking and turning back to Stephanie. “No one but Stephanie. Safe to say, no matter what happened in my life, when I turned back, she was always there. She was there when, at fourteen, we decided to hitchhike cross-country, but only made it as far as the bus station before panicking and running back home. She was there when, at sixteen, we thought dyeing our hair white would make us look more mature. And she was there every step of the way, encouraging me to follow my dreams. So when I first met Nathaniel, I was a little jealous. I kept wondering: who is this boy, trying to take away my best friend? It took me a while, but I saw it, the way she smiled so wide it looked like her face would break. How he was always so willing to jump into whatever she was doing…with slightly more logic than we had together. How he made her world ten times bigger, and it made me so thankful.” She tried not to cry. ?
??Because my best friend was with the best person for her, and she was going to get to laugh and smile like that for the rest of her life, the way she deserved to. You're one lucky guy, Nathaniel, and thank you. Please never stop what you're doing.”
When she was done, she took a deep breath, handing the microphone back as Stephanie came over to give her a tight hug.
