Page 17 of Runaway Bride's Guide to Love

“Bring it on, Tiger.”

She makes a show of holding up the shot glass before clearing her throat. “To hookers with floggers and strangers at the bar saving the day!”

“It takes a village.”

We clink our glasses together, then hit the table before shooting back another shot of whiskey. Usually I pretend to be man enough to not take a chaser, but that went out the window four shots ago.

“Where did you learn to drink?” I ask between sips of the beer.

“University of Tennessee,” she says before holding her beer in the air. “Kappa Delta, baby!”

“No shit,” I say. “I went to UT too.”

She slams her beer down and her eyes double in size. “No way! When?”

“A long time before you did,” I joke.

“Oh, it can’t be that long,” she says. “I graduated in 2020.”

“Fuck me…” I don’t want to tell her that in 2020 I was wrapping up construction on my house. Or that I found my first gray hair. And if my drunk math is doing things correctly, she’s about twenty-six years old. “Let’s just say that was a long time after I was there.”

“I’m betting you know someone in my family. I’m a third-generation Vol, and all my siblings went to UT. I’m the youngest of five. So I bet at some point you’d know someone in my family. Maybe my brother? He was there around the mid-2000s. Oh! Oh my God! I love this song!”

Any conversation of me knowing her brother, or any of her family out of the estimated 28,000 that go to the University of Tennessee each year, are forgotten as she jumps from the booth, her dress trailing behind her, as she makes her own dance floor in the middle of this Nashville dive bar.

And all I can do is sit back and watch. Not in a creepy way. Hopefully. I don’t mean for it to be like that. More in a…proud way? I don’t know what it is, but watching Tiger right now is something special.

This girl doesn’t give a shit that the entire bar is watching her. She’s dancing and singing without a care in the world, wearing a fugly wedding dress that’s now been through it and singing at the top of her lungs about keying a man’s car and slashing his tires. She’s horribly off key and her hair is a mess. She looks more like a zombie bride than one that was supposed to get married earlier today.

And all I can do is sit back, watch, and smile. Admire. I know she’s in pain. I know she’s hurting, and tomorrow everything is going to come crashing down on her. But for right now? In this moment? She’s going to let it all out however she needs to. And I say more power to her.

“Cap! Come over here!”

I shake my head. “I’m good.”

“Oh, come on!” She comes back over to the booth and grabs my hand. “Dance with me!”

I reluctantly get up, but not because I want to dance. Idon’tdance. But more because I don’t want her making a scene. I’ve been to this bar a few times, and it takes a lot to get kicked out.That’s why I picked it. But the way Tiger’s going tonight, I wouldn’t put it past her.

She releases my hand when we get back to the makeshift dance floor and resumes dancing in her own world. I don’t move an inch because I have a feeling the combination of alcohol, dancing, and a dress that has its own zip code is about to catch up to her.

“Come on, Cap! This song is so fun!”

The words are barely out of her mouth before I watch her start to stumble to the ground. She tries to catch herself, but she somehow takes out two couples, knocks over a pub table, and runs into a waitress all in one swoop.

I bend over to pick her up from the floor. “Come on, Tiger. Time to go.”

“No!” She yells as she kicks her feet, sending her dress up in the air. “I gotta dance!”

“Dancin’ time’s over. Time to sober up.”

“You’re no fun.”

“So I’ve been told.”

“You don’t have to carry me.”

I reach into the backseat of the Lyft and pick her up fireman style as we walk to my house. “You fell, therefore I do.”

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