Page 90 of When Love Gives You Lemons
Fielder Lemon is a homewrecker
Chapter 17
The Misery! The Exquisite Tragedy! The Matty Lemon of It All!
Ricky kissed me.
And, dear reader, I told him I loved him. In one big messy word vomit, I did it.
And he said—well, he didn’t exactly say it back, did he? But still!
Now we’re separated by circumstance.Again!
While the parentals are journeying into the Blue Grotto—Ricky’s mom, dad, and aunt in one boat, the Coven in the other—Topher and Sienna waste no time corralling the bridal party for group pictures.
Like a cancer cell that won’t go away, Cam magically reappeared, a plot point of extreme inconvenience, and has ushered Ricky to the other side of the yacht, completely out of view, making me question my own reality, Ricky’s phantom touch lingering on my bare skin like a soft breeze.
Matty leans in. “What happened in there?”
My ears perk. “Huh? Nothing.”
“Lies,” Matty says. “We just got out, and that place was the pinnacle of romantic.” His arm wraps tightly around Nic’s waist, the bare skin of their torsos fusing. “If Benny wasn’t in our rowboat, we would have been naked.”
I roll my eyes. “With the tour guide right there?”
Matty shrugs. “He looks like he’d enjoy the show.”
Topher yells, “Let’s gooooooo!”
“I’ll have you know I make the best third,” Benny says, before adding, “wheel.”
Monroe covers Tyler’s ears. “Fielder! Details! You and Ricky! Grotto!”
“Yeah, andiamo! You roped us into this on the PJ; you need to follow through andnotbe like every other gay man I’ve ever known and not disappoint me.”
“I don’t kiss and tell.” I wink. “But I don’t want everyone on the yacht to know, right now, because Ricky and Cam are still, whatever, and we haven’t talked through our issues, really, so, but, yeah. We hardcore made out.”
Matty slaps my shoulders hard, and Topher hollers like a frat boy.
“What’re we screaming about over here?” Sienna’s hands are perched on her hips. “As the bride, I demand to know any and every bit of juicy goss.”
Matty grins nervously, and my cheeks grow hot. I freeze, but Matty swoops in to my rescue with a redirect nobody saw coming. “I lost my virginity last night!”
“That wasn’t on my bingo card.” Benny raises his cup. “But cheers to that!”
“Salute!” Nic Jr. doesn’t miss a beat.
Tyler high-fives them both.
“Ew, you people really need a trigger warning,” Jenni Lee says, her ignorance sucking out all the oxygen from the planet.
“ ‘You people’?” I cock my head.
Matty’s cheeks go fire red, and his face falls to the floor in embarrassment.
“Relax, I’m an ally, a member of the LGBTQ+AI community,” she says, suddenly sounding far too sober, and saying more than she has the entire trip. It’s almost as if she was waiting for a spotlight.
“Did you just canonize artificial intelligence as gay?” Benny asks. “Adoesn’t stand forally.Sorry, girl.”
