Page 5 of Anything for You
“Do you want us to bow to you or something?” Molly snarks, joining us on Hallie’s other side. “Call you queen of wedding planning?”
There was a time not that long ago when Molly would say something like that and it would devolve into full on bickering, but that’s been happening less since Julie fell in love with Asher and opened up a few months ago about how she has beensuffering from severe anxiety for most of her adult life. There is a new lightness to her now that makes her laugh and say, “Well obviously. Respect must be paid.”
“Hallie, everything about this dress is perfect. Ben is going to lose his mind when he sees you in it,” Molly says.
She laughs a little. “That’s not saying much. Ben loses his mind when he sees me with unwashed hair and leggings I’ve worn for three straight days.”
“Lucky bitch,” Molly mutters. “You too, queen of wedding planning,” she says, pointing at Julie. “I saw the way Asher looked at you last week when we came here after Pilates. He was thirty seconds away from devouring you whole and you were gross and sweaty and not even wearing a cute workout outfit.”
Julie and Hallie’s eyes meet in the mirror, and I can feel the understanding pass between them. The kind of contentment that comes with the confidence of rock-solid love and a man who adores every inch of you. I’m so happy for my friends, and I loved watching them both fall in love. And if there is a small part of me that wonders whether I’ll ever find the kind of love they found with their partners, well, I’m only human. I keep that part of me close, only taking it out and examining it late at night when I decide it’s a good time to torture myself with what ifs and bad memories.
“I know it seems crazy to be getting married in two months, but once we decided we were ready to set the date, I just didn’t want to wait.” Hallie’s eyes are still on her reflection as she speaks. “I’m so ready to be married to Ben.” Her voice wavers a little and she reaches back for my hand. I squeeze hers in a gesture of support, my own eyes filling again, Hallie’s emotion palpable.
“We can do it.” Julie’s voice is firm with the confidence and certainty she typically saves for her clients at the law firm the four of us own together. “You don’t need months and monthsto plan a wedding. That’s what the wedding industrial complex wants you to think so you end up all stressed and strung out and do stupid shit like spend fifty thousand dollars on flowers. Two months is plenty of time. My best friend is marrying my brother, and I won’t allow it to be anything but perfect. Trust me.”
I reach for Julie’s hand too. “If I ever go to war, I want you leading the charge, Jules. Seriously, you could rule the world.”
“Fucking right, I could. But I don’t really want to. Just maybe my little fiefdom right here, making sure we have a successful law firm and really well-planned weddings.”
Molly snickers. “Now that you’re no longer radiating anxiety all the time and understand the meaning of the words down time, I think you do a really good job keeping us all in line at the firm.”
“Mol, I think that’s the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me.”
“Yeah, well, it’s Sunday so you’re not ordering us around at work, and Hallie is standing here in a wedding dress. I’m feeling my feelings.”
“Just for that, I’ll plan your wedding too, when the time comes.”
“As if,” Molly scoffs. “No wedding for me, babe. Why settle down with one man when there are so many men to have fun with. Looks like your wedding planning side hustle will end with Emma’s wedding.”
My stomach twists at Molly’s words but I cover it up with a snort. “And who am I marrying?”
Hallie’s eyes meet mine in the mirror, and hers are full of amusement. “I’m pretty sure there’s a tall, dark, and handsome former hockey player who would volunteer as tribute, if you ever stop turning red and getting flustered whenever he tries to talk to you.”
“You can’t deny he’s liked you for years, Em,” Molly says. “You should put that poor boy out of his misery and just talk to him.”
I sigh, tired of the long-standingJeremy likes Emmabut Emma can’t talk to Jeremybit, but I’m unwilling to put a stop to it because that would involve telling my friends the truth about what actually happened between Jeremy and me, and that’s something I’m not ready to do yet. Maybe ever. Probably never.
Eight years is a long time to ruminate over a one-night stand, but when you have one amazing night with the seven-years-older man you had a two-year-long crush on, and then he runs out the next morning with a guilty face and haunted eyes, that tends to stick with you. And when that seven-years-older man is a part of your friend group and also one of your clients, there’s no escaping him.
I do fine when he’s client Jeremy and I’m sitting behind my desk dispensing legal advice and telling him what to do. But when he’s flirting with me or tossing a heavy arm around my shoulders or remembering that I like sugar instead of salt on the rim of my margaritas, my brain re-plays our night together and the way his face looked as he walked out of my bedroom. I end up red-faced and stammering with a mixture of simmering anger and deep humiliation and a touch of guilt that I didn’t make him tell me the real reason he was running away. Because there was absolutely a real reason, I’ve just never been able to work out exactly what.
I was twenty-two and didn’t know how to start that particular conversation with him, so I never said a word. The more time that passed without me bringing it up, the harder it got to say anything, so I didn’t. And now here we are, eight years later, and the awkwardness between us is weird and uncomfortable and you would think, as a grown ass adult, I would be able to figureout a way to fix that. But I haven’t. I’m all too aware of what the issue is but have no fucking clue how to solve it.
Self-awareness is a bitch.
I shove those thoughts to the back of my mind. Today is Hallie’s day.
I paste a grin on my face and turn to my friends. “He’s not for me. I think I need someone a little less…intense.”
The words taste bitter on my tongue because his intensity is one of the things that first drew me to him—one of the things that still draws me to him, despite the anger and humiliation of it all.
Molly’s brow furrows in thought. “Jeremy’s not intense. He’s, like, the opposite of that.”
I realize my mistake, but it’s too late to do anything about it. They don’t think Jeremy is intense because they only see what he wants them to see. I see more. I see what’s underneath that gregarious, charming, former athlete perfection he shows to the world, but I can’t tell them that because then I would have to explain how I know what I know, and that’s definitely not happening.
“I meant all the former athlete cockiness. It’s not for me. I like my men a little…quieter. Outgoing means going out and talking to people, and you know how much I hate that. I’ll leave the former athlete thing to you, Jules. You do it so well.”
“Damn straight, I do. But he makes it easy.” She looks down at the rings on her finger and I know she’s thinking about Asher. The love painted all over her face is so raw that I almost have to look away. I’m grateful when Julie snaps back into wedding planner mode.
