Page 103 of Gravity of Love
“You’re up, chickadee!” Zee pointed at Poppy.
Frankie, now halfway through her second French 75, followed Zion’s lead to the edge of the dance floor. Poppy joined a cluster of women near the center: Jenna, Tiana, Kiki, and about ten others, all jockeying for prime position but pretending not to strategize in their gameplay.
The air was thick with an anticipatory charge. Frankie’s gaze remained fixed on the bobbing heads and pastel dresses assembling for the bouquet toss, but she felt Zion’s presence beside her like a steady gravitational pull.
“So,” Zee leaned in, lowering his voice beneath the swell of Beyoncé and the shrieks of encouragement from the crowd. “What’s your game plan?”
“I don’t know,” she admitted, dragging a knuckle along the condensation tracing down her glass. “I just know Ineedto talk to him.”
“Justtalk?” Her bestie emphasized, his eyes following the gaggle of single women as they fanned out in a loose semicircle. “The man bought the only house in California with your dream sunroom whilst you were engaged to his baby brother, and he hadn’t spoken to you in over a decade.”
Frankie glanced around, making sure no one had overheard Zee, thankfully everyone’s attention was on the dance floor. She’d thought those things in her head, but hearing Zion state them out loud was even more…intense. “I know.”
“It’s a prettystrongmove.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“We’re talking Lloyd Dobler with the boombox outside the window inSay Anything,cue cards outside the front door inLove Actually, Jake Ryan showing up at the wedding leaning on the red car.” He gasped. “No, it’s Noah. He did a Noah fromThe Notebook. He built you the house with the wraparound porch and the blue shutters.”
But we were never together.
“Except, you didn’t spend a summer in love,” Zee voiced her inner thoughts.
Zion inducting Liam into the Romantic Leading Men Hall of Fame was not helping Frankie remain poised and calm as she scanned the crowd searching for a chiseled jaw covered in five o’clock shadow belonging to a six-foot-three brooding man and coming up empty. Like anything she lost, she began to retrace her steps. Her last Liam sighting was at the cake cutting. That was thirty minutes earlier. Had he left without saying goodbye? It would be very on-brand of him.
The DJ blew a whistle, and Frankie turned her attention back to the dance floor just in time to see women surging forward,elbows out, eyes gleaming with either hope or sheer competitive instinct.
Frankie’s mom looked like she was floating on air as Mr. Sterling held her hand and she mounted the dais with the bouquet cupped in her hand like a chalice. She gave the flowers a one, two, three count, then launched the bouquet over her shoulder. For a split second, the cluster of women froze. Then the bouquet arced through the air and found its target. Poppy looked up, and when she saw the bouquet was headed her way, her arm went up, and she caught it in a soft cradle.
The room erupted. Talia and Jenna, who were on either side of Poppy, sandwiched her in bear hugs as they cheered wildly. Frankie joined in the clapping as she continued surveying the room, feeling like she was in a parallel timeline where everyone else operated at double speed while she was stuck on a glitching loop trying to play an IRL virtual version of Where’s Waldo with Liam being the main character.
She didn’t spot him anywhere—not with her brothers or family, not at the bar, not brooding in a darkened corner, or sulking on the deck.
The energy spiked once more as the DJ transitioned seamlessly into the garter toss, prompting a new wave of chaos. Frankie’s now stepfather, which felt very odd to say or even think, kissed her mom’s hand before dramatically kneeling in front of her, causing her to giggle like a teenager as he slid the garter down her thigh, calf, and ankle with all the solemnity of a coronation. The crowd whooped, phones held high, as he bit the lacy band between his teeth, playing up the moment for maximum comedic payoff.
In all the twenty-five years she’d known Mr. Sterling, she could honestly say she’d never seen a playful side of him. It was unsettling and odd to see now, but she could appreciate it for her mother’s sake.
The DJ called for “all the eligible bachelors.” The prompt sent a dozen men—Frankie’s brothers Niko and AJ among them, charging onto the dance floor. Some were pushed by relatives to join in, others seemed ambivalent, but a few went full showman for the audience, flexing or hamming it up for their friends.
Frankie zeroed in on AJ, whose expression was blank. AJ was typically difficult to read, but she noticed his demeanor was even more detached since he arrived today. There was an extra layer of distance, a barrier that had not been there before. She knew his last deployment hadn’t gone to plan. They’d lost several members of his platoon. Their mom mentioned that he’d refused to talk about it. She wasn’t sure if that was because he couldn’t for national security reasons or because he couldn’t find his words, as he used to say. She hoped that seeing him in person would put her at ease, but if anything, it had caused her concern to escalate.
Her attention was drawn back to the main attraction as whistles and cheers from the men swelled. Mr. Sterling spun the garter around his index finger several times before turning his back to the crowd. The men shifted and tensed, some crouched in an athletic pose, while others stood with hands stuffed deep in their pockets, clearly projecting a force field of disinterest.
The DJ counted down, “On three! One… two… THREE?—”
The garter sailed over Mr. Sterling’s shoulder in a perfect, white and blue lace arc, and AJ—who must not have been paying attention—snapped his head up at the last second. The elastic band struck him squarely in the chest and fell into his palm as if by divine intervention.
The men exploded in a chorus of hoots, jeers, and feigned outrage. Brawny uncles and cousins pounded AJ so hard on the back as they grabbed his shoulders that his shirt nearly untucked. Niko wasted zero time leaping onto his brother’s back, attempting to wrestle him down into a headlock in a movethat was half-WWE, half-drunken bear cub she’d witnessed hundreds of times in her youth. AJ, the unwitting center of this circus, was easily able to maneuver out from under the move in a smooth and decisive aversion tactic.
“Get off.” His tone held neither amusement nor irritation, just flatly stating two words as the garter—lacy, electric blue, and slightly twisted from its journey—hung from his inked wrist like an absurd friendship bracelet.
The women, meanwhile, circled Poppy and gave her the kind of fawning congratulations usually reserved for lottery winners or new mothers. Even Tiana, who had all but tackled her during the bouquet melee, looked to be hugging her with enough force to crack a rib. Poppy, grinning and bright-eyed, raised the bouquet over her head as if she’d just earned a trophy at Wimbledon.
Frankie watched the two groups—men and women, each in their own spheres of ritual celebration—and felt a strange slosh of emotions inside her chest. Pride, nostalgia, an odd pinch of envy, and an instinctual pull that had nothing to do with flowers or garters. Her gaze boomeranged around the room, still searching for Liam and still coming up empty.
By the time Tessa, the wedding photographer, corralled Poppy and AJ to the center of the dance floor for the obligatory Bouquet-Meets-Garter photo op, Frankie’s nerves were sparking again. She saw her mom slip away from the crowd, bouquet-less but radiant, and approach Yaya, who was already hounding a server for another round of espresso martini, her newly discovered cocktail of choice.
Frankie took a steadying breath and, for the millionth time, glanced at the crowd. Liam was still nowhere. She’d thought she would be able to wait until her mom was on her honeymoon to confront Liam, but after learning that he’d bought his home,sight unseen, ten grand over asking because of a room she’d talked about wanting was a game changer. She had to pivot.
