Chapter Thirty-Five
NICKY
Fancy weddings were nothing new for Nicky.
He’d had two and a half of his own. Between the rest of the band there had been five more.
(Or maybe it was six?) If he added in the other band-adjacent weddings of friends and colleagues over the years, the number was well into the double digits.
Though, truthfully some of those hadn’t been fancy, only expensive.
The one with a village of overpriced yurts and another where the groom dropped in from a helicopter sprang to mind.
This one, though, felt different.
He was led to a spot in the front row, just as he had been at the rehearsal, seated between Brandon’s wife, Jenna, and Lucy’s ex-husband Sam. An open seat to his right was where Lucy would sit when she finally made it back to him.
Nicky hadn’t slept well without Lucy wrapping her long limbs around him.
Had he been so inclined, Nicky might have wondered at how quickly she had become essential to his life.
Only days had passed since that first bumbling conversation surrounded by dick lollipops, but it hadn’t felt fast to him.
He wasn’t in the beginning with Lucy, but the juicy heart-pounding middle of a story he’d waited twenty-eight long years to continue.
Devin had yet to make an appearance, but Nicky had already decided to simply ignore the man. He still wanted to put him in the ER for the way he’d treated Lucy, but wasn’t about to ruin Chloe’s wedding no matter how satisfying it would be.
The Cristallo Salon was filled with the smell of flowers and the liquid-soft sounds of a string quartet playing classical versions of modern songs.
The bouncy chords of Maroon 5’s ‘Girls Like You’ made Nicky wonder if they might play ‘The Breathing Room’ or if, perhaps, Lucy had barred it from the set list.
As the officiant took her place at the front of the room, the chirp of happy chatter dialed back to a quiet hum. Nicky felt, more than saw, Devin settle into his seat some ten feet away.
Chandler, beaming like a klieg light, walked up the aisle with his mother on his arm, depositing her on the groom’s side of the room before taking his spot beside the officiant.
Moments later, the double doors at the back of the room opened. And Nicky stopped breathing.
The bright staccato swell of Bruno Mars from the violins played in time with his heart, pounding as it was at the sight of Lucy.
She shined. Glowed. She was a pink, flickering light.
He could feel her warmth in his chest as she smiled at him and took slow measured steps down the aisle.
Her hair was pinned back on one side by a jeweled flower, the other side flowing in loose waves that begged for his fingers.
If only he was standing in Chandler’s spot and Lucy was gliding toward him up there. Jesus, it was an ache. Deep in his belly.
Nicky had accepted that Lucy was wary of relationships in general after her three failed marriages.
He also knew that she was unsure about the two of them.
He wasn’t. Not in the slightest. So, while he knew he shouldn’t push her, God did he ever want to push.
In that moment, he wanted to scoop her up and carry her over his shoulder straight to the nearest wedding chapel.
Or maybe bump Chandler off the stage and take over right then and there.
Nicky offered Lucy his hand as she approached. Her hand in his felt so right he had to stop a moan from escaping his lips.
‘You are beautiful,’ he whispered as he guided her to her seat.
‘Thank you,’ she whispered back. Then: ‘You look like a snack. Black tie suits you. Even if I can’t see the tats.’
Lucy winked, a wicked gleam in her eye, and Nicky was done.
Gone. He didn’t want to be anywhere else on planet Earth.
In the universe. He only wanted to be by Lucy’s side.
He knew right then, with his heart bursting open in his chest, that there would be no going back from this.
Either he would be with Lucy for what was left of his life, or he would spend it pining for what might have been in a way that had been inconceivable when he was eighteen.
He wanted to shout this revelation to her, to the whole sequined and tuxedoed crowd. To the world. But it was time to stand for the bride.
As they got to their feet, Nicky tucked himself behind Lucy and placed a hand on her hip. She had already been snuffling quietly when the music changed, but when Chloe appeared at the end of the aisle, Nicky could feel Lucy’s shoulders shake.
He produced another silk hankie (had run out that morning to the Lusso shops for a whole stack of them) and handed it to her.
She looked to him, her eyes misty and shining with an expression of such gratitude and love that it almost broke him.
He wanted to squeeze her tight and make her say it.
Make her admit how right they were together.
Instead, he watched as she turned away and gazed at her daughter walking down the aisle on her father’s arm.
‘God, look at his face ,’ Lucy marveled, her eyes glancing to Chandler.
Nicky followed Lucy’s gaze, and there was Chandler, looking like a man who was about to have every wish he’d ever made granted in a few minutes’ time. Nicky was not jealous of much in life anymore, but he was sure as hell jealous of that .
Nicky barely registered the glittering white form that passed them, too focused on watching Lucy as her emotions played on her face. He saw pride, joy, humor and maybe just a touch of sadness, too. He was enthralled by them all.
For Nicky, the ceremony passed in a series of hand squeezes and gentle swipes of his thumb on Lucy’s neck.
With all her focus on Chloe, Lucy didn’t pay him a bit of attention.
Nicky ate it up, loved every second of being there for Lucy as a strong, silent partner in her delight and bittersweet sorrow.
When Devin got up to do his reading, Nicky felt Lucy stiffen.
‘Sonnet 116 by William Shakespeare,’ Devin said into the mic. He cleared his throat and continued, ‘Let me not to the marriage of true minds / Admit impediments. Love is not love / Which alters when it alteration finds, / Or bends with the remover to remove.’
Devin’s amplified voice carried through the space, forceful and clear. ‘O, no! It is an ever-fixed mark, / That looks on tempests and is never shaken.’
It was clearly supposed to be a heartwarming sentiment. Nicky could hear sniffles around the room. Poor Jenna was near sobbing. But Devin’s voice was not in any way heartwarming. It was crestfallen. Bitter. Devin wasn’t beaming at the happy couple. He was glaring. At Lucy.
Pointedly. Noticeably. Enough that heads began to turn their way.
‘Shit,’ Lucy whispered.
Devin went on, a noticeable haze of anger coloring his tone, ‘It is the star to every wandering bark, / Whose worth’s unknown, although his height be taken / Love’s not Time’s fool, though rosy lips and cheeks / Within his bending sickle’s compass come …’
Nicky strengthened his grip on Lucy’s hand. Silently telling her that it was all okay. That it would all be okay.
Devin’s voice grew stronger as the reading went on. He never looked down at his paper. Like somehow, inexplicably, this slightly deranged Adidas-tracksuit-wearing jock had memorized Shakespeare just to have this very moment of retribution. That fucking shithead.
Devin bellowed, ‘Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, / But bears it out even to the edges of doom.’
Nicky squeezed her hand, again.
‘Lucy,’ he whispered. A plea.
Lucy looked down at their intertwined hands, and slowly peeled her fingers from his, placing them primly on her lap.
Devin boomed, ‘If this be error and upon me prov’d, / I never writ nor no man ever lov’d.’
Lucy was physically inches away, but Nicky knew that she was already erecting a wall between them.
Knowing her like he thought he did, the thing was bound to be damn near impenetrable by the time cocktails were served.
So, Nicky did the only thing he could in the moment.
He sighed. (Because screaming and smashing things were frowned upon at black-tie weddings.)
Vows were taken, kisses were had, and by the time the string quartet started up with a Taylor Swift song, Nicky’s stomach was in knots.
He stood, and smiled, and clapped for the happy couple as they practically skipped back down the aisle. Then he watched Lucy’s back as she followed Brandon and Jenna out of the room.