Chapter Ten
Katie
Wedding magazines take over the dining table. There is a large piece of cardboard with circles drawn on it and other smaller pieces of paper stuck around the corners. Of course, Ivy would make her own seating chart. Any excuse for arts and crafts.
“Katie, look,” Flynn whispers from his seat beside me. I glance up from the magazine I’m looking at. He’s got a grin on his face as he holds up the little pieces of paper with our names on them. “It’s us in seating chart form.”
I shake my head, suppressing a laugh as he turns the two little pieces of paper into one another and touches them together, like he’s a child playing with dolls.
Flynn and I are sitting next to each other with Ivy and Scott on the other side.
This morning, I got a panicked call from Ivy, freaking out that she’d been engaged for almost six months and hadn’t planned a single thing.
She begged me to come spend my Sunday with her to get the ball rolling.
I was almost out the door when Flynn caught me, made me tell him where I was going, and then decided to come along. “I’ll drive,” he’d said, and then he just ushered me to his truck.
It was probably a good thing that he did come along in the end. Ivy’s been a mess all day, and Flynn knows how to make her smile. He even cut the little name tags out for the seating chart for her.
“Do you think we should be inviting more than a hundred people?” Ivy says, waving for Flynn to put the two tags back down on the chart.
“No,” Scott grumbles from beside her, fist wrapping around the beer Flynn put in front of him just before. “We should invite less.”
Ivy slaps his shoulder gently. “This is the bare minimum list. You have a lot of teammates.”
“They don’t have to come.”
“That’s rude.” Ivy narrows her eyes. “Stop being a grump about this.”
“Sorry. It’s just … I would marry you right now, right here, just with these two as witnesses. We don’t need all those people.” He leans over and gently kisses her hair, tucking a piece behind her ear. “But, if you want to invite them all, then I’m happy. As long as you are.”
I ignore the stabbing pain in my chest at the image of the two of them. It’s been happening more and more with these guys lately. Watching them be happy and in love, it kind of hurts.
I feel a foot tap against mine from under the table, and I glance at Flynn. He’s staring at me, waiting for me to look his way. When I meet his gaze, his eyes flicker toward the couple across the table, then he pretends to gag.
I laugh.
Out loud.
Oh my god. I clamp down on the smile so fast, but it’s too late. Flynn is out of his chair, his arms above his head. “I did it. I made her laugh.”
“You’re an idiot.” I roll my eyes, but my smile breaks through, and I can’t be bothered to taper it down again.
He comes around the table, placing one hand on the back of my chair and another on the table in front of me as he leans down, his face inches from mine. “You laughed. This means we’re friends.”
Then he kisses me on the cheek and heads for the kitchen, one fist firmly in the air like he’s just won a game or something.
“You’re blushing,” Ivy states across the table. Scott has gotten out of his seat too, following Flynn.
“I’m not.” I am. I press the back of my hand to my cheek. It’s warm. I’m definitely blushing. Damn it.
“You guys are cute together. He’s the kind of Golden Retriever energy you need in a man.” She nods to herself as she flicks through the magazine in front of her.
“Golden Retriever? We’re comparing men to dogs now?”
“Uh-huh. It’s the newest thing on the internet.”
“And what would Scott be?”
Ivy pauses, glancing over her shoulder at her fiancé. “German Shepherd.”
“So,” I say, looking to change the subject from whatever complicated and confusing feelings I’m having for Flynn onto something else. “Have you guys picked a date yet?”
Thankfully, she accepts it. “No. It will have to be in the off-season next year. I can’t go through trying to plan a whole wedding while he’s always away for games. It’s too hard.”
“I’m here to help with whatever you need.” I reach a hand out, offering it to her. She smiles and takes it.
“I … I want to go dress shopping soon. Will you come with me?” My heart squeezes when I see the tears flood her eyes.
Unlike last year, when she was just starting therapy and still working through the grief for her parents, Ivy blinks back the tears instead of letting them fall.
I know she’s likely thinking about her mom and how she wishes she could be here.
“Of course I will, Ives.” I shake her hand a little.
“You know what we should do? We should have a girls’ night with wine and ice cream and watch your mom and dad’s wedding video.
I bet she was a gorgeous bride. You could get some ideas of the things she chose for herself and your dad if you wanted to incorporate something she might like. ”
“Yeah.” Ivy blinks a few times and lifts her hand to run her thumb under her eye. “That’s actually a nice idea. I haven’t watched that video in ages.”
I smile gently as Scott joins us again, leaning down to place a gentle kiss on Ivy’s throat. “We’re going to put the football on. Do you want to order some food?”
“Sure. What do you feel like?”
“Whatever you want, baby.” He kisses her and walks toward the lounge, taking a seat on the couch with Flynn. For a moment, I catch Flynn’s gaze and my cheeks heat again.
It’s so easy being here with him. Our friends. His and mine. That right there is another reason he and I would be a bad idea. If we blew up again, if it didn’t work out, we would forever be tied together by the friends we share.
He winks at me, throwing me a cheeky smile before turning to the television that now plays the pre-game interviews.
The boys are on a bye week, so it’s a rare weekend off.
A lot of the team went to Mexico for the week to blow off some steam.
I expected Flynn to join them, but when I asked, he merely shrugged and told me, “There’s nothing in Mexico for me. ”
“Maybe a February date? Do you think it will be too cold?” Ivy draws my attention back to her.
“Do you plan on getting married in the snow?”
“No?”
“Then you’ll be fine if you want to do it in February.”
“I just … to be honest, I wish we had just eloped in Italy when Scott asked me to.”
“He what?” I look up at her with shock.
“Yeah. On the second last night there, he said, ‘We should just get married here.’ I freaked out.”
“Of course you did.” I laugh. “Ives, why didn’t you just elope?”
“I don’t know.” She shakes her head a little. “I had it in my head that I wanted to get married here. Where my family is. Even if they can’t be at the wedding.”
My heart clenches, and I nod. “I get that. So why do you wish you had now? Is it the stress of planning?”
“No.” She glances over her shoulder at Scott. “I just want to be his wife. Like, right now. Waiting for the season to be over feels like torture.”
“You two are disgusting, you know that?”
“Disgustingly in love.” Ivy nods solemnly, agreeing with me.
I laugh, getting up from the table. “Do you have wine?” I ask her.
She follows me into the kitchen and pulls an unopened bottle of rosé from the fridge. I grab two glasses from the cupboard and place them in front of her.
“So, February then? After the season is over?” I ask as she pours out two glasses.
“Yep. February.”
“So … when can we do the bachelorette party? I’m thinking New York?” I take a sip of my wine as Ivy laughs and shakes her head.
“Absolutely not. No New York. I already know what you’re thinking, and you’re not allowed to get me strippers.”
I pout. “Why?! What is the point of my best friend getting married if I can’t enjoy getting her strippers for her bachelorette?”
“No strippers.” My voice must have traveled because when I look up, Scott is glaring at me from across the room.
“You’re a buzzkill, Harvey.” I hide my smirk behind my glass of wine.
“Wait,” Flynn pipes up from beside Scott.
“I can still get you a stripper for your bachelor party, right?” We all laugh because Flynn looks so stressed, faced with the idea that he might also miss out on getting strippers if Scott vetoes them.
I ignore the same pang of jealousy that flourishes in my stomach, and we join the boys on the couch to watch football.
***
“Why did you convince me that walking home was a good idea?”
“Because we’ve both had too much to drink to drive my truck home.”
“You ever heard of Uber?” I grumble, shivering against the chilly evening air.
“It’s a beautiful night.”
“It’s freezing.”
“Yes, but look at the sky. No cloud cover. If we were in the country, we’d be able to see stars on a night like tonight.”
I look up. He’s right. There are no clouds tonight. The moon shines so brightly, and it mixes with the street lamps and the lights pouring out of people’s windows. Flynn doesn’t live far from Ivy and Scott’s place. A few streets, a fifteen-minute walk.
We ended up staying there for dinner and watching another game of football.
I still can’t quite understand why they want to play it, train for it, live football day in and day out, and then even on a break, they’re still obsessed with watching it.
But, they do. Even Ivy was getting into the Sunday night game that we watched between Texas and California, Scott’s former team.
Unlike him, Flynn was drafted to Boston.
He’s never played anywhere else, if you don’t count college.
Because we stayed, I drank more than I should have. Ivy just kept filling my glass, and she kept supplying beer to Flynn. By the end of the night, we both had too much to drive. So here we are, walking.
Flynn’s brownstone comes into view when we round a corner and turn into his street.
“Oh, thank god.” I pick up my pace, leaving Flynn behind. I reach the front door and turn to wait for him. He smirks at me as he climbs the front steps.
“You didn’t bring your keys?”