Freddie #2
Ryker shakes his head. “Barn fire, Samson’s place. It was full of hay when it went up so it was a hell of a blaze. The barn’s completely gone, and the hay kept relighting as we tried to put it out. It’s still smoking now. They make for some dramatic pictures, but everyone’s fine.”
Liam frowns. “Suspects?”
“Samson said he saw a group of kids leaving the scene on their bikes, couldn’t say whether it was five or four, and didn’t recognise any of them. It fits with the evidence we found at the scene—footprints in the mud, one had the Fortnite logo.”
“Adults play Fortnite too,” I say.
Ryker snorts as leans his weight on me. “Oh, I know . . . I do believe I have more points than you.”
“You cheat.”
“I would never.” He places his hand to his chest like he’s wounded by my accusation, then laughs. “So come on, what’s up?”
“The sky,” I say.
He groans as he tips forward and bashes his forehead to the table. “That was awful.”
“And you know awful.”
Ryker leans forward as he smiles. “I love a feisty Freddie.”
“He bought us colas.” Liam says, and he’s using the baseline growl, either angry or concerned. It’s more likely to be the latter, but it wipes the flirtatious smile from Ryker’s face.
Ryker lifts his head, takes in the three glasses of cola, then straightens. “How long have you been here, babe?”
I roll my eyes. “You shouldn’t call me that.”
“Because your girlfriend doesn’t like it?”
“No, I don’t like it.”
I secretly kind of do. Ryker only calls me babe. He doesn’t even call the guys he’s slept with that.
One corner of Ryker’s mouth lifts. “Sure you don’t . . .”
“And an hour,” I answer. “I’ve been here an hour.”
“What couldn’t be said in a text or a video call?” Ryker asks.
“I wanted to ask you in person.”
Wrinkles appear on Ryker’s brow. It doesn’t suit him to be serious, Liam’s the serious one, but both of them stare at me with the same expression—tense, not blinking, poised to react.
It’s only when they’re both like that do I understand why some people get them confused.
Take away the uniforms, either add stubble to one or take it from the other and make them both stare blankly, and even I would struggle to tell them apart.
Liam and Ryker, my best friends, are identical twins.
They live together, eat together, work out together .
. . which means body-wise as well as looks-wise, they’re similar, if not carbon copies.
There are a few clues, though. Ryker smiles more, a lot more, which has created smile bags beneath his eyes that give him a default friendly expression.
Liam, on the other hand, rarely smiles, he frowns, and although they’ve both got the exact same shade of chocolate-brown eyes, his appear darker thanks to the shadow of his brow.
Liam has more grey hairs too, but that’s an unfair comparison considering most of them dot his stubble and Ryker prefers to be clean-shaven.
Ryker’s eyebrows are thinner, sparse at the ends, and he thinks it’s because he’s had them singed in a few fires and the hair follicles are damaged.
I think he overplucked them once and won’t admit it.
“Freddie,” Ryker says, prompting me. “What is it you want to ask us?”
Liam hasn’t moved any closer, but it feels like he’s bearing down on me from across the table, shrinking the room with how intensely he’s watching me. He’s not a talker, he leaves that to Ryker, who on many occasions has been accused of loving the sound of his own voice . . . mainly by me.
I curl the napkin in my fist, squishing the lemon slice. “I . . . I’m going to ask Keegan to marry me, but before I do, I want to know if you’ll be my best men?”
As I’m speaking, I think maybe I’m not doing this in the right order.
Maybe I’m supposed to ask Keegan first, and if she says yes, ask my best friends, but part of me needs to know they’ve got my back.
Part of me is overexcited at the thought of us in matching suits waiting at the front of a church aisle.
I look up from the table, not wanting to miss their reactions, and I see Liam first as he’s sitting across from me.
For once, his eyes don’t look dark. He’s raised his eyebrows, and the lights above strike his chocolate-coloured irises.
At first, I think its surprise, but then he leans back in his seat like he’s trying to get away from me, like he’d rather be anywhere else than here in this moment.
“Wow,” Ryker says.
I turn to him, and he’s widened his eyes too. He chuckles, then scratches the back of his head. “Marriage, Freddie, wow. She’s the one, then, huh?”
It’s not the reaction I’d been expecting. Ryker’s voice isn’t judgmental, but neither is it pleased. Instead, it’s kind of flat, hollow. Where’s the excitement? Where’s the joy? Where’s my best friends blurting out yes, they’d love to be my best men?
“I’ve been with Keegan almost two years.” I fidget, and scowl at the table. I shouldn’t have to justify my decision to them. I’m not after their blessing.
“Yeah, of course, we’d love to be.” Ryker grabs my shoulder and gives me a shake. “Rather you than me.”
“Aren’t you allergic to commitment?”
“Something like that.” He grabs his Coke, takes a few big gulps, then wipes his arm across his lips. “That’s great, Freddie. I’m happy for you.”
“Yeah?”
“Hell yeah,” Ryker says, then he pulls me into a hug.
He squeezes me, and I press my face against the side of his neck, enjoying his warmth and not caring that he reeks of smoke.
I sigh softly against his skin, letting my eyes slip shut.
For a minute there I thought I’d done something wrong. I thought they were angry.
“Champagne,” Ryker announces, letting me go.
I don’t need to give Sharon a thumbs-up, she hears Ryker and comes rushing over. Sharon pops the cork and pours out three chilled glasses of champagne.
“You haven’t asked Keegan yet?” Ryker asks.
I shake my head. “I’m going to on Saturday.”
“She might say no.”
Sharon swats Ryker on the back of the head. “Of course she won’t.”
“A toast to our Freddie . . .” Ryker says. He glances at Liam who cracks his knuckles before picking up one of the glasses.
“Our Freddie,” Liam echoes, and he and Ryker share a look, a long look I have no hope of understanding.
Our glasses clink.
We drink the bottle, and Ryker rubs his hands together, discussing the stag party he’s going to organise.
I know he’s been responsible for a few wayward parties in the past, but he assures me he’ll keep it totally safe and completely respectable.
Liam sips his champagne, ever the silent observer, but when Ryker gets up to buy more drinks at the bar, we’re left alone.
“You’ll get a plus one, obviously,” I say. “Keiron can be a groomsman if you want.”
I’ve not had much interaction with Liam’s boyfriend, which is odd considering they’ve been on and off for almost six years.
There’s been a few fleeting meet-ups where I brought Keegan, and he brought Keiron, and they joked about how similar their names are, but I’ve never spoken to Keiron without Keegan or Ryker being present, and he never joins us for a drink at the weekend.
Liam’s protective of him, protective of their relationship, but if making him a groomsman means Liam’s more comfortable about being my best man, I’m happy to involve Keiron in my big day.
“She still might say no,” Liam says.
I snort. “I’m kind of hoping she won’t.”
“There’s no point asking Keiron to be a groomsman or me and Ryker to be your best men until you know if your plan to marry her is going ahead.”
His words slap me across the face, then leave me shivering at their pure iciness. Liam isn’t wrong. I even thought about it in the moment, that I was asking in the wrong order, but I wanted to tell them, or maybe I wanted the reassurance of knowing they’ll be there for me.
Liam gestures to the empty champagne bottle. “What are we even celebrating?”
The ice-cold feeling inside me is creeping closer to my heart. It’s like he’s shaming me, belittling me. He’s blunt, he doesn’t know how not to be, but this hurts and it feels intentional. “We’re celebrating you two agreeing to be my best men.”
“We always have been.” He pushes his champagne flute closer to me across the table. “I’m going home.”
“Liam . . .”
He doesn’t linger, doesn’t spare me a glance, he just gets up and leaves.
Ryker’s at the bar, chatting away to the man who checked him out when he first strutted in.
He’s telling the stranger he was Mr December in last year’s firefighter calendar—one of his most successful pick-up lines—and he follows it up by showing said pictures on his phone.
He swipes until he goes too far and exposes too much of himself. Another of his pulling techniques.
“Whoops,” he says. “That’s private.”
The man bites his lip, eyeing Ryker like he’s meat to devour from the bone. I sit there and realise I haven’t just lost Liam for the night, I’ve lost Ryker too, as he waves over at me before gesturing to the toilets where he plans to fuck the guy drooling beside him.
I slump, still holding my empty champagne flute, and the excitement that had been holding me up all night suddenly vanishes.