Chapter Twenty-Eight #2
Just as soon as I stopped longing for him to miraculously show up on the ship.
Here’s what I was up against: Nothing was fun without Cooper.
The ship seemed grayer, the people seemed duller. Even the ocean seemed … wetter. I didn’t want to be alone in the cabin, but I didn’t want to be out with the passengers, either. Every conversation I had to endure was interminable. Cooper had ruined me for everything—and everyone—else.
Two days at sea. Two days where I pretended to laugh, and pretended to be interested, and pretended to taste my food.
On the second night, we adjourned after dinner to the little theater where the slow-dance contest had been—this time to watch slideshows about the bride and groom.
Brody’s slideshow, put together by his mother, consisted mostly of school, team, and mall portraits of the same kid with the exact same smile and the exact same haircut.
Yawn. No wonder I’d dumped him.
But Pete had been tasked with putting Ashley’s slideshow together, and he’d taken the project next-level seriously.
He’d gone through every photo my mom had in every shoebox in the attic and pulled out all the sweetest, goofiest ones—of angelic Ashley, but also of our neighborhood gang: climbing the Vargases’ magnolia tree, hand-washing the Hamels’ cars, forming a human pyramid.
The show had plenty of other photos, too, of course—but at least a third of them were the neighborhood kids.
And Cooper was in every single one of those.
Usually right next to me.
That’s what I saw as the photos flashed by—in every picture, Cooper and I were together.
He had me in a headlock, or I was sitting on his shoulders, or we were upside down together on the jungle gym while everyone else was right side up.
In picture after picture, Cooper was sitting on me, or holding my ankles for a handstand, or giving me rabbit ears.
And guess what else? In half the pictures Cooper was in, he was wearing—wait for it: a vest.
That’s right.
Now that I saw the photos, I remembered. Cooper’s mom used to dress him in vests for anything even halfway fancy. And there it was: I liked guys in vests because they reminded me of Cooper. And now Cooper wore vests because I liked them. So we were basically a puppy chasing its own tail.
Of course we were.
Everybody agreed. The whole ship was shipping us, after all.
The whole ship—except for Cooper … who had finally had enough of me, in the end, to do the opposite.
It was fun to see the old photos at first—I laughed and squealed with everybody else—but the more images that flashed by, the more bittersweet it all started to feel.
I missed those kids. I missed being a kid.
I missed the momentum of childhood—that feeling like you were working toward something that mattered.
Growing up, if nothing else. The comforting notion I used to carry that one day not far off, I’d have it all figured out.
Watching Pete’s slideshow, I missed it all.
But that was just a fact about the past. You had no choice but to let it go.
Even if you didn’t want to.
Even if you would remember exactly the way it had kissed you senseless on a windblown balcony for the rest of your miserable life.
THE MORNING OF Ashley’s wedding, she came and found me at breakfast with some front-page gossip. “You are about to be so glad you gave up on Finn,” she said, steering me off into a corner.
“Why?”
“Because I just ran into Harmony in the elevator, and she was rattling off her list of conquests—literally counting on her fingers. And guess who is on her list—twice?”
“Just from context,” I said, “I’m gonna guess Finn?”
Ashley nodded, wrinkling her nose at having to deliver such unsavory news.
“Ugh!” I said, clamping my eyes closed and waving my hand at Ashley, like Stop!
“Apparently,” Ashley went on, “he’s been on quite the sex bender since his divorce. Harmony estimates he’s in the double digits already—on this cruise alone.”
I shifted my hand down from my eyes to my mouth—and stared at Ashley.
“I’m sorry,” Ashley said then. “Is this upsetting to hear?”
I considered the question. “Actually? No.”
“No? You’re not heartbroken?”
I held still to see if I could detect any unhappiness rattling around in my body. Then I answered, “Nope. Nothing.”
“I know you had decided against him, but still—”
But I just shook my head. “Maybe he’s on a healing journey.”
Ashley snorted. “Sexual healing.”
“The traumatizing part is being one degree of separation from Harmony,” I said.
“That is way too close for comfort,” Ashley agreed. “Although, apparently, she’s become friends with Grandma Dodie.”
“She—what?” Grandma Dodie was the best person in the family. How could she be consorting with the worst?
But Ashley nodded to confirm. “Grandma Dodie thinks she’s ‘very bright.’ She’s become a fan. They’ve been knitting together on the lido deck.”
“Knitting together?” Knitting was my thing!
Ashley shrugged. “She’s making a vest.”
“A vest?!” Now this was going too far.
“Anyway,” Ashley said, “Grandma Dodie says she’s not all bad. And we should all be more open-minded about each other.”
Huh.
Ashley watched me think about that, and then said, “You’re not jealous, are you?”
At the word jealous, I burst out with a laugh. “I’m fine.”
“But she got what you wanted.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Except I don’t want it anymore.”
I took a refreshing breath at how true those words were. The Finn journey was complete. The only man on—or off—this ship who could break my heart now, apparently … was Cooper.
THE GUESTS WENT ashore for a relaxing tropical day while our family stayed on the boat, frantically managing final details—including organizing tip envelopes, wrapping gifts for the wedding party (earrings for the ladies, cuff links for the guys), and checking in (again) with the photographer.
My mother had also printed off a totally ridiculous Day-of on the Big Day checklist that included both “keep hydrated” and “drink a mimosa to calm your nerves.”
My mother took the list very literally. “I guess I need a mimosa.”
“That’s for the bride, Mom.”
All to say, my mother put us all to work, and I was glad, honestly, to have something to do.
Because yet another of the infinite downsides of Cooper quitting the wedding was that he’d left me to serenade Ashley at the reception alone.
Alone—as in utterly.
I didn’t have any idea how I’d manage to do it—but I had no idea how to get out of it, either.
If I’m honest, a tiny, tragic, ridiculous part of me kept hoping that Grandma Dodie was right and Cooper would show up—like magic.
I knew it was impossible. I knew I was just manufacturing fantasies to offset my dread.
But that’s how I coped.
As well as by keeping wildly, frantically busy every single minute.
Still, though—nightmare singing scenarios came at me all day like I was being dive-bombed by pelicans.
What if I croaked like a frog? What if I burst into tears?
What if Ashley burst into tears? What if somebody filmed it all and put it up on YouTube?
Tone-deaf maid of honor destroys family with worst toast ever—and you’ll never believe what happened next!
What happened next?
I so badly wanted never to know.
But there was no way out. I’d be living through this day, and this wedding, and this reception, and this serenade, whether I wanted to or not.
Alone.
I wished over and over that I’d never agreed to let Cooper help me.
It was bad facing this alone. But thinking for a while that I didn’t have to—before reverting back, again, to facing it alone?
A hundred thousand times worse.
I comforted myself with the idea that time doesn’t play favorites. It tromps along at its own pace no matter what. Moments you wished could last forever moved at the exact same tempo as moments you wished were already over. All you had to do was just not die.
I pep-talked myself. I could do that, right? Not perish for the length of one song?
Guess we were about to find out.