22. Lucy #4
I had known this was coming. The shape of the conversation had made it obvious. Still, when her eyes landed on mine, something inside me went very still.
Bea smiled softly. “Lucy.”
“No,” I said, but my voice came out wrong.
Her eyebrows lifted.
“I mean yes,” I said quickly. “Obviously yes. I’m saying no to whatever emotional damage you are about to inflict before asking.”
Freya laughed through her tears.
Lo’s mouth curved.
Bea’s smile wobbled. “You made Northbend feel like somewhere I could belong without performing all the time,” she said.
She looked down at her tea, then back at me.
“You probably don’t realize that. Actually, you definitely don’t realize that because you are terrible at knowing how much you matter to people. ”
“I am not terrible.”
“But I love you anyway,” she continued, her voice thick again. “And I want you with me. Will you be one of my bridesmaids?”
“Yes,” I said, smiling. “Of course yes. Are you kidding? I get to stand beside you while you marry a man who looks like he was assembled out of unresolved tension and German engineering.”
Bea pressed both hands to her face. “I love all of you.”
Freya stood first, knocking the blanket half off my lap.
Bea tried to rise carefully and nearly took the breadbasket with her.
Lo made a soft, emotional sound and stood too, arms already open.
Somehow, in the limited space between the table, curved sofa, teacups, plates, and one rejected poached egg, all four of us ended up tangled together in a ridiculous, laughing group hug.
I stood between them with one arm around Bea and the other trapped somewhere behind Freya’s shoulder, my cheek pressed against Lo’s scarf, laughing hard enough that the sound came out wet.
It should have been embarrassing.
It probably was.
I did not care in the least.
Outside, snow kept falling over Northbend.
Inside the igloo, Bea cried and blamed the baby.
Freya declared herself head of bridesmaid athletic conditioning.
Lo began discussing silk robes in a tone that suggested resistance would be futile.
I told her no one needed silk robes. She told me that was exactly the sort of sadness silk robes were invented to cure.
By the time we sat back down, the table was a disaster.
The croissants had collapsed into flakes.
Someone had spilled tea near the mimosa pitcher.
Freya had icing on her sleeve. Bea’s mascara had given up on subtlety.
Lo looked luminous despite crying, which felt unfair.
My glasses were fogged slightly at the edges from the heat of the igloo and the closeness of the hug.
Arlo chose that exact moment to open the door with dessert.
He took one look at all four of us and stopped. “Do I need to fight someone?”
Freya pointed at Bea. “She asked us to be bridesmaids.”
Arlo’s expression softened so quickly it nearly undid me all over again. “Yeah?” he said.
Bea nodded, wiping under her eyes. “And Lo maid of honor.”
Arlo set the dessert in the middle of the table. Four small chocolate cakes dusted with powdered sugar and raspberries. “On the house,” he said.
Lo narrowed her eyes.
He held up one hand. “Wedding party dessert does not count toward the bill.”
“That is suspicious accounting,” I said.
Bea laughed, and the whole table followed.
The sound filled the igloo, warm and bright and alive. It pressed against the clear walls, rose into the string lights, wrapped itself around the candles and the coffee and the little plates of food we had destroyed without dignity.
I looked around at them.
Bea, crying and glowing and stepping into the next version of her life with both hands open.
Freya, laughing through tears, already making plans.
Lo, beautiful and emotional and pleased with herself because she had gotten exactly what she wanted: all of us fed, spoiled, and slightly less guarded than when we arrived.
Arlo, standing in the doorway with snow on his shoulder and pride in his face, watching over us without making the moment about him.
And me. Sitting there in the middle of it.
Northbend was not becoming home because I had an apartment here. Or a title at Talon Arena. Or Dottie’s leash hanging beside my front door. Or even that I had grown up here.
It was becoming home because my life had started filling with people who knew how I took my coffee, when I needed a blanket, how to make me laugh, and exactly how much emotional ambush I could survive before feeding me chocolate cake.
That should have terrified me.
And deep down, it did.
But, instead of worrying about it, I laughed again. Not like a woman trying to prove she had everything under control. Just because I was happy. And because, for one small, shining moment, I let myself be exactly that. Happy. Surrounded. Chosen.
A tiny boss lady winning at life in a rooftop igloo with mascara under her eyes, whiskey in her coffee, and three women beside her who had somehow become family while she was busy insisting she did not need anyone at all.