45. Rule #45 Never skip the celebration.
Amelia
I’ve lost track of how many bottles of champagne we popped. Someone keeps refilling my glass. Or replacing it. I’m not sure.
But the sex club is not a sex club tonight. It’s our own personal party, and the dance floor is not for fucking. It’s for us to dance on to Madonna and Taylor Swift while drunk off our asses.
Phoenix, Elizabeth, Weston, Freya, and I are having our own karaoke night, using empty bottles as microphones as we sing off-key and shake our butts while everyone at the bar laughs at us.
It’s one thing to know my family is here to support me, but seeing Jack and Camille, Weston, Geo, and all the dancers and staff here to celebrate my accomplishment…it’s incredible. This is what family is all about, really.
“So a little birdie told me something,” Phoenix says with a slur in her voice.
I hang my head back and laugh. “Let me guess…Jack told you that Matis passed on the London club.”
She grabs my wrist with wide eyes. “How did you know?”
Laughter spills out of me some more as realization dawns on Phoenix’s drunk face. I think I love this carefree version of her.
“I keep forgetting you two are like…a couple,” she says with a shake of her head.
“So are you going to go for it?” I ask.
“London?”
“Yes!” I giggle, leaning on her as we make our way back to the crowd around the bar.
“I want to,” she replies with seriousness. “Do you think he’s going to offer it to someone else first?”
Stopping in my tracks, I grab Phoenix by the arms. “I think you should go for it. Put your own name in. Don’t wait for someone to offer you what you want. Go and take it.”
“Damn, Amelia. That was very inspirational.”
We both break out in giggles again, stumbling our way across the bar. When we get there, I nearly careen into Matis. He stands me upright and kisses the side of my face.
“Kiss me, old man,” I say before leaning up to press my lips to his.
His arms wind around me, and he kisses me like they did in old movies, dipping me as his mouth devours mine.
I love being able to do this now. Kiss him in the open. Being secretive was fun, but this is even better. Sure, I know people are looking, but I’m not worried about them. My only concern is this sexy-as-sin man who somehow ended up wanting to marry me.
And now I can’t wait to carry all his babies.
I’ve had too much to drink.
“Melly.”
Turning away from Matis, I see my parents standing together and looking at me expectantly. Quickly, I try to sober myself up to face them.
“Your dad and I are going home. It’s getting late, but we want to say good night.”
“Oh,” I mumble, looking at my dad in hopes that he’ll give me something, anything to show that we’re still us. “Well, thanks for coming.”
Then my dad’s eyes meet mine, and all the weight in the room is loaded in the gaze between us. He looks briefly at Matis behind me and back at me.
“I couldn’t be more proud of you, Melly,” he says, his voice cracking.
“Thank you, Da—” I stop before quickly correcting myself. “Dad. Thank you, Dad.”
I’m all grown up now, a fact we both struggled to accept. But when he presses his lips together, I feel the weight of it bubble over for each of us.
“I hope you know,” he adds, clearing his throat but unable to evade the emotion building there. “No matter where you go or what you do…I’ll always be proud of you.”
I couldn’t form a single word if I wanted to. My throat is locked up tight, so I let the feeling burst through my eyes, tears slipping over my lashes as I throw myself into his arms. My dad holds me tight, squeezing me as if to convey that he’s speaking about more than just the fashion show.
“I love you, Dad,” I manage through my tears.
“I love you so much, Amelia,” he replies, clearly as choked up.
When we part, we all force tear-filled smiles. He even gives Matis a hug, and it makes my heart explode a little.
My mom and dad leave, and I let out a happy sigh as I fall into Matis’s arms.
Then a good song comes on, and Freya is dragging me out on the dance floor again. Another glass of champagne is shoved into my hand, and we spend the rest of the evening dancing and singing and living entirely in the moment.
When Matis and I stumble out of the club however many hours later it is, we’re somewhere between drunk, exhausted, and delirious. And when everyone else climbs into cabs, he and I only have to look at each other to know we won’t be taking a car home.
Instead, he links his fingers with mine as we start our late-night stroll. For most of the walk, I do the talking, reliving every moment of the show. What went wrong. What went right. But mostly I focus on how incredible it felt.
“Someday, I’m going to have a real show of my own,” I say.
“That was a real show,” he replies.
“You know what I mean. Like a real, real show.”
He pulls my hand to his lips and kisses my knuckles. “I’ll support you in whatever you do, mon trésor.”
And I know he will.
“What about you?” I ask. “What are you going to do with yourself now that you’re not running a club?”
“I’m retired,” he says with a laugh. “Besides, I’m going to pump you full every night, Trouble. It’s only a matter of time before you get pregnant.”
My heart does a little flip in my chest at those words. Not just the pumping-me-full part, which I’ll admit is hot as hell. But the pregnant part too. I love how fearlessly he’s jumping into this life with me. Almost as if he’s been waiting for it all along.
And to know he chose this over the life he once had. He decided to stay for this. For us.
“So you’re trading in your life of sex clubs and orgies to be a stay-at-home dad?”
He halts on the cobblestones and gives me a serious expression. “No more sex clubs and orgies?”
My laugh bubbles out of me, still a little tipsy from the drinks at the club. Finally, his expression cracks and he grins back.
“Come on, old man.”
As I tug on his hand, ready to be home, off my feet, and in bed, he doesn’t seem to budge. When I glance back at him with confusion, I notice him pointing to himself.
“Aren’t you going to compliment me on my attire?”
“What are you talking about—”
My eyes land on the red plaid scarf I somehow didn’t notice until just now. With my jaw hanging open, I stare at him and try to make sense of what this means.
“Where did you get that?” I shriek.
“I found it the night I brought you home. I thought it was very cute that you kept it.”
He’s wearing a haughty smirk as he runs his fingers over the cashmere.
I slam my hands over my face in mortification. “You knew?”
“Of course I knew, Trouble.”
“Oh my God, this whole time?”
He peels my hands away from my face and kisses my lips. “You know what I think?” he asks in his stupid, charming, sexy French accent.
“What?”
“I think…you knew even then that we’d end up here. I think you saw more in me than I saw in myself, and you gave me your heart long before we found our way to each other. I don’t think it was a crush. I think it was just your heart getting a head start.”
Still smothering my embarrassment, I let him kiss me gently. Because deep down, I think he’s right to some degree. I didn’t just have a crush on him. My heart recognized him.
“Take me home, old man.”
Nuzzling myself under his arm, I cling to his side as we walk.
Not far from home now, he kisses my head.
As I glance up at the night sky, the stars over Paris shine down on us, witnesses to the start of my favorite love story.
The one that began the night we took the long walk home with some day-old macarons and “La Vie en Rose.”
Or maybe it started with a crush or some accidental voyeurism.
All I know is it doesn’t matter when it started, as long as it never ends.