Page 1 of Merry Little Wedding

One

Aurora

“You’re never going to believe this!”

“What?” I ask Liz.

“Last night Neil and myself were texting—”

“Neil and I.”

“Yeah, so we were texting and I said to him,‘I love you care bear heart sign’.”

“What, why would you say that? Andhowdo you have pet names already? You’ve been dating him for like, thirty-six hours.”

“So guess what he says?”

I shrug. “What.”

“So Neil writes back,‘I love you too, baby swan’—”

“His name for you is baby swan? Are you serious?”

“Listen. He said,‘I love you too, baby swan, heart sign heart sign heart sign infinity symbol’.”

“Oh good lord.”

“Want to know what I said?”

“To be honest…”

“I said,‘I love you more care bear red lips kissy face heart face Christmas tree’—”

“Stoppit!” I exhale a giggle, pushing my fingertips into my temples. “Y’all are insane. Is that what you’re telling me?”

My bestie, Liz, loops her arm through one of mine. “Crazy…inlooove.” She bats her eyes. I roll mine up to the heavens. As we’re walking toward the nightclub entrance I lurch us both to a stop in front of a sleek, black pickup truck with jet-black-tinted windows, pivoting toward it to adjust myFuture Mrs.pink sash and straighten my sparkly tiara in the reflection.

Lord. Can’t believe I’m wearing open-toed shoes and no sleeves and my hair isthisfrizzy days away from Christmas. Why can’t we ever have a white Christmas? Juuust once? Now that would be a miracle that might put even me in the holiday spirit.

Liz leans close to the window to fix her makeup, which is also a mess already because…Florida.

“We look pretty good,” I mutter. We don’t look our worst.

“So hot.”

The dark-tinted window rolls down suddenly, putting my entire body in a block of ice as it wipes away our reflections on its way into the doorframe. Did that just…oh—god.

I want to be mortified for getting caughtprimpingin some random stranger’s truck window, but the guy looking back at me is nothing short of sex—on—a—stick.

And bystickI mean a big, hard muscly slab of male.

On second thought yes, I’mwhollymortified. Feels like fire ants racing up my neck to swarm my cheeks. Dropping my hands to their sides I take a giant step back, almost tripping over my own ankles. Freaking stupid open-toedwedges.

“Suh, suh sorry,” I sputter, “we were just um—”

“My bestie’s getting marrieeeed!” squeals Liz, unaffected. How does shedothat? How does she…not care? But like, in a good way. Usually. Well sometimes.

“I see that.” He’s got these blue,blueeyes. He does this thing with them, letting them fall down and then jerking them back up at my face. He does it twice, fast, super fast. “Lucky guy.” His grin on the other hand is slow, and devastating, and turns all my bones to liquid.

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