Page 4 of My Best Friend's Mardi Gras Wedding

And there was a very good chance she wouldn’t be there.

Fuck.

His family was going to give him so much shit about this.

Thirty minutes earlier,two blocks away…

Tori wassupposedto bethe Best Man.

If she was, she would be having drinks at some place called Trahan’s right now.Tori didn’t even care what they served there, only that it would beoffBourbon Street.And she’d be talking to Andrew and his friends.Andnotbabysitting Paisley andherfriends.All of whom made Tori want to stab her eardrums with the tiny colored plastic swords that were skewered through the pineapple chunks at the top of their drinks.

Correction—all of whom made her feel like someonewasstabbing her eardrums with tiny plastic swords.

The subjects of their conversations were bad enough—how could anyone talk this much about shoes?—but the talking alsonever stopped.And then there was the giggling.And the squealing.Holy shit, the squealing.

It got louder and more frequent the more of the icy, pink and green drinks the girls consumed.

Andrew owed her big time.

It was interesting that the guy from out of town was celebratingoffBourbon, while the girl who had grown up in New Orleans was the one getting shit-faced on the infamous party street.Paisley struck Tori as more the mint-juleps-on-the-front-porch type than the doing-shots-and-flashing-her-boobs-for-beads type.

But she’d become that second type tonight.On Tori’s watch.

Thanks, Andrew.At least he was going to be the one dealing with Paisley’s puking later.And her hangover tomorrow.Tori couldn’t imagine the Southern princess hungover.Yikes.

Tori took a tiny sip of the pink concoction she held.And grimaced.She was a beer girl, when she drank at all.This was, obviously, meant to be consumed quickly and after several other drinks.

But this was one ofthoseplaces on Bourbon.It had the neon-on-steroids lights, the crowds of people, the overpriced-but-loaded-with-liquor drinks in collectible glasses that you’d never want to see again after spending the early morning hours kneeling next to the toilet.

What the hell were they doing here?Paisley was a rich girl.Classy.

A loud, screeching squeal went up from the herd of girls standing a few feet away and Tori rolled her eyes.Classy-ish.Apparently Paisley didn’t go out partying like this with her friends on a regular basis, and the rum and lights and festive atmosphere were getting to her.And, of course, the fact that people kept pinning dollar bills to her chest.It was a tradition, apparently, that if you saw a bride during her bachelorette party in the Quarter, you pinned money to the little clip she wore on her shirt.Or, in Paisley’s case, the very low-cut, tightly fit, strapless dress she wore.

Oh, and then there were the masks.The masks were such a huge part of Mardi Gras that Paisley’s girlfriends had insisted they all wear them tonight.They were meant to obscure your identity and make it easier to just let go and revel in everything crazy and sinful.

Paisley’s was a bright pink, glittery thing that matched her dress—including the sequins—and covered everything but her mouth.No one would know she was the daughter of Robert Darbonne, the past and very beloved Mayor of New Orleans and a current United States Senator.It was the main reason that Paisley’s father had agreed to let her take the bachelorette party down to Bourbon tonight.Her mother thought a tasteful cocktail party would be more appropriate.So they were doing that.Too.Tomorrow night.But Paisley’s bridesmaids—minus Tori—had insisted on taking her to Bourbon for a traditional bachelorette party.For better or worse.

Paisley had grown up in the Garden District of New Orleans in a real, honest-to-God mansion on St.Charles Street, the only child of her politician father and nationally renowned neurosurgeon mother.Paisley was a princess.At least as far as Tori could tell.She dressed the part with lots of designer labels and flashy styles.She certainly acted the part too, making lots of demands and clearly expecting people to ask “how high” even before she said to jump.She was the most spoiled person Tori had ever met.

And she was marrying Tori’s best friend, Andrew.

In four days.

Tori was in New Orleans, a part of the bridal party for a woman she barely knew and didn’t like, for an entire week-long wedding extravaganza.

And the Darbonne family didn’t do “nontraditional” things like letting a woman be the groom’s first attendant.So Tori was theninthbridesmaid—thelastbridesmaid—standing up on Paisley’s side of the aisle.

Tori took a bigger drink of the strawberry slush in her hand—and instantly regretted it—as Paisley stuck her chest out for a group of guys to pin bills to her dress and give her congratulations.Though “congratulations” really sounded a lot like “how about I make you wish you were staying single.”

Tori wished Paisley was staying single.That was for sure.

Not that anyone—especially Andrew—knew that.As far as he knew, Tori was happy for him and his bride-to-be.That was mostly thanks to the fact that Tori and Andrew didn’t often see each other in person.He’d been living in Louisiana and she’d been in Iowa for the past six years.

Tori sighed as she thought about how things had changed between them.That was why she’d been so happy that he’d wanted her to be a part of his wedding.“You’re my oldest friend, Tori.You know me in a way no one else does.Of course you need to be a part of my wedding.”Those words were why she’d said yes to standing up at a wedding she didn’t really want to happen.She didn’t have a lot of close friends and none like Andrew, who she’d known since kindergarten and who had always liked her in spite of her weirdness.

She missed him.Andrew had grown up next door to her, literally, and she couldn’t remember a time when she’d gone more than a day without talking to him even when they were both at Iowa State.It wasn’t until he’d gone to law school at Tulane that they started to talk less.She’d been in vet school, so they’d both been working hard and the time between phone calls had stretched, sometimes to a couple of weeks at a time.

But it had been okay.Mostly.They had texting and Snapchat and Skype.

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