Page 15 of Take Me to the Wedding

I took in in the picnic table with a bright green umbrella stationed over the reddish-stained deck. As I was checking out the breathtaking view, Caleb reached over and grabbed a carrot out of a bowl. “We don’t get along any better than before, so don’t get too excited. You know I’m meeting Lilly later on today.”

She cleared her throat. “Oh yes, of course,” she said in what might have been a faux-perky tone. “Well then, I’m glad you two have agreed to disagree then.” Then she wisely changed the subject. “I thought Quinn was supposed to drive with you to Waukasaw.”

“He had to take call tonight, so he’ll get here tomorrow morning in time to drive out to the farm with us.” He grabbed another carrot and addressed me. “Quinn is Tyler’s friend from med school, and he’s doing a gastroenterology fellowship in Chicago. You’ll like him. He’s a great guy. And he’s single.” He made sure to emphasize that last word.

“I’m sure he is, but I’m not interested.” Was he seriously trying to fix me up?

“In nice guys?” he asked in a saucy tone.

“Inanyguys,” I said.

“Oh dear,” said Mrs. D. with a look of concern, “I mean, whatever your preferences, we’re fine with it.”

I laughed. “What I meant was, Idolike guys, except I’m not interested in being fixed up with anyone.” I turned to Caleb, who was standing in front of me, staring down at me, too close for comfort.

“Okay, I get it.” He raised his hands in defense. “I was just trying to be helpful.”

I dropped my voice. “Maybe you were just trying to get your mom off your case.” I wanted to ask him if there was a problem with his family liking Lilly, but it wasn’t my place.

“Are you always so cynical about everything?”

I shot him a look of annoyance, but inside, that blow hit a little too close to home. I often felt that life had hardened me. Beat all the fairy-tale hopefulness right out of me. “No,” I said with a sweet smile. “But there’s just something in you that drives me to it.”

“Okay, you two, cut it out,” Mrs. D. said, holding a pile of plates as she went around setting the table. I grabbed some napkins to help. “Caleb, since when do you try so hard to fix people up?”

“That was Mia’s suggestion, but I fixed up my friends Gerry and Christian, and they just got engaged.” He turned to me. “I think I’ve got a little knack for matchmaking too.”

I tried not to roll my eyes at his cockiness. “Not so fast. They broke up last month.” Also, it had been Mia’s suggestion to fix me up with this guy Quinn? I’d for sure be speaking to her about that.

“What?” he exclaimed. “That’s a shame. They were perfect for each other.”

I shrugged. “Maybe you should leave the matchmaking to the professionals.”

“Maybe you should kiss my?—”

“Too?” Mrs. D. interjected before I could hear the end of that. “Did you say ‘I’ve got a knack for matchmakingtoo?’”

“Sam comes from a family of matchmakers,” Caleb said. “Right?”

“Well, my—my grandmother was very good at it. She had—methods.”

Caleb looked very interested. “What kinds of methods?”

I sensed that his next question was going to be if I’d use them on him and Lilly, which I absolutely was not going to do. “Like, she’d put one hand on each person’s shoulders and close her eyes and then somehow be able to sense if they were a match or not. She was really good at it.”

Caleb scrunched up his face. “Like, magic or something?”

I shrugged, because it was often something I wondered myself. “It was just something I grew up with and didn’t question much.” I should have questioned Oma a lot more, because I didn’t understand enough about what she actually did during the matchmaker test, how she felt, if she’d simply trusted her instincts, or was there more? I mean, I didn’t want to say magic, because I didn’t believe in that, but there was so much I didn’t know.

Caleb still looked way too interested. “Can you do that?” He wiggled his fingers as if he were casting a spell.

“No,” I said in an abrupt tone meant to stop his questions.

The truth was, the closest I’d come was once when I was sitting in a restaurant in between Mia and Brax, and I did happen to touch each of their arms at the same time. And I swear I felt… something. A current, an energy, an excitement. It could’ve been simply being in the presence of two people in love. Or… absolutely nothing but wishful thinking. “I’ve never really tried.”

As for the five couples I’d predicted would head to the altar, I didn’t know if there was anything special about that. I tended to think of it as instinct—sort of like a predictive empathy. Of course, that instinct didn’t tend to work with myself or with any other problems in my life, like how to handle Wynn.

Both of them, mother and son, stared at me with the same fascinated expression. I realized that they both had the same identically shaped eyes, but Mrs. D.’s were blue, not pale green like Caleb’s. The green looked pretty against the backdrop of trees lining the lake. A man with pretty eyes.

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