Page 69 of Flying

Using her teacher voice, she chides, “That’sfutureMrs. Carter, former Mrs. Morgan!”

Groaning, I beg, “Never ever call me again that, please.” I swipe a ball from her lane and land it directly in the gutter for zero points. “Serves you right!”

She retaliates by trying to do the same, but somehow sinks it into the twenty point line instead.

We settle into the game properly, and she’s determined to subtract the extra twenty points from me to make it a draw.

“Okay, my last question for you is: are you happy?”

Looking at me with an easy smile she sighs, “I’m really happy Lils. Are you happy?”

Hugging her close I confirm that, yes, I am the happiest I have been in a long time.

“Let’s go, bride to be. Tonight is our girls night out and that means Delia is waiting to show off her new skills and make us all even more beautiful than we are.” I link our arms as we make our way back towards the hotel.

“It’s funny how she’s kind of a contradiction, right? She’s the most hyper feminine of us and also the most feminist,” Stef muses.

“I actually think it makes a ton of sense, despite some of the ways femininity is meant to attract a mate—a male mate generally—it’s also about being playful, feeling beautiful, and most importantly feeling powerful. Cordelia Shane is absolutely a femme fatale in that respect.”

Nodding in agreement we make our way back, continuing to mull over the people we’ve all grown into.

After kissing the guys goodbye, we close the door between the suites and put on our favorite pop songs from middle school. Dancing around, snacking, and taking turns in Delia’s chair we each get glammed up for a night of sushi, drinks, dancing, and more drinks.

We’ve specifically asked the guys to keep whatever they had planned to themselves after overhearing Mateo lobbying to switch it to a strip club. It was hilarious when he tried to get Seth on his team, forgetting his audience.

“No fucking way am I going into a strip club and sitting down, bro.” He accents the final word sarcastically.

“Why not? It’s not really a bachelor party if we don’t take the groom for a lap dance, right?”

“No sitting, no lap. No lap means no place to dance.”

forty-six

River

The Middle of the Night

Nope.No way. Not again. Drunk grooms and I do not have a great history. With this group, lord only knows what it’s going to be that Lee spits out.

As we’re making our way through the casino floor to head back to the hotel suite, I have to stop and send Mateo for a luggage cart. There’s zero chance we’re all getting Lee to bed any other way. He’s sat down and can barely keep his eyes open at this point, but thankfully he doesn’t seem to have alcohol poisoning.

God this is my nightmare.I try to cut folks off before it’s this bad. He’s going to be so sick tomorrow.Where are they?

Before I can see them, I hear the crowd around us reacting. Arriving like Tony Hawk and the Queen had birthed a Filipino male model, Mateo sails down the hallway on the back of the luggage cart, giving a dainty wave. He is taking one foot down to give a few kicks and keep momentum before rolling a few feet and repeating again.

Meanwhile, Seth is sitting there dead center of the cart, cradling a few bottles of liquor like they are his babies. I have to assume he lost a bet to Mateo.Is Seth singing?I almost want to check that nobody slipped him something.

As they get closer, I see Seth’s “baby” liquor bottles are semi-full and I swear they better have paid for them. The last thing I need to deal with is security showing up to “assist” with the situation. There’s little doubt in my mind these guys’ behavior would get us assisted directly into the parking lot where none of them, or hell even me, are in any state to drive home.

Which means we’d have to sober up in the car or pacing the boardwalk.Ooh, but that would mean we could have pizza, do we have pizza upstairs?

Okay, Seth has to be on something because as they get even closer, I can hear Mateo has somehow roped Seth into singing along to a Backstreet Boys song. After they finish their off-key rendition of “I Want it That Way,” we work together to lift a now-sleeping Lee up onto the cart in Seth’s former spot.

In the midst of rolling to the suites, Lee keeps slurring something and trying to tell us a story of some sort. I just want to get back to the room and go the fuck to sleep, and not listen to another drunk groom spill his guts so I can keep secrets for the next decade from Stef too.

Finally, he’s gotten clearer and is rolling to his side while grasping the golden bars of the cart. Lee gets louder, begging us to stop. Concerned the motion is going to trigger his upchuck reflexes, we pause.

Quickly, I realize we are directly in front of the door to the girl’s suite, and I start to sweat. Whatever we can do, I just want to get him inside without saying something he’ll regret tomorrow.

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