The Unhoneymooners(8)

He sits back down and glances at me. “Was that sufficiently on the cuff for you?”

“It was quasi-charming.” I glance over his shoulder. “It’s still light out. Your inner troll must be sleeping.”

“Come on,” he says, “you laughed.”

“Surprising both of us.”

“Well it’s your turn to show me up,” he says, motioning that I should stand. “It’s asking a lot, but try not to embarrass yourself.”

I reach for my phone, where my speech is saved, and try to hide the defensiveness in my voice when I say, “Shut up, Ethan,” before standing.

Good one, Olive.

He laughs as he leans in to take a bite of his chicken.

A smattering of applause carries across the banquet hall as I stand and face the guests.

“Hello, everyone,” I say, and the entire room startles when the microphone squawks shrilly. Pulling the mic farther away from my mouth, and with a shaky smile, I motion to my sister and new brother-in-law. “They did it!”

Everyone cheers as Dane and Ami come together for a sweet kiss. I watched them dance earlier to Ami’s favorite song, Peter Cetera’s “Glory of Love,” and managed to ignore the pressure of Diego’s intense efforts to catch my eye and nonverbally commiserate about Ami’s famously terrible taste in music. I was genuinely lost in the perfection of the scene before me: my twin in her beautiful wedding dress, her hair softened by the hours and movement, her sweet, happy smile.

Tears prick at my eyes as I tap through to my Notes app and open my speech.

“For those of you who don’t know me, let me reassure you: no, you aren’t that drunk yet, I am the bride’s twin sister. My name is Olive, not Olivia,” I say, glancing pointedly down at Ethan. “Favorite sibling, favorite in-law. When Ami met Dane—” I pause when a message from Natalia pops up on my screen, obscuring my speech.

FYI your boobs look amazing up there.

From the audience, she gives me a thumbs-up, and I swipe her message away.

“—she spoke about him in a way I had never—”

What size bra are you wearing now?

Also from Natalia.

I dismiss it and quickly try to find my place again. Honestly, whose family texts them during a speech they are obviously reading from a phone? My family, that’s who.

I clear my throat. “—I had never heard before. There was something in her voice—”

Do you know if Dane’s cousin is single? Or could be . . . ;)

I give Diego a warning look and aggressively swipe back to my screen.

“—something in her voice that told me she knew this was different, that she felt different. And I—”

Stop making that face. You look constipated.

My mother. Of course.

I swipe it away and continue. Beside me, Ethan smugly laces his hands together behind his head, and I can feel his satisfied grin without even having to look at him. I push on—because he can’t win this round—but I’m only two words deeper into my speech when I’m interrupted by the sound of a startled, pained groan.

The attention of the entire room swings to where Dane is huddled over, clutching his stomach. Ami has just enough time to place a comforting hand on his shoulder and turn to him in concern before he claps a hand over his mouth, and then proceeds to projectile-vomit through his fingers, all over my sister and her beautiful (free) dress.





chapter three

Dane’s sudden illness can’t be from his alcohol intake because one of the bridesmaids’ daughters is only seven, and after Ami retaliates and throws up all over Dane, little Catalina loses her dinner, too. From there, the sickness starts to spread like wildfire through the banquet hall.

Ethan stands and drifts away to hover near one of the walls. I do the same, thinking it’s probably best to watch the chaos from higher ground. If this were happening in a movie, it would be comically gross. Here in front of us, happening to people we know and who we’ve clinked glasses with and embraced and maybe even kissed? It’s terrifying.

It goes from seven-year-old Catalina, to Ami’s hospital administrator and her wife, to Jules and Cami, some people in the back at table forty-eight, then Mom, Dane’s grandmother, the flower girl, Dad, Diego . . .

After that, I am unable to track the outbreak, because it snowballs. A crash of china tears through the room when a guest loses it all over an unlucky waiter. A few people attempt to flee, clutching their stomachs and moaning for a toilet. Whatever this is, it appears to want to exit the body through any route available; I’m not sure whether to laugh or scream. Even those who aren’t throwing up or sprinting for the restrooms yet are looking green.

“Your speech wasn’t that bad,” Ethan says, and if I weren’t worried he might vomit on me in the process, I’d shove him out of our little safe zone.

With the sound of retching all around us, a heavy awareness settles into our quiet space, and we slowly turn to each other, eyes wide. He carefully scans my face, so I carefully scan his, too. He is notably normal-colored, not even a little green.

“Are you nauseated?” he asks me quietly.

“Beyond at the sight of this? Or you? No.”

“Impending diarrhea?”

I stare at him. “How are you single? Frankly, it’s a mystery.”