Save the Date(36)

“We haven’t stopped,” Jill said, her voice rising slightly.

“Actually,” one of the other guys said as they stepped forward, “we do need to stop. We’re getting some shadow at the end of that couch.” He nodded toward the couch Linnie was sitting on. “I think we’re going to have to move it.”

“While you do that, I’ll just take a look outside,” my dad said, making a beeline for the backyard.

“Jeff, let them do their work,” my mother called after him. When she didn’t get a response, she shook her head and followed behind him.

The rest of us were shooed in the direction of the doorway as the crew members started moving our furniture around yet again.

“Can we switch seats?” J.J. asked me. “I think they’re getting my bad side.”

“You have a good side?” Rodney asked.

“My left side,” J.J. said, like it should have been obvious. He turned his face one way and then the other. “Can’t you see it?”

I exchanged a look with Danny and took a breath to respond just as I heard heels clicking on our hardwood floors and turned to see Brooke walking through the doorway, an apologetic smile on her face.

“Sorry about that!” She came over to stand next to Danny, who gave her a quick smile. “Work. I reassigned my patients and told my office I needed to be off the grid this weekend, but . . .” She looked around at the crew arguing over couch placement. “Are you guys still rehearsing? I thought you would have been done by now.”

“Us too,” J.J. muttered.

“So, Linnea,” Brooke said, smiling at my sister, “is there anything I can do to help get things ready for tomorrow?”

“Call me Linnie,” she said. “And that’s so nice of you! But seriously, you should just enjoy yourself.”

“I’m happy to help, though,” Brooke said, taking a step closer. “I’ve been a bridesmaid, like, eight times by now, so I’ve pretty much seen it all.”

“Eight times?” Linnie laughed.

“That’s what happens when you’re in a sorority,” Brooke said, laughing too.

“Linnie!” My dad was yelling from the other end of the family room. “I had a thought. Why put the tent in the middle of the yard? What if we pushed it way to the back of the yard and spared my nasturtiums? Doesn’t that sound like a great solution?”

“No,” Linnie said, shaking her head at him. “We talked about this—” But my dad had disappeared through the door again. “Dad!” she yelled, but he didn’t reappear. “Be right back,” she said to me, already heading in his direction, deftly stepping around the GMA crew, who had moved the couches to nearly the center of the room and were currently pacing around them, light meters in hand.

“Weddings are always crazy.” I looked over to see Brooke smiling at me, like we were in this together, like we were friends. “I remember when my brother got married, it was two days of chaos leading up to the big day. I swear, everything that could have gone wrong did. But it all worked out in the end.”

I nodded. I knew I should respond to this, hold up my end of the conversation. I didn’t know anything about this girl, after all—I should ask her how many siblings she had, or where this nearly chaotic wedding took place, or even what kind of medicine she practiced. I could have treated this like a profile for the Pilgrim. Babbling Brooke! The Girlfriend Nobody Knew Existed Tells All. But I didn’t. I just stared down at my feet and crossed my arms over my chest. And as the silence between us stretched on, I became increasingly aware that I was behaving badly, but also that I wasn’t about to do anything to change this.

The doorbell rang, and I jumped at the opportunity to get out of there. “I’ll get that,” I said quickly, already heading for the front hall. As I reached it, I looked back for just a second to see Brooke standing alone where I’d left her, a fixed smile on her face, looking a little bit lost. I pulled open the door and smiled when I saw who was standing on the other side—Max Duncan, Rodney’s best friend, best man, and wedding officiant. “Hey, Max.”

Max looked the same as when I’d seen him last, at Rodney and Linnie’s engagement party. He’d been Rodney’s roommate freshman year and had been the one to officially introduce Rodney and Linnie at the first-night-of-school mixer. He was short and stocky, with an incredibly bushy beard, which he’d had since college—I honestly wasn’t sure if I’d ever seen the lower half of his face. He’d gotten ordained online to perform the ceremony, and had, in my opinion, gotten a little too into this, signing e-mails on the bridesmaids-and-groomsmen e-mail chains as Reverend Duncan. There was a suitcase at his feet, and he was holding a large duffel bag tightly with both arms.

“Hey, Charlie. Is everything okay?”

“Sure,” I said immediately, then wondered if Rodney had told him about our embezzling wedding planner. “Why?”

“I saw news vans in the driveway,” he said as he stepped inside and I shut the door behind him.

“That’s just Good Morning America,” I said. “They’re interviewing us on Sunday, so they’re here to prep.”

“Whoa,” he said, craning his neck toward the family room. “That’s pretty cool.”