He shrugs. “Might as well see what’s going on.”
Miller gives him a look. “How long’s this shit with Tash been going on, anyway?”
“What’re you talking about?” Lance gets real busy staring into his beer.
“Romero, come on,” Miller says.
“A while.”
“You better watch it. Coach finds out he’s gonna be pissed,” I say, following Miller through the house.
“He won’t. Tash is looking for a ride more than anything.” He drains the rest of his beer. “She just wants to see what all the hype is about.”
He sounds bitter, which is odd, because Lance is probably the biggest player in the league. After Miller got serious about Sunny and we’d go out, he constantly pawned the chicks off on one of us. Lance was always good with taking on more than one. I don’t like having my attention divided.
We find Lily, Tash, and Alex standing outside a door at the top of the stairs. Sunny must be in the room. Alex keeps trying the knob, but it’s clearly locked.
“What’s going on?” Miller asks.
Lily turns; her gaze stops at me for a second, and her hand flutters to her throat. “Violet’s not feeling well.”
“I know. Sunny’s been messaging me.” Miller holds up his phone.
“She won’t let me in,” Alex looks wrecked. His tie is half-hanging off.
“I keep telling you, Waters, you’re pushing her too hard. She hates this kind of thing, and you let my mom and yours run with this. Now they’re gonna expect something even bigger when it comes to the damn wedding.”
“She said it was okay,” he snaps.
Miller scoffs. “Do you even know who you’re marrying? Do you remember the first time you met her and she flashed every member of the team her bra?”
“She didn’t do that on purpose.”
I’ve only heard this story secondhand, but apparently it was epic.
Miller throws his hands up in the air. “Exactly! That’s the point. Embarrassing crap happens to her all the time. She doesn’t want to be humiliated. She probably thinks this is gonna be exactly like her mom’s wedding.”
“You mean another wardrobe malfunction?” Lily asks.
“Wardrobe malfunction? What are you talking about?” Alex asks.
I’m wondering the same thing.
Miller’s eyebrows rise. “She hasn’t even told you?”
“Told me what?” Alex looks somewhere between confused and angry.
Miller lets out a long breath and shakes his head. “I wish she’d damn well learn how to talk about shit.” Miller knocks on the door. “Vi, open up. We need to have a discussion about you not telling your fiancé highly important information.”
After another minute or two, Sunny finally comes out. “She says she’ll talk to you.” She’s not looking at Alex, though, she’s looking at Miller.
“You can thank me later.” Miller disappears inside the room.
Waters rubs his forehead. “All we were supposed to do was thank everyone for coming.”
“You sure you want to go through with this whole getting-married deal?” Lance asks. “Seems like kinda a pain in the ass.”
Tash rolls her eyes. “You’re such a dick, Romero.”
“You seemed to like it enough earlier,” he fires back.
Tash’s mouth drops open.
Lily holds up a hand and snaps, “Enough, you two.” She turns to Alex. “Why don’t you go down and do the thank you? Unless you’d like me to do that on your behalf. Then we can start wrapping things up and get people out of here. That might help Violet be less stressed.”
He taps on the door, regarding Lily for a long while. “I wanted this to be fun for her.”
She rubs his shoulder. “You can’t make everyone happy, Alex. I love your mom, but you gotta rein her in if you don’t want Violet to fall apart between now and this wedding.”
His head drops and he sighs. “Fuck, I’m a *.”
Lily laughs. “No, you’re not. You’re trying to make too many people happy at the same time. Violet has to be priority number one all the time now. Above everything else.”
Eventually they manage to get Violet to come out of the bedroom, but she’s covered in hives. Alex goes downstairs to deal with the guests, and the girls all huddle in the bedroom to provide moral support or whatever it is girls do when one of them has an emotional breakdown and winds up with hives.
No one seems to question Violet’s absence at the party.
Lily messages me a while later to let me know she’s staying with Violet. I’m not surprised considering how tight she is with the Waters family. I end up getting a ride home with Lance and Tash. It’s awkward; no one really talks. Tash seems pissed, all quiet and brooding in the front seat. Lance drops me off first, which I expect.