As much as my heart is filled by watching these couples express their love for one another, I’m starting to feel less like I fit and more like an intruder, not on their lives but on Griffin’s. We don’t have these things to say to each other, at least not that I can admit. Not until he knows what it would really mean to be with me. I look at Jordan and measure myself against what seems an unattainable sort of perfection. Of course Griffin fell for her. I don’t expect he’d have words like that for me. But with less than a beat, he turns to me, glass raised.
“I’m sensing a theme here, Pippi, so I want to tell you something.” A sweet but nervous smile takes over his features. “I’ve barely known you for a month, but a part of me swears it’s been years. I know what we said, what we agreed. But I want more than a WILD card. I want new ground rules.”
My breath catches at his words, at both of us thinking we could avoid complication yet neither of us being able to do it. Because I want what he wants, too. I want to give to him what he’s asking. So that’s what I choose to tell him.
“Rule number one,” I say. “You can have the whole deck.”
The apprehension doesn’t leave his smile, but it’s joined by something fierce, a determination that makes me believe maybe I’m not fooling myself. That I can believe Miles and his trust in my readiness to take something for myself.
“Oh will you two snog already so we can drink?”
So we follow Duncan’s orders, my lips rushing to meet Griffin’s as we collide in a kiss that is the start of something.
“Sláinte!” Duncan yells, and Griffin and I separate.
Everyone holds a glass up high, and we repeat the word, one of the few in Gaelic I actually know.
Then we drink, the bubbles of the liquid popping on my tongue, down my throat—my first sip in two years. My eyes drift shut as I hold on to the taste, the memories that go with it.
“Hey, slow down there, Speed Racer.”
When I open my eyes, Griffin raises a brow at my glass. Without realizing it, I drained three quarters of it on my first swig. A different kind of heat floods my cheeks now, one filled with bubbles that rise and pop at the top of my glass as Duncan tops me off.
“I’m good,” I tell him. “I feel…good.”
Duncan and Elaina fall into conversation with Jordan and Noah, but Griffin keeps his eyes on me.
“Did you really mean it?” he asks. “The whole deck?”
I nod and take another sip, my inhibitions crumbling with each one—and along with it the wall I’ve kept between us.
“Well, that depends,” I say, threading my fingers through his free hand. “Does it mean no more phone numbers on your palm?”
I expect him to laugh or maybe look surprised at the forwardness of my question and what his answer would mean. Instead his brows knit together. Then he shakes his head like he’s pushing away his thoughts.
“What?”
He untangles his hand from mine and places it on my cheek, heat adding to heat.
“Tell me you see me differently, that you trust I’m not the guy I was before I met you.”
“Yes,” I admit. “That’s the part that scares me. You’re willing to give me something I never asked for, and what if I can’t do the same? What if you find out I’m different than you think I am?”
“I don’t understand.”
“Something happened,” I start. “I had to take a year off, and now I’m part-time and…”
“Food!” Duncan yells. “I was getting bloody hungry! Thanks, mate.”
The same server who took our picture arrives at our table with loads of appetizers, compliments of the reunion committee. Our pocket of privacy dissolves as everyone turns to the table and digs in to the array of dips—hummus and pita, black bean dip and plantain chips, and my favorite, guacamole.
Griffin’s eyes search mine for a moment, but I shake my head. We’ll have to finish talking later, and I realize I want to be sober when I tell him, and each sip takes me further from that possibility. Tonight can be fun without complication. We have six hours in the car tomorrow to unload baggage.
So we eat. And we drink, the set of Griffin’s shoulders relaxing with each new conversation and each pour of the second and modestly less-expensive bottle of champagne. I surprise him when I pull an Uno deck from my bag, something I found buried in my nightstand drawer, a reminder of one of the hardest times in my life. But after the second night I spent at Griffin’s, the date that wasn’t a date, seeing the deck evokes new memories. Memories that include him. Memories that, despite the constant threat, have yet to fade.
“Uno! Oh my God, I love that game!” This comes from Jordan who bounces in her chair with excitement.
“You guys want to play?” I ask, my words slow and methodical as I consciously try to avoid a slur.
Duncan and Elaina shrug in unison.
“We’ll teach you,” Noah assures them. “It’s easy. And really competitive if you want it to be.” He smiles, and Jordan pushes a dark wave of his hair from his forehead before she plants a kiss in the same spot, and he starts explaining the rules to our foreign friends, like the girl he’s head over heels for touches him like this, shows her love for him in this way, all the time. And I realize she must.
“Perfect,” Elaina says when Noah finishes. “I will kick all of the asses.”