Chapter 9
Ace
I unscrew the bottle of whiskey and pour two fingers full into the small crystal glass. I don't even wait until the bottle is down on the bar to take the gulp. The amber liquid burns from the start of my throat all the way down to my stomach. I quickly fill it up again and take another shot before gently placing the bottle on the top of the bar next to me. I look into the empty glass at the little drops of amber liquid. My head can still hear the words over and over as if it's on repeat. "I love you, Sheila." I shake my head. "For fuck's sake." I pick the bottle up again and pour a bit more than I did the last time. It takes two gulps to get it down. I hiss out as my stomach feels like a firepit. I put the glass down and pour another bit. "Is this seat taken?"
I hear her voice and turn to look at her. She's standing there in her wedding dress. The minute the doors opened and I saw her, I couldn't even help myself. I leaned over and whispered to Joseph that he was a fucking lucky man. Her blue eyes look like the deep end of the ocean does right before a storm rushes in, which should have been my first clue that something was up. Her eyes only get that dark when she is super pissed, but I just figured that it was her nerves. She pulls out the stool and sits next to me. "Not sure if they have enough booze to share with you." I joke with her and pour myself another glass. My hand picks up the glass, and I wince right before I swallow down the whiskey.
I look down at my hand, seeing the knuckle bloody and scraped. I close it in a fist again and open it feeling the tightness in the skin. "That always plays out differently in the movies." I shake my head and laugh. I didn't even know I was going to punch him in the face, but the minute he said my name, I just couldn't help it. Did it feel good? You bet your ass it did. Was it immature? You bet your ass it was. Would I do it again? You bet your ass I would. "In the movies, the guy just walks away with a swagger."
She throws her head back and laughs. "You definitely walked away with a swagger." She leans to me.
"Yeah, but it was also done with a wince." I pour another shot. "Thankfully, you couldn't see it."
She pushes away from the bar, and I help her get down. The dress looks like it's going to swallow her up. She walks around the bar as she walks to the end of the other side. I see her moving, but I have no idea what the fuck she is doing. My head is just a touch fuzzy, so I'm slow to ask her. "Whatcha doing back there?" My eyes follow her every move.
She walks back out from behind the bar, and I see her holding a white cloth in her hand. She gets back on the stool, and the dress goes bigger than when she's standing. "Is your dress growing?" I ask, and she laughs.
"No." She shakes her head. "When I sit, the crinoline moves up." She grabs my hand in hers and puts the white rag on it. "There you go, Rocky." I laugh and look over at her as she leans over the bar and grabs her own crystal glass.
"Fill me up," she says, and all I can do is nod at her and pour her a small shot. She just stares at me. "I will stab your toe with my heels." She glares at me, and I try not to laugh as I pour more in her glass and then pour the same amount in mine.
"What are we toasting to?" I ask, knowing she always loves to toast when she pours her first drink. It all started after we took our midterm and went to grab a beer. I made the mistake of taking a sip, and she glared at me. I never made that mistake again.
"I'm not sure there is actually something to toast." I laugh, looking down at my shot. My stomach sinks as my head remembers what just happened.
"We can toast to love." She throws her head back and laughs at her own joke. "The irony."
"You mean, to being morons." I hold the glass up, and she nods.
"I will definitely drink to that." Her hand goes around her glass as she picks it up and clicks it with mine. The sound of the two glasses clanking together fills the silent room as she brings the glass to her mouth and swallows it down.
"Gross," she says, putting her glass down and grabbing the bottle to pour another shot. She pours me one also and then looks at me to see if I'm going to take it with her. I grab my glass, and we take another shot. "Somehow, the burning just got worse." She puts her hand to her stomach. "Which is weird."
"After the fifth one." I pour her more. "You think it's water."
She spins the glass in front of her, and I can see that she's thinking. She looks over at me, and I can see her fighting away the tears. "Did you know?"
I shake my head and look back at the glass in front of me. "Not even for a second." I swallow down the shot. "Did you?"
She laughs as she takes herself another shot. "Not until I got his email." She laughs and looks at me. "Nothing says you are marrying the wrong person like a declaration of love to someone else." She tries to make a joke, but her voice cracks, and I can tell that she is hurt.
"Got to say." I put my arm around her, pulling her to me. "You handled it with all the class in the world." I kiss her temple.
"I'm sure my mother is going to kill me." She looks up at me and shrugs. I know that this is the least of her worries. I also know that her mother will never be mad at her for long anyway.
"Who knew?" I spin the empty glass in front of me, wanting to know every detail to her finding out.
"I wasn't going to tell anyone." Her voice goes soft as she puts her head on my shoulder. "I was blissfully aware of nothing and getting ready when I got the email, and honestly, for one second, I thought he was sending it to me." She laughs, and I see her lift her hand to rub the tear away from the side of her eye. "The first clue was the way he started it. He's never called me love." She pushes away from me, grabbing the whiskey bottle, and I know she has to let it out. She takes it down in two gulps, and she coughs a bit, putting her hand to her mouth. "The most romantic he called me was honey." She rolls her eyes. "I kept reading with a smile on my face, even though there were things in the letter that didn't make sense." She looks over at me.
"I picked up on that, but then thought it was just me," I admit softly.
"When I got to the end of the email . . ." Her eyes go to her hands, looking at the engagement ring that is still on her finger. A ring that he brought me with him to pick out. A ring that personally I would never have chosen for her, but it wasn't my choice. It was his. "The phone fell from my hands." She rubs her cheek, and I see that it's wet from a tear. "I tried to cover it up, tried to pretend it didn't happen." She shakes her head as if she is trying to block the memory out of her brain. "Picked the phone up and read it again just to make sure that I did, in fact, read what I read, and I wasn't having a stroke."
"Jesus." I pour myself another shot and then fill her glass with another shot. Hopefully, by the end of this bottle, neither of us will remember being fucked over by the people who said they loved us.
She takes the shot and doesn't even wince this time. "Clarabella came in then, and I didn't have enough time to recover, and she found me on my knees." She looks over at me, and I can see two big tears in her eyes, and when she blinks, one spills over. My hand comes out to wipe it away as soon as it falls onto her cheek. "I don't even know how I got on my knees. I tried to talk my way out of it. Fuck, the last thing I wanted to do was to say it out loud." She smiles sadly. "I thought that if I told her and put it out there in the universe that it would be true and not just my imagination."
"Shelby," I say in almost a whisper, but I know she has to get it out of her. My hand falls from her face when she pours herself another shot to continue the story.
"Yeah, well, Clarabella took the phone from me, and all she could do was look at me like this isn't true." She takes the shot. "Presley came into the room with a drink in her hand, and in five minutes, the three of us were sitting on my bed wondering what the fuck I was going to do."
"Who came up with the plan to go through all of this?" I ask, not sure I would have been able to go through with it.
"Me." She shrugs. "Not well thought out, that is for sure," she admits. "If it was up to Clarabella, we would have shown up at your house with a baseball bat and some gasoline to burn it to the ground."
I laugh. "Thanks for not doing that one."
"Presley wanted to reply to the email with a thanks for letting me know." She shakes her head and laughs. "I was the one who came up with the plan to confront him at the altar."
"I'm not going to lie." I look over at her. "I don't think I would have been courageous enough to do what you did. I would probably have gone with Clarabella's plan."
"To be honest." She pours herself another shot. "It might have been the booze talking and then the anger. I didn't think I would be able to either. The whole time I was sitting there with my hand in his, I kept thinking maybe this isn't a good idea. But then he started saying his vows, and I was like, wow, he had to google what he wanted to say to me, his future wife, but when it came to Sheila, he didn't even have to think twice about it." She takes the shot and looks at me. "That's my fifth shot, and it still tastes like ass." It was way more than five but I’m not going to tell her.
I look at her and smile. "Maybe it's the sixth shot, then." She throws her head back and laughs, and all I can do is stare at her. When she turns to look at me, I can't help but reach for her. "I'm sorry," I say softly right before I kiss the side of her head. "For introducing you to him."