“I miss him, too. I think about him all the time. But you need to loosen up a bit.” Sienna shakes out her arms. “Ever since you moved to Seattle, every time I’ve seen you, it looks like you’re just trying to get through the day.”
I shrug. “Probably because I am.”
Concern floods her face. “That’s no way to live.” She places a hand on my forearm.
I study her ginormous diamond engagement ring. “It’s not that I dreadeveryday.”
“Whatdoyou dread?”
How do I answer this—put into words exactly what I dread when I myself don’t even have the answer? My eyes search the grounds of the villa for something, anything, to distract me.
They fall onhim.
Fielder.
In the courtyard by the pool, talking to Monroe and Tyler. He’s laughing that full-chested belly laugh that infects everyone around him.
“You’re smiling again,” Sienna says. “Here I was worried you and Fielder would rip each other apart and ruin my wedding by falling into the cake or something.”
“That only happens in cheesy Amazon Prime rom-coms.”
“Who knew it’d actually be you two ripping each other’s clothes off.”
“I—What? We’re not—”
She laughs. “Can I ask why you broke up with him? I still don’t get it.”
“We were on two different—”
“Paths,” she finishes. “I know, I know. You’ve told me that a billion times. But from where I’m standing, your paths seem to be crossing at just the right place, and at just the right time.”
“Dearly beloved, we’re gathered here to celebrate the union of Topher Lemon and Sienna DeLuca,” I say, stiffly mimicking a priest. “It’s not exactly fate.”
“How do you know? And why does it matter if it was or wasn’t?” Sienna asks. “You’re too practical for that anyway. You think it was fate that brought me and Topher together?”
“Actually, yeah, I do. You said you and Monroe were out in the city for her and her twin sister’s birthday and ended up atsome hidden speakeasy in the Village you needed a password for, which you didn’t have, and as you were about to leave, the secret bookcase opened and who walked out?”
Sienna’s grinning ear to ear. “I hadn’t seen him in years, since we both left for college, and when I did again, it was like we were the only two people in the entire city.”
I felt the same way earlier at the lemon groves with Fielder. When our pinkies touched like we were the only two people in Italy, and Amalfi belonged to us.
“As if the universe or the cosmos were reintroducing us.” Her eyes are beaming and bright. I’ve never seen them sparkle like this. I didn’t even know it was possible; I just thought looks like these were something authors wrote in books. “Our first date, we walked around the Lower East Side and got Artichoke Basille’s pizza. Very low-key. Our second date, you know what he did? In his apartment, he re-created the time our moms set up a projector in the backyard and played Disney’sTangled. I don’t know if you remember that; you must have been, like, six? But you and Fielder were there.”
Of course I remember that. I didn’t care much for fluffy Disney, preferring bloodier, more action-packed fare. But Fielder cried, and I couldn’t stop looking at him.
“During the song ‘I See the Light,’ he found my hand and we held hands for the rest of the movie. It was really sweet. Topher and I were eleven? Babies!” She continues, telling me how she knew then he was the one. “He remembers the small things.” She laughs as she reminisces how nothing happened when they were eleven, even though he asked Sienna out all through high school many, many times, but she didn’t want a boyfriend yet.“Back then, I had Nonno in my ear telling me to work hard and forget about boys. Which I’m grateful for because I ended up laser-focused on a career, and now I’m working with Monroe on building her fashion brand, with my marketing and merchandising expertise. I get crap a lot, especially from the Coven who ‘joke’ that I’m trying to fleece the golden child. Or that I’m the one who chose to get married in the most expensive place on earth.” She shakes her head. “All Topher. I’m happy to go along with it, but I want a life with him, not just a wedding.”
“Youlovelove him,” I say, almost as if reinforcing it for myself.
“I do. I wasn’t ready for that in high school. But that’s what I’m trying to tell you. I don’t think it’s fate that brings two people together; it’s beingreadyfor love, the kind of love that’s earth-shattering and life-changing and time-consuming. The stuff hard wood is made from. Remember that old family tree Nonno was working on? I loved that thing so much. What I loved most was that it felt like he was immortalizing his love with Nonna, our family. Taking the seed it was grown from and carving our history into it, fortifying it into something that couldn’t be broken.”
I don’t mention that wood can easily break, so I make vomit noises instead.
“I know, someone kill me.” She reciprocates the vomit sound, and sticks out her tongue. “I sound like a Hallmark card.”
“It’s bad, See,” I say. “But I get it. Iam reallyhappy for you.”
“I’m happy for me, too.”
