20
Elliot Crane
Down in the lobby with Val.
We got breakfast.
Seth Mays
Be there soon.
“Mom will fuckingkillyou,”Hart was saying as I walked into the room.
Elliot looked mulish. “I’m not doing it for her,” he retorted.
“She’s still gonna kill you,” Hart told him.
“Why is she gonna kill him?” I whispered to Raj, who was the closest—and safest—person in the room.
“Because if you get married before you go back to Wisconsin, she won’t be at the wedding,” he replied, his voice low.
“If Iwhat?” My voice rose a bit higher than I’d intended.
Both Hart and Elliot looked over at me, and I felt my whole neck turn red.
Hart rolled his lavender eyes. “You didn’t evenask him, shithead?”
“Remind me again,” Elliot retorted, eyes narrowed, “how your proposal went the first time?”
Hart’s ears turned an alarming shade of magenta. “Fuck you, you asshole.”
Elliot bared his teeth.
“Children,” Raj interrupted. “No biting.”
“He started it,” Elliot complained.
“He usually does,” Raj replied calmly, and I could sense amusement radiating off his body. “But we have had quite enough biting and clawing for the foreseeable future.”
It bought me the time to figure out what was going on. Because Ihadagreed to take Elliot’s name, which, now that I thought about it in the light of day, probably had been agreeing to get married, since that was usually how that worked. Once I’d managed to process that, it was a bit less alarming that that’s what they’d been talking about.
“I didn’t know you meant literallyright now,” I said to Elliot, who had been trying to look everywhere but at me.
“Oh,” he said, then swallowed. “I mean?—”
“Now is fine,” I hastened to add. “If Noah can make it.” Ideally, I’d like to invite Quincy, too. And Hart and Taavi, obviously. But Noah was the most important person.
Noah and Lulu had left yesterday, so I’d have to get them to come back.
“You could atleastgo to Richmond,” Hart pointed out, glancing at me, although he was clearly talking to Elliot. “Youmight not know many people, but Seth here does.” And that’s where Noah and Lulu had been headed—back home. And Quincy and Taavi were there, too, for that matter.
Elliot looked at me.
“I—I don’t want to get marriedherehere,” I said, emotion making the words hard to say. I didn’t ever want to come within fifty miles of the hell-hole where I’d grown up ever again. OrStaunton, which wasn’t exactly fair, because Staunton is actually a cute little city with some interesting things in it—artisan shops and an old-style Shakespeare theatre. But I really didn’t want to come anywhere near it again, either, for at least a decade or ten.
Elliot immediately came to me, taking my hands. “I’m sorry,” he half-whispered. “I thought?—”
“I do,” I interrupted. “Idowant to marry you—just nothere.”
