"Who am I?"
I gave her a look. "You don't know?"
She made a sound of impatience. "Iknow. I just need to know ifyouknow." She struck a pose. "So go ahead. Guess."
Screw it. "You're Amber," I said.
"Well, yeah." She rolled her eyes. "Obviously. But what else am I?" When I said nothing, she lifted the flowers higher and started humming something that sounded vaguely like the wedding march.
The way it looked, she was either a bridesmaid or a bride. Either way, I decided to keep my mouth shut.
She sighed. "I'm a bridesmaid. If you were a girl, you would've totally known that." She peered around me and asked, "So, is Chloe here?"
She wasn't, actually. Thank God.
I shook my head. "She's at her grandma's."
"Oh." Amber frowned. "You got the address?"
I looked at her for a long moment. In a careful voice, I asked, "Why?"
"So I can audition."
I wasn't following. "For what?"
"To be her maid of honor. Duh."
I froze. Amber knew? How? Chloe didn't even know, not for sure, anyway.
I still had the engagement ring, and was planning to pop the question on Chloe's favorite holiday, Christmas Eve. It was less than a month away, and I could hardly wait.
The last day or so, I'd started carrying around the ring in my front pocket. Stupid or not, I couldn’t stop looking at it. Already, I could practically see it on Chloe's finger, telling the whole world that she was mine, and was going tostaymine.
Always.
But things weren't official yet, so all I told Amber was, "I think you're getting ahead of yourself."
She nodded. "Exactly."
I wasn't following. "What?"
"I wanna be first in line. You know, before all the good slots get taken."
That actually made sense in an Amber sort of way. Scary.
"Just what have you heard?" I asked.
"Well, you know, my parents are really good friends with this super-exclusive jeweler guy. And he was over for Thanksgiving. We had a ton of people there." She poked me in the shoulder. "You should've come. There were like five kinds of pie, too. And I know how you lovethat."
Why deny it? "Well, I do like pie," I said.
"Anyway," she continued, "he mentioned that last month, he sold the biggest rock he'deverseen to some super-famous guy who lives right here in Rochester Hills."
What could I say to that? Not a whole lot. I tried to play it off by saying, "Eh, it could be anyone."
But Amber was shaking her head. "Nope. Because I asked him, 'Is it a super-famous hot guy with tattoos?' Andhesaid, 'Sorry, that's confidential.' So of course, Iknewthat if itweren'tsome super-famous hot guy with tattoos, he would've just said, 'No. It was a regular guy.' So Iknewit had to be you." She smiled. "See?"
"Uh…" I looked past her. "Look who's here. Bishop." And he really was, too. Thank God. He'd just pulled into the driveway and was getting out of his car.
