“Thank you.” She digs into them instantly.
“What don’t I understand?”
“Huh?” she asks, still focusing on her snack.
“You said, ‘You don’t understand, Noah,’ so I want to know what I don’t understand.”
“Oh.” Her shoulders sag in defeat. “I just ... I wanted to get married somewhere I love, and I love this place. It feels like home to me. I didn’t want my wedding to be impersonal, you know?”
Well fuck if that doesn’t hit me right in the chest.
When I married Chelsea, it was as impersonal as you could get. I was barely involved in the planning, though it wasn’t for my lack of trying. Every suggestion I gave her was squashed in an instant. So I stopped trying.
Izzy isn’t the same as me, though. She won’t give up so easily, which is why she’s still sitting here begging me to use the farm.
“Besides, the community center was already booked for a wedding that day.”
Ah, and there it is—the real reason.
“You’re telling me this town has two weddings on the same day? How will the citizens decide which one to invade?” I say sarcastically.
She tosses a cashew at me, immediately replacing it with another and popping it into her mouth. “We’re getting married inten weeksand don’t have a venue. What the hell else are we going to do?”
“I have a very simple solution.” I pick up the discarded cashew and toss it into the trash, then grab a rag and an already-clean glass, settling back against the counter. I polish it because I need something to do with my hands. “Change your wedding date. You’re trying to cram planning a whole wedding into ten weeks for no reason.”
“It’s not for no reason. I want to get married on my anniversary and don’t want to wait a whole year. I’ve already waited long enough, and it’s more romantic to get married on your anniversary.”
“Romance, schmomance.”
She groans. “Ugh. Don’t start with your anti-love stuff.”
“I’m not anti-love. I’m anti-marriage. It always ends in disaster.”
“Just because your marriage to Chelsea didn’t work out doesn’t mean all marriages won’t. Our parents are still married.”
Shit. She has me there.
I run the towel around the inside of the glass again. “They’re the exception.”
“Craig and I could be the exception too.”
Maybe she’s right. Perhaps they could be the exception. But I wasn’t, and I don’t want that same heartache for her.
“I’m just saying you can continue to date. You’re already living together. It’s not like being married will change things all that much. It will—”
She holds her hand up, stopping me. “Save it. I’ve heard your ‘marriage is a terrible idea’ speech enough times since your divorce. Just let me sulk.”
That’s precisely what I do. I let her sit there and eat my cashews while she goes on and on about all the things she still has to do but can’t because they don’t have a venue, because—shocking to no one—everywhere is booked already. Of course it is. She’s rushing the wedding. She could have everything she wanted if she’d just give it time.
Her troubles make me feel slightly guilty for saying no, which I’m sure is her goal.
For as long as I can remember, Izzy has had me wrapped around her finger. We might have a twelve-year age difference, but it’s never felt that way.
I’m sure part of that might have been because I was busy as hell trying to carve my way into the NHL, and I didn’t have time to be annoyed by her, but still. I remember when she was just a little bundle of pink and how I’d hold her in my arms like she was the most fragile thing in the world. Now she’s getting married. It’s wild how fast time moves.
“You could rebuild the barn like you’ve been talking aboutanda new chicken coop to keep Tootsie from getting out. This could be your reason,” she says, voicing my thoughts from earlier.
I hadn’t even considered finally building a new coop for our chickens, but she’s right. Our resident escape artist, Tootsie, knows exactly how to break out of our current enclosure, no matter how many times I rig it so she doesn’t.
