Today feels like all my nightmares are coming true because my lifelong friend, Ash, is walking his sister, Erika, down the aisle.
He’s giving her away. To a complete fucking loser.
It’s not only my opinion; Ash also thinks Huck, Erika’s future husband, is a freeloader because he relies on Erika for financial support as he tries to build his music career.
Huck doesn’t deserve her, and I wish, not for the first time, that I was the one supporting and caring for her. Then she’d know what it feels like to be treated the way she should be.
That’s never going to happen, you fool.
I exhale and look around, realizing I’m just one exit away from where I need to get off to get to the church. The church I prayed would burn down in the middle of the night. Only that miracle never happened, and I didn’t get the call I was hoping for to tell me the wedding had been canceled.
Running my hand through my hair frantically, I then scratch my freshly shaved face before tapping impatiently on my steering wheel, all while scanning my mirrors for a clear gap in traffic to merge over.
“Erika’s getting married,” I say out loud to the empty car and shake my head for the hundredth time today.
It’s unfathomable.
While Ash might be my best friend, Erika is also one of my closest friends. We spend our days off together. Sometimes, we run after her shift at the hospital because it helps her relax. Not only does she share her free time with me, but she also often tells me little snippets of her dreams and goals for her future.
I’ve noticed that Huck isn’t included in any of those, and I’ve often wondered why. Recently, she has talked less and less about him, and I’m not even sure she’s excited about today.
While she might share some of her secrets with me, I’ve never shared my biggest one with her: I’m in love with her.
It’s not just infatuation or some stupid high school crush either; it’s real. I know it is because I’ve never felt like my heart is going to burst out of my chest around anyone else but her.
So, yeah, today sucks.
Multiply the hell that is today by a billion, then multiply that again by how fucking awful I feel, and it all adds up to excruciating pain and regret rushing through my mind faster than a bullet fired from a gun, making it impossible to think clearly.
I should turn around… no, you shouldn’t, stop this right now, you coward.
Why didn’t I tell her how I feel or how I have felt for years?
Oh, I know why, because there’s no way on this God-given earth that Ash would let me date his sister.
Not ever.
Not given my dating record, or lack of it.
As a former NHL player for the Edmonton Eagles and Ash’s ex-teammate, I’ve got too many notches on my bedpost. At least in his eyes, I was a player. He made it clear during our hockey days that he thought I was a manwhore. Back then, he was right—I was reckless in my twenties. Now, at forty-three, that’s not who I am anymore. I’ve changed, and I wish he understood that.
If only he knew that the reason I haven’t had a girlfriend in years is because I’m in love with his sister.
I used to date—a lot—but I don’t anymore; I prefer casual hookups. However, I haven’t had one of those in as long as I can remember. They only serve to distract me from the one person I can’t have, and they always leave me feeling empty inside.
No one feels right.
Because they’re not Erika.
When she accepted the engagement ring Huck gave her, I had to hide my opinion that the ring resembled something from an arcade claw machine. She deserves to be adorned in the finest silk, lace, and diamonds money can buy.
I was speechless when Erika broke the news that she was engaged, and I couldn’t bring myself to congratulate either of them, so I ended up ghosting Erika for weeks until my other ex-teammate and business partner, Buster, told me to grow a pair, accept the inevitable, and congratulate her.
“Huck the halfwit.” I shake my head once more at how ridiculous today is and at the nickname Ash gave him after he called Ash a nepo baby because he played for, and later coached, the Edmonton Eagles, the same team Ash’s father also played for.
Huck has no filter, and the only reason he didn’t get his face rearranged that night was because Erika begged us not to.
Although I did have a few stern words with Huck outside, where I may have told him never to set foot in my bar again. Since then, thankfully, he’s kept his distance.
