I laughed. It sounded a little hysterical. “She’s shutting down the whole street. She has food trucks coming and everything.”
“Food trucks! Food trucks!” a pack of Blade’s college-aged brothers chanted as they marched by, hauling several kegs outside.
“They’re basically animals, my brothers,” Blade said, glaring after them. “So much for a low-key, classy engagement party.”
“Stop lollygagging,” Garrett said. “You have to drive people over to the party.”
“I’m the groom.”
Garret glared at Blade. “There is a system. We have X amount of cars and Y amount of people. You have three spots in the back of your car. We can only fit so many people on the bus.”
“You have a bus?” I said.
“Indeed we do,” Blade replied.
I followed Blade and his wave of brothers outside to see Remy pull up in a large white school bus painted with slightly wobbly pink lettering that read, #AveryandBladeGetHitched.
“We helped on the lettering!” Blade’s little brother Henry told me in excitement.
“It’s a beautiful bus,” I assured him. “And so festive!”
Blade was assigned three of his brothers who had just graduated college last year and had decided they were God’s gift to womankind.
“You seriously want to marry Blade?” one of them asked, draping his arm around the back of my seat as we drove down the road.
“Yeah, he never does anything,” another one of them said. “You could hang with us and take an upgrade.”
“We’re friends with one of the Frost brothers,” the third bragged. “He’s buying a yacht; you could come hang out.”
I stifled a giggle. They were trying so hard!
“Oliver is buying a yacht?” Blade interjected, clearly skeptical. “I’m sure Owen and Jack will have something to say about that.”
“You can’t tell them!” his younger half brother exclaimed. “Geez, man, you just want to get people in trouble. A yacht is a thing of beauty.”
“I am a hundred percent sure there is no way Oliver is even getting close to purchasing a yacht,” Blade said dryly as he turned onto Ida’s street.
Rows of cars were already parked. The atmosphere on the street was festival-like. Art, one of the seniors in the bingo club who liked to dabble in the art of distillery, rode by on a unicycle.
“This sure is a unique engagement party!” Shirley remarked when she saw me.
“Oh my god,” I whispered. “I don’t want to sound ungrateful, but...” I gestured around helplessly. There were picnic tables, game booths, and a stall where someone was handing out deep-fried butter. “Did she just invite the whole town?”
“Pretty much,” Edward said. He had a bouquet of fried foods on a stick in one hand and a large stein of beer in the other. “Seriously, screw classy weddings. This is like the best shit ever.” He took a long draught of the beer.
“None of this is going to photograph well,” I hissed to Shirley. “No one is ever going to hire me to plan their wedding. Maybe I should just call it quits. What’s the point of owning the perfect historic wedding venue if people are just going to see my name and burst out laughing?”
“Look at the blushing bride!” Ida called, zooming up to me on a pair of neon-pink in-line skates that matched her neon-pink cat suit. “Isn’t this a great showing?”
“It’s really something. You all put a lot of work into it,” I said faintly. “Thank you.”
“Let’s take a picture of the happy couple!” my grandmother sang, pulling Blade toward me. She handed each of us a corn dog. “Smile and say Harrogate!”
A man with a large video camera hustled over to me and Blade, Gunnar next to him with a clipboard.
“This sure is a unique engagement party,” Gunnar said as the camera operator filmed us. “Can you talk about your philosophy for your wedding?”
“Just food and friends and family and fun!” I chirped, grinning until my teeth hurt.
