“It is a wonderful match,” Mei-Ling agrees. “Though perhaps the world’s most perfect might apply to you and a certain friend of yours who hasn’t been able to take his eyes off you all day.”
I feel a tingle of happiness all the way to my toes, despite the fact that my toes have lost sensation hours ago in these ridiculous heels.
“Really? You think so?” It takes everything in me not to turn around and see if he’s looking at me right now.
“I know so. I practically had to vault over the sexual tension between you two on the way to the altar. Why is it again that you two keep pretending you’re just friends?”
“We’re not pretending,” I say sadly, the intrusion of reality popping the bubble of my daydreamy bliss. (List items number five and six: No bubbles. No balloons—this is not a children’s party.) “And you know why.”
As do I, all too well. Brendan’s panic disorder is a real thing, a mental health issue he’s struggled with since he was a kid. And it’s not like four months of hanging out with me have erased the fall-out from the totally shitty, emotionally damaging marriage to his high school girlfriend, now ex-wife. Being twenty-five and already having gone through a divorce is enough to mess anyone up, but someone with Brendan’s issues . . . He starts to hyperventilate just thinking about dating again.
Mei-Ling squeezes my arm and smiles. “If things end up changing between the two of you, then I think I win the Best Sister Award for picking out that dress you’re in.”
She’s not wrong.The advantage of having a sister who embodies elegance and class is that my bridesmaid dress isn’t some hideous, Goodwill-bound mess of tulle. (Though, admittedly, I thought it might be fun to wear the most tacky bridesmaid dress ever.) My knee-length satin dress is burgundy and form-fitting and somehow makes my form actually look like something that deserves to be shown off.
If I could walk in these heels like a normal human woman, I might even approach “sexy.” For a girl whose primary descriptor is “cute” or maybe “goofy,” that’s a pretty awesome leap.
“Look at my beautiful girls,” my dad says, walking up to us with an Old Fashioned in hand.That drink—or the fact that it’s, like, his third—may be the only reason he’s up and walking around. Dad claims his knees are bad, but he can walk just fine. He just prefers sitting down, and when he’s home, which is most of the time, he stays attached to his old, ragged armchair like Lan does to her phone. (Dad’s list number one:The armchair stays home.)
I don’t remember it being that way before Mom left.
“Hi, Daddy,” Mei-Ling says. “I know you didn’t like the idea of the jazz quartet for the reception, but aren’t they fantastic?”
“You are right, as usual,” Dad says. I make a face at him that Mei-Ling can’t see, and he tries not to laugh. Dad agrees with me that things are more fun when they’re actually, you know,fun. He suggested it be a karaoke reception—Dad loves singing karaoke, particularly anything by Sinatra or Coolio.
When he got his list with rule number two, no karaoke, I could tell he was a little sad. I was too. Dad’s actually a great performer, even from the confines of his armchair. I assured him that whenever I get married, Dad can belt out “Gangsta’s Paradise” to his heart’s content.
“They were actually Wes’s choice,” Mei-Ling says, beaming over at her husband, who’s being talked to by my adorable-but-senile grandma.
“Ah,” Dad says, nodding. “Well, he is a wise and discerning fellow with excellent taste, that Wes. Especially in picking a bride.”
Dad’s laying it on a bit thick—he likes Wes well enough but finds him too strait-laced and serious. Which makes him a great fit for Mei-Ling, in my opinion. But what Dad really loves about Wes is that he’s Chinese. Dad’s big on his girls dating, and thus eventually marrying, Chinese guys.
Brendan is definitely not Chinese. Dad loves Brendan, but as my best friend and business partner. I’m not sure what he’d think about me dating him—if that ever happened.
Brendan didn’t say he would definitely never date again. Just that he wasn’t sure if he’d ever be ready to or when. He also never actually said that he’d want to dateme, so it might be a moot point.
My palms feel sweaty.
Dad asks Mei-Ling to dance, and I take that moment to head toward Brendan, who is no longer talking with Lan and looks like he’s wishing he could disappear into the wallpaper. He’s also got social anxiety, and I worried that spending a whole day with my family and their friends would be stressful for him, but he’s done really well. Now, though, I can see it wearing on him.
He smiles when he sees me approaching, which does nothing to make my palms less sweaty, but does make me feel all warm and happy inside.
“How’re you holding up?” I ask.
“Pretty good now,” he says.
“Because Lan has given up making you look through some celebrity Instagram feed, or because I’m here?”
His blue eyes get a little sparkle in them. “I’m going with both. I don’t know why Lan thinks I need to see thirty pictures of Khloe Kardashian’s lunch. I’m one kale salad and cocktail pic away from an existential crisis.”
I laugh, and his smile widens.
“But,” he continues, toying with the glass in his hand, “you being here is always the best.”
A blush creeps up my cheeks. Brendan and I flirt with each other all the time; that’s always been part of our friendship. Something’s felt different the last couple days, though. I’m not sure if there’s been some actual shift, or if I’m hallucinating it after four months of longing.
I open my mouth, possibly to outright ask him—sometimes I’m not sure what I’m going to say until the words tumble out—but a woman’s voice from behind me cuts in. “Su-Lin, have you seen Derek?”
