Page 14 of Wedding or Not

No one needs to be told that Grace did the morning’s baking. Audrey hates any sort of kitchen work, and Natalie sticks to the basics. While I like to putter around with cooking, I certainly can’t produce baked goods at this level.

Jake finally folds the newspaper back up, keeping the folds exactly as they were originally, and sighs as he reaches behind him to drop it on the stack of past papers. “Not sure why I bother reading anymore. World’s gone to shit.”

He’s always been a grumpy sort, but I know his heart is warm and generous beneath the grumbles. And this particular sentiment I heartily agree with.

“No argument here. At least you contain the torment to twenty minutes in the morning instead of getting bombarded with it twenty-four hours a day over social media.”

“Why folks do that to themselves, I’ll never know.” Jake is scowling—not at me but at the world. “Speaking of, what’s this crackpot idea you’ve dragged Wes into?”

“I know. I’m sorry.” I don’t know why my instinct is always to immediately apologize if anyone, anywhere, is unhappy, but it is. “I⁠—”

“I didn’t get dragged into anything. I agreed to The Plan before Ella did.”

“But you sure as hell didn’t cook it up.”

Embarrassed and self-conscious, I start to apologize again, but Wes doesn’t let me.

“Neither did Ella. It was Natalie’s idea. And it’s not a bad one. Even you’ve seen all the new business coming our way in the past two days.”

“Sure, whatever. We were doin’ fine without all this playacting.”

“We weren’t doing fine. We were in trouble, and this might be the way we fix it.” Wes is as sober as ever, almost stern, but his tone isn’t mean or annoyed. He loves his father as much as he loved his mother.

“Whatever. Seems like a lot of hoopla for nothin’, but what the hell do I know?” He’s frowning over a big bite of muffin. “You sure it’s not uncomfortable for you two? Can’t be easy to pretend you’re a couple when you’re not.”

This is a surprisingly sensitive observation from Jake, and I smile at him. “It’s okay with me as long as it’s okay with Wes.”

“I already told you it’s okay with me.”

Jake snorts. “You two are always up to something. Remember that hayride when you were kids when everyone was saying Wes kissed you, and you both went around telling each and every person there that he didn’t?”

I laugh as he wants me to, but my cheeks are flaming at the memory.

I was only twelve back then, but the thought of that evening still makes me cringe.

Wes might feel similarly. He’s flushed slightly and is staring down at his coffee.

Jake, oblivious to our reaction, keeps chuckling over the rest of his muffin.

It was the Fourth of July, and Blossom Park was doing hayrides all evening and fireworks after the sun went down. Back then every community event we hosted was well attended. Half the town showed up and a good portion of the rest of the county.

I’m not sure how it started, but the story was going around us kids all day that Wes liked me and was planning to kiss me that evening. It spread the way that kind of thing always does, and it led to a lot of teasing and giggles.

So much teasing. So many giggles.

I didn’t like Wes despite how often we were thrown together. He wasn’t one of the cute boys in school. He didn’t do sports, and he didn’t have a lot of friends. He was skinny and quiet and kind of nerdy, and he was sometimes teased for the sweater-vests he occasionally wore. I was appalled at the idea of everyone believing I liked him.

We got herded into the same hayride, and the kids with us jokingly pushed us together.

I was so mortified I was almost in tears, and I finally couldn’t stand it anymore.

So I stood up and yelled at the top of my voice, “I don’t like you, and I don’t want you to kiss me!”

The night spiraled out from that outburst exactly as you might expect.

It was afterward that both Wes and I went around making sure no one had any suspicions that he kissed me, and it was more than a year before he would get within a few feet of me.

We were out of high school before he said more than two words at a time to me again.