The beginning of everything else

Chicken Wings

After meeting up in the hotel lobby, we make our way out of the hotel and start walking to the Town Square. It's a nice night for a walk, and being so close to the airport means that it's still only 9 in the evening. Apart from feeling hungry, there really isn't any rush and so we meander towards the restaurants relishing in the fact that we have no deadlines, no appointments, no need to watch the clock. In front of us, Lee and Rachel lead the way. I'd seen Lee try to date through college, and he had been a little more successful than me even bringing a couple of them home to meet our parents, but seeing him now with Rachel, it was clear that those other girls weren't meant to be.

Elle has wrapped her arm around my elbow, the way that you would see in those British Period Dramas like Pride and Prejudice that she loves so much. It's been over 6 and a half years since that road trip, which was the last time the four of us had really hung out as a group on our own, and I can believe I survived that long without this. 

At one point we stop to look at some planes parked on the perimeter of the airport, with Lee and Elle chatting away about which superstars these private jets probably belong to. It's strange to think that there was a point in time when I was so incredibly jealous of their friendship, when I knew how I felt about Elle but also knew my brother would stand in the way of it. Now looking at the two of them excitedly making no sense to anyone but each other, I know that everything is right in our world, I no longer see him, albeit platonically, as competition. 

"You look at her like she's the whole world you know", Rachel smiles standing next to me.

"Ah that's because she is, but am I that transparent now?", I laugh knowing the answer. I like Rachel, she's good for my brother, and during that last summer we had become friends too. I perhaps hadn't realized the friendship's potential at the time, I had Elle who took up so much of my headspace as relationships do when you are a teenager in love, and I had my friendship with Chloe. As someone who had been a loner until I started dating Elle, a girlfriend and a best friend seemed enough. Chloe and I are still close, but we haven't been in the same city for a number of years and so my social circle had grown. Now back in LA, with Rachel ready to marry my brother, that old friendship had started to flourish. Lee and Elle had big personalities, 'zany' was the word my Dad used, and whilst Rach was more willing to be dragged into their insane ideas than me, we definitely share a more laidback approach.

"From what I hear you've always been transparent when it comes to Elle", she replies, and this is news to me, I raise an eyebrow in question to see if she'll spill, "Lee obviously knew, rule number 9, but that started off as a friendship thing, he realized Elle had a crush on you when they were 13 or 14, and he said that he noticed you hanging around them a lot more too?"

"It didn't register until much later, but yeah, looking back that's probably accurate" I tell her. We've started walking again, this time with Elle and Lee out front. I say walking... Rach and I are walking as Elle and Lee hold hands skipping down the sidewalk, "They're absolute children when they're together", I laugh, but it's so nice to see them looking so carefree.

"Tuppen told me that all of the guys at school knew too, especially when you started threatening them to stay away from her, but they were too scared to say anything"

"Not my finest moment" I respond a little ashamed, "pretty toxic actually"

"I'm not going to say it wasn't" she nods, and I like this about Rachel, she doesn't pull her punches "but... you got over it, and look at you now, we live and learn right?"

"We do... we do... anyway, enough about me, how's the wedding planning going? Got any more jobs for me?"

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