Reaching for Stardust // Josh Kiszka

Part XII

Word Count: ~3k

Warnings: none

A/N: I'm so sorry for the delay. I've been really sick for the past week with no end in sight and have been pretty useless as a result. I didn't want to fall behind in writing, but I also shouldn't leave this hanging any longer. Hope y'all are still enjoying <3

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"We're really cramming a ton of stuff into just a few months," I said to Josh as he packed an overnight bag for another Detroit trip. "Halloween, these bachelor and bachelorette parties, Thanksgiving, Danny's birthday, Christmas, bridal party, New Years, our wedding. When will it end?" Halloween had passed–blissfully, thankfully. We'd all gotten together for an old-school costume party which, thankfully, Kirsti had hosted. I'd been grateful to feel young again though my sister wasn't much older than I was. Still, her friends were all the "real" adults I'd imagined myself being when I was a child, with big-people jobs, their own houses, new cars, kids and spouses. At least I was soon going to check one of those things off the list and Josh had his big-person job already.

"Well, my love, it will never end," Josh told me while he folded a pair of pants. "Life is a series of wonderful adventures, holidays and surprises."

"It's a lot," I replied.

Josh looked at me and frowned a little. "Are you stressed? This is supposed to be a fun night for you. I want you to have fun."

"No, no, I'm excited," I insisted, which was the earnest truth. "A chill sleepover with the girls is honestly just what I want. I can't even remember the last time any of us did that."

The frown turned to a smile. "Are you going to gossip about all of us?"

"Yes, absolutely."

The smile grew even brighter, Josh's entire face lighting up. No matter the season, no matter how dark the sky became, he always had such a beautiful glow about him. "Good. What are you going to eat?"

"Junk food. Lots of it," I said, reaching for a shirt that was lying on the bed to fold myself. "No bar food for us."

"I already know I'm going to–" Josh paused, looking up as he waved his hand around, searching for a word. "Expand by the time our wedding arrives. Maybe that's the real problem with all these excursions one after the other."

"You'd look hot with a few extra pounds," I assured him. "Don't worry about it. But I really have to worry about fitting into that dress."

"No worries for either of us. Not about that." Josh waved his hand again flippantly, resuming packing his bag. "Unimportant."

I sat down on the bed to watch him. "Fair enough. Not gonna worry about it," I said, though the thought of abruptly not fitting into my wedding dress filled me with enough dread to promise myself that I'd take it easy on the Doritos and Little Debbie cakes later.

Josh, Jake, Sam and Danny commenced their bar crawl that night while I drove myself over to Jane's to meet her, Bev and Kirsti for our sleepover. After I dropped my bag in the living room, I went into Jane's cozy kitchen and saw that she'd taken a page from Jake's book–instead of the bags and boxes of junk and comfort food lazily peppered around, she'd laid everything out in a contrasting, elegant way.

"You are so cute," I said, eyeing the Ho-Hos and Zebra Cakes that had been unwrapped and plated in an alternating pattern on a funky black and white curved platter.

"Thank you," Jane said with a smile, handing Bev a bag of pizza rolls, then she gave an exaggerated bow. "And welcome to your bachelorette party on a budget. It can still be kind of fancy, I think."