Bridesmaid Lotto (USA Today bestselling author)

Chapter 15

I phoned Mattie to let him know that I wouldn't be in to work that day. "Could you smooth it over with Don?"

"Of course," Mattie said. "Now, tell me everything. Don't leave anything out."

"Um. I can't really talk right now, but I'll tell you about the trip when we get back," I said.

"Oh my God, is he sitting right there?"

"Yeah."

Mattie gasped. "You are so gonna marry him."

"I'm hanging up now," I said.

"Okay. But just to get our stories straight, I'm telling Don that you have a migraine."

"Cool. Thanks Mattie. You're a life saver."

"He sounds like a good friend," Jake said as I hung up.

"The best."

"Is he your roommate?"

"No, that's Calla. She's pretty great too," I said. "Actually I've been feeling kind of guilty lately because with all this wedding stuff going on, we haven't really had much time to hang out, just the two of us. And then we were supposed to do something this weekend, but all this came up," I said motioning around the room.

Jake nodded. "Well, the wedding isn't that far away now."

"And hopefully life will get back to normal again," I said.

"How normal are you hoping for it to get?" he asked. He seemed to be fishing for something.

"Well, it doesn't have to go completely back to normal," I said.

He leaned in and kissed me. A soft, perfect kiss. A kiss that I could really get used to.

Before we went out for the day, I snuck to the bathroom to try to clear my big head.

Dear Disaster Diary,

I was so excited for the junior high dance. It was the first time that I had a date for a dance and was feeling pretty special. We'd just finished taking swing dance lessons in this special arts class at school, and my date had also been my partner in that class. That's probably why he asked me to the dance, come to think of it. Anyway, there was one really difficult move that we had not yet mastered where the guy swings the girl over his head and then pulls her back down to continue dancing seamlessly.

So at the dance, a swing song comes on. Me and Mark get really excited and head out to the dance floor. Soon everyone stops dancing and forms a circle to watch us dance. I felt like a superstar. And I guess Mark must have too, because all of a sudden he decides we're going to do "the move." He pulls me up, over his head, and for a moment, I hang in midair, poised perfectly above him. I'm thinking, it's working! It's working! But then I begin to tip. The wrong way. Mark tries to compensate to catch me, causing us both to end up in a heap on the floor with the entire school circling around us, dying of laughter.

After a glorious day of relaxing on the island with Jake, who was a complete gentleman and made a point to include Jennifer, we flew home. We were all tired, but Jake was a pro when it came to flying and made sure that he was alert. I switched back and forth from the cockpit and the back to keep both Jennifer and Jake company. Jake even made sure that Jennifer took a turn up front so she'd have the experience of flying up front in a small plane. She absolutely loved it.

"I've got to go take some flying lessons," she said when she came back to the rear of the plane. She'd spent quite a while up there and I could hear her asking Jake all kinds of questions about flying and his plane.