Night Cap

The Best Man - Part Three

I halfway edited this. Please excuse any typos. Enjoy!

***

Everyone seemed to buy that Sanai somehow overslept on the morning of her son's big day and that by some strange occurrence; Chris had been locked out the house and didn't think to ring the doorbell until almost 11:00 a.m. the next day. Sanai tried her best, and was actually doing a great job of pushing last night's exciting turn of events to the back of her mind, Chris however, was not. He was enamored with her and completely distracted by her presence and the memory of the moments they shared the night before. He was already plotting his next move to get her alone.

The morning weaved into the afternoon and Sanai left the groomsmen at her home to join the bridal party at the wedding venue as they prepared for the wedding, which allowed Chris to finally concentrate on his duties as best man. For some reason he was already missing her, but also felt relief that his mind could take a break from his constant thoughts of her.

"Bruh, you got locked outside? Really?" Bryan asked his friend, unconvinced.

"Uhh... yea man."

"I know we haven't seen each other in a minute, but you do know I can tell when you're lying right?"

Chris looked at his friend, trying to come up with a lie, but he had nothing. If it were as easy as just telling him what and who he was doing last night, he would have. But that wasn't the case.

"I know who you were with Chris." The older friend stood frozen in place, waiting for what Bryan would say next. How would he deal with this?

"You were with Veronica weren't you?" He smirked.

"What? She's here?" Chris asked his question with excitement and sadness. Ronnie was his college sweetheart. The woman he planned to marry and spend the rest of his life with—until she broke up with him after he moved to China. Chris was willing to do the long distance thing, and it seemed so was she at first. That is until one day two years ago she told him she 'couldn't do this anymore' and sent her engagement ring back to him in China. He was in a fog for some time after that and started growing his hair out because of it. It wasn't on purpose at first, he just didn't care about grooming for a while. When he finally decided to get out his funk, he just kept the hair as a reminder of her.

"Yea man, don't act like you don't know! Ariel said she was looking forward to seeing you this weekend. She was supposed to get in last night." Ariel was Bryan's soon-to-be wife and Ronnie's first cousin. At least he didn't suspect anything about where he really was last night. The tides had shifted and just as Chris was able to focus on something other than Sanai, she was forced to face her growing feelings for him head on.

***
"Ronnie, this is my new mom, Ms. Johnson." The bride beamed with pride as she introduced Sanai to her cousin. Ronnie about spit out her mimosa, making Sanai frown at her lack of grace.

"Oh my gosh, you're Ms. Johnson? You look so young! It's so nice to meet you." Sanai extended her hand to the young woman, only to be excitedly embraced by her. Sanai stood there stiff as a board and tapped Ronnie's shoulder-blades like she didn't want to touch her. Sanai was never big on hugging or touching people she didn't know.

"And you are?" Sanai asked, completely clueless as to who she was and why she was here. She didn't recall a Ronnie in any of her extensive planning of the wedding.

"I'm her cousin." Ronnie was starting to sense some unpleasant energy from Sanai. She seemed uptight and bougie, something Ronnie, a free-spirited young woman didn't mesh well with.

"And she's the maid of honor, Ms. Johnson," Ariel added. "You remember I told you a while back my cousin may be coming and if she was, she'd be the maid of honor? Well she showed up last night and surprised me. Bryan set it all up! You missed her big entrance before you got here." Suddenly Sanai was grateful she'd overslept in the arms of handsome partial-stranger.