𝐒 𝐎 𝐏 𝐇 𝐈 𝐀
Families like this make me miss my own.
The unexplainable yet magical closeness each family member shares with one another, as well as the close friends that they consider as part of the family by everyone. The inside jokes they share that while they may seem confusing to an outsider but to family, they are the most hilarious jokes. The way you can share something with them and they will never judge and help you through it.
My family is not a million miles away, in fact, they live down in Syracuse, which is four hours away from where I live in Manhattan. With running my business and planning several weddings at once it means taking a vacation isn't the easiest thing to do in my line of work, so I don't get to see them as much as I would like to.
Gently pushing a lock of my raven black hair away from my face and behind my ear, I smooth out my floral sundress before grabbing the salad bowl off the kitchen island in front of me. Walking outside the bowl, I smile towards Savannah and Elijah's family and friends as the light sound of music fills the outside area while people chat away to one another or sway to the music.
Placing the bowl in the middle of the long wooden picnic table on the patio that is large enough to fit all twenty family and friends that are here. I stand back to admire to sight in front of me. Covered in fine china and candles in the middle of the table, fairy lights hang both above the table and around it strung on the trees, illuminating the garden.
"I heard you got stuck listening to my aunts 'in my days' stories." Savannah appears, placing bottles of wine and water on the table. "For that, I am truly sorry. I love her to pieces, but I've had to listen to those stories and they're so long," Savannah says, making me laugh.
"Nothing I can't handle," I tell her. "I have to admit, though her story about sneaking into a concert by flashing her boobs had me laughing."
"Oh, my god, don't even. She tells that to random people she meets at events and we have to drag her away," Savannah explains. "She told that same story to Elijah the first time I introduced him to my extended family and I thought that was the end of our relationship."
"How did you two meet, anyway?" I ask her as we make our way back inside to the kitchen.
"College actually. I was there for veterinary studies and him law, which are two extremely different courses, so we should have never crossed paths, considering we were never on the same sides of campus, but one day my class got moved to his side, and we bumped into each other," Savannah explains.
"Sounds like fate to me."
"Ugh, fate...a big bowl of bullshit," Victoria says, sitting down at the kitchen island with a glass of wine in her hand.
"Tell us how you really feel, Tori." I chuckle, and she rolls her eyes.
"So I know Nicole has her girlfriend, Meghan. You and Jackson have that complicated thing going on," Savannah trails off, waving her hands in the air. "What about Miss wedding planner over here? I have plenty of attractive cousins to set you up with, as does Elijah."
"Well, as appealing as that sounds. I'm not one for dating. I'd rather focus on my business."
"She has the whole independent woman who doesn't need a man thing going on." Victoria gestures to me as I roll my eyes.
"I haven't dated since college. My last relationship ended in a bad way and it almost cost me my future," I explain. "After that, I focused on setting up my business and I don't intend to let a guy distract me."
"If I ever see his face again, I'll put my first through it. No matter how pretty he was," Tori threatens, sipping her wine. This is exactly why I didn't tell her I saw or thought I saw Carter at the club the other night, as she can be quite violent. But she's my friend, and I'd never want her to change for anything.
"Please tell me we're not talking about putting a fist through my face?" Elijah appears, wrapping his arm around Savannah. "I still have to get married."
"We weren't on about you, silly. Speaking of silly, where is your best friend? Dinner is ready," Savannah asks. "He's your best man, and I wanted to introduce him to Sophia, since she will see our bridesmaids and groomsmen a lot."
Elijah sighs. "He's on his way. He got stuck in a meeting with his investors. The downsides of being a CEO."
"Why am I not surprised? Every guy in New York seems to have some big shot job," Tori scoffs. "I should know. I've more than likely slept with half of them," Tori admits, making us all laugh.
"I'd be more surprised if he didn't, considering high power corporate guys practically take over half of Manhattan." I chuckle. "They all look the same to you after a while."
"Well, he should be here soon and said we should start getting everything out," Elijah tells Savannah. Soon enough, we're all grabbing the dishes before heading outside, placing them in the center of the table between the candles. I take my seat next to Tori, laughing as Jackson attempts to take the wine off her as she almost falls over getting over the picnic bench.
She's not drunk. Just clumsy.
"I know, I know I'm late. Don't kill me, Sav," a masculine voice says as I place my napkin down on my lap.
"I guess I forgive you, since I know you hate those meetings and that is punishment enough." Savannah laughs. "Now that you're here, we can eat," Savannah says before I look up.
I part my lips part in shock as Elijah's best friend and best man takes a seat in front of me. Looking into his familiar warm brown eyes, he doesn't even try to hide the surprise in them when he sees me sitting in front of him.
Although it's been four years since I last saw him, I know it's him.
"Sophia, this is Elijah's best man, Carter. Carter, this is our wedding planner, Sophia," Savannah introduces, oblivious to the fact that we already know each other. Victoria chokes on her drink, but I pay her no attention.
We don't look away from each other.
Carter's facial features have defined more over the years and he still looks as handsome as he always did. No surprise there. His sharp jawline that is covered in stubble looks like it would cut my finger if I even tried to touch it, and his charming smile still gets to me. The white button-up shirt he wears that has the sleeves rolled up shows off his sculpted chest and arms.
All the memories of our relationship hit me all at once, but sitting across from each other in a setting like this makes me remember our first date like it was yesterday.
"Where are you taking me?" I giggled as a blindfold covered my eyes. Carter's hands squeezed my waist while he directed me somewhere and made sure I didn't walk into anything. My nerves had calmed down, which had been through the roof when Carter picked me up for our first date, but one look at his smile made my nerves disappear.
First dates were the cornerstone of a relationship, and they set the tone, which was why I was nervous.
"You've been asking me that since I picked you up." Carter chuckled, that sent a shiver down my body. "I'm not telling you. We're almost there, anyway."
"You know if this is where you plan to kill me, I should warn you Tori will send the FBI for me."
"I know she will," Carter agreed, considering the lecture she had given him when he went to pick me up for our date. Most people get overprotective parents that threaten their dates, but instead, my best friend threatened him. "She scares me."
"Don't worry, she has that effect on everyone," I assured him. "Are we almost there?"
"You're so impatient. Just a few more stairs," Carter said and helped made sure I didn't trip up the stairs. Soon enough, I heard a door had opened and air had hit my face. "We're here," he said as he stopped me from walking and had taken the blindfold off. We stood on a rooftop of a building, which one, I did not know. The rooftop had fairy lights that surrounded the ledges around the roof, and candles sat on the floor of the roof that stood out against the night sky above us. A mattress was lying in the middle of the roof, covered in blankets, pillows, a bottle of wine and snacks, with a projector screen in front of it.
A homemade cinema.
"You really know how to charm a girl, don't you?" I giggled and turned around to face him with my hands now placed in his.
"Believe it or not, this isn't a regular thing for me," Carter admitted and rubbed the back of his neck. I smiled at his nervousness and leaned up to kiss his cheek softly.
"It's cute," I admitted and pulled back before we walked over to the makeshift blanket bed and sat down. "No one has ever gone to all this trouble for me before."
"Well, they were idiots, you deserve to be treated right," Carter said and pushed a lock of my hair behind my ear, which made me look down as a blush formed on my cheeks. His hand trailed down my bare arm where goosebumps appeared to and grabbed my hand before he kissed it.
"I was right. You're a charmer. I like it though," I admitted. "Did you make this?" I asked about the food that was in front of us.
"Contrary to what you might think, I'm actually a good cook," Carter said.
"Well, I have to try this food and see for myself how good of a cook you are," I told him as I sat facing him. "Hmmm," I said after I tasted one of the mini pizza rolls. "Ok, I admit it, you're a good cook. Who taught you?"
"My grandma, she has a recipe book the size of someone's head." Carter laughed. "My grandad cannot cook to save his life and she said if I turned out like that she pitied my future wife."
"She sounds awesome, and she's not wrong. A man that can cook is a selling point." I shrugged.
"Good to know," Carter said as his hand reached up to wipe some crumbs from the pizza roll from the side of my lip as he stared into my eyes.
"You seem close to them."
"I am. They raised me since I was seven. I owe them a lot." Carter smiled in admiration of his grandparents. "Which is a story for another day and definitely not one for a first date." Carter chuckled, although I could see the pain in his eyes.
"So what movies do we have? And let me tell you now movie choice could make or break this date." I pointed at them as I changed the subject, knowing he didn't want to talk about his past and I saw the appreciation in his eyes.
"Someone takes movies seriously, huh?" Carter asked. "Well, I brought three movies so you could choose. A classic Disney movie, a romantic comedy, or an action movie." Carter held up the choices.
"Oh, the action one for sure," I told him. "I'm a big action girl." I winked, and he laughed as he threw his head back.
"This may be too soon, but please marry me," Carter joked, and I laughed. "You've just won my heart."
"Keep cooking for me and we'll see," I joked as he sat next to me again and grabbed some of the food he made. He laughed before we lied back on the mattress, cuddled up together as the movie started.
The noise of plates and glasses clattering around me brings me out of the memory of our first date. Both me and Carter are still staring at each other while everyone else is busy engaging in conversation. Clearly, he's as surprised as I am to see me. We have had no contact with each other since we broke up in college, and neither of us expected to see each other ever again. Looking away from him, I focus on my food and everyone else around us who are oblivious to our staring content. Well, everyone except Tori anyway, who is glaring daggers at Carter.
This is going to be a long dinner.
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One awkward dinner later, I could not rush from the table fast enough offering to help Savannah clean up. Between Carter's not-so-subtle glances towards me and Tori's glares towards him, dinner was interesting. My friends and Savannah picked up that Carter and I had history as they noticed we didn't talk to each other at all and we kept stealing glances at each other. That was a conversation for later on.
My heels click against the tiled flooring of the kitchen as I carry plates through and place them on the counter. Letting out a deep sigh, I rest my hands on the counter, closing my eyes to get a moment of sanity until I hear footsteps.
"For the fifth time Savannah, I don't mind helping you clean up..." I trail off as I turn around to scold Savannah, believing it was her as she protested about me helping. Not that I gave her much choice, as I was already carrying stuff inside before she could protest, so I could get away from Carter. I needed a moment to think. But instead of Savannah, I see Carter leaned against the entrance to the kitchen with his arms crossed.
"She is persistent." Carter chuckles, shaking his head before he looks at me. "Hey."
"Hi," I respond, playing with my bracelet on my wrist, as I don't look away from him. He looks down to where I'm messing with my bracelet, a smile twitching at his lips. A nervous habit I've always had, and he knows it. Letting go of my bracelet and looking away from his eyes, I turn around and busy myself with cleaning up.
"It's been a while," Carter states. I look over my shoulder at him and nod, giving a small smile as I place some hair behind my ear, watching as he walks further into the kitchen with his hands stuffed into his pockets. "You look good. No surprise there, though you've always been beautiful."
"You look good too. Clearly, being Mr. Big Shot CEO works for you." I chuckle, leaning against the counter facing him.
"Yeah." He rubs the back of his neck. "Well, you know I went to college for business. I left and started my company," He explained. "Clearly, your wedding planning business took off, too. I guess we'll be seeing more of each other then, since you're planning their wedding."
"Yeah, just don't turn up late to any of the stuff I need you to turn up to. I'm not as forgiving," I tell him and he chuckles.
"Noted," Carter says, "You know you can't be scary, though you're too cute for it."
"Yeah, yeah. I'll have you know I do scare people," I tell him, and he raises his eyebrow in disbelief. "Ok, well over the phone, I do, cause they've never met me."
"It's great to see you again." Carter smiles as we stare into each other's eyes.
"The feeling isn't mutual," Tori says, walking in, breaking us from our trance before I can even respond to agree with him. "Stone." Tori glares at him as she walks past, placing the dishes down on the counter.
"It's nice to see you too, Tori." Carter chuckles.
"You know if I said if I ever saw your face again, no matter how pretty it is, I would mess it up," Tori says, holding up her fists and I roll my eyes, placing my hand over her fist, bringing it back down as she pouts.
"I have no doubt about that. I still remember you punching Alex in college," Carter says, referring to one of his college friends.
"He was a creep, it was well deserved," Tori defends and Carter agrees with her. "Anyway, I need you to come back out with me. Elijah's uncle is trying to dance with me and you know I do not do well with relatives." Tori takes my hand, leading me out of the kitchen. My eyes lock on Carter's as we pass him, and he shoots me a small smile.
Arriving back outside where everyone is still drinking and some people are, in fact, dancing, we walk over to Jackson, Meghan and Nicole, who all shoot me confused looks as I sit down with them. While they know of my ex-boyfriend, they have never known his name or what he looks like and I can tell I'll have a lot of explaining to do.
Soon enough, Elijah's cousin gets me up to dance with him and everyone else also joins in the dancing. I laugh as I get twirled and try to focus on the steps he is teaching me. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Carter staring over at me with a smile on his face. My eyes connect with his and I give him a small smile before carrying on dancing.
Some dinner that was.