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Saturday, May 18th, 2019: Lima, Ohio — Alicia
People might say she was trying to speed her life up, but Alicia Brown has known since she was fifteen or so that she was going to have Daniel’s babies. Stopping the pill three months before the wedding, just like the nurse practitioner recommended, didn’t seem like that big of a deal.
Of course, what neither the nurse practitioner nor Alicia herself predicted was that Alicia’s body didn’t exactly need three months to adjust to being off the birth control. It didn’t need any time, in fact, because four weeks after Alicia took her last pill, her period doesn’t show up.
It doesn’t show up the next day, nor any of the days for the next week, and by the time seven days have passed, Alicia doesn’t really need the test that she buys. She buys one anyway, and after the cheapie test shows a positive result, she buys one of the ones that reads out ‘pregnant’, just for fun.
Of course, by now she’s just a month or so away from the wedding, and Alicia has to consider carefully who exactly she’s going to tell. Daniel, of course, and her parents, but other than that, no one really needs to know, aside from the person in charge of bringing out the champagne toast at the reception.
She keeps it a secret for another week, just her private knowledge, until she sits Daniel down and stuns him with the news. Then it’s just the two of them, through her graduation and the weeks leading up to the wedding. Ma notices her nibbling on crackers one afternoon and guesses, just like that, though Alicia privately wonders if Ma overheard her talking to the caterer.
Alicia doesn’t feel sick, and if it weren’t for the two pregnancy tests and the continued absence of her period, she’d almost doubt she was pregnant. Oh, sure, the occasional bout of nausea, but nothing a little pop and a few crackers can’t take care of. She takes her prenatal vitamin daily and otherwise goes about her business, which as of the week before, with her graduation, is solely wedding preparation.
“Are we ready to go to the shower?” Alicia yells out from the bottom of the stairs. “I could’ve come back to Lima sooner than two weeks before the wedding,” she continues more quietly, muttering to herself.
“Nah.” Miles’ voice suddenly comes from behind her, making her jump. “Would’ve given people too much opportunity to figure you out.”
“Excuse me?” Alicia says, turning around and raising her eyebrows.
“I’m just saying, you can excuse not drinking one or two times, but anybody who knows you’s going to guess it by the third or fourth,” Miles says.
“I’m sure I don’t know what you’re discussing,” Alicia says stiffly. “Are you trying to crash the shower?”
“Hey, I’m not knocking you being knocked up,” Miles says, grinning like he thinks he’s so clever. “It’s not like I’ve got any plans to settle down, and Ma needs her some grandbabies to spoil.”
“Miles Brown,” Alicia says, glaring at him. “You keep your mouth shut.”
Miles shrugs. “I just hope the kid looks like you,” he says. “Life is cruel enough without looking like a Rickenbacker.”
“Miles!” Alicia says, pointing a finger at him. “Stop that. And I mean it, I don’t want you crashing the shower. And you had best keep your mouth shut.”
“I swear on the latest incarnation of Ma’s juicer that I won’t tell a soul, provided you tell me right now when I can expect my first niece or nephew,” Miles says.
Alicia sighs. “Christmas Eve, give or take.”
“Promise me you aren’t naming it anything-junior.”
“Not even if it’s Miles Junior?” Alicia says too sweetly, smirking at Miles.
“I might make an exception for Miles Junior,” Miles concedes.
“I’m sure you would,” Alicia says with a roll of her eyes. “I think it’s going to be a girl, though.”
“Then she’d definitely better look like you,” Miles says. “The Browns are a fine-looking people, especially the women.”
“I told you to stop that. MA! Are you ready?” Alicia yells out, glaring at Miles again.
“Fine,” Miles huffs. “Good thing I’m gonna be a fancy-pants lawyers, so if it comes out looking like Foots, I can pay for the plastic surgery.”
“Ma, Miles is insulting your grandbaby!” Alicia calls.
“All I said was I hope it looks like my beautiful sister!” Miles shouts up the stairs.
“Miles,” Ma says with a loud sigh as she appears at the top of the stairs. “Behave. Alicia, don’t yell. You’ll make the baby ugly!” She shakes her head and slowly walks down the stairs, looking between them pointedly.
“Ma, you look beautiful,” Miles says. “And you definitely look too young to be a grandma.”
“Damn straight I do,” Ma says, straightening her dress when she reaches the bottom of the stairs. “I’m always going to look too young to be a grandma, and you should remember that in the future as well.”
“Tell it to my sister! I’m not the one making you a grandma!”
Alicia snorts and shakes her head. “That’s what you say now,” she tells Miles, because Alicia knows Ma will get what Ma wants.
“Go see if your father needs any help,” Ma says to Miles, making a shooing motion with her hands. “We’re going to the shower.”
“Yes, Ma,” Miles says, giving her a kiss on the cheek. “You girls have a good time. Keep Alicia away from the booze.”
Alicia rolls her eyes, then flips Miles off behind Ma’s back. “What was that you were saying about the tuna salad appetizer at the shower?” she says loudly. “I think I’ll have a lot of tuna salad.”
Saturday, June 1st, 2019: Lima, Ohio — Rick
“I swear I’m gonna be sick,” Rick groans, his head in between his knees. “I’m gonna be sick all over Alicia’s dress and she’s gonna divorce me before we ever get married, is what’s gonna happen.”
“I don’t think it’s technically a divorce if it happens before the wedding,” Casey says. He sounds like he’s being helpful, but he’s not, and he knows he’s not, Rick can tell.
“I’m gonna puke on my shoes,” Rick says.
“Here,” Taylor says, opening a can and trying to push it into Rick’s hand. “Have a Red Bull. And we’ll get you another cup of coffee.”
“I never should’ve let you drag me to that third bar, Taylor. I never should’ve let you drag me to the second bar,” Rick says. He takes the Red Bull and chugs it.
“You didn’t believe me about the third bar having the special on shots!” Taylor says, protesting. “I had to prove you wrong. You want another Red Bull?”
“Yeah,” Rick says, nodding his head miserably. “You got any Tylenol?”
“I think you need some water,” Casey says. “You’re probably dehydrated.”
“Aleve,” Taylor answers after a moment. “There’s a bottle of Aleve in this drawer.”
“I’ll get you some water. You need to drink a lot of water to avoid damaging your liver or your spleen, or maybe both of them,” Casey says. Rick doesn’t look up, but he does hear the water running in the little attached bathroom, so when a plastic cup of water appears right in front of his face, he assumes it probably came from Casey.
“Thanks,” Rick says.
Taylor drops two pills into Rick’s other hand, then claps his own hands. “Drink up, you have a tux to put on!”
“You reckon Alicia’ll notice if I skip the tux?”
“If Alicia didn’t kill you for it, Ma would,” Brown says, way too loudly, as he comes into the room. “Foots, you look like shit. You’d better perk up and clean up, ’cause you are way too rough-looking to marry my sister.”
“You’d better do it. You don’t want to upset Miles’ Ma,” Casey whispers.
“I wish she’d have let us elope,” Rick says. “Alicia, I mean. Not Ma.”
Taylor laughs. “Even if Alicia had, her Ma wouldn’t have, I bet. Anyway, once your headache is gone, all you have to do is repeat after the minister and say ‘I do’ once or twice.”
“Rick, where’s your tuxedo?” Casey asks.
“Kacz was getting it. Or Dorian. Or both of ’em,” Rick says. “Maybe both of ’em.”
“Here we are!” Dorian says, the door opening. “Got all of the tuxedos except one, they said it’d already been picked up.”
“That was me,” Casey says.
“Cherry don’t like too many strangers touching his clothes,” Brown says.
“It’s true,” Casey says. “I don’t.”
“Still a control freak,” Taylor mutters under his breath, quietly enough only Rick can hear him. Rick starts laughing in the middle of a sip of Red Bull, and ends up snorking it up his nose.
“Aww, crap, that burns!” Rick says.
“That’s better,” Dorian says with a laugh. “I was wondering why the long faces. It’s just a wedding, Rick. Not like there’s a baby involved!”
“I did hear that Alicia’s mom owns a shotgun, though,” Kacz says.
“I’m stepping into the other room to change,” Brown says, louder than Rick thinks he should have to be, considering the size of the room. “Since I don’t have to wear a rental tux.”
“You aren’t in the wedding?” Kacz asks. “You were in the rehearsal thing last night.”
“Yeah, and I own my own tux, too,” Brown says. “Excuse me, gentlemen.” Before he leaves the room, he shoots Rick a look. Rick glares back at him, because if Brown doesn’t watch it, everybody’s going to figure out that Alicia’s pregnant, and then Alicia’ll be mad, since she said she wanted to have a special day just for her. The baby will get all kinds of its own special days later on.
Taylor mutters something else under his breath, but even more quietly than before, and then he walks over to Dorian. “I guess we should get these distributed,” he says. “So we can all make sure Rick matches his buttons.”
“Hey! I never would!” Rick insists.
“Remember the game against… who was it? Indiana? Rick put his jersey on backwards.” Dorian pauses and laughs. “Three times!”
“Alright, fine,” Rick grumbles. “I might button it wrong.”
Saturday, June 1st, 2019: Lima, Ohio — Miles
“I didn’t know flower arrangements came in that large a size,” Casey says in a suitably awed-sounding voice.
“You know me and my dad made them up special just for Alicia,” Miles says.
“And Rick,” Casey says.
“No, Foots only gets the boutonnière,” Miles replies, shaking his head. “The rest of the flowers are for the bride. That’s why they’re so big. If it were just for Foots, I’d have given him daisies and baby’s breath.”
“The big colorful kind or the regular white ones?”
“You remembered! Good for you, Cherry,” Miles says. “And I just meant the regular white ones.”
“He probably wouldn’t notice the flowers, anyway,” Casey says. He tugs at his bowtie, scowling. “They should have let us wear the clip-on kind.”
“Blasphemy!” Miles says. “Don’t let Ma hear you saying that!” He swats Casey’s hand away from the bowtie and quickly reties it into a neat bow. Once the tie is tied, Miles straightens Casey’s collar, then the lapels of the rental tux jacket, then brushes some dust that isn’t actually there off Casey’s shoulder before finally taken a step backwards.
“Ma will be happy now?” Casey asks.
“Of course she will be. You look good.”
“Nobody looks good in wedding clothes,” Casey says, shaking his head. “People look uncomfortable and kind of ridiculous in wedding clothes.”
“Well, Cherry, you wound me,” Miles says, putting his hand to his chest. “Are you trying to say that I look ridiculous?”
Casey sighs dramatically. “You always look better in a suit than anybody else, Miles, and you know that.”
“Yeah,” Miles says, grinning. “But I do like to hear you say it.”
Before Casey can reply, Rick’s friend Kacz hurries into the chapel, looking confused and a little put out. “Either of you see Rick anywhere?” Kacz asks. “He said he was going to find a place to pee that didn’t have a bunch of other people in it, but he’s been gone for fifteen minutes, so I don’t know if he’s taking a crap or he’s gotten himself lost.”
Casey looks mortified, but Miles just laughs. “He’ll turn up. He wouldn’t dare miss the wedding, since he knows he’s lucky to get a girl as pretty and smart as my sister to marry him,” Miles says.
“Plus, Ma would kill him,” Casey adds.
“She sure would,” Miles agrees. “Several times over, she’d kill him.”
“I guess I’ll go check on the other side of the building,” Kacz says, hurrying off in the opposite direction from whence he came.
“Guess that explains why they get on so well,” Miles says, gesturing in the direction Kacz disappeared.
“Weddings are weird,” Casey says. “They make people act weird. I don’t understand them.”
“Oh, so you and Shep aren’t planning on tying the knot ever, then?” Miles asks, and if it’s a little too nonchalant, it’s not like Casey would notice.
Casey doesn’t answer. All he does is give that little enigmatic half-shrug of his, and a small smile, and then goes back to tugging at his bow tie, which actually might be more of an answer than Miles really wanted.
Saturday, June 1st, 2019: Lima, Ohio — Dave
The first thing Dave notices after he sits down is that there are a lot fewer fabulous-looking hats at Alicia and Rick’s wedding than there were at Ty and Mercedes’ wedding. The next thing Dave notices is Casey tugging at his bow tie, then putting his arm down and frowning, which makes Dave hide a grin.
The music changes then, anyway, and everyone stands to turn and stare at Alicia as she walks up the aisle with both of her parents flanking her. Dave turns to look back at Rick, standing between all of the groomsmen and all of the bridesmaids, and Rick looks like he’s about to start floating off the floor, he’s smiling so widely and beaming at Alicia.
Everything goes smoothly as the ceremony starts, though Dave does look over at Miles when the minister says the bit about if anyone thinks Rick and Alicia shouldn’t get married, they should speak up. Miles doesn’t do or say anything, though, which is probably good, since Dave thinks Miles and Alicia’s Ma would have been upset if anything disrupted the wedding.
It’s probably halfway through the vows, or at least Dave hopes it is, when he realizes that he’d prefer to have his camera with him, taking pictures or something, though the wedding photographer is relatively discreet. Casey looks distinctly startled when Dave glances back at him, and Dave turns to the back of the room for a few seconds before turning back to look at Casey again, who now looks dreamy-eyed and like he has absolutely no knowledge of what’s happening insofar as the wedding is concerned.
Almost everyone starts laughing quietly, but by the time Dave looks back towards Rick and Alicia, all that’s happening is Rick, the minister, and Taylor are all grinning while Alicia shakes her head slowly. “Taylor Lange, I bet you did that on purpose,” Alicia says, and everyone laughs again, louder than the first time. Taylor just keeps grinning, and whatever he did, it might have been on purpose, because he doesn’t deny it.
The remainder of the ceremony goes smoothly, down to the minister proclaiming “Mr. and Mrs. Daniel and Alicia Rickenbacker!” before everyone recesses out of the church. As Alicia and Rick walk past, Dave also notices Alicia invested in one of those crazy push-up bras, and he shakes his head a little as the church starts to empty.
Dave wanders with the rest of the crowd towards the reception, since there are a few more pictures to be taken post-ceremony. He goes to the bar and asks for a glass of wine, raising his glass in a silent toast to Ma Brown, who apparently said firmly that the Browns would pay for the alcohol when the Rickenbackers refused. Dave still isn’t sure how Casey got such good play-by-play of the wedding planning drama, but he also decides it’s lucky that Alicia and Ty never met, because Dave doesn’t particularly want to see their mothers dueling. He imagines it’d be a great scene in a movie, but not something for real life.
“There you are,” Coach says from behind Dave, and he turns with a smile.
“Just appreciating the decorations?” he says with a laugh.
“Are you two ready to head back out on the friendly skies?” Coach asks, and Dave nods.
“Tomorrow morning, yeah,” Dave answers. “Heading out to San Diego.”
“And how long is it before you’ll be back in the States after that?”
Dave grins. “Months, if everything goes according to plan.”
Casey and Monty approach the two of them then, engrossed in a deep conversation that Dave misses most of, though the last word he hears is “birdfeeders.”
“Oh, that would make it more aerodynamic,” Casey says in apparent agreement, before turning to Dave. “Hi, David!”
“More aerodynamic?” Dave asks. “You want a Coke?”
“The garden, and yes,” Casey says.
Dave shrugs and turns to get a Coke, handing it to Casey and raising an eyebrow at Coach’s amused look.
“You two assimilated, calling a pop a Coke,” Coach jokes.
“But mine’s actually a Coke,” Casey says. “See?” He holds it up, both eyebrows raised like he’s waiting for Coach to acknowledge the obvious Coke-ness of his Coke.
“It’s still a pop,” Coach finally says, sounding mystified. She shakes her head and looks back at Dave. “So do you think Taylor was trying to make it look like he almost dropped the rings on purpose?”
“Is that what happened?” Dave asks. “I didn’t catch the exact moment.”
“I did think it looked a bit staged,” Monty says.
“Did it? I didn’t really notice,” Casey says. “Did I tell you that the only reason Rick made Taylor best man was because otherwise Alicia was stealing him?”
“Stealing him?” Coach repeats.
“For her, um. Man of honor, I guess?” Casey says. “But Rick wanted him, so Alicia said he had to be the best man. Otherwise, it was going to be Miles.”
“What do you suppose you would call him if he weren’t the man of honor, but he was still on the bride’s side?” Monty asks.
“Bridesman,” Casey says in that firm way that means he actually has no idea whatsoever.
“Wouldn’t the groom be the bride’s man?” Monty asks.
“No,” Casey says, then, “Or, um, maybe yes, but he’s her other man. Her wedding man.”
“That could get confusing,” Monty muses. “It sounds like a romantic comedy, The Bride’s Other Man.”
“It does,” Coach says, nodding, and then she smiles at Monty. “C’mon, let’s dance.” As Coach leads Monty towards the dance floor, where people are mostly swaying, Dave notices Taylor dancing with a girl that looks a little bit like the girl Taylor dated in high school, if Dave’s remembering right.
“At least they’re unlikely to force us to dance every song,” Dave says to Casey wryly.
“Oh, dancing’s not that bad, really,” Casey says, almost dreamily. Dave frowns at Casey and snorts once.
“Let’s just find a good view of the wedding cake in case Alicia smashes it in Rick’s face,” Dave says, shaking his head. “And the next wedding we’re invited to, I’m bringing my camera.”
Saturday, June 1st, 2019: Lima, Ohio — Taylor
Taylor pulls Maci a little closer, their bodies fitting together just as well as they always did, even if they long outgrew anything deeper. “So,” he says to Maci quietly as they dance. “I noticed something interesting just a little while ago.”
“Oh yeah? What’d you notice?” Maci asks, her tone teasing and possibly promising some later action.
“Other than the fact that you’re here without a date,” Taylor says with a chuckle, “I noticed that Alicia’s glass of champagne wasn’t actually champagne.”
“What? Oh, you’re so silly!” Maci says through giggles, which confirms that it was definitely not champagne. “Of course it was!”
“Maci!” Taylor says, acting affronted. “You know me. How could you try to fool me?”
“Taylor, you’re taking all the fun out of it,” Maci says, pulling a dramatic pout as she lightly whacks him on the arm. “You’re supposed to play along for another few weeks.”
“I won’t say a word,” Taylor promises. “Just tell me Rick knows, at least.”
“Of course he does. He’s over the moon, Alicia says. She had to stop him from telling his parents, though, because can you imagine?” Maci shakes her head. “Did you know that one of his uncles wouldn’t even come to the wedding?”
“Well, better not to come if he would have caused trouble,” Taylor says, frowning. “Guess I’ll have to throw Rick another party in a few more months, though.”
“You’re still so sweet,” Maci says. She leans her head against his shoulder. “You got taller, too!”
“Oberlin was good and bad, but it didn’t make me meaner,” Taylor quips.
Maci giggles again. “Good. I can’t even imagine you being mean. Not really.”
Taylor grins down at her. “You know…” he says slowly.
“I know?”
“I did get a hotel room,” Taylor continues.
“Really? I’m just staying with my parents,” Maci says. “Maybe I should drop by, for old time’s sake.”
Taylor keeps grinning. “Old time’s sake. That sounds good to me.”
Sunday, June 2nd, 2019: First Class, Somewhere over the Plains states — Casey
“Hey, Case?” David says, putting down the in-flight magazine.
“Hmm?” Casey looks away from the window and its view of a long, flat stretch of nothing, turning his attention to David.
“What was that about yesterday?” David asks. “With the dancing?”
“Dancing?” Casey repeats. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“When you said dancing wasn’t so bad,” David says, raising an eyebrow.
“Well, it wasn’t, was it?” Casey asks, shrugging slightly. “It was sort of nice, really.”
“Why the change of heart?” David counters.
“Oh. Hmm.”
David laughs softly. “Still not an answer, Case.”
“It’s just, wedding dancing isn’t exactly the same as other dancing,” Casey says. “Not really.”
“It’s not?” David says. “How is it not?”
“Well, um. There’s a wedding first, which is, um. Nice.”
“Nice?” David says skeptically. “Yesterday morning you were complaining about wedding attire and all the pomp and circumstance.”
“I don’t think I actually said it like that,” Casey says.
“Close enough, Case,” David says, still sounding skeptical. “What changed?”
“Well, it’s just.” Casey shrugs slightly. “Maybe it’s not so bad, a wedding.”
“I guess.” David shrugs. “I don’t know anyone else getting married anytime soon, though. Don’t wait on Coop, or you’ll never go to another wedding.”
“Oh,” Casey says softly, trying not to let his face fall. “You don’t, um. You don’t think anybody else might want to get married? Before Coop, I mean, since obviously.”
“I don’t think so?” Dave says. “I mean, if you really wanted to just attend more weddings, there’s probably a way to be a witness for people at city hall or something.”
“Oh. No, not, um.” Casey sighs quietly and turns to look out the window again, where they appear to be flying over a lake of some sort. “Not other people’s, really.”
“Not other people’s?” David repeats. “Case, I’m conf— oh.” David shifts in his seat, probably staring at Casey. “Really?”
Casey doesn’t look at David. He just shrugs again. “Um.”
“Huh,” David says, sounding surprised. “I didn’t know you were interested.”
“I just never really thought about the event,” Casey says softly, glancing over at David. “I just, um. Considered the aftermath.”
David blushes and shakes his head, then takes Casey’s hand. “It’ll give us something to think about while we’re flying over the Pacific in a few days,” he says, squeezing Casey’s hand.
“It will?” Casey asks, letting a smile start to creep across his face. “Really?”
David laughs. “But we’re not going to do it outside the U.S., okay?”
“Oh, noooo,” Casey assures him. “Uncle Monty would never forgive us!”
“You,” David says jokingly. “He’d never forgive you.”
“Hmm. Yes, probably,” Casey agrees. He leans his head against David’s shoulder and closes his eyes as he smiles. “Weddings aren’t really so bad at all.”