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Rebecca takes her maid of honor duties very seriously for someone who doesn’t care much for weddings these days. She’s near Keeley’s side most of the night - ready to assist where she’s needed, to make sure the different events and traditions stay on track, and to help keep some of the well-wishers at bay so Keeley and Roy can at least have some time to enjoy their night together and that they can have some actual fun. If there was one thing Rebecca regretted about her own wedding (aside from who she married in the first place, obviously) it was that they scheduled nearly every second with some sort of event or had been constantly talking to other people the whole night and she hadn’t gotten to enjoy her own wedding.
Eventually though, Keeley notices Rebecca’s attentiveness and tells her to relax
“Babes, I love you so much, but you’re supposed to be having fun, too! Go dance!”
Rebecca kisses Keeley on the cheek and makes her way over to the dance floor, where she finds Sassy and Nora tearing it up with Ted and some of the footballers. She dances with everyone for a few songs; Beard ends up sweeping her away to go nuts together during a Lady Gaga song, Keeley and Roy make their way back to the floor (after disappearing for awhile) for some ABBA, and eventually Rebecca starts to feel the stress of trying to make the day perfect for her best friend ease away.
Then the DJ began to slow the BPM down and suddenly the telltale strings of the wedding classic, Etta James’ At Last, begins to fill the room. Rebecca, without a date, uses the slow down in tempo as an excuse to get a much needed drink of water, hoping that no one takes this as an opportunity to ask her to dance. She’s been really enjoying embracing her singleness tonight, determined to not let the inherent loneliness in attending a wedding alone get to her, and is not really interested in dancing with anyone like that tonight.
Well. That’s not entirely true.
In fact, as she catches her breath, she watches the one person she wouldn’t mind dancing with slip out into the venue's courtyard. Rebecca doesn’t miss the way he clenches his hand, the way his shoulders are just a little bit hunched over, and she doesn’t hesitate to cross the room and follow him outside.
It’s quite a bit cooler outside than it is back inside with the rest of the reception, where they had all been working up a sweat on the dance floor. The cool air feels nice on her warm cheeks, and it also means that she and Ted are the only people out there right now. The door closes behind her, and so only a little bit of Etta James’ voice can be heard, as if it’s floating on the air. The patio area is nicely decorated with floral arrangements and with the fairy lights creating almost a ceiling across the stretch of the little courtyard. It’s a shame, Rebecca thinks, that it’s such a chilly night and that no one really wants to utilize such a lovely space. At the same time, though, she's glad to have this quiet moment after how hectic the entire day has been.
Ted is sitting on a stone bench off to the side, looking down at his hands and still clenching them a little. If Rebecca hadn’t followed him out here, she probably wouldn’t have noticed him right away. It’s not until she walks toward him, her heels clacking on the stone and pulling him out of his thoughts, that he realizes he’s not alone.
“Hey,” Ted says quietly, a genuine little smile on his face. Surprisingly, as both maid of honor and best man, neither of them had really spent any time together tonight (that wasn’t meticulously scheduled out by the wedding planner), even during the reception.
“You alright?” She asks softly and seriously, with an eyebrow raised. His smile grows, with an almost knowing look on his face, as if he should’ve guessed that she would have noticed. He nods at her and rubs his hands down his thighs anxiously, in an attempt to relieve the tension.
“Yeah,” he answers, “I just needed some air.” He still seems a little closed off for some reason, a little wrapped up in whatever has clearly triggered a little bit of a panic attack, but Rebecca’s not about to let him off that easy.
“Want some company?” Rebecca asks, surprisingly nervous that she's overstepping, but he looks relieved as he nods.
“Would love nothing more.” Ted pats the spot next to him and because she’s cold (and a little drunk) she sits closer to him than she probably should. He doesn’t seem to mind, but does seem to notice that she’s probably a little chilly, and he slips off his jacket and puts it around her shoulders without even asking.
“Thanks,” she says, smiling sweetly at him. “You sure you’re doing okay?” she presses, bumping his shoulder with hers, and he chuckles warmly at her persistence.
“Yeah, yeah... it’s just that song. Brings up some tough memories, I guess.” He starts clenching the hand closest to her again. Rebecca notices and slips her hand into his immediately. This seems to bring him back to her, and he takes a breath and continues. “It was the song my mom and dad danced to at their wedding. It had been my mom’s very favorite song of all time, and whenever it would come on the radio, she’d stop everything and make me dance with her around the house." Rebecca hums a little in thought as she imagines a mini-Ted dancing with his mother. "She’d tell me that dancing with my father that night had felt like magic, and that magic is what they created our family out of.” Ted says wistfully, and gets a little choked up there, and Rebecca patiently waits for him to gather his thoughts, absentmindedly drawing circles with her thumb on his hand. “When-when he died - right after he died, things changed, of course. One of those things being that Mom would turn the song off as soon as she heard it, and gosh, it broke my heart every time. But over the years, by the time I was in college, she started to warm up to it again. It took me a little longer to come back around to it..."
He trails off for a moment and Rebecca rests her head on his shoulder, waiting for him to finish his story.
“When it came time for planning my and Michelle’s wedding, we were talking through what songs we wanted and, of course, At Last, was on the list. It's practically the most popular wedding song, right? Well, I told Michelle the whole story of it - the story I just told you - and why it still kinda broke my heart to hear it. But I also said that it should probably be on the set list anyways, since it's a classic, and that maybe I'll feel better about it again by hearing it on such a big night. But, I guess Michelle read a little too much into it the first half of the story, and told the DJ not to play it, cause I found myself waiting to hear it all night, and then it never played. I didn't say anything about it though, didn't seem like it was that big of a deal. Then, I don’t know… I guess my mom was expecting to hear it, maybe so that we could dance to it again, and so she got a little disappointed and said something about it to us a couple months later, and then Michelle got upset, and it just turned into this weird fight." Ted sighs in frustration, but continues. "I guess it was an early example of Michelle and I never really being able to communicate our feelings properly. So, now anytime I hear it I think of my dad and this stupid little fight about my wedding night, which then reminds me of my divorce and…” he takes a breath, realizing he started rambling. “Yeah... so... Lots of weird emotions and bad memories. Which sucks, because I really do love the song a lot.”
“I’m sorry,” is all Rebecca can think to say in response. He squeezes her hand in thanks and they stay there for a moment in relative silence. Ted’s story had gone past the runtime of At Last, and they can hear the notes of a different slow jam filtering out into the courtyard. Suddenly, Rebecca has an idea, and turns a little towards him. “Can I see your phone?” she asks with her palm open, her own phone left somewhere in her clutch at the head table. He narrows his eyes and smiles, sensing that she’s up to something, and unlocks it and hands it to her without question. She taps around on it for a moment, not saying anything, and then suddenly At Last starts up again, this time a bit more muted as it plays out of the small speakers of his phone, and she sets it down on the bench next to her.
Rebecca stands and offers her hand.
“What do you say we replace those bad memories with another good one?” Rebecca asks, a little anxious that she’s making the wrong move here, but the smile that lights up his face pushes all her doubts away. He grabs her hand and she pulls him to his feet, and they immediately begin to sway to the music.
They start off a little apart from each other, trying to keep a respectable distance, as if they’re at some sort of school dance. As the song plays, he pulls her in closer and she doesn't stop him. Rebecca still has his jacket on, and now that she’s in his arms, she’s completely wrapped up in him. She feels so safe and warm in this moment, she wishes she could spend the rest of her life like this.
“This is actually one of my favorite songs, too,” she admits, quietly. “But Rupert vetoed this at our wedding as well, something about it being 'too sappy.' At the time I was so, so angry at him, but now I’m really glad that bastard didn’t ruin it for me like he ruined a lot of things.”
He laughs a little at this, his hand moving up and down her back to the pace of the song, and the way his chest shakes with laughter so close to her gives her goosebumps. It makes her feel like she had butterflies in her stomach, like a teenage girl with a crush, and she’s relieved that they’re alone out in the courtyard; that no one can see the blush creeping up her neck.
As the song continues, they seem to melt into each other, and they’re dancing cheek-to-cheek. Lost in the song and in the moment, Rebecca begins to sing along with it without realizing.
You smiled, you smiled
Oh, and then the spell was cast
And here we are in Heaven
For you are mine at last
The strings begin to fade out, and they both seem to slow to a stop, pulling back from their position to look at each other.
“Beautiful,” is all Ted says, and Rebecca can’t tell what exactly he’s referring to. She watches him glances down at her lips just briefly, and she feels her heart almost stop. Rebecca wasn’t expecting the night to take this turn, but it’s felt like they’ve been hurtling towards something for so long, maybe it is time. She feels herself lean forward, eyes fluttering closed, and-
The door opens with a bang behind her, and quickly they pull apart, as if they had just been caught doing something much more inappropriate than they were.
“Rebecca!” Nora yells, oblivious to what had just happened between the two, “we need you, it’s bouquet throwing time!” Rebecca rolls her eyes at the stupid tradition that she, now unmarried, is required to partake in (and is quite certain that Keeley will be aiming that bouquet her way). Ted laughs at her reaction, though a little breathlessly as he’s still breaking out of the little spell they were both under, too.
“Alright, I’m coming,” she yells back, as she slips off his jacket and hands it back to him. “Well, what do you think,” she asks Ted softly now, “better memory?”
“The best,” he replies, beaming, and she can feel the heat rising on her cheeks again. Single Ladies can now be heard loudly out in the courtyard, and Ted nods his head toward the door with a wink. “Better get you back in there.”
And as Rebecca fails to duck out of the way of the bouquet that comes hurtling towards her, she wonders if she’ll have the opportunity to improve upon that memory with Ted in the future.