“Nope, don’t go there. Let’s just enjoy us, this, for a little longer.”
So we did. Just for a little longer. Then we had to peel ourselves away from each other and face the day. Showers, skip the razors, clean bedding, a quick breakfast of eggs and honey ham slices with coffee, and then the call to Apollo was made.
I could hear Henry’s boyfriend squeal with joy after Ryker asked if he would help with the cake. Guess Apollo thought cake meant wedding, because in less than an hour he was at our house, seated at our kitchen island looking at wedding magazines with us, Henry, and Apollo’s aunt Maria. I imagined we’d have time to think about this, but nope, here he was, and I still had stuff to write on the report, and I could see my laptop from here.
“I am so excited for this!” Apollo beamed as he tossed about twenty wedding magazines to the countertop. “I know you’ve been having troubles deciding, so now all the troubles will be mine! I’ll be the best wedding planner ever!” I glanced at Ryker. He was agog, his lower lip between his teeth. “First, we need to pick the perfect place. I know where that is! Not too big, not too fancy, and price wise it will be perfect!”
“We’re not getting married at Adler’s mansion,” I quickly interjected because Ryker was obviously having speech issues.
Apollo frowned for a moment then snapped his fingers, setting his bangles to jingling. “No, stop, I was not suggesting the halfway house. There are too many patients there now. A wedding might be too much stimulus for some of them.” He tapped his phone. “I was thinking of using Colorado’s desert camp. It’s remote but beautiful. And cheap!”
“Uhm…” I said and nudged Ryker. He blinked. Great. “Uhm, well, I’m not sure Colorado would—”
“Of course he would! Look, I’ll call him!” He swept around the room with his phone to his ear. Henry sat beside me smiling softly as his man took over.
“Colorado, hello, it’s Apollo. I’m putting you on speaker.”
“Dude, what’s up?” Colorado’s raspy voice filled the kitchen.
Apollo held the phone out. “I’m here with Ryker and Jacob, the soon-to-be newlyweds, they’ve turned to me to plan the wedding-slash-reception,” Apollo winked at me.
“Cool! Your parties are epic. Almost as killer as mine.”
Maria crossed her long legs and sipped her coffee.
“Well your party days are over and so it falls to me. Since I have an easy schedule at school I’m happy to help these two. They’re here. Say hello boys!”
“Hey,” Ryker and I said in tandem.
“Yo, guys. Man, tying the knot is huge. How can I help?”
“They want to use your camp out in the desert,” Apollo quickly replied.
“Oh sure, go for it. Do with it what you will. Oh, hey, got to roll. Joe and Maddy Boo are ready for a trip to see Kricker. The camp is yours! Later!”
The line went dead.
“There! Done! The wedding will be at the camp as will the reception. I’ll do the food because, in all honesty, I am one hell of a cook!” Apollo beamed.
“He is,” Henry agreed and got a buss on the cheek from his man.
“Such a sweetie! So, wedding food is taken care of. Auntie here will do makeup and hair!” Apollo patted his aunt’s arm.
“Guys don’t wear—” I started to say then Ryker drove his elbow into my ribs. Apollo’s big brown and lined eyes locked on me. “I mean… Ryker and I don’t wear makeup.”
“I can do your hair then,” Aunt Maria said then took a sip of coffee. “Although you could use some concealer maybe, and some powder, just for the photographs.”
“Uhm…” I said again then was steamrolled by Apollo tossing out menus while his aunt held up color palettes next to our faces while babbling about moisturizers and anti-shine powders and subtle applications of a gel comb on our eyebrows. It was noon before they left, Apollo and Maria chatting away, Henry shaking our hands at the door as he juggled the magazines.
“I know they seem overwhelming, but trust me, they’ll do a great job for you guys,” Henry said. We both nodded. He smiled at us then jogged off.
I closed the door and looked at Ryker. “Well that certainly went differently than I expected,” I said.
“Yeah, me too. Did we even mention chocolate cake?”
“No, not once.” I chuckled then pulled him into a warm hug. Burying my nose in his hair, I inhaled. “I don’t really even care about cake flavors. I just want to marry you and start our lives together. Are you okay with the camp? I know it’s not a fancy church followed by a massive reception hall.”
“Actually, the camp is fine. There’s plenty of land for the teams to explore, no neighbors to worry over sound issues with, and I bet it’s plenty romantic at night.” He nuzzled my chin with his nose. I kissed him, hard, and with so much yearning it hurt. “I just want you to be happy.”
“Same baby.” I stared into his beautiful hazel eyes framed with thick dark lashes. “I think we may have compromised.”
His smile made me weak in the knees. “I think we did. And all we had to do was turn over the biggest day of our life to Apollo Vasquez, party master extraordinaire.”
I loved seeing him happy. “Want to go back to bed?”
My phone rang then, and I knew exactly who it would be. As did Ryker. The playful aura surrounding us dissipated.
“I better get that.” I left his arms to grab my phone before it hit the floor.
“Yeah, best jump for him,” I heard Ryker mumble as I swept the phone off the counter. The muffled jab hit dead center but I didn’t respond. Instead, I replied to the text Adam had sent reminding me that we had a lunch date. I stared at the word date for a second, feeling funny about it for some reason. Shaking that off, I hit him back to tell him I was on the way in five.
“It’s Adam,” I said after sending off my text. Ryker nodded. “This won’t take more than a couple of hours. Do you want to come along?”
“No, I…” He shook his head. “No. I don’t. I’m going to go work out, maybe call Alex to see how he’s doing, get caught up on that Lovecraft show.”
He was stiff now. His words clipped. Fucking work. This was so not how I’d envisioned my job being. Maybe I needed to tell that to Adam. See if I could back out of the Bygenta program and find something less tech-based and more animal-based.
“Okay, well, I’m going to grab my laptop and go.”
He nodded.
I rushed to grab my Dell then change into clean jeans and my old Owatonna T-shirt. Ryker was spread out on the sofa when I emerged from the bedroom. I bent over the back of the couch for a kiss. He puckered. The touch of our lips was brief.
“Right then,” I said as I straightened up. “Glad we got the wedding stuff figured out. I think it will be amazing, Ry.”
“Yep, me too. Amazing.” His attention was on the TV.
Exhaling softly, I grabbed my wallet, keys, sunglasses, and laptop then backed out of the apartment.
My truck was hot, because even in freaking winter it was on the warm side in Arizona, and so I eased into Sunday traffic, my mind looping over a thousand things as Blake Shelton sang a sad song about a love lost. I never wanted to lose Ryker or what we had, but I was beginning to suspect that somehow, somewhere, something was going to have to change. I could see he wasn’t happy. And that saddened me. All I wanted out of life was to make Ryker happy. And I was failing at that.