ASHTON TALKED JULIAN INTO WAITING A FEW DAYS. Mirabelle saw some wisdom in that, too. She admitted she couldn’t get married even in a tacky Vegas chapel without her mother. Julian agreed to wait until the following Saturday if Ashton would do him a favor and give Zakiyyah a ride to Vegas. Riley was in Chicago on business and would fly into McCarran straight from O’Hare. Ashton refused. “I’m already your best man. You can’t have my intestines, too.” Julian said Zakiyyah had sprained her ankle and wasn’t comfortable driving all that way by herself and besides, it didn’t make sense for both of them to take separate cars.
“It makes perfect sense,” Ashton said. “What doesn’t make sense is for her and me to be in proximity to each other, ever.”
“Please, bro. For me.”
“What, I don’t do enough for you?”
“One more thing.”
“You want me to drive across the desert,” Ashton said, “across Death Valley . . .”
“Not Death Valley, Mojave.”
“With Attila the Hun?”
“Come on.”
“Death Valley, Julian. That’s most appropriate. Death. Valley. With Attila the Hun.”
* * *
The following Thursday, the day of the bachelor party and two days before Julian and Mia’s wedding, at seven in the morning, Ashton pulled up to the curb on Lyman in front of Zakiyyah’s house and honked the horn. No one came out. He honked again and, receiving no reply, switched off the engine and walked up the stairs to the landing, where he gave a surly double knock and stood back, nearly kicking over the damn petunia pots.
Zakiyyah opened the door. She was wearing a gray cotton knit dress and a pink ribbon through her halo of corkscrew hair.
“Hello,” she said.
“Hello, did you not hear me honking?”
“That was you?” Zakiyyah said. “I was about to call the cops to report a disturbance.”
“You didn’t see my car?”
“How would I know it’s your car?”
“You didn’t see me sitting in the open convertible? You didn’t recognize me?”
“Odd, isn’t it,” she said, “I didn’t recognize you without your Free Licks shirt.”
Ashton wore an ironed, thin cotton buttondown, sleeves rolled up, and jeans. He was done speaking to her. She hadn’t invited him in or offered him a drink or asked him for help, so he stood like a pillar.
“Ready to go?” he said.
“Hold the door for a second,” she said. “I have to get my suitcase. Come in, I guess.”
“Thanks, I guess.”
She held open the door as he walked past her. It irritated him that she smelled good, of something warm and woodsy, irked him even more that the dress, even though it had a square neckline, could not contain her voluminous cleavage.
He tried not to look around as she hobbled in her ankle boot to get her suitcase. It was a cute, girly apartment. Comfy. It smelled nice. All tapestries and film posters and funky lamps and scented candles. It even had a plant, like she wouldn’t kill it instantly with her death glare.
Limping, Zakiyyah rolled a large suitcase out of her bedroom.
“What’s that?” Ashton said.
“It’s a conveyance for carrying clothing and sundries.”
“Why are you bringing it? We’re barely going to be there two nights.”
“Just in case,” she said.
“Just in case what?” Why was Ashton raising his voice?
“Anything. Brush fire. Earthquake. Flood.”
“Flood,” he said slowly. “In the desert?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “Anything. Everything. Have you not read your best friend’s book, his chapter on survival? Clearly not. He said to always be prepared.”
“Prepared for what, the siege of Las Vegas?”
She matched his antagonism. “And I suppose you brought nothing but the keys in your hands and the beanie on your head?”
“I brought a tux, and what does my beanie have to do with anything?”
“Well, it’s 90 degrees out,” said Zakiyyah. “Wearing that in 90-degree weather makes it seem like you don’t know what temperature is.”
Ashton swiped the beanie off his head. “Better?”
“Saner, certainly.”
“Ready to go?” he repeated through his teeth.
“Just a minute.” Zakiyyah stood in the middle of her open living room, appraising the kitchen, the cold stove, the latched windows, the killed lights.
“What are you doing?”
“Hang on,” she said. “I’m having a silent moment. Or trying to.”
“Having a what?”
“A moment right before you leave the house when you don’t talk and don’t move, you just stand or sit completely still and try to make sure that you’ve brought everything, done everything.”
“Great. Ready?” he said.
“I can’t tell. You keep talking through it. Did I mention what it’s called? A silent moment. What you’re supposed to do is built right into the name. It’s another one of your friend’s life hacks.”
Ashton snapped his mouth shut to keep himself from speaking so they could finally leave the house.
“Okay, now I’m ready,” Zakiyyah said.
“Let me help you with your suitcase,” Ashton said. “Do let me get that for you. By the way, have you seen my car? Take a good look at it while I carry this downstairs. Appraise it in silence.”
On the sidewalk they stood in front of his BMW two-seater convertible.
“That’s small,” she said.
“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.”
“Clearly you’re pretending not to compensate for something,” she said.
Ashton didn’t respond. He had nothing to prove.
“Is there a trunk?” she said.
“Yes. The top of the car is in it. And my tux.”
“Well, put the top up.”
“I’m not putting the top up,” Ashton said. “We’re driving through the desert. You have to have the top down in the desert. We’re not eighty.”
They stood in the street at an impasse. His arms were crossed. Her arms were crossed.
“Well, what am I supposed to do with my suitcase?” Zakiyyah said. “Hold it in my lap?”
“There’s an idea.”
“Fine,” she said. “I won’t go. Call Julian, tell him I won’t be able to make the wedding because you have no room for me in your car.”
“I have room for you,” Ashton said. “Just not your steamer trunk.”
“So is that the choice,” Zakiyyah said, “a zero-sum game? Choose the luggage, then. Be my guest. I’ll stay home. The suitcase can be maid of honor.”
Ashton tried not to swear under his breath. “Give it here.” He moved the passenger seat all the way forward and stuffed the luggage as best he could behind them.
“Wait, I forgot one thing,” she said.
“Suitcase looks like it has your entire wardrobe in it.”
“I’ll be right back.”
“Why even have a silent moment, then?” he muttered.
“Oh, I had a moment,” Zakiyyah said. “It was anything but silent.”
A minute later, she limped back outside, holding a guitar in her hands.
“Are you kidding me?” Ashton said. He had to restrain himself from saying are you fucking kidding me.
Zakiyyah gave him her phone. “Mia asked me to play at her reception, to sing her and Julian’s wedding song. Call her and tell her I can’t because you refuse to help.”
Ashton took deep breaths. “What’s the song?”
“What, if you don’t approve of their choice, my guitar’s not coming? I don’t even want to tell you now.” Zakiyyah took deep breaths herself. “Tom Waits, if you really must know every detail of every single thing before we can drive away. ‘I Hope That I Don’t Fall in Love With You.’”
“That’s their wedding song?”
“By all means,” Zakiyyah said, “when you see them, let them know what you think of it.”
Somehow Ashton squeezed both the guitar and the suitcase behind their seats. “There,” he said. “You don’t mind sitting with your nose to the dashboard, do you?” He closed her car door, taking care not to slam it.
In aggravated silence, they drove out onto the 101 and a half hour later, onto Highway 10. Out of Pasadena and San Gabriel Mountains, it was a straight pass through the desert to Vegas. Six hours. Five if he drove like a maniac. The hot wind was fierce, even when they were stuck in traffic and were barely moving. Zakiyyah took a black thermos from the bag between her legs, popped it open and took a deep swig.
“What do you have there?” Ashton asked.
“Lemon water with ice.”
“What kind of thermos is that?”
“The amazing kind,” Zakiyyah said. “Your best friend recommended it. Japanese technology. Incredibly light, yet keeps any liquid ice cold or very hot for over twelve hours.”
“Huh.”
“It’s another one of his life hacks,” she said. “It’s in his book.”
“Whatever.”
“I don’t want to insult you by offering you some of my lemon ice water,” Zakiyyah said. “Can I get you your own drink? I’m sure you brought your own. I mean, you being Mr. Prepared, you wouldn’t commit to a six-hour drive through the desert in the middle of summer in hundred-degree temperatures with the top down without bringing something to drink, would you? That would just be crazy. So, where’s your water, Ashton?”
“I see,” Ashton said. “This is going to be one long mother of a drive.”
“And getting longer every minute,” said Zakiyyah.
After a few miles of silence, Zakiyyah offered him her thermos, and Ashton grudgingly accepted. “Do you want to listen to some Apple music?” he said, taking a long welcome swallow and handing it back to her.
“I prefer Spotify,” she said. “Better playlists.”
“Shame that your Spotify is not hooked up to my car, sweetheart.”
“My name is not sweetheart. It’s Zakiyyah. My friends call me Z.”
“Your phone is not hooked up to my car, Zakiyyah,” Ashton said. “But you know whose phone is hooked up to my car? Mine. With my inferior Apple playlists.”
“Whatever.”
He tried again. “So what would you like to listen to?”
“Some classical? Early Bach, or Chopin?”
Ashton groaned.
“Fine, how about some Simon and Garfunkel, or Sam Cooke?”
He made a small whimpering swearing sound under his breath.
“Just forget it, then.”
“How about some Kendrick Lamar?” he said. “Or Chance the Rapper?”
Zakiyyah made a face.
“How about Rihanna?”
Zakiyyah made a face.
“You don’t like Rihanna?”
“I like her fine, but why?” Zakiyyah said. “Do you think I should like Rihanna? Because I’m black?”
“No, not because you’re black,” Ashton said. “Because you have two ears and can hear. That’s why you should like her.”
“So put on some Rihanna, if you know everything. We’ll take turns. And after her, I’ll put on some Sam Cooke. Because I have two ears and can hear.”
“Do you want us to crash?” Ashton said. “Do you want me to run off the road because I’ve fallen asleep listening to your narcoleptic music? Do you know anything about car music? It must be in 4/4 time. Its tempo should be faster than 80 beats per minute, faster than the average beat of a human heart. It needs to keep me awake. That’s also in my friend’s book, or have you not gotten to that part yet? It’s a long book, and that bit is at the end.”
“It’s nine in the morning, why would you fall asleep?” Zakiyyah said. “It’s literally the beginning of your day.”
“My day already feels like a year long,” Ashton muttered, adding louder, “and that’s not the point. Is Cooke’s tempo even 15 beats a minute? He’s not upbeat enough for a wake.”
“I’m done.” Zakiyyah crossed her arms. “Put on whatever you want. Just close the top. It’s too windy and hot.”
“The AC is on.”
“Yes, you’re cooling the outdoors admirably. Maybe that palm tree over there likes your AC, but inside, where I am, I’m hot.”
“Why don’t you take a sip of your ice water to cool yourself down if you’re so hot.” Ashton grumbled, but he pulled into a gas station, closed the top, took her suitcase and stuffed it into the trunk. He laid his garment bag on top of it, moved her seat slightly back so she’d be more comfortable, bought himself some bottled water, some Coke, and got back on the road. He put on Rihanna’s “Only Girl,” the only girl in the world, and Zakiyyah put on Sam Cooke’s “You Send Me” as Ashton flew a hundred miles an hour across the Mojave while Cooke slowly warbled that she sent him, she thrilled him.
When it was his turn again, Ashton put on “Hey Baby” by Stephen Marley.
“Now that’s more like it,” Zakiyyah said, and actually smiled. Her dazzling smile lit up the desert.
“Aha,” said Ashton. He stared sideways at her beaming face. “You like Stephen Marley?”
“You like Stephen Marley,” Zakiyyah said. “I love Stephen Marley.”
Ashton turned his eyes to the road and the volume up. At the top of their lungs, together they sang “Hey Baby” along with Marley, afterward expressing a reluctant surprise that they’d finally found a song they both knew and liked.
“It’s one of my favorites,” Zakiyyah said.
“Mine, too,” Ashton said. “I love all the Marleys.”
“You do?”
“Yes, why? A white boy can’t like reggae?”
“Stop getting defensive every five seconds,” she said. “You don’t look like the type who would like Stephen Marley is all I’m saying.”
“What type is that, Z? The white type?”
“Why don’t you put on the song again instead of speaking. That would be best.”
“Couldn’t agree more.”
They sang along to “Hey Baby,” three more times, and then to UB40’s “Red Red Wine” and “Please Don’t Make Me Cry.” They sang along to everything because they knew it all. They argued about who was better, Sean Paul or Jimmy Cliff, agreed that Ziggy Marley was amazing, that Bob was in a class by himself, accepted that Third World and UB40 were fun to listen to, especially in the car with the top down, but both confessed to a particular weakness for Stephen Marley’s hip-hop/reggae brilliance. Next time they stopped, Zakiyyah asked for the top to be down and Ashton said, “Make up your mind, will you?” but he put it down happily, and they cruised down Desert Inn Road, cranking Marley all the way up and turning him down to passionately disagree about which album was better, Revelation Pt. I: The Root of Life or Revelation Pt. II: The Fruit of Life.
If, at the start of the trip, Ashton had been breaking every speed limit trying to get to the end of the journey faster, by the end, he was dogging it on Highway 15 at forty an hour, still trying to persuade the infuriatingly unpersuadable Zakiyyah that he was right and she was wrong.
They stopped at a watering hole in the Mojave to gas up and grab a quick snack. The food was gross. Old wrapped burritos, nachos with dried-up cheese, dubious-looking tuna sandwiches.
They got sodas and Doritos and brownies and potato chips and sat at the picnic table in the desert dust under a canopy, continuing their ardent conversation. The topic veered off to the horror genre.
“Your ignorance of classic horror, Zakiyyah,” Ashton said, “leaves you woefully unqualified to run my haunted house.”
“I have a job,” she said. “Why would I ever want to run your haunted house?”
“I didn’t say I was going to pay you,” Ashton said. “You’re not even qualified to run it for free.”
“I wouldn’t run it even if you paid me,” said Zakiyyah.
When their lunch at the decrepit picnic table on the side of the gas station convenience store in the middle of the desert began, Ashton knew he was sick in love with her. By the time it was over, he knew he couldn’t live without her.
Why are you looking at me like that? she said.
He waited to answer. Like what?
I don’t even know. Like I got something on my face.
Is that how I’m looking at you?
I don’t know. That’s why I’m asking.
He said nothing.
What’s wrong with you? she said.
Everything’s wrong.
Ugh. What is it now?
Ashton didn’t say anything, he just stood up. He lifted himself off the bench, leaned all the way across the table, over their garbage train wreck of travel mart food, and kissed her.
For God’s sake, what do you think you’re doing, Zakiyyah exclaimed, breathed out. She dropped her drink. Her arms wrapped around his neck.
I really don’t know, he said. He came around the picnic table and pulled her up. His hands were in her hair, his lips were on her. His arms slipped down her back, down her cotton dress, pressing her breasts against him. Her hands rose in supplication.
Ashton, what are you doing, she kept repeating, her eyes closed, her face up.
I really don’t know, he said.
Their fevered fumbling in his miniature car could’ve been filmed as a climax of a screwball farce. He couldn’t move the seats far enough back, not his, not hers. Before he could even get her inside the car, before he could pull down her dress or expose her breasts, he had to remove the boot cast from her leg and put the top up. He sat in his seat, she in hers. He leaned over the console. Finally the tinted windows got steamed up. He pulled down her dress, unhooked her bra, bared her glorious breasts to him. He didn’t have enough hands for all of her, enough lips for all of her. He didn’t know what to touch first, what to do first. He knew where he wanted his hands and lips, he knew where he wanted his everything. Why do you smell so good, he murmured. Why are you so hot? They made out like wild kids on the beach.
Off to the side at the rest stop, they remained parked, her trying not to make a sound, and every five seconds a new car would pull in and some joker would get out, and peer across the dust at his lightly shaking BMW.
He pressed her against the car door, fondling her, kissing her, the heat off his body melting her down, the heat off her body making him rock solid.
Ouch, she said.
That’s not me, he said.
No, it’s the door handle in my back.
He took her hand and put it over himself.
Whoa, she said.
That’s me. Let’s get out of here. Quick. Let’s go find a motel.
Are you out of your mind?!
Yes. He was panting.
She was panting. Everyone is waiting for us in Vegas, said Zakiyyah. Julian’s family, Mia’s mom, my mom—oh, and Riley!
Ashton pulled back slightly. How do you know about Riley?
Mia told me.
You asked Mia about me? That is so hot. His mouth was on her breasts.
It was a question, not an invitation, she said in a moan.
How wrong you are. Let’s go. Motel.
Ashton, we can’t!
I didn’t say we had to stay overnight, he said. We’re not moving in. But I can’t drive like this or stand aright. I can’t move or breathe or live until—
You want us to go rent a motel for an hour? Please, Ashton, do continue with the romance. But he was making it difficult for her to berate him and moan at the same time, his fingers and palms and mouth on her topless body so insistent.
Z, this is the most romantic thing I can give you, Ashton said. I want you so desperately that I can’t wait until later. I can’t wait another minute. He tried to move his entire body over the stick shift into the passenger seat to get closer to her.
You cannot fit into this space with me! she said.
Watch me.
It’s physics, Ashton. Two people can’t occupy one space at the same time.
Watch me.
I think your idea of romance and mine is quite different, Zakiyyah said, gasping it out, pressing his stubbled mouth harder against her nipples. Suck them, she whispered, suck them. Wait, she kept saying, wait! This isn’t going to work.
Even the motel that rented by the hour was about to become out of the question.
You knew what you were doing, he said, when you wore this unbelievable dress. You knew how I’d feel about it.
The $20 knit pullover from Amazon?
Yes. Sitting there tantalizing me, seducing me. You’ll think twice next time.
I’m thinking twice right now, but what does the dress have to do with it?
His hand was between her knees.
Ashton!
Now you know. Because the dress is nothing but flimsy fabric, nothing but a bit of cotton between me and your bare—
Ashton . . . !
Now it was really too late.
Somehow Zakiyyah held herself up and he slipped under her from his seat into hers, somehow he unbuttoned his shirt and unbuckled his belt. While Marley’s “The Lion Roars” played through the car speakers, he sat in the passenger seat, moving it as far back as he could against her guitar, and she climbed astride him, her underwear off, the dress bunched up at her waist. His mouth tried to remain on her nipples as she fit over him and slid up and down, but she weakened too soon and was unable to hold herself up, breathing out his name O Ashton followed by I can’t, I can’t, I can’t. He had to keep her steady and move himself, breathing out her name followed by the words I can, her hips clamped between his hands. Both he and she tried desperately not to make any sounds that would make the people putting gas in their cars 50 feet away call the cops. The convertible heaved. The shocks made a sound, hissing in, hissing out. Stephen Marley made a sound. The guitar behind their seat made a sound. The bass strings vibrated their humming rhythm pounding on every half beat, then every quarter beat, then every semi-quaver. And then Zakiyyah made a sound.
“Well, you were certainly right about one thing,” she said after it was barely over, still on top of him, clutching his wet neck.
“What’s that?” Ashton murmured, his head back. “Oh, yeah. If you see something that needs doing and can be done in under two minutes, do it immediately.”
They both laughed.
He opened his eyes. “I saw something that really needed doing.” Her body was in his hands.
“And you did it immediately.”
“Woman, I think I love you,” said Ashton.
She gazed at him. “You’re very fickle. A minute ago you hated me.” She rubbed her breasts back and forth against his bare perspired chest.
“Do that for two more minutes.”
“Ashton!”
He fondled her, he kissed her.
“Do you know when I knew I loved you?” Zakiyyah said. “When I stepped into your store and you were wearing your stupid Free Licks shirt and I was yelling at you for it, as you deserved to be yelled at, and you opened your arms like you could do no wrong—and I realized even as I was infuriated that all I wanted was to be in them.”
“That’s why I opened them.”
Eventually, they got going. With their lips pulpy and Zakiyyah’s neck and chest inflamed from his stubble, they got themselves dressed and sorted, got cleaned up as best they could, and pulled out onto the highway, but not before Ashton leaned over and put his face into her outrageous breasts, pulled down her dress, kissed her nipples again, kissed her lips. You’re a goddess, he whispered. He drove with one arm. His other arm lay in Zakiyyah’s lap.
“I hope Mia and Julian don’t kill us for what we’re doing,” she said.
“For what we just did,” Ashton said, “or for throwing them a surprise wedding with a hundred people, not twenty?”
“Yes,” she said. “Wait, did you get the right flowers? Mia said he’s really . . .”
“You don’t have to tell me. A bear. Ridiculous. Nuts. They nearly wiped out my bank balance, but yes, I ordered them some white asphodel. He keeps telling me the asphodel is the forever flower.”
“That he even knows that is weird.”
“He knows a lot of weird shit, pardon my language.”
“Oh, when you spoke to him yesterday, did he tell you he punched a guy?” Zakiyyah said.
“If Julian told me about every man he punched,” said Ashton, “we’d have no time for any other conversation. What did the guy do?”
“Oh, great. Sure. Defend Julian.”
“Um, did you want me to defend the other guy?”
“Whatever. Mia said they were in the casino and some drunk said something to her. She said the words had barely come out of the man’s mouth when he got his shit quaked. Julian hit him so hard, he knocked him out. MGM had to comp the guy like two years’ worth of visits so he wouldn’t press charges.”
“What did he say?”
“Mia said something like aren’t you a sight for sore eyes.”
“Come on,” Ashton said, “there had to be more.”
“That’s the thing—there wasn’t. Julian couldn’t explain it. He told Mia the phrase just set him off.”
“Well, the drunk should’ve kept his trap shut.”
“Oh yeah? What if Mia says something that sets him off?”
“Let’s all calm down. You know she can do no wrong in his eyes.” Ashton cleared his throat, let a mile of road go by. “But he has been having really bad dreams lately.”
“I know. She told me.”
“I don’t think she realizes how bad it’s been,” Ashton said. “She’ll know soon enough. Several times a week, I find him sleeping on the floor in my room. I had to put an air mattress in the corner.”
“Because that’s not weird,” Zakiyyah said.
“You know what’s weird? That the dreams only started after he met your friend.”
“Um, do you know what the word coincidence means?”
“Julian says there’s no such thing. First time coincidence, second time happenstance, third time enemy action.”
“Then this is coincidence even by his definition,” said Zakiyyah. “You can only meet someone for the first time once.”
“Jules says otherwise,” Ashton said.
“Does he remember what he dreams about?”
“Unfortunately for me, yes.”
She waited. He drove. “Are you going to sit there, or are you going to tell me?”
“The dreams are so bad, I almost don’t want to tell you.”
“Oh, then by all means, don’t tell me.”
“Dreams in which,” Ashton continued, “I die, and Julian dies, and Mia dies.”
“So he tells me anyway,” said Zakiyyah.
“Dies not just once. But over and over. In the most unimaginable ways. He doesn’t come right out and say what happens to me. It’s so bad, he won’t tell me. I’ve had to extrapolate. But no matter what else happens, Mia always dies. Don’t tell her I told you this.”
“Oh—not to worry.”
“I’m serious, Z. Ever,” Ashton said. “Or I’ll actually be dead, because Jules will kill me. It will ruin our friendship.”
“Do I die?” Zakiyyah said.
“I don’t think so. You just vanish.”
“Thank God.”
“Are you going to take it seriously or what?”
“You want me to take seriously the screwed-up dreams of some guy I hardly know?”
“Yeah, some guy who’s about to marry your oldest friend.”
“That’s her problem.”
“Nice.”
“What do you want me to say? What do you want me to do? Why did you tell me?”
“Because I’m worried about him,” Ashton said. “I couldn’t keep it to myself anymore. I couldn’t bear it on my own.”
“Well, now we both can’t bear it. Happy?”
“Happier,” he said, “knowing I’ve made you a little bit miserable.”
“A little bit?” Zakiyyah said, bringing his hand to her lips.
She’s not the one.
Ashton said that about every girl he’d been with. And it didn’t matter. Every silk designer-bejeweled beauty from Pasadena to New Orleans made him shake with joy, but he’d also shake his head and say, Jezebel, Delilah, Grace Kelly or Marilyn, I love you, girls, I love you all, but you’re not the one. You’re pretty, foxy, you smell good, you sing, do cartwheels, laugh at my jokes, you like morning sex and swimming naked in my pool. But you’re not the one. He and Julian had a decade of sun and fun pretending to search for the one.
And then the bell rang on a Friday morning, and she walked into his Treasure Box with her ripe body and her perfect face, judging him even as she herself was falling, falling, falling. Before she spoke a word, Ashton knew. He knew it in his gut.
And when that happened in a man’s life, the man had to come clean with everyone else, and make good on his human promise to struggle toward perfection, to try to be good, to try to do good, and hope that his puny effort would be enough.
Ashton finally understood what Julian had been talking about.
He and Z were quiet the rest of the way into Las Vegas, listening to Marley’s “The Fruit of Life,” listening to “Babylon” and “Paradise” and “The Lion Roars,” on repeat. Half a mile before the Wynn, Ashton pulled into a 7-Eleven. “Look, Z,” he said, taking her hands in his, “my Julian and your Mirabelle are getting married at the Chapel of the Flowers. It’s an incredible momentous day. Even my dad, whom I haven’t seen since my college graduation, is flying in for the occasion.”
Zakiyyah nodded. “And Mia’s mom, Ava, who’s been a widow for sixteen years, is bringing a plus one! Some Vietnamese guy. She met him on her last trip to London. Had lunch at his place, and they hit it off. Mia doesn’t even know about this yet.”
“Yes, and your girls from Brooklyn are flying in to meet my boys from UCLA and Jules’s boys from the gym,” Ashton said, grinning. “It’s going to be one hell of a party. My point is, I don’t want anything, not one single blemish, to ruin this for Jules and Mia. Okay?”
“Of course. But why are you telling me? How are you planning to ruin it?”
“What I’m trying to say . . .” Ashton regrouped. “Is that I can’t speak to Riley until after the wedding. I promise you, it will be the next private conversation she and I have. I will do right by you. But I also have to do right by her. I’ve been with her a long time, and I owe her that.”
“Okay,” Zakiyyah said, looking at him with deepening emotion.
“I just don’t want you to be upset that I have to stay with her, and sit next to her, and dance with her. That for the next few days, I’ll have to be with her.”
Zakiyyah leaned forward to kiss him. “Thank you for being honest with me. Besides, the maid of honor always dances with the best man. So I’ll get to dance with you, too.”
“Yes. Because you’re my maid of honor.”
“And you’re my best man.”
He gazed into her face. “You are so familiar to me,” Ashton said. “I don’t know why. You’re like my favorite song.”
“And you are mine,” Zakiyyah said. “Don’t worry about me. You do what you need to do. I’m playing the long game. I’ll stand aside.”
“And if at any time during the wedding and dinner and dancing, you hear me say the words Hey Baby,” Ashton said, “know that I’m thinking of you.” He smiled. “I’m thinking of the next time I can romance you again.”
“Ashton!”
“Yes, Z?”
“Hey, baby,” she whispered.
“Hey, baby,” he whispered back.