“And pretty?” I add, but it comes out as a question and Elias laughs but turns the sound into a cough.
Sabrina turns around with a raised brow and her hands on her hips, the other two girls coming to a stop beside her. “What are you guys laughing about back there? You’re not laughing at us, are you?” She looks down and checks her shoes.
“No, baby.” Noah quickly drops his arm from my shoulders and rushes forward, scooping her up into his arms. She laughs, tossing her arms around him as he spins her. “I would never laugh at you. I was laughing at Fisher.”
“Why?” She grabs onto his arms to steady herself when he sets her down.
“Because Fisher?—”
I sprint forward and slam my hand against Noah’s mouth. “Noah’s had too much to drink. He’s talking nonsense.”
Ebba lets out a giggle. “If it’s about me, I think I deserve to know.”
Noah shoves off my hand. “He thinks you’re pretty!”
Groaning, I cover my face with my hands.
“Is that true?” Ebba asks in a teasing voice. “Do you think I’m pretty, Fisher?”
I cock my head to the side. “You know the answer to that.”
“I do.” She takes a step toward me, using her cane to steady herself. She’s wearing heels that have to be at least three or four inches, but I know better than to think she’d forgo them unless absolutely necessary. “But are you going to do anything about it?”
She’s drunk, and so am I. It takes everything in me not to cup her face and kiss her.
“Do you want me to do something about it?” I ask, proud of myself for thinking of that in my inebriated state.
She opens her mouth to respond, but before she can, Sabrina starts jumping up and down and pointing. “Ooh! Guys! Look! A chapel! It’s so cute.” She grabs Noah’s hand, tugging him in the direction of the chapel across the street. “Come on, guys.”
“Sabrina,” he sighs. “We’re getting married in like...” He pauses, trying to count on his fingers. “Soon,” he settles on. “I think you can wait.”
“I just want to check it out,” she says with a pout.
Inside, the building smells musty with a hint of rose from the candle burning on the front desk.
“This place is so cute,” Sabrina croons, leaning on Noah for support. Batting her lashes up at him, she says, “Come on, let’s go ahead and get married! We can still have our real wedding, but this will just be for us!”
Noah shakes his head, but amusement curls his lips. “You’re crazy.”
She pouts up at him. “Please?”
“Maddie’s not here,” he reminds her softly and her face falls.
“You’re right. We can’t do this without Maddie. It wouldn’t be right.” She swings around and wiggles her finger at Whimsy and Elias and Ebba and me. “But you guys could.”
Whimsy shakes her head. “Don’t look at me like that.” To Elias, she says, “I love you so much, but I don’t want to get married yet.”
He squeezes her hand pulls her in for a kiss. “Agreed.”
“That leaves you two,” Sabrina giggles. “What do you say? We all know you guys totally have had a thing and you still look at each other like you want to fuck each other brains out.”
“Wait, we do?” Noah blurts. “And they want to do that?”
Ebba is strangely quiet.
Somehow, instead of feeling more sober from our walk, I feel even drunker—or maybe it’s just the proximity to Ebba that has my brain on the fritz, because why am I considering this?
“What do you say?” she asks. “Wanna be my groom?”