Happenstance 3 (Happenstance #3)(15)
Author: Jamie McGuire

She ran up the stairs, and in less than a minute, she plodded back down, her hand over her mouth. She took me into her arms and looked to Sam. “Her dress is covered in punch. Brady poured punch on her!” Her voice broke with a combination of sadness and anger.

“She is not the victim here!” Lynn said, pointing at me. “She initiated an unnecessary fight between these boys! They used to be friends, and she has poisoned Weston’s mind against my son!”

Julianne held me against her side.

Peter looked at Weston and spoke, “Brady said that you attacked him after Erin walked into his cup of punch. Is that true?”

Weston became agitated again. “Brady tossed his cup of punch on Erin and then tried to pour another one over her head.”

Lynn sneered, “It was an accident. She’s lying.”

“I saw it,” Weston said. “Everyone saw it. That’s why Coach Morris threw him out.”

Sam pushed up his round glasses. “Lynn, I think you’d better leave.”

Lynn’s face screwed into disgust. “My son was attacked, and you’re asking us to leave? You owe us an apology!” Her eyes targeted me. “I can’t believe I actually felt happy that you were doing so well. I was going to nominate you for an award at the club. How can you sleep at night, knowing you’ve made up such lies about my son?”

“Don’t address Erin,” Sam said. “If you have something to say, say it to me.”

“You are trash!” Lynn seethed, narrowing her eyes at me.

Julianne stepped onto the porch, just a few feet from Brady and his mother. “Lynn, get your pretentious ass off my lawn—now.”

Lynn’s jaw dropped, and she grabbed Brady by the arm before jerking him toward their SUV. “There will be consequences!” she called back, her short hair bouncing as she marched.

Peter chuckled. “She realizes we’re attorneys, right?”

Veronica glared at the Becks’ SUV while Lynn drove away. “She forgets how much I know. Brady comes home and laughs about how he bullies kids at school, and she laughs with him. She encourages it. She thinks those kids are beneath her and Brady and their family. She believes it in her soul. She thinks his cruelty is funny, and now, she has the gall to pretend he is innocent. Just pathetic.”

“I’m just disappointed about that award,” I said. “I was really looking forward to it.”

Our parents burst into laughter, our mothers wiping away tears.

“Oh, Erin,” Julianne said, hugging me, “you’re amazing.”

Weston wasn’t amused. I took his hand and squeezed it.

Veronica patted Weston’s shoulder. “I think, uh…I think we can fix the evening. Don’t you, son?”

It took Weston a moment to process what she’d meant, but once recognition hit, his eyes sparked. “We can!”

He whisked me across the yard, and I was glad I had on flats instead of heels. He pushed through his front door and pulled on my hand until we reached the door to the basement.

“Wait here,” he said. He disappeared down the stairs, and a few moments later, music began to float up from the basement. When he opened the door, his hair had been smoothed, and he had a smile on his face. He offered his hand. “C’mon.”

“What’s going on?” I asked.

Weston led me down the stairs, and I gasped.

“What…when did you do all of this?” I asked.

The entire basement was draped in orange, red, blue, and white streamers. The coffee table had been made into a pretend fire pit, and white twinkle lights had been strung across the tops of the walls.

A wide smile stretched across his face. “I wasn’t sure if you’d really go, so this was plan B.”

“You thought I would back out?”

“Right up until we sat at the table.”

“So…you made us our own prom?”

He shoved his hands in his pockets and shrugged. “Mom helped.”

I threw my arms around him. “I love you. I am so”—I shook my head—“in love with you. I don’t know why you love me so much, but I am so lucky.”

“Yeah?” he said.

A slow song came on the radio, and Weston clasped his hands behind me.

I looked up at him. “I feel bad that you didn’t get to finish your last prom.”

“Don’t. This is better. We should have come straight here after the Grand March.”

I wasn’t going to tell him that I felt the same way. Instead, I rested my cheek against his chest, letting myself relax for the first time that night. No one was watching, and no one was judging or plotting or thinking up rumors to spread. It was just us, in our space, just the way our story had begun.

He touched his lips to my ear. “Nothing Brady said was true.”

“I know,” I said, breathing out the words.

There was no one here to tell him where to keep his hands or not to kiss me too long. I liked that about our private prom, too. His mouth traveled down my neck, and he pulled at the collar of my shirt to taste my shoulder. I reached my fingers into his hair and looked up into his eyes as he pulled away. He stared down at me with such intensity as he held me so close to him that I fell from being lost in the moment to jumping off the ledge.

Another song started, and we swayed back and forth. It didn’t matter if I was any good at dancing or if I was too close or if I stepped on his toes. It was such a relief, so liberating. An upbeat song came on, and Weston began hopping around, shaking his head. I watched him for a few moments, an eyebrow raised, and then I joined in, lifting my hands above my head while shaking my hair and hopping in a circle. We were free and happy. He accepted me like no one else. He always had. His chuckles and my giggling filled the room. Just a few times had I laughed that hard or for that long, and all of them had been with Weston. So far, he was my best day, my favorite night out, and everything in between.

Once it was over, we were breathless, puffing, with ridiculous grins on our faces.

A familiar slow song began to play, and Weston held out his arms. “The best part about this? I don’t have to worry about anyone cutting in.”

“I wouldn’t want to dance with anyone else but you.”

Weston loosened his tie, and I helped him pull it over his head. That small movement began an avalanche of soft kisses, and strong hands grabbed at my skin, becoming more intense, more like need. I walked backward to the couch, pulling him with me, while his mouth smiled against mine. We sat together on the worn cushions we’d occupied so many times before, but this time was different, and we both knew it.