I'm Addicted to the Thrill

“Dani, I can’t do this,” muttered Niki as we all stood there in the middle of the changing room. We were all already in our red dresses waiting for this wedding to start. How Niki’s mind only came to decide that she wanted to call off the wedding now, I’ll never know. The bustle of the room halted at the very mention of not going through with the wedding.

“I swear if you call this off, I will never speak to you again,” Mrs. Adams hissed. I had grown to like Niki’s mom over the past few days that we had all been putting the final touches on the wedding.

Niki looked at me then Madi looking for a sympathetic ear in the room. Everyone in the room shook their heads. We all wanted to see the woman in white become Mrs. Toews. I just didn’t know if I was the best one to even begin to working towards getting her ready for her walk down the aisle. I could hear my phone buzzing over on the table on the opposite side of the room from where we were all standing. I nodded to Madi and Christine then to Niki telling them to deal with it while I checked on the phone.

Are you almost ready? Patrick texted me. I paled at the idea of telling him no. What would he do? He could tell the groom, and the entire wedding could get shot to hell. I wasn’t going to let my best friend ruin her wedding day. No, I had to figure it out. I just put the phone down and walked back over to the girls.

“It’s just when we started dating, he went out with another girl. What if he gets sick of me while we’re married?” sniffled Niki. I rolled my eyes but realized that the bride was still watching me. I sighed and pushed a strand of hair from my eyes. I could already feel the gaze of all the other women turn on to me.

“If I can keep Kaner interested for three months, you can keep Jonny around for forever,” I told her. I knew that motivational speeches weren’t my forte. In fact, I was fairly certain that this would be the last one I would ever give at a wedding from the looks that people were giving me. Thank God I didn’t have to make a toast. I bet that would have gone terribly.

She sucked in a deep breath and looked at the lot of us. We were all on edge waiting for her to give us the okay to finish any preparations. As she began to nod, I let out the deep breath that I didn’t know I was holding in. Christine kept from freaking out, and then the knock at the door came. All of us assumed that now Jonathan was calling it off. I was chosen to go check and see what was needed of the women in the room.

I opened the door a crack and looked out at our guest. Patrick stood there smiling at me. It was as though he knew who was standing on the other side of the door without me even poking my head out all the way. I peered over my shoulder and nodded before stepping out of the room. The smile on his mouth grew as he looked down at me.

“Do you know how lucky you are the wedding isn’t outside?” he joked tugging at the hem just above my knees. I rolled my eyes and made sure that the door was completely shut behind me. “What’s going on? We’re waiting for all of you.”

“Niki panicked. It’s under control now,” I told him. “I swear if you say anything to Jonny, I will hurt you.”

“I know you will. You look great,” he said. I remembered when Niki jokingly sent him a picture of me in the wedding dress and how mad I had gotten at him for not saying that I looked pretty in that poufy dress. Hearing him comment on this dress made me feel even better about anything that had gone wrong so far that day from the Niki meltdown to leaving my favorite lipstick at home and then forgetting to grab the right shows and having to go home to grab both.

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Patrick’s POV
I watched as Jonny and Niki made their ways around dancing and talking to different guests. I could see Dani glancing over at me. Between the fight that we had only days before on something as foolish as whether or not I was allowed to dance with other girls at clubs whenever she was not there and our only other spat about who got to control the radio on the way here, she was acting strange towards me.

“Danielle, let’s dance,” I told her. I had thought that the little passing between us together before the ceremony would have made everything better, but something changed about her during the ceremony. I had watched her as she and the others had gotten Christine and Kris together.

She rolled her eyes but followed me out anyway. I somehow picked the time when our faster song changed to a slow dance and the couples all joined us on the floor. I winked at Jonny as he caught sight of Dani and me dancing. He knew about our fights as of late. He just hadn’t been helpful in trying to find ways for me to make it up to her. This seemed to be working though. Dani was actually happy to be around me.

“You make me so mad sometimes,” Dani finally admitted. “At least you’re not dancing with anyone else here.”

“I can change that for you if you like,” I retorted. She stopped dancing with me. I honestly knew I had said the wrong thing the second the words left my lips. As she pushed her way off of the floor, I wasn’t sure if I should follow her or let her have her peace for now. “Aw, fuck.”

I followed her. Dani had already made it closer to the car as she was running to get away from me. I knew she wasn’t going to leave me there. She wouldn’t. Dani wasn’t that mean to do that to me. I grabbed her wrist and pulled her to make sure she stopped and looked at me. The look in her eyes was a mixture of anger and anguish. The tears were there, and I couldn’t bear the thought of having made her cry for any reason.

“I swear, Patrick, I wish you hadn’t said that. You know I hate when you dance with other girls, and to joke about that at a wedding is just low,” she said. I could barely hear her, and every other sound she made was a sniffle. I couldn’t stand what I had just done to her. “Please just go away. Maybe one of the others will give you a ride. I need a break.”

I let her go and almost asked her if this was the end. It couldn’t be. Dani wouldn’t do that to me. I just had to let her walk away and cool down. What the fuck had I been thinking? Maybe I should keep things like that to myself next time. I walked back to the reception running my hand through my hair.

“I fucked up bad,” I told Versteeg as I walked past him and Christine.