Turbulence

I had always hated the idea of getting married at the house I grew up in, but for Davina it was a dream come true. Every moment of the wedding was perfect, but I was more excited for the reception. With Mom showing off her grandson, I was free to do whatever I wanted, which meant drinking champagne and avoiding the man I had brought along. Yes, it was rude to avoid him, especially since he had worked so hard to convince me to invite him, but I really couldn’t risk getting into some kind of fight; not on my sister’s perfect day.

“Carey, we need to have a chat.”

I turned and looked up at my father. It was bound to happen, but I had hoped he would wait until after the reception. “Can it wait?” I asked, taking a sip of the bubbly drink in my hand.

“Not this time.” He put an arm around my shoulder and led me into the house. “Why didn’t you tell us?”

“Tell you what?” I pretended to be oblivious.

“Carey.” His voice held a warning tone.

“I know how you feel about children outside of wedlock.”

“That wouldn’t have mattered.”

“You know it would have. I saw the expression on your face when you saw Cameron; you couldn’t have been more pissed off.”

“Language, Carey.”

“Dad, I hang out with hockey players, language isn’t really something I worry about.”

“You have a boy now, so you better start caring.”

I resisted the urge to roll my eyes. “Look, I’m sorry I didn’t tell you and mom.”

“But?”

“There isn’t really a but to that. I’m just sorry I didn’t tell you. It’s not going to change anything. If I could do it again, I’d do it the same way.”

“Your relationship with Patrick is good, though.”

“We are working on it. The pregnancy took a bit of a toll on our relationship, but we’re working things out. Can I go now?”

“This conversation isn’t over.”

“It is for now, Dad. I just want to relax and not have to worry about anything for the night. There’s been a lot of things piling up on me and this is my chance to forget about it all. I’ll talk to you tomorrow or I’ll give you a call once Pat and I get back to Chicago.” Not waiting for him to say anything, I walked away. I needed a new glass of champagne and felt the need to find Patrick in a hurry. Grabbing a glass from one of the waiters, I headed over to Patrick and my sister. By the look on the boy’s face, I know that Davina was tearing him to pieces.

“You’re never going to find anyone as wonderful as my sister.”

“I know.” Patrick looked down at his feet.

“Leave him alone, Dav. It’s your wedding, you should be partying.”

“And you shouldn’t be drinking all of my champagne.” She raised an eyebrow challengingly. “You’ve had quite a few. I know because I’ve been watching you.”

“I’m not paying, might as well take full advantage,” I joked with a wink. “I’ll slow it down. Anyway, I need to grab Pat, Mom’s been bragging about Cameron and I need to feed him.”

“So, why do you need me?” Patrick asked.

“I need you to distract her while I do so.”

“Are you still breast feeding?”

“Who said I was ever breast feeding?”

“The size of your tits,” Davina smirked.

“And I’ve had too many,” I muttered, grabbing Patrick’s hand. “I’ll bring him back once I’m finished.”

“You’re not breast feeding still are you?” Patrick reworded Davina’s question. “I don’t think you’re supposed to drink if you are.”

“I’m not,” I assured him. “I haven’t for a couple months now. I also haven’t drank alcohol in awhile.”

“Good thing I came along,” Patrick chuckled. “Now you can get trashed and I can take care of Cam and probably you.”

I snarled at the man as we approached my mother. “Hey, Mom, I need to feed Cameron.”

“I can do it if you’d like, Sweetie.”

“That’s not necessary.”

“I want to make up for the past year,” she confessed.

I looked at Patrick who shrugged. “I guess that’s okay then. There are some bananas in my bag and some Dino Buddies in the fridge. He should be good with those. There should be some grape juice in the fridge, too, so feel free to give him that. He’s able to feed himself, so you really just have to make sure he eats something.”

“Carey, darling, I’ve done this before, twice, I think I can manage.”

“Right,” I mumbled, mentally slapping myself. “Well, thanks Mom.”

“Why don’t you and Patrick go dance? Have some fun while I’m looking after this guy.”

I nodded and realised that I was still holding Patrick’s hand. Instead of letting go, I led him out to the wooden platform that was set up for dancing. Without much thought, I wrapped my arms around his neck as a slow song started playing.

“This is nice,” he whispered into my ear.

“Don’t think too much of it, Patrick,” I warned. “Mom and Dad don’t know we’ve split, so I don’t want them getting suspicious.”

“Don’t worry, Cee, I know what you’re intentions are. I was just thinking about the last time we danced.”

“That was ages ago, Patrick, how can you remember that long ago?” I joked, earning a nudge from the man. “We were on the beach, weren’t we?”

“It was one of my favourite nights,” he confessed with a nod.

“Why’s that?” I asked, skeptically. “I thought you hated dancing.”

“I do, but I was with you.”

“Smooth,” I muttered. “Jonny and I made a bet that you wouldn’t dance with me that night. I knew I could convince you, though.”

“It was never hard to be convinced by you.”

“It’s because I’m so pretty, right?” I batted my eye lashes for effect.

“You are very pretty, Cee, but that’s not the reason.”

“Well, gee, thanks.”

“Don’t start something, Cee,” he warned, leaning back a bit to give me a look. “I just meant that you’ve always had a way with me. I’ve never really been able to say no.”

I bit my tongue as thoughts of our break up crossed my mind. “So, what made you dance with me that night?”

“The same thing that’s making me dance with you tonight. There’s no way out.”

“I swear, Patrick, you keep cracking jokes and I’m going to walk away, again.”

“Now, Cee, there’s no need to bring that up, especially not at your sister’s wedding. I forgot what drinking does to your mouth.”

“Does to my mouth?” I asked, raising an eyebrow at him. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Breaking away from me, Patrick grabbed my hand and led me into the house. We quickly passed by my mother, who was coddling my son and chatting with a family friend. Once we were inside a spare bedroom, he stopped and closed the door. “We are not having a fight in front of your family.”

“So, you’d rather fight inside the house?”

“I’d rather not fight at all. We’ve been doing pretty well these past couple of months; I don’t really want to start something now.”

“Yet, I have a feeling you’re going to be starting something anyway.”

“It’s just that, when you start drinking, you tend to run your mouth off.”

“Excuse me?”

“You just tend to say anything, not really thinking about it.”

“I do that all the time, Patrick.”

“It gets worse when you drink.”

“Then I won’t drink anymore.”

“I don’t mean that you should stop drinking.”

“Oh, really? Then what is it that you mean?”

“You know what? Forget about it. I’m going to go check on Cameron.”

Before I could argue, Patrick was gone. Sighing, I laid down on the bed. Memories of dancing on the beach with Patrick filled my mind. It was one of the best times I had had with the man. He knew it and I knew it, but that didn’t stop me from starting an argument. Something in me didn’t want him to know how happy he made me, but I knew that over the past few months, while we’ve been reuniting, Patrick had been slowly figuring out exactly what I was working so hard to hide.

As thoughts of suppressing my past feelings continued to swirl around my mind, I could feel my eyes start to flutter closed. The events of the day seemed to have exhausted me more than I had known and fighting of sleep was harder than I expected.