“Thanks.” She tucked a piece of blond hair behind her ear and beamed at me. “It was such a surprise, but we’re so happy.”
“You better be my kid’s Godfather.” Ollie slung his arm over Liam’s shoulder. “Don’t say no to me, man.”
Liam looked apprehensive and shuffled his feet nervously. “You want me in charge of your kid if something happens?”
“Well, yeah,” Talia spoke this time, “we trust you.”
Liam blanched, clearly taken aback by that statement. “Well, um, I’d be honored.”
“It’s settled then.” Ollie grinned from ear to ear and smacked Liam on the chest before letting go and returning to Talia’s side.
Brady let out a low whistle. “This is going to be the coolest fucking kid ever with you guys as parents and with us as unofficial uncles.” He chuckled before moving in to hug Ollie and Talia.
“Congrats, guys, this is awesome.” Jeremiah took a turn hugging them.
“Thanks.” Talia beamed, leaning against Ollie’s side.
“Now, can we eat cake?” Ollie questioned, eyeing the large cake across from us.
“This isn’t your party,” Liam grumbled, “so no.”
“Fun sucker.” Ollie picked up the bag of Cheetos and opened them, immediately stuffing a handful in his mouth.
Liam shook his head and smiled over at me. “Having fun?”
I nodded and picked up my plate of food, finishing off the piece of pizza. “Yeah, this is awesome. I can’t believe you’d do something like this for me.”
He shrugged, trying to act like it was no big deal, but we both knew it was.
I set my empty plate down and clapped my hands together. “I’m thinking cake would be good now.”
“Yes.” Ollie fist-bumped the air.
Liam fought a smile at his friend’s outburst. “You heard the birthday girl. She wants cake,” Liam yelled loud enough for everyone to hear.
Ollie went running over to the table and stood by the cake. “Someone light these fuckers.” He pointed at the candles that spelled out HAPPY BIRTHDAY.
“I’ve got you covered.” Liam chuckled, pulling a lighter from his pocket.
I followed him over to the table and my heart beat nervously as everyone gathered around. I didn’t like being the center of attention, and being boxed in by so many people made my fight or flight senses kick into overdrive. I took a deep breath and counted to five, blocking out all the noise and chatter around me.
Liam noticed my momentary freak out, though, and looked at me with worry in his eyes. I smiled at him in a way to let him know that I was okay. He nodded once, having understood, and proceeded to light the candles. I noticed then, that there were even more than the HAPPY BIRTHDAY candles. In fact, there were fourteen more. Tears filled my eyes.
Do not cry, Ari, I scolded myself silently. Now is not the time for tears.
Liam began to sing “Happy Birthday” and everyone else joined in, which only brought more tears to my eyes. One spilled over, and I quickly swiped it away.
When the last notes of the song hung in the air, I held my hair back and blew out the candles. It took three tries to extinguish them all and Ollie ended up helping me, because, let’s face it, he wanted cake.
Liam removed the candles and cut the cake.
“Birthday girl gets the first piece.” He handed me a plate with a chunk of cake the size of my head.
“How do you think I’m going to eat all of this?” I laughed, grabbing a clear plastic fork from a cup on the table.
“We’ll share.” He winked, and my stomach stirred.
He was really going to have to stop with the whole winking thing. It was destroying my insides.