Before I could blink, Stephanie threw her full glass of white wine on my shirt. “Fuck you,” she said before grabbing her purse and storming off through the gate.
That was the end of Stephanie.
All eyes were on me as I sat in shock, my shirt soaked. Thankfully, my mother was still in the kitchen with Denise and hadn’t witnessed it.
Allison kneeled down slowly so that Callie could climb off her back.
Caleb had his head in his hands while he tried to contain and hide his laughter; he was doing a horrible job at that, by the way.
Allison walked over to me. “I’m sorry, Cedric…that was bad.”
I squeezed my white Ralph Lauren polo shirt to rid it of the excess wine. “I am not sorry at all…you shouldn’t be either…C’mere.” I pulled Allison onto my lap, not caring who was watching and planted a kiss on her lips.
“Cedric, what are you crazy? We shouldn’t do this here in front of everybody,” she said.
“Allison, every single person in this house already knows how crazy I am about you.”
Her face turned a beautiful shade of pink as she blushed, before taking a piece of my wet shirt jokingly into her mouth. “Mmmm…I love Chardonnay.” She laughed. “Seriously, you should go inside and change your shirt.”
Caleb wiped his eyes from tears of laughter and walked over to where we were sitting. “Bro, I think I have a spare shirt in my truck.”
“Gimme the keys, shithead,” I said as I got up and reached for Allison’s hand.
We walked through the gate to the driveway at front of the house, where I opened Caleb’s backseat to find a navy button down shirt.
I put my hand on Allison’s cheek. “I was gonna offer to drive you home, but I just realized we took Stephanie’s car here, so I am carless.”
“Join the club. Looks like someone’s going to have to slum it and take the train like the rest of us.” She winked.
“Let me go inside and clean up and then we can leave.”
We walked back through the gate and Allison sat down to wait for me while I went into the house and changed. I looked back at her and couldn’t believe that this was real, that she was really here. I couldn’t wait to get her home and be alone with her.
My mother was just finishing up the dishes in the kitchen while Denise wiped them.
When I tried to sneak past them, my sister-in-law interjected, grabbing me by the shirt. “Uh-uh, no you don’t. What’s going on out there? You smell like the dumpster behind the pub,” she said.
“What do you mean?” I tried to play dumb, but my guilty smirk probably gave me away.
Denise laughed and glanced over at my mother who was also smirking. “Liar. Caleb’s been texting me a play by play.”
That shithead.
“Stephanie left,” I said.
“And?” she laughed.
“And she threw her wine at me.”
Denise’s jaw dropped. “And that was…because…”
I threw my head back and ran my hands through my hair. I just wanted to go to the bathroom, change and get out of here with Allison.
“Because she figured out that Allison and I snuck away after lunch and were making out in Callie’s room.”
“What?!” Denise yelled as she smacked the counter.
“I knew it,” Mom said smiling.