Page 60 of Last Night Was Fun

She may as well have rolled a strip of tape down the center of the room to mark it his and hers, but she was satisfied with her work once finished.

As instructed, she pulled out her phone to text her sister.

I’m settled. Where are you?

Piper responded within a few seconds.

Villa 2. You can walk from your room. Bring your suit.

Of course they had a villa. Emmy silently wondered if it had a spare room she could escape to and leave Gabe their room to himself.

Once she had slathered herself in sunscreen, stripped down to a bikini and loose cover-up, and thrown her phone, water bottle, and wallet into a tote bag, she found the map the woman at the desk had given her. Villa 2 sat to the north of her building and somehow even closer to the sea.

Emmy broke the seal of her air-conditioned room and stepped back into the hallway. Her flip-flops pleasantly smacked the tile as she returned to the elevator, much more comfortable in her loose and flowing clothing now. Outside, the sun still beat down from above, but a gentle breeze cooled the ocean side of the building when she got there. The Caribbean rolled and tumbled onto the shore to her right,the color palette completely different from anything back home. The powder-white sand and crystal water were almost hard to look at for being so vibrant. Her brain could hardly process the colors. Lounge chairs and umbrellas dotted the beach with sunbathers basking in the heat. The sweet, thick smell of coconut and cream threaded into the misty air, either from the cocktails melting in sandy glasses, the oil and sunblock, or the actual coconuts growing on trees.

It wasWish you were herepostcard perfect, and Emmy found herself smiling.

She followed a path to the end of her building and saw a small cluster of stucco houses in a shady grove of palm trees. Each had its own walkway and enough space between the next to allow privacy. Villa 2 hid behind a lush garden. Emmy almost didn’t see the hand-painted address tile thanks to the crash of flaming pink bougainvillea draping the front doorway. Birds-of-paradise poked their spiky little heads in every direction like a curious flock beneath the front windows, and a forest of squat palms brushed her legs as she made her way up the path.

She could not even fathom what Ben and Piper were shelling out per night for this place.

When Emmy reached for the doorbell, because of course there was a doorbell, she noted a second hand-painted tile below the one marking it Villa 2.Bridal Villa.She smiled again.

She half expected a butler to open the door, but instead, it was her sister. Barefoot and wearing a gauzy white cover-up over a pink bikini and holding a tumbler with clinking ice.

“Hi. Um...wow?” Emmy greeted. “And here I thought my room was nice.”

Piper casually waved her hand and welcomed her in. “Yeah. At least we don’t have to share the bridal villa with the other wedding couple too.”

Emmy followed her into a space equally as beautiful as the outside. Kitchen, living room—actual doors closing off bedrooms. Everything was marble and sandstone, the beach out the back doors clearly private, and to top it off, they had their own pool. A peanut-shaped puddle three shades bluer than the teal sea just beyond it.

“Piper, this is incredible,” Emmy gushed.

She expected another dismissivethis is my life nowhand wave, but instead, she heard a hard sob that pierced her right in the heart.

Emmy immediately dropped her bag and pulled her sister into her arms. Piper was taller, so her chin landed on Emmy’s shoulder. Still, Emmy cradled her against her like a little sister and stroked her hair. She saw over her shoulder Piper had set up camp at the breakfast bar, a slab of icy marble, with a bottle of tequila and bag of Takis.

“Everything is going to be all right,” she promised her. “Mom and Dad are on the way. Your dreamboat fiancé is out there walking to the ends of the earth to make you happy. Your friends are coming. Everyone will be here together, and it will all work out.”

Piper shuddered in her arms and said something Emmy was not at all expecting. “I wish Josh was here.”

Oh.

Mention of their brother stunned Emmy into silence. A hot wall of pain slammed into her and nearly closed off her throat. She suddenly couldn’t breathe.

Piper pushed back and wiped her eyes. “I’m sorry. I’ve been thinking of him a lot lately because I hate that he can’t be here for this. I was doing okay with it, and then things went wrong with the hotel, and it was like the last straw. This dam broke loose, and now I can’t stop.”

Piper had always been so free with her emotions. She didn’t hold them back but instead embraced them, even when messy and inconvenient. Emmy didn’t have that skill. She swallowed hers down and left them festering and sometimes cancerous inside her. It was how she’d coped with their brother’s death as a teen, thinking she was being strong rather than doing herself a disservice, and the habit had lingered.

But here, in this beautiful place with her beautiful sister crying in her arms over their shared loss, she felt herself break. She stopped fighting the pain she kept at bay whenever she thought about Josh and let it in. It ripped through her, shattering her like glass, but her sister’s arms around her helped hold her together.

She squeezed Piper tighter. “I wish he was here too,” she said thickly. Tears had welled up her throat and pushed out her eyes.

They held each other, crying, in a shared moment of sorrow. They hardly ever talked about their brother, but Emmy quickly remembered the hole that plagued both their hearts felt slightly more whole when they were remembering him together.

Josh was permanently twenty-three in her mind. Curly hair the same color as hers, a big, generous smile for everyone because he just plain loved people. She had trouble envisioning him close to forty, as he would have been now if he were still alive, but she imagined he’d still be smiling. Maybe coaching his kid’s Little League team by now.

Piper chortled a soggy-sounding laugh and pulled back to wipe her nose. She found a box of tissues on the countertop. “God, he was such a dork. I miss him so much.” She dabbed her eyes with a wet smile.