Life's Next Chapter (31 page)

I’VE WAITED FOR this night for weeks. I’ve planned every minute until the moment we leave this place. Fingers crossed it all goes smoothly. Tonight is Kate’s thirty-third birthday and she doesn’t know it, but she is having a party. She thinks it’s just her and me having a night out. Low and behold I have gathered her best friends and family to surprise her.

We are heading to Universal Studio’s City Walk, where they have restaurants, bars, and clubs, and tonight we are heading to dinner and a Karaoke Bar. We get off the last moving sidewalk and she’s completely stunned by the group of people who are singing ‘Happy Birthday’ to her. She walks up to Beth and Ella and they share a group hug. I walk over and man slap Jacob and Chris on the back. I see Leah with Ethan and they seem to be very cozy together. Leah couldn’t look happier. As long as she is happy, I’m happy.

I hug my sister and shake Ethan’s hand. Kate hugs Olivia, who is Jacob’s sister, and hugs Mike, who is the brother in law. I make my rounds and end with a back slap by my cousins Brody and Nick. I place a kiss on Amanda’s cheek. I introduce Kate to Amanda. All eleven of us head for Pat O’Brien’s, where she’ll be even more surprised. She doesn’t know I rolled the red carpet out for her. Tonight is the night she feels like a princess. She looks amazing and sexy as hell in her teal dress it has only one shoulder strap. It hugs to her sweet body, with a slit on her left thigh. She has her hot nude colored—so she informed me when I called them beige—stilettos and her hair is in loose curls. She looks fantastic to me.

We walk into the restaurant and the hostess guides all of us upstairs to our private room. It’s a huge balcony that overlooks the whole City Walk. I escort Kate in first, so she can see everything. The room has hot pink balloons all over the place. We walk in to “SURPRISE” and the girls run up to her and give her a hug. Her mom is there, along with her granddaddy and nana. Erik and his girlfriend are there. My mom, dad, Danika, Lilly, and Tyler are all there. She turns around and mouth crushes me with a huge kiss. “You’re unbelievable, Mr. Ashton!”

“You’re the unbelievable one. Happy Birthday, sunshine!”

We hug friends and family members until we find our seats. Julia sits next to her and Nicole sits next to me. I hold Kate’s left hand throughout dinner. We laugh, talk, drink, and laugh some more. Her Granddaddy had stories to tell us about Kate. Beth even put her two cents in with some wild and crazy stories. We all had a great time, and I haven’t seen Kate this carefree, or happy in a while. I could only hope her next surprise was just as memorable.

After dinner the waiters bring out a two-tiered cake covered in hot pink frosting, with sparklers lighting up the cake. She plants her hands over her mouth and just laughs, she laughs so hard that tears are coming out of her eyes. I can handle those kinds of tears. Once the cake stops in front of her. She leans over and gives me a kiss. Then the girls jump in our laps and kiss her on the cheek. “Blow the fire away, Momma!” Julia shouts over the singing. We all laugh and wait for the sparklers to sizzle out.

We eat cake and talk some more. By nine o’clock the girls are slowly falling asleep along with the older crowd. Kate’s mom and grandparents are the first to leave with the girls. We give them all hugs and kisses and her granddaddy gives me a pat on the back. “Make me proud, son.” He gives me his famous wrinkled grin and walks out with his wife’s hand in his.

My parents are next to leave and us three kids hug and kiss them goodbye. My father hugs me tight and tells me how proud he is of me. My mom sweeps Kate into one of her momma bear hugs. Danika hugs us goodbye and walks out with the older crowd.

So, now it’s just the original eleven as we make our way over to the Rising Star Karaoke Bar, where people sing with the house band.
I’ve reserved a section for us. We have a corner booth next to the stage. The guys and I each have a double Jack and Coke for the extra liquid courage to go through with what we have planned for our ladies. When Leah wasn’t looking, I asked Ethan is he wanted to join the surprise with us men. He gladly accepted. We all sit around the oval table drink, small talk, and watch the performers sing on stage. Mike is sitting across from me. “I don’t know about this, Luke. I don’t handle public performances very well.”

I smile at Mike and wave the waitress for another Jack and Coke. “Whoa, Michael, you’re not getting shit-faced on me,” Olivia retorts, sitting next to him. I just laugh. I’m so nervous all I do is laugh. To see my beautiful girl, next to me laughing with her girlfriends and smiling…damn I love her smile.

“Our next performance is a group of men. Will Luke, Brody, Nick, Jacob, Chris, Mike, and Ethan come up?” the woman at the microphone announces.

The girls’ jaws drop. “You guys are singing?” Ella shouts.

“We’re singing for our ladies.” Jacob replies as he takes one last swig of his drink.

The men and I all line up and we start to laugh because this planned out so much better than it’s actually happening. Poor Mike looks like he is going to vomit. The band starts up the music. I start singing… “You’re insecure, don’t know what for….” Then Brody takes the next line and soon all seven of us are singing One Direction’s
What Makes You Beautiful
. I look out to Kate and she’s laughing hysterical and clapping along with the other people in the bar. I can only pray we sound somewhat decent. Jacob’s really into it, performing his own dance moves. Beth is hooting and hollering. Just seeing our girls happy makes us want to give them a good show. As we all sing the last line of the song, all the girls jump up from the table clapping and whistling at us. All right, that was easy. It was actually fun. I need another drink for round two.

We all sit around, talk more, drink more, and watch more people get up and sing. Some people where just horrible, but with all the alcohol running through peoples blood, we didn’t care.

“Baby, I didn’t know you sang so well. You have a good voice,” Kate mumbles against my cheek. Oh shit, she’s getting drunk. I can’t have her drunk for what I am going to do.

“I’ll sing to you every night, my sunshine. No more drinks for you!” I ask the waitress to bring two glasses of water for my girl.

It’s approaching midnight and it’s almost ‘Show Time’ for me. The female announcer calls me up on the stage. I grab the mic and tell the audience, “This song is for my country girl!” Then I point to her. She hides her face in her hands then throws her head back and laughs.

The band starts up with the guitarist strumming the strings. I start to sing the song that made me fall head over heels in love with her. I sing to her our song,
I Want Crazy
by Hunter Hayes. Kate’s bright blue eyes are on me the whole time. I’m trying my damnedest to sing out every feeling I have for her. The crowd seems to really enjoy my performance; even the guitarist stands next to me and we rock together. Who knows, maybe my next career choice just might be singing!

The song comes to an end and Kate stands up, clapping away and even blows me a kiss. I stand there with the mic and everyone is waiting for the female announcer to come up and announce the next song.

“I was going to take a break, but, hey, I’m on a roll. So, this is my last song for my beautiful girl. But for me to sing it, I need her up here by my side.”

Kate looks blown away. The guys know what I am up to, so Jacob grabs Kate’s hand and walks her to the stage. The staff at the bar knows of my plans and the female announcer comes out with a chair to sit on. Kate has a dumbfounded expression on her face. She comes to me and I give her a kiss and guide her to her chair. I look behind me to the band to signal it’s okay to start.

The guitarist stands next to me and slowly starts the chords to the song. I softly sing to her, and only to her. Once she realizes I am singing the song
Marry Me
by Train, I see the happy tears pool in her eyes. In that moment I want the song to be over, but I keep going because this song has so many heartfelt words that I feel towards her. Once the song is over, the guitarist takes the mic, and I get down on bended knee in front of her. She places her hand over her mouth and is doing a combo of laughing and crying at the same time. I grab her hands and place them in mine.

“My sunshine, my beautiful Kate. I love you more today than I did when I first told you I love you. I promise to love you a little more every day. I promise to be your everything, just as you are my everything. I want to spend forever with you. I love you, Kate. Please make me the luckiest man in the world and marry me.”

She swings her arms around my neck and shouts, “YES! YES! YESSS!”

I pull out the ring that has been in my pocket all night. I take her left hand and slide the beautiful solitaire canary diamond ring, smaller white diamonds surround the stone and around the platinum band. She gasps when she sees the ring, it might be a little big for her taste, but she holds the sun for me and the sun is big.

“I decided on yellow, because you’re my sunshine, you’re the light I’m destined to follow forever. I love you.”

“Oh my God, Luke, this is amazing. I love it, and I love you so much. This is the best birthday ever.”

Hearing those words, I know I did good.

TODAY IS THE day that I have dreamt of since I was a little girl. Today is the day I thought would never come. I chuckle at the memory of Beth and I playing brides, and we would get in so much trouble for using all the toilet paper for our veils and trains. Nana would make us roll it all back up. Those are such fun memories.

I’m lying in Beth’s guest bed. Luke and the men have taken over my house. What a tidal wave of experiences for Luke and me, these last six months have been. Out of the last six months, June was the hardest for us. Luke tried his hardest to get my mind focused on the wedding, but the preceding weeks of Luka’s due date were especially hard. Then Luke’s birthday was on Father’s day this year and that was difficult. If fate had other plans, Luka would have been with Luke and me on his birthday and Father’s day.

Next it was the Fourth of July, and the families all got together for a barbecue. Luke and I sat in the driveway for an extra fifteen minutes while I tried to control my tears. Seeing the kids run around and the babies in their parents’ arms, it was agony to put on a happy face. Granted we didn’t stay long and it wasn’t because of me. Julia got stung by a wasp and had an allergic reaction to it. So, we spent the evening in the ER.

The following months flew by; my mom and nana were making sure this would be the wedding of the year. For Halloween, we stuck with tradition and went to Danika’s. We had pizza, and Danika and her roommates had a blast dressing the girls up as princesses. My children looked like something out of
Toddlers and Tiara’s
. I couldn’t believe the amount of makeup. I was calm and bit my tongue, but Luke wasn’t too pleased. Luke was out numbered, but only because it was Halloween.

Just two days ago was Thanksgiving. It’s hard to believe it’s been a year since the fiasco of the last Thanksgiving. This year we held it at our place. We rented a tent and had this huge outdoor Thanksgiving dinner. The kids had a blast running around, we went horseback riding, and ate a ton. Last night was our rehearsal dinner, it was at the same restaurant Luke and I confessed our love to one another and the place where I told him I was pregnant, just over a year ago. It was a bittersweet moment, but we wanted it there for those reasons. It was beautiful; Luke’s parents went over and beyond. Luke and I enjoyed our family and friends. We laughed the whole night through.

Luke gifted me beautiful diamond and sapphire earrings to wear today for my something blue. Nothing huge, but simple sapphires surrounded by smaller white diamonds. Luke says the stone matches the color of my eyes.

My other favorite moment of the night was when our loved ones gave speeches. The only one that didn’t present one was my Granddaddy. He said he was saving it for the big day. I know I’m going to need a ton of waterproof mascara.

Beth barges into my room as I continue to reminisce over the last six months. “Katie! Wakey-wakey. You’re getting married today! EEEEKK!” She squeals as she runs and plops on the bed next to me. “Girlfriend, do you know how long I have waited for this day…Twenty-seven years. Even though it seems like yesterday we were playing toilet paper bride. I’m so excited for you. This is going to be the biggest, best wedding this side of town has ever seen.”