Twenty-four people had showed up to support me at the gallery showing tonight. Including me, that's twenty-five people, which means that it's a good thing that I asked Scott to pick a good restaurant for us to go to afterwards because the party room at the steak house sat all twenty-five of us comfortably around many grouped tables.

Once we are all seated, there's a dull buzz of chatter around the room so I stand up from my seat and get everybody's attention before speaking.

"I just want to take a moment to thank everybody for coming out tonight, I know that it was a long trip for most of you. It really means a lot to me that you are all here tonight to see what I've been putting so much of my soul into. I love all of you so much and I couldn't have asked for this night to go any better so just thank you. Anyway, I tried to introduce everybody to each other at the gallery but I know that I probably missed a few of you and I know that not all of you know each other, so I'll introduce everybody again."

And so I go through all of the names of the people that are there. Beside me, there's Sienna and then Bennett in his car seat on a sling thing, Penn, Annabelle in a high chair, Declan in his highchair, Stella, Andrew, Wyatt, Emma, Mason, Colton in his highchair, Brian. On the other side of the table, Uncle Chase, Jenny, Terrance, Nick, Haven, Noah, Conner, Jasper, Aiden, and then across from me, Ana and Niles, with Scott (who I introduced as my boyfriend, with read cheeks) sitting beside me.

Sitting back down, the waiters come around and take our drink orders.

"So, how do you feel? Surviving your first show and all," Sienna asks me.

"Surreal," I say. "I still can't believe that it went so well. And so many people showed up."

"Of course we did, this is huge," Ana pipes. "It would have been absolutely awful of us if we didn't fly in for your big night- and also to meet your boyfriend, who I've heard much about."

"All good things, I hope," Scott says and I can hear the smirk in his voice as my face flushes red.

"You all secretly hate me," I decide. "Your life goal is to humiliate me."

"What? No, that's not humiliating," Ana tells me with a shake of her head. "What's humiliating is that Niles was afraid to jump into the water when we were coasteering in Wales last month."

"How did I become the victim in this?" Niles wonders beside his girlfriend.

"Better you than me," I offer him a 'good luck' smile. "Anyway, what's coasteering?"

"It's basically like exploring the caves and cliffs and going on nature walks but then you get to jump off of cliffs into the water. It was beautiful. A wonderful way to get in touch with nature. But poor Niles thought that he saw a shark in the water, so he wouldn't jump."

"There was a shark," He insists.

"If there was a shark, it would have eaten me when I jumped or when the other people jumped." She giggles at him and shakes her head. "See? Now, that's humiliating. But thinking that your boyfriend's eyes light up the eastern seaboard isn't embarrassing. It's adorable."

"Oh my, God," I groan, recognizing that phrase from something that I told Sienna a few days ago over the phone, who probably told Penn, who told Ana. I want to murder all three of them. "I'd rather get attacked by a shark than to be sitting here right now."

Scott wraps his arm around my waist and kisses my temple as if to comfort me. I don't feel comforted.

"Leave my poor sister alone," Sienna comes to my defense but she's laughing. "I embarrassed her enough this afternoon. I mean, in my defense, I didn't know that he could hear me but still."

"Yes, I am sufficiently embarrassed, let's talk about something else," I say quickly.

"Wait, are we embarrassing you? I missed the conversation, I want in," Jasper says, looking in our direction and I give him a glare but he just smiles back at me.

"We were just talking about Scott's eyes," Ana informs Jasper.

"Oh, the eastern seaboard thing? That's nothing compared to what I listen to every day," He grins at me and I turn to Scott, who's smirking at me.

"They're making all of this up, I swear," I mumble.

"I'm sure they are," He assures me for my benefit but he's still struggling to try not to laugh.

"Did she tell you the part about where-" Jasper starts talking again, but I interrupt him because unlike with Ana, I have ammo against Jasper just for this occasion.

"Say one more word and I'll have a nice long chat with Conner about what you say about him when we're alone," I threaten my best friend and that shuts him up immediately but, of course, it catches Conner's attention.

"Hang on, now I'm interested," He says and I laugh at that as Jasper now starts teasingly glaring at me.

"Fair enough," Jasper decides, choosing the right choice in this situation by not saying anything else about what I've told him about Scott, which is a whole lot that I don't wish for Scott to hear, especially not in front of everybody that I know.

"Wait, no I want to know what you say about me," Conner tells him.

"No you really don't," Jasper shakes his head.

"You really do," I grin but I follow through with my deal with Jasper and I don't actually tell Conner anything.

"You two are so adorable," Sienna chuckles, motioning between Jasper and I. "I miss having you guys around, you're hilarious together."

"Yeah, we're just a hoot," I sigh, rolling my eyes.

"Remember at Stella's wedding when you two convinced everybody to start dancing to The Lonely Island," Niles says and I laugh at the memory of teaching Stella's brother how to do The Creep. We were only thirteen, me and Jasper, so we were pretty young and nobody was dancing. Stella's family is very prim and proper so they kinda killed the mood and me and Jasper weren't having it, so we practically pulled people out of their chairs and started playing songs from The Lonely Island and it was probably the best wedding ever.

"Andy Samberg is comedy gold," I confirm with a nod. "You can never go wrong."

"We do have our moments," Jasper agrees.

"Well, I can't be the only one who has things going on," I change the subject. "Sienna, how's the school going?"

"Really well," She nods. "I've only visited a few times since Bennett arrived but I'm keeping up on everything. I'm probably going back to work next month and I'm so excited. I miss my kids."

"Tell them what happened last week," Penn urges her excitedly.

"What happened?" I wonder.

"Oh, it's nothing," Sienna shrugs as the waiters return to the table with our salads and to take our dinner order. "But the school got the 2014 Wagner Award for Best Dance Studio for Children and according to statistics, enrollment next year is going to triple."

"Wow. Nenna, that's amazing," I grin at my sister. She has her own dance company in Seattle called Sienna Shaw Dance Company and I always tease her about it, telling her that she's basically Abby Lee from Dance Moms and that she should get her own TV show. She's only been in business for a few years but she's still taken her dancers to national championships and they've won some major awards. "Congratulations."

"And Sienna isn't the only one with good news," Penn adds, shooting a look at Ana and Niles.

"Penn," Ana snaps her brother's name and glares at him. "Shut up."

He just laughs but now I'm curious. "What's going on, Ana?"

"Nothing," She sighs but I just look at her, not believing her at all. "I don't want to ruin your big night."

"You aren't going to ruin my big night if you have news of your own, I promise. We aren't at the gallery anymore, my night's already over," I confirm, praying that this is leading to what I think it's leading to.

"Okay," She sighs.

"You have to tell everyone," Penn tells her.

She glares at him again before Ana sighs and then stands up from the table and then tugs Niles up with her and I grin. I know exactly what she's going to say and I can't wait for her to confirm my suspicions.

"Um, hey, everybody," Ana clears her throat to get everybody's attention and then everybody falls silent, all eyes on Ana and Niles, who is also grinning. "So, we don't know a lot of you so this is kind of weird, but we have some news, me and Niles. And, before I say anything, for the record, this wasn't my idea. I was going to wait until tomorrow to tell you guys."

"Just get on with it, Ana, you're stalling," I say, trying to urge her along.

"We're engaged," She confirms my suspicions with a wide smile splitting her face in two as everyone at the table starts clapping and I eagerly stand up from my chair to go congratulate her.

"That's so great!" I squeal, wrapping my arms around her shoulders. Anything that had to do with romance- engagements, weddings, proposals, they are my weakness- so I'm trying not to cry but I'm barely succeeding. "Let me see the ring."

She holds out her hand and I see a thin diamond and white gold ring wrapped around her ring finger.

"We need to hear the story," Sienna says, getting up to hug Ana too, along with Stella and Mason. I assume Penn already did his congratulating since he obviously already knew about the engagement before tonight.

"Congratulations," I say, hugging Niles too.

He hugs me back and then laughs a small, shaky laugh. "Thanks, Jo."

Once everybody is sitting down again, all twenty-five of us listen to Ana recall how Niles proposed to her in Wales, in front of Caldicot Castle. She'd cried and then said yes and then they kissed and then she cried some more. Even now, telling the story, she's tearing up a bit.

"And so after this weekend, we're flying to Portland to start looking for an apartment or a house or something to settle down in. They have a big tech industry in Portland and with Niles' computer science major, he'll be able to get a job there lickity split," Ana explains.

"And Ana is going to go back to school to finish her doctorate to become a vet," Niles adds.

"Meanwhile, I'll be continuing my current job, of course, until I finish a bazillion years of school though," Ana says with a smile and then turns and kisses Niles' cheek. "We have it all figured out."

Ana went through a super rough spot in her teen years and had been institutionalized because she'd tried to kill herself a few times so when she fully recovered, she'd realized that writing about what she'd been through and then just writing in general really helped her get over her past, so she's written a few books, which is a great career for her because she's always traveling so she can write wherever she is and then send the manuscript to her agent. And meanwhile, she's also going to grad school so she's a pretty busy person.

"I have most of my classes done online but there are a few lab classes that I'm going to take in Portland and then I'm going to start my dissertation," Ana explains. She'd went through all of her college years online considering how much she loves to travel.

"That's so great," Sienna grins at Ana, who is still beaming. "We're all so happy for you both."

"Joey, are you crying?" Scott wonders beside me and I shake my head, wiping away just the one stray happy tear that had fallen down my cheek.

"I'm not, shut up," I say, nudging him with my shoulder but he just laughs. When I look back up at Ana for her to finish her story, she's looking at me with a wide-eyed look and I frown in confusion. Looking around, I can see that everybody around me is looking at me like that, like I just told them that I'm actually a penguin disguised as a human or something. I give them all a weird look back and then look at Scott, but he looks confused too, noticing all of the strange looks of awe. "Why are you guys looking at me like that?"

"He just called you Joey and you didn't break his nose," Sienna informs me.

"You call me Joey all of the time," I tell my sister with an eye roll. "Why is that such a big deal?"

"Because if anybody else tries to call you Joey, you threaten to break their nose," Ana adds and our whole half of the table is still silent, looking at me with those wide eyes.

"Even I'm not allowed to call you Joey," Jasper adds even though he isn't shocked like everybody else because he's heard Scott call me that before. He just wants to tease me a bit.

"She's in loooove," Penn sings teasingly with a playful smirk.

"He's always called me Joey," I defend, not denying nor agreeing with Penn's statement in purpose, and my cheeks turn bright red. "I barely even realize it."

"Because you're in loooove," Niles adds with a grin.

"You're all horrible," I groan, hiding my face in my hands to avoid any more embarrassment. I don't usually get so embarrassed, which is why everybody around me is probably preying on this moment of weakness and enjoying it as much as possible at my expense.

"Only because we love you, Jo," Ana giggles.

"We do love you, and we must take full advantage of this opportunity because you're almost never embarrassed," Sienna explains what I was just thinking. "But anyway, I'll change the subject out of pity. Jenny said that they still live in the same house."

I nod. "They do. It's how I found them."

"Have you been over there?" She asks me.

I nod again. "I have. Our old house looks just the same. From the outside, I haven't actually ben inside of it but the outside looks the same."

"I'd like to go inside," She decides. "Do you know the people that live there, Scott?"

"Yeah, they're nice. They'd probably let you walk around if you ask them," He says and I give her a weird look.

"Why'd you want to go back there?" I ask her incredulously. "After spending so much time and effort to get away?"

She shrugs. "I just do. Do you want to come with me?"

I don't. However, I know that she won't let Penn or anybody else go with her into that house and I don't want her to go in alone, so I nod in the affirmative. "Sure."

"You don't have to," Sienna says to me, noticing my hesitation. "I'll be fine going by myself if you don't want to."

"I want to go," I assure her. "I guess. Scott said that the people that live there now don't know about anything, everybody still thinks that he was an upstanding man- a gift to society- and that's so ridiculous but people only believe what they want to believe, I guess. Anyway, we can go over there tomorrow if you want."

"Sure," She nods. "So, how'd you guys meet Noah? Does he go to the Art Institute with you?"

Why hadn't I expected that question to come up? I look at Sienna just to get Scott out of my field of vision as if that gets rid of the awkwardness that the question presents. "We met at a bar, actually. They both go to GSU but Conner and Jasper really hit it off. And Conner and Noah are brothers, so Noah hangs around sometimes too." That's a good answer, I decide. No lying and yet I avoided as much awkwardness as possible by leaving out the most obvious truth.

"That's not what you told me," Haven, who chooses right now to join our conversation from where she had been sitting between Nick and Noah (coincidence?) and conversing with them.

"Yes it is," I defend because that is what I told Haven, I'm just leaving out a certain detail that my family doesn't need to know about.

"Oh. Right," She nods, understanding that I don't want them to know that Noah was my one night stand and I especially don't want to discuss it with Scott right beside me. I mean, I know that he knows that I slept with Noah but that doesn't mean that I am okay with talking about it with him right there.

Across the table, Noah shoots me a quick smile before I look away again.

"There's something that you're not telling us," Ana decides from across the table.

"Drop it," I plead with the people around me. "Really, it's no big deal. Do you have a maid of honor yet, Ana?"

"I do, yes," She nods, allowing me to change the subject without any further questions, which I appreciate very much. "I've decided that my friend, Renee, will be my maid of honor. We're actually going to have a pretty big wedding party. For my side, I have at least Renee, Mia, Sarah, Sienna, Sophie, you, and then Niles has Terry, Alex, Josh, Gavin, Johnny, and Penn."

"I was never asked to be a bridesmaid," I say.

"Well, I'm asking you now," She pipes as if that's not something really exciting, which it is to me. With Sienna, Stella, and Mason's weddings, I was kind of young so I was always the flower girl, never a bridesmaid. Although I expect best man status at Jasper's wedding, I never thought that I'd be a bridesmaid, so I'm pretty excited about it.

"I'd be honored, of course," I giggle and I feel Scott's hand snake over to my lap underneath of the table. He finds my hand with his own and holds it under the table. I glance at him and he's smiling at me, so I smile back just as the waiters come back and serve our food.

"But I've barely even started the wedding stuff. I haven't even told my mom yet because I'm absolutely dreading that," Ana sighs. "My mom is going to go into complete overdrive and try to control everything about the wedding. I want it to be nice but not dramatic."

"She was pretty... demanding when we got married," Sienna nods in agreement.

"And by demanding, you mean crazy? Psychotic? Yeah, she is one for weddings," Penn says. "Maybe you can just tell her that you already have a wedding planner so that she'll back off some."

"But I don't have a wedding planner," Ana reminds her older brother.

"Excuse me," Mason sings from the other side of the table and we all look over at her. "What am I, potato salad?"

"I figured that you'd be busy," Ana tells her. "But if you really want to, the job is definitely yours."

"Of course I want to," She insists. "Really, I'm already on it."

Just then, Haven stands up from the table and clinks her glass, looking like she's about to give a toast, and everybody goes silent to hear what she has to say.

"Thank you for your attention," She starts. "I just want to say congratulations to Jo for doing such amazing work tonight. I haven't known her for very long but it's obvious that she's so awesome and so lucky to have all of you here to support her. And when she's super big and famous and wine and dining with Timothy Hogan, we are the people that she will remember. At least, you better remember us. So, anyway, here's to Jo. You're awesome."

I smile at her as everybody lifts their glasses and says "to Jo" and then sips their drinks.

"I want to make a toast," Scott decides but I squeeze his hand to negate that idea.

"Please don't," I say quickly. "If you do, then Jasper will want to and then everybody is going to want to toast and geez, I don't want that to happen."

"Alright," He goes along with me and then kisses me right below my ear and I can feel his breath on my neck which causes my breath to hitch but I try my best not to look affected at all because we're still at the table with everyone around it. "I'll do it later then."

He sits back up straight and I give him a look that just makes him laugh and then sheepishly shrug.

Our dinner is very long because even after we're done eating, we stay at the table and just talk for a good hour. Ana tells us more about Wales with Niles and Sienna talks more about her dance studio. Stella tells us about her new job and how Declan is going to start preschool next year. He's getting so big already.

Even Scott's parents seem pretty engaged in the conversations, which is good. His dad talks business a lot with my uncle, I notice, so it's good that they like each other, I guess.

"We should have one of those sit down dinners where we sit down and discuss stuff with Scott," Sienna suggests. "Since we're here until Sunday and Mom isn't here to give you guys the talk."

"I don't need the talk," I assure my sister as we're all getting ready to leave. The restaurant is closing and we've all paid our bills so we have to be going now. Sienna and Penn are staying at the apartment but it's obviously not big enough to house everybody, so everybody else who had flown in are staying at a hotel just down the street. "Seriously, we're fine without it."

"You're not getting off of the hook that easily," Penn shakes his head at me, shooting an apologetic look at Scott. "We had to have that dinner with Chase."

"He nearly peed his pants," Sienna giggles at the memory. "And he's right- you're not getting out of it just because Mom isn't here to do it. So after we go to the old house tomorrow, we can pick up a pizza and converse at the apartment about awkward things and stuff."

"I wasn't that scared," Penn defends himself. "But it was awful. So it's like a food chain, we have to put you through the same hell so that you continue the cycle with your children and so on."

"I don't like that idea," I shake my head at both of them, waiting for Scott to back me up, to tell me that he's busy tomorrow or something but he doesn't, he just stands beside me with his arm around my waist, and stays quiet.

We all start walking as a herd out of the restaurant that we'd walked to from the gallery because it's just across the street.

Before Sienna can argue it again, I walk over to Scott's parents and give them another tight hug and thank them for coming yet again before Scott says goodbye to them as well and with Nick in tow, they all get in their car and drive back to their house across town. I say goodbye to Noah and Conner as well before they're leaving as well and then Haven is gone too (it makes me mildly suspicious that she just so happened to leave at the exact same time as Conner and Noah).

"As I was saying, it's happening," Sienna tells me stubbornly.

"Come on, Jo, just go with it," Stella says beside me. "Everybody has to go through the parent talk- even if it's not with your actual parents. It's going to happen."

"She's right," Mason agrees with her with a sympathetic nod.

"Her dad threatened to throw parts of me into a meat grinder," Brian adds, motioning to Mason, who just laughs with their youngest son, Colton, in her arms.

Once we get to the apartment building, I spend a long time saying goodbye and thank you for coming, it meant a lot to me, to everybody who had driven to the apartment from their respective hotels and once they're all driving away from the apartment, that leaves my sister and Penn and their two kids and then Scott and Aiden, since they'd driven together from the dorms.

To get a little bit of privacy before Scott left, we go around the corner of the building. Scott doesn't want to because it's very conspicuous but I don't care. I just want to kiss him goodnight and I don't want an audience.

"Did you have a good time?" I ask him, my back against the brick wall of the building with his body pressing against mine and his hands on my waist but not too much because he's afraid that somebody will come looking for us and find us in a compromising position.

"I did," He confirms. "You know some really funny people. And the gallery was absolutely incredible. I can't believe that I'm dating somebody so incredibly awesome."

I giggle a little bit at that. "Shut up."

"I'm serious," He assures me, kissing my cheek. "Anyway, Aiden's waiting for me so I should go but I'll see you tomorrow for dinner."

"I'm going to talk our way out of it," I assure him.

"I hope that you don't," Scott mumbles, his face incredibly close to mine.

"Why is that?"

"Because I think it'll be nice. Embarrassing and awkward maybe, but I still want to do it. Is that okay?"

"I... I guess so. It'll be horrible though, I hope that you know that."

"I can handle it," He assures me with a wide grin and then kisses my lips and I kiss him back, savoring this one moment of privacy that we get before it's gone. "And I think you should invite Ana too, I like her."

"You only like her because she's painfully honest," I mumble shoving his shoulder as I kiss him one last time before we walk back to where Penn and Aiden are talking about something but Sienna and both kids are gone, I assume they're up in the apartment with Jasper now.

"That might be part of it," He shrugs teasingly.

I shove him again and he just laughs. "Shut up, she was lying about everything that she said, she made it all up."

"You already said that," Scott reminds me but I just roll my eyes at him and then kiss his cheek and then say goodbye to Aiden before they're getting in Scott's car to drive away.

"I'll call you tomorrow," I call to Scott right before he shuts the door to his car and then waves a goodbye to me before he's backing out of the parking lot to leave.

As Penn and I turn to walk to the apartment, he wraps an arm around my shoulders. "Dinner will be fun, kiddo."

"Don't be mean to him," I say. "He's really nice and he doesn't deserve to be scared."

"Why would I scare him?"

I shrug. "Because you can be very scary and it's very hypocritical of you to threaten him into waiting for marriage."

"We did wait until marriage," He lies as we walk into the apartment where Sienna is sitting on the couch with Bennett and I can hear Jasper upstairs talking to Annabelle.

"Please," I scoff with a small laugh. "Penn, you're married to my sister. I know more about you than either one of us is comfortable with. I know that you didn't wait until marriage, you big fat liar."

He gives me a curious look but I don't explain further. That would be an incredibly awkward conversation.

"Anyway, I'm going to go change the sheets on the bed and you guys can have my bed, I'll just sleep with Jasper," I say with a yawn. I'd had such a long day and I can't wait to get dressed in pajamas and to go to bed.

Especially since I know that tomorrow will probably be equally as long if not longer.

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Song: Never Let Me Go by Florence + The Machine
Picture: Fan cover by jupitah