All is Found - Chapter 53: Chapter 53

After finding my dress everything really feel into place. Emily had the wedding plans under control and Thea and I didn't have to worry about anything. All of the decisions are made and the only thing left to do now is just show up. Over the course of the last month, all the finer details came together and it made me happy that I don't really have to do anything else.
The countdown is at 7 days now. Today is my bachelorette party that Nikki and Alyssa have been planning since I've asked them to be my bridesmaids. They have kept all their plans close to their chests and haven't told me what we are doing. I just asked them to keep it PG-13. My doctors still don't want me to drink and if I want to be able to have a glass of champagne on my wedding night, then I can't drink this weekend.
Before we party later on right now I'm driving to a place I haven't been in so long. I wanted some time to myself before the party which I made clear to the pair. They respected that and told me to be home by 5. I drove through the familiar front gates of the cemetery and drove slowly to the section of graves where my siblings lay. I parked my truck and grabbed the marigolds and started the walk to their graves.
I haven't seen them since I was shot. I guess they really meant that when they saved Thea, that would be the last time I would see them. The walk didn't take long and soon I found myself sitting in front of Asher and Ashley's headstones. I split the flowers between the two of them and placed some in front of the stones.
"I wanted to thank you both for saving Thea. I know I also have Allison to thank as well and I will get to her stone a little later, but for now I just wanted to sit here with both of you for a while." I said and cleared my throat.
The early May weather has been kind to us this year. Mid to upper 60s is beautiful when the sun is shining. I turned my face up to the sky and absorbed some sun before looking back at my siblings.
"I'm getting married next week. Thea said yes when I asked her in the hospital. I wish you were here to design my dress Ashley. I ended up going with a dress and not a suit because I knew how much you would have wanted to design it. Pat is going to walk me down the aisle for you Asher. He said he is honored to do it."
I took a deep breath and wiped away a tear that fell from my eye. I closed my eyes and took a few deep breaths and opened them. My jaw dropped when I looked at their graves again. My mother is kneeling in front of me.
"How are you here?" I asked and reach out to her. She didn't say anything as my hand passed right through her.
"To chat with you for a few minutes before I have to go." Mom said and moved to sit down next to me.
"Were you there in the hospital when I woke up?" I asked watching her every move.
"Yes, I was. I wanted to make sure you were okay." She said sighed.
"I don't see them anymore." I said and nodded towards the two headstones sitting in front of us.
"They moved on. There is another place after this one. A better one where we can live the rest of our lives as we wished for them to be. After saving Thea, they used the last of their power and they needed to go." Mom said and looked over at me.
"Then why are you still here?" I asked.
"I wanted to stay until Asher, Ashley and you were settled. They are both going to be fine and now that you're going to be married next week I know you are going to be okay." Mom said and placed her hand on my leg.
"You popped in when I was dress shopping too." It was more of a statement then a question.
"I was. I wanted to see what you decided on. I want to tell you that I will be at the wedding. Once it is over though I will be gone like Asher and Ashley. You won't see me again." Mom said.
"Will I be able to see spirits at all anymore?" I asked.
"You made the Reaper mad when you didn't take his deal. I think he took his gift back. The fact that you are still able to see me is a miracle. I think that he knows I won't be here for much longer." Mom said.
While being able to see people who have passed on has been a pretty amazing gift, I think I'm ready for it to be over. I'm ready for the next chapter of my life. My life with Thea.
"I'm really proud of you Ashlyn. I want you to know that. After everything you've been through I'm blown away at how you have been able to recover and move on. Your music career is really starting to take off on a new level and your relationship with Thea is something for the movies. You complement each other so well." Mom said and smiled at me.
"Thank you." I said looking her over one more time.
"You shouldn't spend too much time here. I know you have a party to get too." Mom said.
"Do you know where they are taking me?" I asked.
"I do but where's the fun in telling you." Mom said and smiled.
"Fair enough." I said and smiled back at her.
"I love you babygirl, so much." Mom said and gave me one more smile before she faded away.
Like she said, I didn't stay to much longer in front of my siblings graves. I told them a little bit more about the wedding details before I took a few flowers and made the walk back to my car. I drove a little bit farther down the road and walked to Allison's grave. Thea must have been here recently because there are fresh flowers here already. I placed the few marigolds I grabbed next to the other flowers and stood in silence for a few moments.
I took the long way home needing a few moments for myself before I was launched into wedding craziness. I don't really have any kind of idea for what they were planning on doing. I know that Thea is also having hers tonight and I said bye to her before I left for the cemetery. I won't be surprised if they drag her to a strip club. I'm not all that worried though. If Thea doesn't want to do something she will put her foot down.
I pulled up to my house and saw a waiting party bus out front. I sighed and rubbed my forehead. Tonight is going to be a long night. I checked my face in the mirror to make sure you can tell I wasn't crying before getting out of the truck. When I got to my front door I could hear voices inside and I didn't know what to expect.
Biting the bullet, I pushed my front door open and I was shocked to who was standing in my living room.
"Surprise!" Nikki yelled from the kitchen.
Standing in my living room is basically my Who Run the World, Girls group chat. I don't remember when I got added to it but I'm in a group chat with pop music's biggest names. In the chat we would talk about anything and everything. From music to our personal lives to even gossiping, it was an amazing group chat to be included in especially since I'm still somewhat new to the game and my more rock leaning music. There are about 50 of us in total in the chat and it grows every once in a while. But standing in my living room right now is Taylor Swift, Fletcher, Halsey, Camila Cabello, Hailee Steinfeld, Hayley Kiyoko, Charli XCX, Ariana Grande, Billie Eilish, Britt, Alyssa and surprisingly Diego and Eli.
"How did you get into my group chat?" I asked my eyes narrowing in on Nikki.
"You were like out of commission for a while in December and your phone kept blowing up, I might have been giving them updates while you were in the hospital. Then when you made Alyssa and I bridesmaids, I knew I could get in touch with Ariana and she asked everyone in the chat to come. Those who could come did and those who couldn't be here tonight sent a care package." Nikki responded.
I didn't have enough time to say anything back as I was being pulled into hugs with everyone in the room. Once I greeted everyone I quickly went upstairs and changed into something a little nicer than what I'm wearing. I took an extra second to get myself together before walking back downstairs.
"How did you get roped into this?" I asked Eli as he was waiting at the bottom of the stairs.
"Diego and I are here for the wedding and I didn't want to be left alone in the hotel all night when we knew you guys were going out." Eli said and offered me his arm. I gave him a smile and intertwined my arm with his as he led us over to the group.
"Before we leave you need to put this on." Nikki said and came over with a sash in her hand. I didn't get a chance to see what it said before Nikki placed it over me and I looked down to see it says Bride to Be in gold lettering. Just as I was going to take it off Eli put a crown headband with a vail on it on my head and I just sighed.
Once the sash was on Nikki pulled me into the living room where all my friends were waiting. She pushed us all together in front of a sign I failed to notice until now. The sign said Miss. to Mrs. With all my bitches. Eli and Diego snuck into a few pictures and it was all good fun.
After we took a bunch of pictures we all got onto the waiting party bus. The bus looked a lot bigger on the inside then it did from outside. We all had plenty of room to spread out. I ended up sitting down next to Cari Fletcher and chatted for a few minutes before Nikki stood up.
"So Ash has no idea what I have planned for the evening and I want to keep it a surprise. The ride to the venue is going to take about a half an hour and I thought it would be fun if we played a little game on the ride, who knows the bride to be the best?" Nikki said.
After a little cheering the bus started to drive away and Nikki pulled out her phone for a list of questions she had prepared. Before she could start Alyssa pulled out a notebook with a sharpie and gave it to me.
"Everyone write your answers down so you can't cheat." Alyssa said passed out the notebooks to everyone as Nikki got everyone's attention for the first question.
"Alright we are going to start easy. How many tattoos does Ash have?" Nikki asked the group. I wrote down my answer and held the notebook to my chest so nobody could see. When Nikki nodded at me I held up my notebook with the answer. 2.
"Okay now let's get into some deeper questions. What was the first gift Ash gave Thea?" Nikki asked.
I quickly wrote down the answer and held it close to my chest and looked at Cari's notebook. She didn't have an idea. This was getting hard faster than I thought it would. Nikki pointed at me and I held up my notebook.
"I gave her the St. Michael pendant as her first gift." I said and looked around at the group. Only Ashley got the answer right.
"Out of the two who is more likely to get all glammed up for a night out?" Asked Nikki.
Thea was the answer and I quickly wrote her name down. It seemed like everyone knew right away and most of the group wrote Thea's name down.
"Who proposed to who?" Nikki asked next.
I sighed and wrote my name down and looked around at the bus. Nobody really knew except those who were there in the hospital. After it looked like everyone was done writing I held out on flipping my book over.
"I want to see your answers first." I said and everyone turned their books over. Majority of the group answered Thea and I was surprised. When I flipped mine over for them to see my answer they all started demanding for the story. I gave them a shortened version of the story as I spun the engagement ring on my finger.
After I was finished Nikki launched into another question. The questions had more upbeat answers and it didn't take long for Nikki to venture into the dirtier questions. The last one she asked was if we ever used Thea's handcuffs in the bedroom and I started yelling that I wasn't going to answer that. It didn't take long for everyone to start busting on me. But thankfully we arrived at our destination.
Before we left the bus Nikki put a blindfold over my eyes so I couldn't see where we are. We had to be somewhere in Boston from the length of the trip. Diego and Eli helped me off the bus and into the place we were going to. Once we were inside I felt myself get pushed into a chair and when I was going to pull the blindfold off someone hit my hands away.
"Not yet." I heard Eli say in my ear.
A few minutes later I felt someone come up behind me and pull my blindfold off. It took me a few second for my eyes to adjust to the lighting and when it did I knew where we were. I looked around and found Nikki sitting not that far from me. She smiled at me and it only took a few more second before the show started. We are at a drag show.
"Good evening ladies and gentlemen, we have a special show for you guys tonight so get ready and sit back and enjoy." Someone said as music started up.
The show was amazing. The queens were wonderful and had amazing voices. It wasn't long before they started to sing some of our songs and we had to jump up on stage to join them. As the night started to wind down the announcer said that there was one last special performance.
I drank the last of my one glass of champagne and looked at the stage. The stage was empty of everything and a black sheer curtain was put up as a back drop. The music started up and I knew right away what song was about to be played. Alyssa appeared from behind me and pulled me up. She forced me into a chair in the middle that was set up in front of the stage as the first lines of Edge of Seventeen started to play.
Before I could question it I looked at the stage and saw someone coming through the curtains. The person started to sing along with the song and had a pretty nice voice. I could tell the person singing doesn't sing often from the roughness of it. The person kept their face hidden from view until the chorus of the song hit and they came out from behind the curtain. It was Thea. Thea was singing and it blew me away.
Whenever she would sing along with me in the car it never sounded this good. After the haze of the shock wore off I got to see what she is wearing and that's when my jaw dropped. Thea is dressed in leather, all leather. She is wearing skin tight leather pants with a painted on leather shirt that has a zipper running down the middle. That zipper is half away undone to reveal a black lacy bra.
I could hear all of the other girls in the background yelling like maniacs for my fiancé as she strutted around the stage and sang along to the song. A few of them got up from their seats and started throwing left over bills on the stage as Thea jumped off the stage to stand in front of me. She finished off the song and left the microphone on the stage before coming over to me and sitting on my lap.
"I hoped you liked the show." Thea said and wrapped her arms around my neck as she caught her breath.
"You were breath taking." I said and smiled at her. Before she could say anything I leaned in and gave her a big kiss. I wish I could give her more but we still have an audience who are cheering for us at the moment.
"How long were you keeping this a secret for?" I asked after I pulled away.
"A few weeks. Lindsey had my bachelorette at a karaoke bar down the street, Scarlett, Lindsey and Malia are all here right now." Thea said and stood from my lap.
"We need a bow after that performance y'all." One of the queens said from behind Thea. My fiancé hopped back on stage and gave everyone a bow before rejoining me.
We walked back to my friends and saw that Malia joined Nikki at the table while Lindsey and Scarlett were talking with Alyssa. The party broke up soon after that and we all got onto the bus. Most of my friends were staying in town for the week because they are coming to the wedding so we dropped them off at their hotels in Boston before the bus drove the remaining few of us back home to Salem. Needless to say Thea gave me an encore performance and this time she did with less clothing.