Chapter Text
Caitlin wakes up to her alarm blaring, sun warm on her exposed skin, and a huge smile on her face. She turns off the alarm and rolls over. She's getting married today. Usually she is out of bed the second she wakes up, but today she takes a moment to just lay there and think about the day ahead.
She's putting on her gown when she hears her mother and sister let themselves into the apartment.
"Caitlin!" Roxanne yells, running up to her and wrapping her arms around her middle. "Hi!"
"Hey, how's my favorite sister?"
"I'm your only sister."
"But you're still my favorite."
Roxanne grins. "When do fish sleep?" she asks, arms still around Caitlin. Roxanne had been a surprise baby, and the age gap between her and Caitlin sometimes made her feel more like her parent than sibling, but she loved her just the same.
"You know, I have no idea."
Roxanne accepts this with a serious expression that looks out of place on her young face. She pulls out a notebook and writes something down. She plops down on Caitlin’s sofa with her notepad and Caitlin knows she'll be content for a while.
"How are you?" her mother asks, pouring herself a cup of the coffee Caitlin had just made.
"Good. Really good."
"Excited? Nervous?"
"Both."
Carla hands Caitlin a mug and she takes a sip, reflecting on her life with Ronnie. She and Ronnie have been together for five years now, and have stood watching as all their friends got married and started having kids. It may have taken Caitlin and Ronnie a bit longer to get with it, but they're here. Maybe she has trouble showing it sometimes, but she really couldn't be happier.
Allegra lifts a bunch of flowers into her van. The back is packed with buckets of different arrangements. Iris leans against the shop window, a Twizzler dangling from her mouth.
"When are you going to get a love life Allegra? All these weddings . . . ." She trails off when Allegra gives her a look.
"I don't need a love life. I have a like life and I enjoy it just fine."
"Okay, okay." She munches on her Twizzler for a minute before asking Allegra who the couple are.
"Caitlin and Ronnie--haven't met either of them though. The bride’s mother came in to order the flowers." Allegra doesn't think she will be forgetting her anytime soon, she was a force to be reckoned with.
Iris still looks like she wants to discuss Allegra' stunningly boring love life, so Allegra heads back inside to get the last bunch of flowers. She's perfectly aware that she hasn't been with anyone in a long time, but she doesn't think this is necessarily a bad thing. She doesn't want to be in a relationship just to say she's in a relationship, she wants it to mean something. Iris has already found such a relationship, and is happily living with Barry. Allegra tries not to be envious.
She loads the flowers into the van and promises Iris to have lunch with her the next day.
Ronnie is standing with Cisco, watching guests arrive and listening as Cisco makes discourteous comments about the people he isn't fond of, which happen to be most of them.
Roxanne tugs on his dress, ignoring a reproving remark from Carla.
"What happens when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object?"
"I haven't the faintest clue." he thinks about sending Roxanne off to find Caitlin, as she is usually better with her questions.
"It never happens," says a voice from behind her. She turns around to see a smartly dressed woman smiling at Roxanne. "If there’s a thing that can’t be stopped, it’s not possible for there to be something else which can’t be moved, and vice versa. They can’t both exist. It's a trick question."
Roxanne thinks about this.
"I'm Allegra by the way," she says, extending a hand to Ronnie. "I did your flowers."
"Can I sit with her?" Roxanne asks Carla.
"Why not," Carla says.
Roxanne leads Allegra away, asking her questions along as they go.
Ronnie watches the church doors, waiting for Caitlin. He's got this irrational idea that she isn't going to appear, that she's changed her mind and he'll be up here at the altar all alone.
"She's going to come, right?" he asks Cisco.
"Of course she's coming."
"When? When is she coming?"
Caitlin and the others finally arrive outside the church, everyone now settled inside anxiously awaiting the bride. Her father kisses her on the cheek and exits the car to notify everyone that Caitlin will be making her way into the church any moment now.
Kamilla hugs Caitlin tight. “Wish me luck, then.”
“Wish YOU luck?”
“Oh, Caity, it’s a wedding. The bridesmaid always pulls at a wedding. I hope there are some Romeos inside.”
Caitlin sits in disbelief and rolls her eyes. “You are unbelievable! Well, good luck.”
The brass band begin playing the wedding march and that’s Allegra’s cue to say her quick goodbye to Roxanne as she tries to pass by the others sitting in the pew, apologizing profusely as she goes.
As Caitlin walks in through the door and down the aisle with her father on her arm, she turns to her right and catches sight of a brunette walking away as she continues down, a shiver shooting through her body. She turned again to see the face of this mysterious woman and as she does so she feels a knot in her stomach. Not an unpleasant knot, a good kind of knot, a welcome kind. She doesn’t entirely know why.
When she turns around for a third time the woman is gone, she shakes herself off and continues down the aisle to stand with Ronnie.
Allegra looks back at Caitlin from the doors of the church, exhales deeply and heads off to the function suite to help set up.
Caitlin is staring forlornly into the giant punch bowl which now contains, somewhere in its vastness and among the floating fruit, her wedding ring.
Someone reaches for a cup and Caitlin looks up to see the woman from earlier.
"I wouldn't, if I were you," she says.
"Something wrong with the punch?"
"My wedding ring is in there."
"And you tried the ladle?"
Caitlin nods. She gave up on that several minutes ago.
"Well, there's only one thing to do then," the woman says, and rolls up her sleeves.
“Cover me. I’m going in!”
She snuck behind Caitlin and dived straight into the punch with her hands. Caitlin was doing her best not to laugh, her arms outstretched to the side trying to hide what Allegra was doing.
As people came up to help themselves to a drink and Caitlin having to continuously fob them off, Allegra finally sought out the ring and shook it to dry it slightly. Caitlin got into a deep conversation with a guest and so Allegra took Caitlin’s hand and placed the ring back onto her finger from behind, stroking the back of her hand once before letting go.
As she is doing so Ronnie's boss, Harrison wells, appearead.
"I'm very happy for you two," he says. Caitlin very much doubts this, as Ronnie's boss is notoriously rude and unpleasant, but she thanks him anyways.
"And who is this?" Harris asks.
"Allegra," the other woman says, reaching out to grasp Harrison' hand in a very wet handshake. "I did the flowers."
Harrison looks at his now punch-covered hand and makes a face. He turns around without saying anything else, but Caitlin doesn't have it in her to care.
"So, you did the flowers?" Caitlin asks Allegra.
"Yep."
"They're nice."
"You really think so?"
"Yeah, I do."
Allegra beams.
Ronnie and Caitlin take the first dance, as she and Ronnie were dancing; Caitlin’s eyes never left Allegra as she gazed at her from over Ronnie’s shoulder. After which Roxanne asks to dance with Ronnie. She puts her feet on his shoes and they stumble around together for a bit, laughing. Ronnie catches Caitlin's eye; she's smiling softly.
Cisco spotted Kamilla standing alone and offered her to dance with him.
Allegra gets ready for bed and tries not to think about how happy Caitlin and Ronnie looked. She wants that, wants someone to share her life with, someone other than Iris and Barry. Iris says Allegra doesn't put herself out there enough, that if she tried harder to meet people maybe she'd find the one. Allegra' parents had been perfect for each other. When her father died it had devastated her mother. Her mother wasn't ever really the same after that. Allegra isn't so much afraid of never finding her other half, she's afraid that she'll lose them like her mother lost her father.
Allegra lay in her bed staring at the ceiling with only one thing, one person, one woman on her mind.