"We never needed a fortune-teller with a crystal ball," Eddie Janko sang passionately as she sat in the passenger seat of her Porsche.
Jamie Reagan couldn't believe how hyper she was as they sat in standstill traffic on the Montauk Highway, even if they had just spent five days on the beach together on an extended Independence Day weekend getaway. Eddie had arranged the much-needed vacation for them with one of her father's old business partners as an engagement present, staying at his beachfront house in Montauk.
Her Porsche was the obvious transportation option considering the wealthy town they were visiting, and Jamie loved any excuse to drive it. He had admired Porsches since he was an impressionable teenager, but he fell in love with this one during their first week as partners. Of course, this was after he fell in love with his soon-to-be wife when he first laid eyes on her.
She continued, "…to tell us in the autumn that the leaves are gonna fall, or if the evening sun will slip into the sea." Jamie felt the left side of his mouth smirk because he loved the next line: "It's inevitable like you and me."
He secretly enjoyed how she sang the song that they argued about before their first kiss in all of her bubbly and demonstrative glory, but he doesn't want to let that sneak through because he knows he will catch hell for it like he did that night in drunken haze. The song meant even more knowing that their parents had a special connection to it as well.
Eddie kept on singing, "How did you know when you were in love?" Jamie was terrible with remembering lyrics as she found out early on in their partnership, but he was pretty sure that that wasn't how the original song went.
He turned to glance at her, puzzled. She looked into his eyes and held his gaze as she expressed, "You smiled back at me and your face lit up the moon. You took my breath away, I was hooked from the moment I laid my eyes on you." Jamie knew how lucky he was to find his soulmate, let alone work with her every day especially after the close calls they'd experienced during their partnership.
Jamie couldn't admit his feelings for the most beautiful woman he had ever met when he told his older sister four years ago, 'She's a real pain. I mean, she's always trying to tell me what to do. She eats too much, she's opinionated, she never listens, and she's constantly making plans for me without consulting me.' But he knew deep down before they even kissed that Edit Marie Janko would be the future Mrs. Jameson Reagan, even though it took it almost losing her to shake some sense through every cell of his body to truly convince himself to act upon those feelings.
Eddie sang the familiar refrain again, taking off her seatbelt partway through so she could properly tease her fiancé. Only a half hour into the lengthy drive, she had started performing this ridiculous charade that he had been trying his best to not acknowledge as he was trying to focus on not hitting the car in front of him on the log-jammed expressway. He had been glancing her way here and there, but now he was attempting to stifle his chuckles as she tried to distract him from the endless traffic ahead of them. Jamie couldn't hold back his thoughts any longer, "You're the most ridiculous person I've ever met, but I honestly never get tired of you."
Eddie smiled as her tone softened when she carried on with her adapted song, "Why is it only you I'm thinking of? In the absence of love, nothing's worth fighting for. We dug a hole so deep we could never get out. Nobody can understand unless they're in it too." Jamie could not have said it better as he agreed wholeheartedly.
She sang the chorus again before grasping his hand for the final verse, "Because of you, I could believe in happy endings again, and I'm reassured every time we embrace. It took a lot of faith to get us here. Against all odds, we made it happen. You can count on me, forever and always…" Jamie squeezed her hand in return as thanks for her blessing him with her heartwarming performance.
Jamie holds her gaze for just a tender moment before reverting his attention to getting them home safely. He is actually somewhat sad when her crazy act is over but also grateful at the same time because he wants to soak in their last few hours together away from the city, even if it is spent in the worst traffic he's been stuck in since his trips to and from Harvard for his three years of law school.
Jamie reminded himself of a piece of advice that his grandfather gave him during one of their bonding sessions shortly after they announced their engagement at family dinner. 'It is not talking of love but living in love that is everything.'
Eddie broke through his trance, "What did you say?" Jamie was confused, but he must have let the words leave his lips under his breath.
Jamie repeated the wise words, "It is not talking of love but living in love that is everything."
With a gentle squeeze of his hand, Eddie replied sincerely, "Aw, Jamie. Where did you get that from?"
Jamie responded with a smile, "It was one of the first things my grandfather told me after you joined us for dinner the first time."
Tears started to form in both of their eyes as they recalled that life-changing weekend. After a lengthy quiet moment, Eddie laughed and asked, "What do you think the dinner conversation covered this weekend?"
Eddie had been to several family dinners now and loved every moment of them. The talks about the job and their current cases, the lighthearted moments, the heartfelt wisdom, and of course the homemade food; she loved it all and looked forward to them each week. They beat the hell out of her lonely Sunday meals in front of the TV watching football or some show marathon.
They both knew that what would normally be a two-and-a-half-hour drive was going to take at least four hours thanks to the holiday traffic, so Jamie welcomed the new conversation topic. "Probably how many leftovers there would be without your huge appetite at the table," Jamie tried to say with a straight face, but inevitably broke into uncontrollable laughter as his fiancée slapped his chest in disbelief.
"UGH! SERIOUSLY?!" She couldn't hold back now. "Come on! I'm sure our absence came up, especially you as the rabbit-food-eater of the bunch."
Jamie scoffed at her dig at his vegetarian diet but quickly moved past that to say, "I'm sure our absence came up. There were definitely a number of jabs at our expense were thrown around that wouldn't be if we were present. I don't know. The adults probably shared drinks after to further discuss our escapade, but I don't want to think about that because we will surely get ribbed for it next weekend."
Eddie just silently nodded and leaned back in her seat to put her seatbelt back on and get comfortable for the long ride with no end in sight.
With no peep out of Eddie in several minutes, Jamie looked over to his fiancée and found her sound asleep. In the standstill traffic, Jamie put the sportscar in park for a moment to turn around and grab a blanket out of one of their bags before he unfolded it and gently laid it across her curled-up body.
After returning his focus to driving, Jamie absentmindedly turns on the radio and starts searching for a radio station to keep himself awake. He glances over to his peacefully resting partner once more to make sure the music didn't stir her from her slumber before his mind wanders off.