Weddings make me cry.

Okay, fine. Blubber is more like it.

I can replenish vanishing seas at wedding ceremonies.

I cry when the music begins, when the groom sees the bride’s face, when the vows are exchanged.

That is not entirely surprising, considering I cry over dog food commercials. One of the Hawks’ biggest sponsors is an organic dog food company, and every time I see that sweet collie patiently wagging his tail while waiting to be adopted by his forever person, we’re talking buckets of tears.

That’s why I grab an extra packet the next day, snagging it from a drawer in the bathroom of my new penthouse in Cow Hollow, on top of a hill with a gorgeous view of the Golden Gate Bridge, the San Francisco Bay, and the glittering Pacific Ocean.

I’ve been here for a week now, and I’m fully moved in. I’ve been working hard, running back and forth to meetings with the city, interviewing general manager candidates.

This weekend, I’m off, focused solely on Eric’s nuptials.

Wearing a sapphire-blue dress too, my sister, Brooke, reads Percy Jackson to her eight-year-old daughter, Audrey, who’s convinced she wants to attend Camp Half-Blood, like the characters. They’re smushed into the corner of my new dove-gray couch, surrounded by purple pillows.

After Brooke finishes a chapter and closes the book, she waggles a well-manicured finger in my direction. “I saw that you only packed two packets of tissues, Nadia. That’s not going to be enough for you. Don’t forget you needed a towel at my wedding.”

Her daughter snickers. “A towel? Why did you need a towel?”

Brooke nuzzles her daughter. “Your Aunt Nadia cries at every single event. She cried at my high school graduation. I was soooo embarrassed,” she says.

I sneer at my big sister. “Thank you for teasing me for caring about your rite of passage.”

Brooke flings me an evil grin. She’s particularly good at boomeranging those in my direction. “That was nothing compared to how much you cried at my wedding,” she says.

“I was sixteen! I was hyperemotional. My big sister was getting married. Plus, you met your husband in China, and he moved to the US to be with you. That’s amazing,” I say, then arch a haughty brow. “Or maybe I was happy you were finally moving out of the house.”

“Ouch,” Brooke says, wincing in over-the-top pain. “I see you still have the zinger spirit, Nadia.”

“And I see you still have the crushing spirit of an older sister,” I tease.

My mom clicks across the floor, setting a hand on Brooke’s shoulder, ever the peacemaker. “And I see you both have the spirit of totally loving each other.”

I point at Brooke. “Yes, but I have a heart made of sponge cake and hers is carved from ice.”

Brooke launches a saucy look at me. “Just call me Elsa.”

Audrey and Brooke break into the famous song from Frozen, then they both laugh. “You know I love you. And all your cakey heart sponginess,” Brooke says.

Audrey bounces up from the couch, her sleek black hair, thanks to her dad’s genes, braided down her back. “I’m ready to see Mariana in her princess dress and then to eat all the cake.”

“Me too,” I say, offering a hand for high-fiving to my niece. She smacks back. “Cake is the best part of weddings. But vanilla wedding cake, not heart cake.”

“And on that note, we agree.” Brooke tips her forehead to the door. “I’ll be downstairs in the limo with David. See you there in a few minutes.”

She takes off with her kiddo to join her husband, and just to be safe, I grab one more packet of tissues, wielding it at my mom. “One more for the road for me.”

“Grab an extra for me too, sweetheart,” my mom says in a confessional whisper.

“You’re not a crier,” I say suspiciously. My mother isn’t a cold woman, but she’s more steely, steady.

Dad was always the crier. Tough as nails in business and a total marshmallow when it came to family.

He was the one with tears rolling down his cheeks when he walked Brooke down the aisle nine years ago.

He was the one with the trembling bottom lip when my mother received an award for all her philanthropic work in San Francisco.

He was the one whose voice broke when Eric told him two years ago that he’d just met the woman he was going to marry.

“Do you miss him?” I ask my mom.

She nods, her voice tight. “I do.”

“You wanted him here today,” I say, and it’s a statement, not a question.

“So much. He’d be so proud of Eric. All he wanted for his son was for him to fall in love.”

“He wanted Eric to have what the two of you had,” I say, rubbing her arm.

Her eyes well with tears, and I draw her into a hug. “I miss him a lot too,” I say when I let her go. “But I know it’s harder for you. He was your one true love.”

She pulls back, giving me a sad smile. “He was. But I also believe that we can have more than one true love.”

I tilt my head, surprised. She’s always seemed so rah-rah soulmate-y. “You do?”

“I’m not looking right now, but I loved love. I loved being in love. And I’m only sixty-five. I’d like to think some of my best years are still ahead of me. And I wouldn’t mind being in love again.”

My heart glows at that thought. At the idea that somebody who lost the man she was married to for more than thirty years has a heart that’s open enough to love again.

It’s an unexpected thought, but one that makes perfect sense now that she’s voiced it. “I bet you’ll find someone,” I say.

She laughs dubiously. “You think it’s easy at sixty-five?”

“Well, it’s hard at twenty-five,” I say.

She shakes her head. “Sweetheart, I’m winning this battle. There’s nothing as hard as dating at sixty-five.”

“Fine. You win, but then again, I wouldn’t know what dating’s like at twenty-five. Or twenty-four, or twenty-three.”

“You’ve never really been in love, have you?”

I shrug, grabbing my silver clutch as we head to the door. “It felt like love a few times. But looking back, no. I liked my high school boyfriends, but it wasn’t love. And being at an all-girls college, I never really met anybody there I fell for. I honestly don’t think I’ve ever been serious enough with anyone to feel that way. Maybe that’s why I cry at weddings. It all feels wonderful and magical and sort of far away.”

She squeezes my hand. “It won’t always be far away.”

But it doesn’t matter if my time is near or far away.

Today isn’t about me. It’s about my brother.

When we reach the Luxe Hotel atop Nob Hill, I find Eric in the suite next to the ballroom, fiddling with his bow tie, the other groomsmen milling about in the hall.

“For a brother, you look fantastic,” I say with a smile.

“For a sister, you look decent,” he says.

As we leave and make our way toward the groomsmen, Eric lowers his voice and says, “Don’t forget what I said the other day. About Crosby.”

My brow knits. “Why are you reminding me right now?”