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There is a little problem in the church vestibule.
Megan looks like she is about to kill everyone in a one-mile radius with her phone. She holds it out and screams at it. “What do you mean you’re in Las Vegas?”
Miranda and I exchange looks but neither one of us actually knows who she is talking to. Except that Dixie is late.
“Leo, how could you do this to me?” she screeches.
“I’m going to go get her some water. She’s going to need it.”
I shake my head. “Go find a groomsman. They all have flasks. She’s going to need that more.”
“It’s eight o’clock in the morning.”
Megan makes a noise that could open a portal into hell, and Miranda nods quickly. “All the flasks. I’m going to collect all of them.”
“Good idea.”
Megan hangs up the phone, and I pull her onto a bench. “Sit.”
“I can’t sit. There’s so much to do.”
“If your head blows off, we will never get our cleaning deposit back. Sit.”
She slumps onto the bench. “I can’t believe he did this. He left his bachelor party last night and dragged Dixie off to Vegas on a redeye. They were married by an Elvis impersonator an hour ago.”
That rat bastard stole my wedding plans.
“Megan...” How do I tell her that I’m pretty sure he rescued his bride from a wedding neither of them wanted?
“Poor Dixie. She lost her beautiful, once-in-a-lifetime dream wedding all because my stupid brother didn’t want to wear a cummerbund.” She buries her face in her hands. “Now what are we going to do?”
A man’s voice rings across the vestibule. “We’ll get married instead.”
We both look up to see her boyfriend Brad striding across the room with a ring in his hand.
“Brad?” my sister and I say in unison.
“I’ve had this ring in my pocket since February, but then Leo asked Dixie first, and you were planning their wedding and I thought I needed to wait because you couldn’t plan two weddings at the same time.”
Has he not met my sister? She could plan two weddings and the Olympics at the same time.
Her eyes are huge as she stares at the ring. “I... we...we can’t get married today. This is Dixie’s dream wedding. I can’t just...”
He gets on one knee and takes her hand. “You know I love you more than anything in this world, so I say this with love, but you know, deep in your heart, this is not Dixie’s dream wedding.”
“It’s not?” She watches him shake his head. “It’s not. It’s my dream wedding, isn’t it?”
He slides the ring on her finger. “I’m sorry I didn’t ask you sooner. I felt like such a jerk watching you plan all this knowing it was what you wanted. But I knew you wouldn’t want to share this with another bride, so I was going to wait until they were back from their honeymoon.”
She stares at the huge rock on her hand. “But the license.”
“We’ll get the legal part done next week.”
“I’m just supposed to wear her dress?”
I intervene here. “Mom can do some quick alterations if you need it. You and Dixie are about the same size.”
I notice the vestibule is filling up with family as we all witness Saltine Brad really come out of his shell. “Megan Marie Stone, will you marry me? Today?”
She looks at me for an answer for the first time in our entire lives. I nod my agreement. She swallows hard and looks back at Brad. “Sure.”
Sure?
I nudge her with my elbow.
“Yes!” she laughs and launches onto the floor with him and into his arms. “Yes, I will marry you today.”
It’s not for hours that I finally feel done with this day and can relax and have fun at the reception. Megan and Brad got hitched without a hitch.
The flowers, the tulle, the cake, the colors...everything was exactly the way Megan always dreamed her wedding would be. She informed me she’s keeping all Leo and Dixie’s presents, too. I don’t blame her.
The first wedding dance has commenced and now the bridal party is filtering on to the dance floor. Christopher is right there when I need him and leads me to the group. He’s played patient, helpful boyfriend-to-someone-in-a-wedding-party all day, fetching things and moving tables and chairs as necessary. We haven’t had a minute alone until now, I’ll admit I’ve been avoiding it.
After today, there’s no reason to pretend to be dating anymore.
Last night...last night was so intense. I’ve never been so fully present while having sex.
“You look amazing,” he says. “Prettiest woman in the room.”
He’s holding my hand and it feels forced between us for the first time. I want to make it less awkward, but that’s not exactly my strong suit, is it? “I can’t believe Megan chose such a cliché for a wedding song. I mean, ‘Up Where We Belong’? It’s very Megan of her.” Christopher smiles and puts his arm around me and that’s when it hits me. “Goddess, Christopher. This is the first time we’ve danced together,” I say as the horror dawns.
“Yeah.”
I pull back to look at him. “That makes this our song now.”
He laughs and then this look steals over his face, and he shakes his head. “I had a worse song once. My ex and I slow danced to ‘Three Times a Lady’ at a Motown-themed party.”
“‘Three Times a Lady’ was your couple song? No wonder you didn’t last.”
Oh, shit. That was the wrong thing to say. He looks crestfallen. “That wasn’t the only reason, but I’m sure it didn’t help.”
“That’s the first time you’ve mentioned having an ex. I was beginning to wonder if you’d ever dated anyone before me.”
His shields go up. “Well, it didn’t work out.”
“Thanks for the recap, Captain Obvious.” I squeeze him so he knows I’m kidding around.
He laughs, but it’s sort of hollow. I feel like my heart is hollowing out on this dance floor. Maybe I’d already been making room in it for Christopher. Just in case. And now that he’s vacating the space with each passing minute, it’s all echoes in there. “Were you in love with her? Your ex?”
“I thought I was.”
Jealous or not jealous? I can’t decide how I feel. “Wool socks love or dagger through the heart love?”
“Doesn’t matter. It didn’t work out.”
“Ah, dagger through the heart then. Is that why you’re so cautious? Did she hurt you very badly?” While I kind of hate thinking about him being in love with anyone who isn’t me, I hate the idea of him being hurt even more.
I force myself not to get too comfortable in his arms. It’s tempting to melt. To pretend this is real.
Do I want this to be real? Is this what I want? Christopher, the disapproving veterinarian? I hold my breath. I’m afraid he can somehow reach right into my head and pull out my thoughts, and I don’t think I want him to know. If not, why is my heart hollowing out?
Is it just the sex? There is no denying the sex is great. I love that he loses his mind when he needs to be inside me. I love the way he uses my body so roughly, but at the same time manages to make me feel treasured.
“I asked her to marry me.”
I pull back, all melting stopped. “You were going to get married?”
His muscles stiffen. Tin Man style. That’s when I realize that he is the marrying kind. The committing kind. With someone else, anyway. Someone not me.
I don’t understand why it hurts so much. We weren’t even really dating.
“What happened?” What was she like? What inspired you to want to spend the rest of your life with her?
“Do you remember the show Marry Me Flashmob?”
“That was on MTV, wasn’t it? Public proposals or something?” I pause. “Oh, Christopher...”
I do remember that show. I remember one in particular that went viral—after the flashmob was over, the girl said no. Right in front of everyone in the food court and everyone who later watched it at home.
“Buzzfeed, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter...my fifteen minutes of fame lasted about a month before something more interesting came along.”
That was Christopher? I’m thinking back to how often I saw it pop up on social media. “I didn’t even recognize you. You had Bieber bangs then.”
“More of a Zach Efron style, I think. At least, that’s what my ex used to say.”
“I’m so sorry. That must have been very painful for you.”
“Well, now you see why I avoid the limelight. It’s not very flattering.”
“So, I take it you two broke up right away.”
He nods. “Yeah. Maybe now you can understand why I’m not...”
He leaves it hanging, but I know what he thinks. That he can’t trust love. That maybe he doesn’t deserve love.
He’s so wrong about that.
“Look, it was a hell of a way to find out she didn’t want to marry you, but you can’t just give up on love and romance entirely because you got rejected once.”
“Stella, I’m not the kind of guy who could go through that twice. I’m a very private person. It took every ounce of courage I could muster to put myself out there like that. To do it so publicly and with a camera crew. I thought she would like it. Find it romantic. Understand how much I sacrificed to do something so against my introverted nature. Instead, she made me the laughingstock of pop culture.” Christopher clutches me harder, but not to get closer. He’s tense, angry. “No, I take that back. It isn’t her fault. I made myself the laughingstock. I misread everything. It’s my issue that I don’t understand how love works. How people work.”
“Well, as someone who is embarrassed a lot, I can sympathize with you. But you’re a good man. You’ll make a good husband. A good father. But you’ll have to open up more if you want the real thing, Christopher.” Be careful. “With someone. Someday.”
He blows out another breath. A huff really.
Change the subject. The song is almost over.
I need to rip off the Band-Aid, don’t I? “I think we should look like we’re having some kind of argument.”
“What?”
“So our breakup will be more believable. You know...if we have a fight in front of everyone.”
“Stella—”
I pull back. “I can’t do this anymore.”
“Dance?”
The pulse in my ears grows louder.
“You mean...us, don’t you?”
A look steals over his face that reminds me of his face when he told the police some of Mrs. Bain’s cats were going to have to be put down.
My back stiffens. I knew we weren’t going to be a real thing after this, but I thought...might as well be honest. I kind of believed we could be a thing after this. For all my protesting, part of me hoped for something more. But if I want even a shred of dignity left after he leaves town Monday night, I need to make this a clean break.
“I’m going to walk away now. Tell everyone later that we argued. As you know, I’m taking Monday off for family stuff. There are two surgeries scheduled, but that’s it. No appointments. Carlita knows what to do with the charts and my computer.”
“Stella...”
We stop dancing, the song still swirling around us, but he doesn’t stop staring at me. My heart is still trying to lead me into the dark. I know he can see in my eyes that I’m pleading with him to stop me. Change my mind. Say something. Keep me.
It’s not like I didn’t know this was coming.
It’s better this way.
I don’t storm off. I take one step back. Then another. He doesn’t stop me.
He’s not going to.
I turn slowly and walk toward the door calmly, knowing the moment that Perry and Tru are behind me. They will keep me upright.
“It’s okay,” I tell them. “I knew it was coming. It’s part of our plan. I’m okay.”
Perry hooks her arm in mine. “We got this. Lizzo and Haagen-Dazs on the way. Just hold on.” We get to the gift table by the exit. “And don’t you dare look back.”