by Katy Evans
I think of Miles, by now, probably wondering how he’s going to get back home. I think of how he made love to me on that bench, not an hour ago. How desperate he was, like he’d been waiting to taste me for a lifetime and almost knew that he’d have to die with this one last taste.
I close my eyes and force the memory away.
Aaron opens his arms to me, and I nestle between them. He kisses my cheek.
The embrace feels stiff, like the arms of a stranger.
A day ago, I was so sure I wanted to be his wife. And now…I just don’t know.
“Let’s make a deal. Whatever happened before doesn’t matter. We start here. Fresh. And we won’t hurt each other again. Do you like how that sounds?”
I hesitate.
“Lia?” He presses.
I suddenly feel like a dick. I mean, he’s trying. He’s trying hard, doesn’t he deserve a chance? I force myself to nod. “I do.”
But I’m not sure if I believe it.
I’m not sure if I can say those words, when the time comes.
We get back on the road. He’s driving with the stick shift in his left hand, managing the steering wheel with his knees, so that he can hold my hand in his right. He keeps stroking the back, keeps gazing at me like he loves me.
And I’m not sure.
He wants us to only think forward, but I can’t do that. Not with Miles back there.
I feel like I’m already breaking a promise to him.
“Aaron,” I say softly.
“Yeah?” he asks, smiling, giving my hand a squeeze.
“Miles has the rings.”
He drops my hand, rakes his fingers through his hair, and his posture tenses. “Fuck.”
9:28 AM, December 7
We’ve decided to forgo the rings.
After all, my blind insistence on having them is what fucked me to begin with.
It’s been two hours since we left the rest stop, and I’m still trying to come to grips with the fact that I left Miles behind.
What we have between us behind.
“I’m just putting this out there right now.” I hold onto the strap over the door as Aaron’s Jeep careens down the road at breakneck speed. “I’m not going to look that great.”
Actually, I’m not just putting it out there right now. I’ve been muttering something similar since we got on the road.
“You think I care?” he says again, for what must be the twelfth time. “I’m marrying you. Not a fucking supermodel.”
Right. He keeps saying that. And I keep wondering why I can’t stop saying these things. It’s not because I’m worried I’ll look awful. For once, I don’t really care how I’ll look for him. I don’t really care that our pictures are going to look lopsided without a best man. Put a fucking fish hook on my finger.
I’m done.
I want him to put the brakes on this. On his Jeep, on this whole thing. I feel like I’m falling toward the ground, picking up speed, and there’s nothing but concrete under me.
This time, I was the one who bailed.
I was the one who left Miles behind.
The one who refuses to think about what just happened between us because it’s so big, I don’t think I can handle it.
I’m surprised my heart hasn’t burst out of my chest yet. “Aaron.” My voice is weak.
He’s going seventy in a forty-five, the motor’s roaring, and his soft-top is flapping in the wind, so he doesn’t hear me.
“Aaron.” I say it a little louder.
“Yeah?”
“We’re still pretty far away. And you’re going really fast. I don’t feel safe.”
“It’s okay. I’m fine. We can make it.”
He’s right. We can.
But I’m not sure I want to.
“Our family would prefer us to get there alive.”
He presses a button on his hands-free on the dashboard. A phone starts to ring, and then a voice says, “Hello?”
It’s his dad.
“Dad, it’s me.”
“Aaron! Where are—”
“Listen to me, Dad. I’ve got Lia, and we’re heading back. But we’re cutting it close. I need you to talk to the officiant and the lodge and ask them if it’s possible we can delay a little. See what they say.”
“Yeah, Aaron, Mrs. Ripley already has. The officiant doesn’t have any conflicts but there’s another event at the gazebo where the ceremony’s being performed, at one. So we have to be out of there by noon.”
I check my phone for the time.
“All right. We can make that,” he says, just as I’m thinking the same thing.
He hangs up and looks at me. “Never a dull moment, huh? Hope this isn’t foreshadowing how our marriage is going to be, huh?”
I try to smile but I feel so frazzled, I can’t do anything but stare at the road ahead. The sun is shining bright, the sky is blue as it’s ever been, and the snow is melting away quickly. The wet, dark pavement is now visible in spots, and the glare from the sun is giving me a headache.
“I don’t know…” I say, gnawing on my lip.
He glances at me. “Oh. Right.” He reaches into his pocket and pulls out his phone. “Text Miles and tell him to get your car out of the ditch and haul his ass over here asap.”
My eyes widen. “What? No. Not if you’re going to—”
“Relax. He’s like my brother, Lia. He fucked up, sure. Like I said, I don’t care what happened between you two. It’s over. But it’s going to feel like shit if he’s not there.”
I can’t believe what I’m hearing. “So…you’re not going to throw down?”
“No. We are. I was going to save it until after you and I were married but I guess I can’t, considering he has the rings, and considering—”
“We slept together.”
That shuts him up.
He shifts his position in his seat. “You…what?”
I’m already not so sure I should’ve said it the first time, so I can’t repeat it. “You heard me.”
“Yeah, I did.” He blinks and shakes his head as if it was a punch in the face. “When?”
“At the rest stop.”
He grits his teeth. His voice sounds pained, tight. “All right. Well, one last fling, right? I told you it was over. Jesus, I didn’t want to know that. But all right. What’s done is done. I only want to think about the future.”
Holy shit.
Am I hearing this right?
I suppose he needs to let this fly because he’s cheated on me, how many times?
But I don’t want him to.
“But Aaron! What if I can’t?” I bury my face in my hands. “That’s a nice thing to say. But just because you say we get to start over doesn’t mean we’re going to treat each other any better going forward! The underlying problems are still there.”
“Underlying problems?” His brow wrinkles, and his voice drips sarcasm. “And what are those? That you like Miles’ dick better than mine?”
I shake my head. “No. That’s not fair. I’m confused. I just need time to think.”
His face turns cold. “You had two fucking years to think, Lia. Now’s not the time. Not when everyone we know and love is sitting at the lodge, waiting for us. And I don’t care if you slept with the entire male population of CU. I’m making you my wife today.”
“But—”
“Lia, are you trying to get me to call this wedding off? Is that what you’re doing?”
“No, I—” Yes. I guess I am. Because I don’t have the guts to do it myself.
Again.
I look over at him. His jaw is set, his face resigned with a grim determination. If my telling him I slept with Miles isn’t going to get him to change his mind about today, I guess nothing will.
I’m marrying Aaron.
I open a text to Miles and type in: Hey. It’s me. Lia. Please bring the Mini and the rings?
I watch the dancing dots indicating he’s replying, and then: I’m pretty sure you left somethi
ng else here with me. But if you don’t mind, I’m keeping that.
What the hell is that supposed to mean?
I feel my body. Did I leave my panties there? No. I’m wearing my panties. I’m wearing my bra. All my clothes. What the hell did I forget? He sounds like he needs it, whatever it is, so I guess he can have it. I suppose he always knew Aaron would never get married without him. No matter what he did.
I wipe some hair from my face and realize I’m sweating.
When I imagined my wedding, I imagined romance, love, beauty. A fairy tale.
But this wedding is going to be the biggest three-ring circus there ever was. And I’m going to be the clown in the center ring.
10:38 AM, December 7
Aaron and I don’t talk much after that. He has the fan on, because we’re both sweating and tense. When the Midnight Lodge comes into view on the horizon, he pumps his fist. “Haha! Told you I’d get us there.”
I open up a text to Eva and type in: Almost there. ETA: 5 minutes
She responds with: We have everything ready for you. Plus a double mimosa because I think you’ll need it.
I smile nervously. She has no idea. I’ve never needed a drink so much. But I think I might do better with a double shot of straight vodka. Thanks.
Aaron coasts into the lot and pulls in under the overhang by reception. I open the door and jump out before he fully comes to a stop, nearly careening into a line of luggage carts. Eva, my mother, Natalie, and Cara are waiting for me. The bridesmaids are all in their aqua-blue dresses, and mother is wearing the sequined dress she had special ordered for the occasion, and they all look so breathtakingly lovely that I want to cry.
This day, the day I saw them all assembled and dressed to the nines, was supposed to be so different. I wasn’t supposed to be such a mess. Inside and out.
Eva hugs me tight. “Oh, honey! Don’t worry. It’s under control. Come on.”
It’s a mad dash to the bridal suite, where everything’s been set up for me and my bridesmaids to get ready. When I’m rushing down the hall, it occurs to me that I never said anything to Aaron as he dropped me off, and the next time I see him, I’ll be walking down the aisle.
I trip over my bare feet, but Eva holds me up. My mother says that my father’s assembling everyone outside by the gazebo underneath the mountains, and that if we can get down there before eleven-thirty, everything will be fine.
My best friend rips open the double doors to the bridal suite and hands me a mimosa. I chug it. Like Eva promised, it’s extra-strong, and burns my throat going down.
And just as I suspected, I need another.
I don’t think there are enough mimosas in the state of Colorado to help me out, now.
The suite is packed with people—my hairdresser, my makeup artist, a photographer, the videographer. I’m sweating like a hog. Pictures are being snapped of me in my cavewoman state and this is the furthest thing from what I expected my wedding morning would be like.
“Speed Primping! I love it!” Eva squeals with glee, her eyes gleaming with excitement.
I rip the glass away from my mouth as the photographer keeps snapping and hold up my other hand. “Ugh! No pictures! God! And turn off the fucking video!”
Everyone stops to stare at me.
“Um, please?” I add, as nicely as I can, fanning my hot face.
I’m going to pass out.
“Now, dear,” my mother scolds. “We’re paying them an awful lot so we might as well get our money’s worth. I told them to film everything.”
Right. Like I really want a memento of my nervous breakdown. “Oh. Okay. Um. Sorry. Should he come in the bathroom with me while I shower, too?”
My mother gives me a look that says she’s not amused.
A bridesmaid takes the empty champagne glass, and I jump in the shower that’s waiting for me.
When the shower curtain is closed and I’m truly alone, I start to bawl.
Yeah, I’m glad the photographers aren’t capturing this.
I hang my head and cry so hard that I forget I need to be getting myself ready. I think of Miles. And Aaron. And how I can’t stop the tears from falling on what is supposed to be the happiest day of my life.
Before I know it, I hear Eva’s voice. “Lia? You okay, baby?”
I sniffle, wondering if she heard me crying. “Um, yeah.”
“Well, are you clean yet? We’re in a little bit of a rush, in case you didn’t know!”
I look down, and I’m surprised to see that the pads of my fingers are pruning. I turn off the water and as I step out, she greets me with a towel and a fluffy white robe. “Come on, sweetie. Let’s get you beautiful.”
11:00 AM, December 7
The dress is a strapless Carolina Herrera, with layers and layers of whisper-thin organza. It blows my budget and the “less is more” mantra out of the water, but like Eva said the day we bought it in downtown Denver, when you know, you know. There are five hundred guests waiting for me to get this show on the road. The twenty-three members of the bridal party are assembled outside the stone walkway that leads to the gazebo outside the Midnight Lodge, underneath the Rocky Mountains.
This is my fantasy.
At least, the one I’d been harboring up until today, when everything changed.
Eva smiles at me. “Ready to make your dreams come true?”
I stare at myself in the mirror. I look like Cinderella, if the wicked stepmother had just materialized at the castle on Cinderella’s wedding day and gunned down Prince Charming in cold blood. I’m also about three minutes away from losing the mimosa I’d polished off earlier at breakneck speed. I go to chew on my nails but then I remember Eva painted them, and the last thing I want is for him to see the chips.
He notices things like that. He’s an observer.
And I want to be perfect for him.
Him.
The wrong him.
Oh, god.
I go to chew on my lip, but I can’t do that because they’ve been lacquered with bubble-gum pink gloss, and he’d probably notice if I got it on my teeth, too. All my normal ways of freaking out are off limits. This is the day of my dreams, and I’m not supposed to be freaking out.
But I am. Oh, lordy, am I ever.
I’ve been waiting my whole life for this day.
This perfect day, where the sun is shining, the snow is melting, birds are singing, and the sky is the deepest blue I’ve ever seen.
But there’s a problem.
A problem in the form of a pretentious, bearded, six-foot-three wall of hot man flesh who stalks around hating the world and thinking he’s better than everyone in it.
My fiancé’s best friend. The best man, Miles Foster.
This is all his fault.
“You okay?” Eva asks.
“I am,” I insist, pushing the infernal veil out of my face for the thousandth time. “This dress is itchy as hell.”
I stand and pluck the dress up under my armpits, hoisting it over my boobs. I try to take a step but…too much fabric, in all directions. It’s a wonder I don’t drown in this sea. In this sea, or in this mess I’ve created for myself. I sit back down on the vanity stool and pout. “I’m stuck.”
In more ways than one.
She gathers handfuls of too much organza and helps me up, depositing the pile of fabric safely in my wake. I shuffle to the full-length mirror and glance at myself. I don’t look like a bride, or even a fairytale princess. I look like a prisoner who just got her death sentence.
“It’s too loose,” I whine. “I think I must’ve lost some boobage during my diet. What if the top of my dress falls down while I’m walking up the aisle?”
Eva smirks. “I’m sure Aaron’ll love the show.”
The thought makes the mimosa turn in my stomach. I always used to live for what Aaron thought. When I would look at something, be it a new movie coming out, or a sweater at the mall, or a new hair style, I’d think, Would Aaron like this? But I realize, as she says
his name, that it doesn’t matter to me in the slightest what Aaron thinks. The only opinion I care about now is that of the man who will be standing precisely two feet left of my husband-to-be.
I am such an idiot.
In less than fifteen minutes, I will be marching down the stone steps outside the Midnight Lodge to a picturesque gazebo at the foot of the hills, on the arm of my father, who has socked his entire life’s savings into making this day picture perfect for his only daughter. I will take the hand of the man I’ve been attached at the hip to for five years, ever since I met him in a dank frat cellar when I was a wide-eyed little college freshman. I will join with this man, this man I’ve spent all of my adult life with, in holy matrimony, ’til death us do part.
I will become Mrs. Aaron Eberhart.
But I know I will be looking past my husband-to-be, to the man who, up until twelve hours ago, I thought I’d hated. Miles Foster.
And I will be wondering What if…
I wish finding a husband was as simple as finding a dress. When you know, you know.
I did know, or I thought I did. Up until twelve hours ago, I thought Aaron Eberhart was my true soul mate, the one I’d happily spend the rest of my life with. That’s when things took an unexpected turn.
Right now? I don’t even know my own name.
And I have a feeling I might have made a huge mistake.
“What’s wrong with you?”
I peer beyond my reflection, at Eva, who’s watching me suspiciously as I twist my engagement ring on my knuckle. “Um. Nothing.”
“Cold feet, I suspect.” Wrong. “Don’t worry, once the ceremony is over, you’ll feel so much better.”
I will? No. Not happening.
She straightens the little tiara on my head and spreads the organza waterfall of a veil over my shoulders. “Perfect. You’re a beautiful bride.”
Around me, the other bridesmaids and my mother gasp in awe. The photographer snaps pictures. I try to look happy. I don’t succeed.
I turn to Eva. She pats my hand but I grab it in a death grip before she can go. “I need to talk to you,” I grit out under my breath. “It’s important.”
She can tell from the tone of my voice, I mean business. She claps her hands. “Hey, everyone. Get out. Bride needs some alone time with her maid of honor.”
