20. Bex #2
I sip my water, watching as Geraldine begins talking about the history of Hollyvale. She describes how the Kerne family moved here decades ago, how Jordan and Skye expanded the resort's reputation. She speaks with effortless pride and zero pretension, weaving funny anecdotes about local festivals.
It's the kind of conversation I've never quite mastered: measured but warm. I steal a look at Lucia, who is listening intently. Possibly moved, though she keeps her expression neutral.
At one point, Geraldine leans forward and says quietly, "I know it can be strange to see your child choose something you didn't expect. But stranger things have led to lasting joy."
I watch some emotion shift across Lucia's face. A flicker that might be longing or sadness. It's gone as soon as it comes, replaced by that polite mask. Lucia offers a curt nod. "Yes, well. We'll see."
I try not to fidget. I wait, half expecting my father to insert some pointed remark, but he simply says, "Thank you for your hospitality."
That statement feels big coming from him. I file it away.
A few minutes later, Geraldine excuses herself. Some staffer needs her at the bar. Lucia and Marcello are left in thoughtful silence.
I inhale. My chest is tight. The entire time, the ring in my jacket pocket has felt like it weighs five pounds. I stare at nothing, thinking about the vow I made in secret. I wonder, for a fleeting second, if I should just tell my parents: Hey, guess what? I also got married. Surprise.
For four seconds, I consider it.
Then I let the thought go.
No. That would be disastrous, overshadow Sofia's big moment. And I can already predict my father's reaction: fury or cold disbelief or some brand of disappointment. I'm not sure which is worse.
I push the idea aside, turning to fill the silence. "So, if you two want to settle in, Sofia should be free in about an hour. Then we can all head over to the dinner together."
My mother nods, rising from her seat. "Yes, let's do that."
Marcello rises as well, smoothing his shirt. "All right."
As they walk away, I watch them go, my mind whirling. I catch a glimpse of Kit entering the lounge from a side door, binder in hand. Our eyes meet for half a second. No more.
Kit's expression flicks to my parents, then back to me. She wears a set, professional face, but something flickers underneath. I can guess what.
I don't cross the room. Kit is surrounded by staff, and I'm supposed to be helping my parents.
Tonight is the rehearsal dinner, all the complicated family drama laid out under glowing light bulbs and candy cane arches.
I tuck my hands in my jacket pockets, a reflex to keep from fidgeting, and feel the smooth metal band against my fingers.
The ring isn't leaving my pocket. Not yet.
By the time the rehearsal dinner ends and the formalities dissolve, my brain feels like a rubber band stretched too tight.
I've spent the evening passing from conversation to conversation, laughing when Lexi recounted old childhood stories, analyzing tomorrow's timeline with Kit, always half-distracted, my attention skipping across everything like a rock on a lake.
I need a minute. That's how I end up at the bar off the main lobby, where Geraldine is already settled with something amber in a lowball glass. She looks up when I approach, gives a small wave, and I take the stool beside her without needing to ask twice.
"You held up well this afternoon," she says. "With your parents."
"You noticed."
"I notice most things." Her tone gently invites me to share as much or as little as I want.
"Yeah." I rub a hand over my face. "They showed up, which is honestly more than I expected a month ago. But showing up isn't the same as being on board."
Geraldine's face softens. "I understand that better than you'd think.
Skye and I had a complicated road too, in a different sense.
I spent a long time treating my daughter's life like something to manage.
Scripts. Thresholds. The version of her I thought the business needed.
I told myself I was securing her future.
What I was actually doing was choosing my expectations over the person standing in front of me.
It nearly cost me my daughter. Not in one dramatic scene.
In years of distance we were both too proud to name. "
A pang goes through me. I picture my parents, who basically threw up their hands when Sofia said she was marrying Jordan.
"My parents, it's like they can't handle that this might reflect on them.
And they blame Sofia for stepping outside the lines, but they also kind of blame me.
Because I've been all over the place with my career choices and personal life. She was their shining hope, and now."
I exhale, not sure why I'm telling Geraldine any of this.
She touches my arm gently. "I sat with them for a while this afternoon, after the introductions.
They're worried, and they're proud in equal measure.
They want to be right about what's best for Sofia, and they're frustrated she isn't letting them chart her path.
So they're stuck. They came all this way, and they're still standing outside it. "
"Will that change?"
"It could. But it takes time and humility on their part.
Sometimes parents don't realize they've built up a dream of who their child is supposed to be, and they cling to it too long.
" She turns her glass. "I ask myself, some days, how I knew when it was time to stop protecting what I thought I was protecting.
The answer is: when I understood that what I was protecting was the version of my child that matched my expectations.
The real person was standing right in front of me the whole time, waiting.
That was time lost, and you can't get it back. I'm lucky Skye forgave me."
Something cracks in my chest. I remember late-night arguments with my father about becoming a tattoo artist instead of something "respectable," my mother suggesting I keep it as a hobby.
I remember never quite matching what they hoped.
And now Sofia is on that same side, not quite the right shape for the puzzle our parents built in their minds.
"I guess that's the fear," I say. "That one day we'll look back and realize we traded what we had for what we wanted it to be."
"Yes. And sometimes by the time you see it, you've let decades slip away. Better to see it sooner, if you can."
We sit in silence after that, the distant hush of the lake drifting through the open windows.
I thank her quietly. I feel raw, the way you do when you realize you've been outrunning your own heartbreak by never staying still long enough to let it catch you.
Eventually she pats my shoulder and excuses herself, leaving me alone at the bar.
I don't want a night of drowning, so I leave the whiskey where it is.
Instead I pull the ring out of my jacket pocket, the modest silver band still faintly smudged from the day I got it, and turn it in my hand, letting the overhead lights catch the metal.
"Inevitable Surprises," I mutter, thinking of the label I teased Kit about.
Tears prickle unexpectedly at the back of my eyes. I am not starting to cry now.
I head out into the night instead. The party's hum still lives in the distance, some last attendees lingering under twinkle lights near the fire pit.
Here's the thing Geraldine doesn't know she handed me.
I've spent my whole adult life shrinking the word want down to a manageable size, want a smaller shop, want a quieter dream, want less, so that when the people who are supposed to love you shrug at what you built, it doesn't level you.
It's efficient. It's armor. And carrying this ring around for three weeks has quietly wrecked the whole system, because every time my fingers find it, the want in me is not small.
It's specific and enormous and shaped exactly like a woman with a color-coded binder.
I slide the ring onto my finger for just a moment on the walk back, feeling the weird, certain knowledge of how it fits, then slip it off and return it to my pocket before I reach the porch.
At some point I'll have to face that ring head-on.
Face Kit. Face what we did and what it meant.
Tomorrow is the 26th. Tomorrow is the wedding.
Tomorrow is everything, and I have no idea if I'm ready.
But maybe, somewhere in all of it, I can find the nerve to admit what I want.
I climb my porch steps, the lounge's jazz carols still faint on the air behind me, and let myself in to face the rest of the night wide awake.