3 #2
James is shouting at Eliza, gesturing toward me, screaming that he has no idea who I am. Eliza turns to face me, pulling up her dress and stomping over.
The veil catches around her face, and she yanks it away and snaps, “Who are you?”
With the veil and my lack of sight, I didn’t see her well enough, but this close, her features become clear.
Her nose isn’t supposed to be as straight and pointed as it is right now.
It’s supposed to be rounded, and lower. And her skin should be riddled with enough freckles, no amount of foundation could cover them all, unlike the tan, clear skin I see.
Her lips should be thinner, her jaw rounder, not full and sharp.
I never understood the phrase time stood still. Not for my two weddings, not when Taina got married and I walked her down the aisle, and not when I got my first client. Not until right now, when I realize this isn’t the best friend of the woman I ran the background check on. This bride isn’t Eliza.
I slap my hand to my mouth.
My thoughts all come too quickly yet too slowly. If I stop pressing my hand against my mouth, bile will spill from it.
How could this have happened? I’m sure this was the time for Eliza’s wedding. I triple checked the times and dates.
A shadow pours over me.
“Lucinda, what’s going on?” Anders asks, and somehow, he seems less accusatory and more concerned with my well-being. “You said this wasn’t the wedding.”
I swallow down a lump of bile. Every word that comes out stutters into something incoherent. I wonder if I can begin speaking Spanish and pretend I don’t understand a thing. Sure, they heard me speak fluent English already, but I can gaslight over fifty people. I’ve done it before.
The bride takes another step toward me. I move back into Anders’s body.
He waves a hand in my face. “Lucinda?”
Is it too late to pass out and hope everyone just leaves me to die?
“Oh my God,” I whisper, removing my hand from my mouth, speaking to the bride. “I’m so sorry. I don’t know your fiancé, this is—I’m just—” How the hell do you explain something like this? There are no words. I want to find the nearest body of water and fling myself into it. “I’m sorry.”
As fast as my feet will take me, I sprint down the aisle, ignoring all the stares and the shouts. My bad foot half drags as I push through the double doors. The other doorway is wide open when I make it to the opposite side of the hall.
People file out, smiling, chatting, forming two lines.
Eliza and her husband walk through them, hand in hand. As I approach them, I can see that Jennie is dragging behind, a tight smile on her face as she follows the couple. Because I went to the wrong hall, and I didn’t stop her best friend’s doomed-to-fail marriage.
Oh God.
I keep moving until I’m at the end of one of the lines.
James high-fives and fist-bumps the people as he goes, like a football player getting praised after a touchdown.
Eliza presses kisses on cheeks, nods along the way, but coldly.
Like the royals greeting people they consider peasants. Not like the great Princess Diana.
Then Jennie spots me.
Her green gown glides behind her, making her appear to float as she approaches. Her blond hair is pinned in a delicate bun, pearls like the ones sewed on to her gown clipped all around it. She looks absolutely stunning.
In the same way they described Lucifer as being the most beautiful angel.
She removes her hand from her husband’s arm, wraps her arms around me, and presses her mouth so close to my ear she’s kissing it as she speaks.
“I hate you.”
Well, shit.
Jennie didn’t give me a single break, even after I met her in her hotel room while the rest of the wedding celebrated at the reception.
I could barely hear after the first minute, when her screaming popped my eardrum.
I didn’t say a word. Only sat there and listened to her disappointment, her reminder that her best friend would have to suffer from this doomed marriage.
There’s no defense here. She came to me for help, and I failed her.
Failed Eliza. I remember the hope and joy of getting married—despite nerves and hidden reservations.
That feeling of something being wrong, and the swift, heavier obligation that if you had gotten that far, you had to stick it out.
And the other feeling, too, of loving someone and them being in love with someone else.
Like my second marriage. I bet Eliza has had the same conversations with herself I had. He’s just friendly with her. They’ve been friends for years. You’ll look crazy if you bring it up. You’ll be humiliated if it turns out to be true—and it can’t be true if you avoid it.
Even now, years later, there is this missing fragment in my chest, permanently shattered from heartbreak. It doesn’t matter how much time passes, it only eases the pain, but the scars remain. This haunted feeling that I’m irreparably flawed.
And now Eliza will have to feel that way too. I couldn’t help her, like nobody could help me.
I had no time to pack, and with the lack of time and proper eyewear, I’m sure I’ve forgotten something in the rush of leaving. Even though most of my meeting with Jennie is a blur, I got the gist of it. Not getting paid. I ruined Jennie’s best friend’s life.
She got me the worst seat in economy—though I’m lucky she paid for a seat at all—set me up with a thirteen-hour, two-stop flight from the tiny island in the Caribbean back to Taina, and threatened to call security if I stayed on the premises any longer.
On the flight, I try to sleep, but the seat won’t recline, and some kid won’t stop kicking the back of it like I’m the one who forgot his gaming console back at the hotel. All this misery, and I don’t even get the comfort of nearing home.
Because there is no home to go to.
Even if there is comfort in the safety of Taina’s support, it’s tainted by questions I don’t want to answer. Faces I don’t want to see. And dreams falling further out of reach.