Chapter 5
Chapter Five
The second edit begins with Caleb laughing.
"One last night of freedom," Jeremy says from behind the camera.
"I was never free," Caleb answers. "Dahlia keeps my balls in her purse."
The men roar.
The video jumps to Sable entering the room. Jeremy's voice carries over the music.
"Time to pick the right woman."
Caleb kisses her. The blindfold comes off. He kisses her again.
The clip stops.
Text fills the screen.
He knew.
"What the fuck?" Caleb whispers.
"Your best man seems determined to help you explain."
"That conversation didn't happen in that order."
"But you said it."
"It was a joke."
"About me keeping your balls in my purse?"
"A stupid joke. Jeremy was giving me shit because I kept checking the time. I wanted to call you before you went to bed."
"And did you?"
He stops.
"Did you call me that night, Caleb?"
"No."
"Because I remember waiting. I remember telling myself you were having fun with your friends and I should not be the clingy fiancée who interrupted."
"I lost track of time."
"You found enough time to put Sable's tongue in your mouth."
He flinches. "Stop saying it like that."
"How would you like me to say it? Should I call it a collision? Did your mouths have a traffic accident?"
"I know you're angry."
"You know nothing about how I feel."
"Then tell me."
I wrench the door against the chain until it rattles.
"I feel like everyone at my wedding knew I was a joke except me.
Jeremy watched me walk toward you. Your friends raised glasses during your vows.
They danced with me. They let me thank them for supporting our marriage when they had already watched you with her. "
"Most of them didn't know Sable was coming."
"But they knew afterward. They knew more about you and her than I did, and that feels like fucking treachery.”
"I made them promise not to tell you because I thought it was over."
The hallway goes silent.
Caleb's expression changes before he can pull the words back.
"You what?"
"Dahlia, listen to me."
"You made them promise?"
"I didn't want that filth anywhere near you before the wedding. I told Jeremy to delete everything."
"What did they say when you asked them to lie?"
"I didn't call it lying."
"Of course you didn't. What did you call it?"
"Keeping a sick joke from hurting you."
"Did anyone argue?"
Caleb looks away.
"Owen did. He said you had a right to know."
"And?"
"I told him it was my relationship."
"You mean your decision."
"Yes."
"Did Jeremy promise to delete it while planning to save it?"
"He showed me himself deleting the file."
"And you believed him because believing him made the wedding easier."
"Yes."
The answer is quiet, but it lands harder than another defense.
"Did you look for Sable afterward?"
"No."
"Did you ask Jeremy why he chose her?"
"He said she contacted him when she heard about the wedding."
"And you accepted that too?"
"I told him never to mention her again. I went home. I sat in the shower for an hour. Then I called you, but you were asleep."
"You could have left a message."
"What would I say? Sorry I missed your call, also I kissed my ex?"
"Yes. Exactly that."
"You would have canceled the wedding."
"You will never know. You were too afraid to let me decide."
"You knew there was a video."
"I knew somebody had been filming. I didn't know he kept it."
"You stood at the altar knowing your entire wedding party was keeping this from me."
"Because I had stopped it. Because I was ashamed. Because I knew it would hurt you even though I never asked for any of it."
"You asked me to marry you while hiding something that might have stopped me from doing it."
"It would have ended us over a prank Jeremy pulled."
"No, Caleb. It might have ended us over what you did during the prank. You took away my right to decide."
He pulls the door toward himself. The chain catches with a metallic crack.
"I was terrified," he says. "I was three days away from marrying you.
One of my oldest friends had just put my ex in my lap and lied that she was you.
I shoved her off. I told everyone in that room it was sick.
I went home alone. I never contacted Sable.
I never touched anyone else. I thought telling you would give Jeremy exactly what he wanted. "
"What does Jeremy want?"
Caleb's jaw works. "He thinks I changed after I met you."
"You did. You stopped waking up in strangers' apartments and arriving at work hungover."
"I know."
"Does he miss having someone as miserable as he is?"
"Probably."
"And Sable? Did she accidentally fall into his plan?"
"I don't know."
"You know her. You loved her. You proposed to her. Why did she agree to this?"
"I don't know."
"Why did you keep kissing her?"
"I don't know!"
His shout crashes through the hallway.
The door across from mine opens. Mrs. Chen peers out, sees Caleb, and slowly closes it again.
I feel heat crawl up my neck. Even here, even in the apartment that was mine before him, strangers are watching my marriage come apart.
Caleb sees it too. He lowers his voice.
"I was drunk. I was shocked. There was history. For a few seconds my body remembered something my heart did not want. Is that ugly enough for you?"
"No. It isn't nearly ugly enough."
"What do you want me to say?"
"That for three seconds, you wanted her more than you wanted to protect me."
"I didn't think of it that way."
"That is the problem. You did not think of me at all."
He looks at me through the narrow opening. "I chose you."
"After you finished kissing her."
"I married you."
"Because you hid the truth long enough to get me down the aisle."
"Don't do that."
"Do what?"
"Turn our wedding into a lie."
"You did that."
"I meant every word I said to you."
"So did I. That is what makes me the idiot."
Caleb slams his palm against the door. "You are not an idiot."
"Then stop asking me to behave like one."
"I'm asking you to look at all of it."
"I looked at enough."
"There is more."
"There will always be more. Another angle. Another joke. Another person who knew before I did. I have been your wife for three days, and I am already the last person invited into my own marriage."
His anger disappears. What replaces it is worse.
"Please," he says.
The word is raw and small.
For one treacherous second, I want to take off the chain. I want him inside, on his knees, his arms around my waist. I want to go backward to the moment before my phone vibrated.
Then the video restarts on Ivy's phone. Caleb's laugh fills my apartment.
Dahlia keeps my balls in her purse.
I slam the door.
Caleb knocks once.
"Dahlia."
I lock the deadbolt.
He stays in the hallway for almost an hour. I know because I sit with my back against the other side and listen to him breathe.
When he finally leaves, he does not ask me to forgive him.
He sends one message.
I am getting the raw footage.