Chapter Thirty-Five #2
I glanced down at my notes and cleared my throat.
“Heeeellooooo, my loyal listeners, I’m back from Belize.
Slightly sunburned, emotionally dehydrated, and ready to dish!
For those of you who missed the memo, I’ve just returned from my mother’s destination wedding.
Yes, the woman who once grounded me for sneaking off to a Dave Matthews concert just pledged eternal love to her fourth—yes, fourth—husband under a canopy made entirely of palm fronds and delusion.
Anyway, we’ve got a jam-packed show today.
Hot takes, cold truths, and that familiar and ever-lingering taste of regret. Let’s dive on in.”
Ravi hit play on the show’s intro music, then pointed to me when it was time to take over again.
“If you hadn’t already guessed, today’s hot topic: destination weddings. Pinterest fantasy . . . or hostage situation? I definitely have my perspective. What’s yours?”
I looked down at the long bulleted list of destination wedding transgressions in my notes, trying to decide where to start.
The lie of “casual beach” formal
The $27 poolside mimosa
Being emotionally waterboarded by steel-drum covers of Ed Sheeran songs
Family photos staged to look perfect when the people in them were anything but
All of them were a good place to jump in, but the one about family seemed like it had the most legs.
I adjusted my headphones and leaned into the microphone.
“Okay, let’s get this party started with a conversation about the awkwardness of putting all your family members on an island with literally no escape.
I’ve mentioned this before, but my dad left me and my mom when I was young.
Now imagine he and his whole new family—wife, kids, the works—showing up at the wedding of the woman he left, a.k.a.
my mom. Two people who haven’t exchanged so much as a text in over two decades, unless it was about me, now sitting side by side at the pool, sipping mai tais like old friends.
And if that wasn’t enough drama, guess who else shows up?
My ex. Yes, that ex. So there I was, surrounded by my dad’s new family, my mom’s new husband, and the boyfriend ghost of my past, trying to act like I was totally fine when really it was a personality endurance test. I was the pinata, smiling for photos, taking hits, and quietly wondering if I could book a one-way flight home without anyone noticing. And no plot twist here: I could not.”
Ravi gave me two thumbs-up, like I’d just delivered a sermon he’d been waiting his whole life to hear, but my mind . . . my mind drifted.
Back to the wedding weekend.
Back to the thoughts that had made this segment almost impossible to write without lying to myself. Because the messiness, the awkward silences, the forced proximity, the accidental reveals, the truths I didn’t ask for, turned out to be exactly what I needed.
I’d seen it with my parents, who somehow managed to share space without blame or broken glass. I’d seen it in my mom, choosing love again without apology. I’d even seen it in myself, finally confronting what happened with Matty, and my part in it all.
The trip didn’t break me. It exposed me for the fraud that I was. The girl who could analyze love to death and dismiss it without ever really understanding it. The one who could keep control, keep score, and keep her distance without ever admitting she was actually lonely.
“Alright, loyal listeners,” I began, the sarcasm easy, automatic.
“What do you get when you mix one destination wedding, an ex, and a lifetime of unresolved family tension? Apparently . . . a breakdown in paradise. I went to the wedding with one singular goal in mind: survival. To stay out of the way, keep it superficial, and feel absolutely nothing. What I didn’t expect .
. . what I didn’t expect . . . was to feel everything. ”
I exhaled and met Ravi’s eyes, which were wide, confused, and very much saying, What the hell are you doing? This isn’t in the script.
I gave him a tiny shrug and kept going.
“Turns out, emotions don’t really care about itineraries. They don’t care if you’re ready or not. Because here’s the thing, when you go into something like family drama, or really any relationship, trying your best to stay numb, life tends to hand you a defibrillator to shock you back to life.”
I readjusted in my chair, staring up at the ceiling as if the right words might be written there.
“But somewhere between the ceviche and the mayhem, the chocolate tours and the arguments that cracked me open, I realized that maybe . . . I’m not as invincible as I thought.
Maybe protecting myself all these years from love, from disappointment, from vulnerability, maybe that’s what’s been keeping me stuck.
I realized I’ve been moving through life with blinders on, missing not just the good stuff, but maybe even the best stuff. ”
A silence settled in the booth, heavy and alive, like the kind that only happens when you’re about to say something that really matters.
“So, yeah. I felt everything. Old heartbreaks, new hope, nostalgia, anger, awe, regret, longing—you name it, I went through it like a twelve-course tasting menu. And I came back not with answers, but with this one annoying little truth I can’t seem to ignore anymore.”
I looked straight at the mic, heart hammering.
“Maybe love isn’t a scam. Maybe it’s just a messy, flawed thing shared by messy, flawed people fighting like hell to weather the storms and still dance in the downpour.
Maybe it’s just a terrifying, unpredictable, wildly inconvenient leap of faith.
And maybe I’m finally ready to stop sitting it out. ”
The last words snagged in my throat, thick with the weight of everything I might’ve missed by seeing love and life as all or nothing.
I’d been clinging to a world drawn in black and white, and now this epiphany happening in real time on air caused a sudden ache to burrow inside my chest, knowing how much I’d lost by shutting love out. But not anymore.
All the years I’d spent building walls had only kept me from the things I needed most, and I was done with pretending not to care. It was too tiresome, too draining, and no longer true.
“So if you’re out there listening, sitting in your own fortress of doubt, maybe today’s the day you stop building walls and open the damn door.
I did. Even if I’d been kicking and screaming, I did it.
And the view? It’s different. Brighter. Less lonely.
More alive. I won’t pretend it’s easy. But now I know it’s worth it.
And maybe that’s the real lesson. That love is a four-letter word. And that word . . . is hope.”
Tears I hadn’t expected wet the corners of my eyes, and I brushed them away with my knuckle before they could fall.
Ravi, on the other hand, looked horror-struck, jaw clenched, lips tight, and fiercely pacing in the small studio space.
From the look on his face, I knew I’d very possibly just blown up the show, and probably my whole life along with it.