They have turned that girl into a pawn. And I hate that for her. We’ve never fought, but suddenly my desire to fight for her consumes my better judgment.
Your father is an idiot. He cares about himself. Your business. The optics. Not your happiness. You deserve something better.
I could do better. That’s what I really mean. That’s what I realized sitting here tonight.
That I’m thinking things I shouldn’t.
Wishing for things I can’t have.
Because I’m too late.
She leans back as if he’d hit her, her lips lined with anger as she blushes all the way to her chest.
“No, Jasper. Your father is like an idiot. Mine loves me. You don’t know what that’s like.
She turns on her heel and yanks open the restaurant door with an unknown violence about her.
But I prefer him to show violence rather than apathy. That means the wild girl is still in there somewhere.
He threw words at me that should hurt. But I only hurt for her. Because my biological father is an asshole. But the man who really raised me? Harvey Eaton? He is the best of the best. He showed me love, and I can identify it very well.
Also, I remember how Sloane looks at a man when she really loves him. And she doesn’t look at her fiance like she used to look at me.
I’m happier than I should be.
2
Sloane
Sloane: Are you there?
Jasper: Where else could I be?
Sloane: I thought you’d be mad at me. Please do not hate me.
Jasper: I could never hate you, Sunny.
I feel sick.
The day I’ve dreamed of since I was little has finally arrived, but it’s nothing like what I had imagined. It’s snowing. And I’ve always wanted a spring wedding.
It’s in an ornate church downtown. And I wanted a cozy country affair.
It is a show attended by hundreds of people. And all I wanted was something small and intimate.
The worst thing of all is that the man I am going to take to the altar is not the one I see when I close my eyes. It’s not the one I’ve wanted for most of my life.
I have given up so completely that I am settling for a person I don’t love.
One that I’m sure I don’t even like, and that makes me sick.
No, this day is nothing like I imagined.
My cousin Violet plays with the pins in my hair while I sit at a stained wood dresser with my hands pressed together in my lap, covering the enormous diamond on my ring finger. If I keep them there, squeezing until it hurts, I will avoid crying.
Or doing something stupid like running.
-I do not know where it is. I can’t see anything with the way they have everything twisted.
-Is there. I can feel it pulling. It’s too tight. It hurts me.
He sighs and looks at me in the mirror.
“Are you sure it’s the hair, Sloane?”
I lift my chin, lengthening my neck and observing how the column of my throat works.
-Yeah. I force my voice to sound more confident than I feel and leave my mind blank, like when I act. When I jump and spin and the lights are bright and the audience is dark, I feel comfortable.
With a heavy sigh and a worried look, Violet obediently goes back to searching my hair for a hairpin she’s not sure exists. You just hinted that my awkward updo is some kind of parallel to my life.
I know how to read between the lines.
He hasn’t talked much about Sterling. No one has… except Jasper.
Jasper.
I can’t even think of his name without a wave of nausea hitting me. The guilt over the words I threw at him the other night has eaten away at me. It does not let me sleep. And the end of knowing that my now impossible chance with him will end with me marrying someone else never fails to break my chest.
Jasper Gervais and I are friends. Good friends. He’s made it clear a couple of times.
And I’m not masochistic enough to go for the triplet.
I’m sure everyone thinks I’m over it, but that’s only because I’ve become an expert at hiding my feelings. He’s consumed every corner of me since I first saw him, and he’s never looked at me as anything more than a little sister.
I wince as liquid spills onto my hands. I turn them around and look down. A manic laugh erupts from me as I look down. The blood pools languidly into a perfect, shiny drop in the middle of my palm, almost as if it defies gravity by simply existing.
The prick where the pointy claw of my engagement ring dug in taunts me, as if the universe knows this marriage will make me bleed in ways no one else will know or see.
Sterling wouldn’t lay a hand on me, but everything else about him – about this life – exhausts me .
-Oh shit! Sloane! You can’t get your dress dirty like that. Violet pulls her hands away, alarmed, before rushing into the bathroom, her black satin dress billowing against her.
Black. Again, I laugh. I would never have chosen black dresses for my wedding. I would choose something light and whimsical. A festive color.
But then, this isn’t really my wedding, and it’s not really a celebration either. Maybe funeral colors make a lot of sense.
I haven’t been able to muster the energy to complain about things I don’t want. And now I realize, as I watch the little glob of blood slide down the center of my palm, that it’s because I don’t want this wedding at all.
-Take. Violet presses a wad of toilet paper against the prophetic cut, her face terrified as she stares at me. Are you OK?
I snort calmly.
-Yes Yes. It’s not like he lost a limb or anything. The idea of animals tearing off their limbs to escape a trap comes to mind.
Violet frowns.
-Listen. I don’t want you to take this the wrong way, but I need to offer it to you just once or I’ll never forgive myself.
My lips twitch at his serious tone.
-OK. I hear you.
He throws his shoulders back dramatically as he stares at me. He looks at me intently . I feel inclined to look away, but I don’t.
“If you don’t want this.” His free hand points around us. If you need a way out. If you need a getaway car. I’m your girl. I will not say anything. I will not judge you. But what if this is not right? If you need to run away? Like…” He looks away momentarily, lips intertwined as he carefully weighs his next words. Blink twice or something. OK?