It’s a choice.
You made it a hundred times.
And you’d have kept making it for the rest of our lives.”
The officiant, who had lingered near the stage for the traditional toasts, quietly gathered his notes and stepped back into the shadows.
The orchestra did not resume.
For a long moment nobody in that vast, beautiful, ruined room seemed to know what a person was supposed to do next.
Chapter 14 — You Ruined Your Sister’s Wedding
Then, slowly, the guests began to leave.
There was no announcement.
People simply understood that the evening was over — that there would be no first dance, no cutting of the cake, no bouquet toss — and they rose from their tables and gathered their coats and moved toward the doors in a subdued, murmuring tide.
Some of them stopped by Ryan on the way out and gripped his shoulder or shook his hand, wordless gestures of solidarity.
A few stopped near the relatives who’d been charged, offering the awkward comfort of people who’ve witnessed something they’ll be talking about for years.
Nobody stopped for Whitney.
She stood alone at the head of her ruined wedding, and the room emptied around her as though she were a rock in a stream.
I gathered my purse and my coat and started for the doors myself.
I had done what I came to do — or rather, what I hadn’t come to do, but had done anyway, because the moment had finally arrived and I’d finally been ready for it.
I felt no triumph.
I mostly felt tired, and strangely tender, and lighter than I’d felt in years, as though I’d set down a bag I’d been carrying so long I’d forgotten it was optional.