I did not know that across town my oldest daughter was about to do something that would end that wedding, and that the phone call telling me so was, at that moment, already coming.

Chapter 9 — The Call

My phone rang.

It was my cousin — the one person in my family who had stood beside me through all of it, who had not told me to accept the situation, who had simply been on my side.

Her voice was shaking.

“Jessi.

You’re not going to believe what your daughter just did.”

I sat straight up on the couch, and every other thought left my head, and there was only one.