And that time is now. Or… last week.
She wasn’t wrong about this being magical. But that said, everything in me is screaming with the need to get the heck out of here. Getting confirmation this world exists feels dangerous. I can’t shake the feeling that I should learn as little as possible about it before I get out of here and my instincts are imploring me to get far, far away from this purchased destiny immediately.
I don’t have room for magic in my life. And frankly, it scares me. Maybe ten years ago, things would be different, but now? My world of childhood fantasy is colliding with my world of adult responsibility. And I can’t compute.
I can’t even imagine how Ivy’s been feeling.
When Auntie Nelle died, I wasn’t engaged. I was single, with a fresh case of heartache. I met him a couple months after she died. And honestly, I was about to end the relationship with Rick when he surprised me with a very public proposal. I wasn’t feeling it. Wasn’t feeling much at that point due to a whole lot of drama with my parents, not to mention still being in a bit of an emotional rut after my breakup with the guy I was with pre-Rick.
But when Rick proposed after just five months of dating, I told myself it was crazy-romantic and I got caught up with the speech he made, the things he said, the fact that he told me he loved me when no man had said that before. The way he seemed like he really was in love with me.
He slipped that ring on my finger in bed that night, telling me that he’d had the ring made for me, but had forgotten to bring it to the game where he proposed on camera.
The next day, at a brunch with his mother, she sprang it as a suggestion that we get married on his grandparents’ anniversary.
Rick was all over that idea. I thought, at first, they meant the following year. They didn’t; they meant a few months away.
I tried to laugh that off, saying we needed a year to plan, especially after he said there would need to be close to four hundred guests, but in hindsight he and his mom basically bulldozed me. It felt like something between a high-pressure sales technique and an intervention. They convinced me of how happy it’d make everyone if we got married on that special day. Rick’s mom would help. Rick then threw in that he knew a wedding planner. And before I knew it, the date was set, and I was running around planning a huge and lavish wedding like a headless chicken. A headless chicken being directed by two demanding drill sergeants. My future mother-in-law and The Wedding Planner from Hell.
See, Rick’s grandfather had died not long before this and was, in fact, responsible for us meeting at the hospital I work at after he had a heart attack, took a shine to me, and set me up with his grandson.
He was such a character that I found myself checking in on him on another floor the day after admitting him and that’s when he not only introduced me to Rick, but also finagled a way to set us up to go on a coffee date. I wasn’t sure I was ready for things to go anywhere serious as I was still recuperating from heartache, but then I was invited to Mr. Bullock’s coming home party when he was released from the hospital and was quickly pulled into not only the family fold, also the relationship with Rick.
Fast forward and I’ve spent the past few months cram-planning the wedding, getting bossed around by Rick’s mom and the cunty wedding planner, and to say it’s been stressful is an understatement.
Rick insisted cost was no concern – we’d make a profit by the time it was over because his relatives and his mother’s business associates would be generous with their wedding envelopes. I still can’t help but be uneasy about the amount of wedding debt I’ve racked up on my credit cards.
Rick also blew sunshine up my butt telling me he had every faith in my abilities to pull the planning off in time for his grandparents’ anniversary, a week ahead of his thirtieth birthday. He hired that nightmare wedding planner as if that’d make my life easier. But it hasn’t. Sheila has made it worse. Way worse.
I’d have fired her if she weren’t a friend of their family. Because she’s made it ultra-clear that she hates my guts. I’m not expecting everyone to kiss my ass, but she doesn’t even hide that she hates me and it’s her job to help me. And it’s like Rick’s mom thinks that’s funny or something. She gets sheer joy out of seeing me hold my tongue and play politics.