“Exactly. They see him out with girls who are supposed to be my friends, then getting particularly cozy with my former next-door neighbor, and they decide it’s a good idea to wait until after he leaves me at the altar to let me know,” I said. “That has been one of the most eye-opening things of this whole experience. I used to think people should leave well enough alone and mind their own business when it came to other people’s relationships. That it wasn’t somebody else’s place to talk about people cheating.”
“Not so much anymore?” he asked.
“No. Definitely not. Now all I can think is that if one of them had spoken up about something they noticed before, I could have avoided this whole debacle.”
“Absolutely,” he said.
“You know what, though? As much as it hurts and as much as there are still times when I feel sad, I really kind of feel relieved. Like I dodged a serious bullet. It’s not that I’m sad that he’s out of my life. It’s more just sad for what I thought we had,” I said.
“I absolutely think you dodged a bullet,” Nick said. “You never should have agreed to marry him in the first place.”
I laughed. “You’re just saying that because you’re my big brother and would say it about anybody.”
He nodded. “I’m not going to argue that.”
Nick pulled up in front of our parents’ house, and I was surprised at how short the drive felt. Being with my brother again and being able to talk about everything that was going on felt good. Now the reality of what was happening settled in again. I really was back in my hometown and getting ready to move in with my parents again because my marriage fell through before it even started.
That definitely wasn’t where I thought I would be at this juncture in my life. It wasn’t where I thought I would be at any juncture in my life.
I let out a sigh, and Nick looked over at me.
“Are you sure you don’t want to stay with me?”
I shook my head. “Thanks, but it’s okay. I’ll be fine with Mom and Dad. Besides, they’re expecting me.”
“Alright, but if Mom gets overwhelming and you just can’t take it anymore, you can always change your mind and come stay with me,” he said.
“Thank you. I might hold you to that.”
I took one more second to brace myself and opened the door. Just as I was climbing out of the car, the front door to my parents’ house opened and Melissa came bounding out. My best friend ran toward me with her arms thrown out open to her sides and flung them around me when she got close enough. She held me tight, rocking me back and forth like I’d just come home from war.
“I’m so glad to see you,” she said.
I laughed. “Melissa, the wedding-that-wasn’t was three weeks ago. You were there for that.”
Since Melissa moved back to Astoria, we didn’t get to see each other anywhere near as much as we would like to but seeing her twice in less than a month felt like a pretty good run. Even if the last time was something I wanted to wipe out of my memory completely.
“I know. But I just wanted to make sure you’re okay,” she said. “I hate that I couldn’t stay with you after everything.”
“It’s not your fault,” I said.
I stepped away from her and into the hug offered first by my mother and then by my father. They then hugged Nick. With the hugs all around finished, my mother pointed behind her to the open door.
“Come on inside,” she said. “We’ll get some lunch.”
I didn’t realize how hungry I was until right then. Nick brought my luggage inside for me and left it in the living room as we went into the kitchen to sit around the table and talk while Mom made her famous tuna melts. The bright, vinegary cucumber salad she put on the side was a taste of home, and I couldn’t help but smile when my father peeled his sandwich apart to sneak potato chips inside.
How well this all was really going to work out had yet to be seen, but for right now, I was happy to be home.
3
Tyler
I found myself wandering the aisles of the grocery store and quickly filling my cart with anything that looked remotely tasty. I benefited from good genetics and a strong work ethic for keeping my body in shape after years of playing high school sports, so a bag or two of cookies wasn’t going to throw my entire game off. But as I stared down into the metal cart, I was starting to doubt that my metabolic gift and my regimen of sit-ups and push-ups was going to be enough to work off the calories therein.