Oh, how I wish I had asked Jordan to be my maid of honor, but, given that she’s an attorney at a large firm with a large billable hour requirement and travels so much for work, I didn’t want to put that burden on her. Also, I know weddings aren’t quite her thing, so I was grateful that she even agreed to be a bridesmaid.
“I feel like Neil is the one who should be making these calls.” I take another sip of my drink before continuing. “You know, the one who calls it off should do the calling.”
“Agreed. But you know that’s not going to happen.”
“Right. Or maybe my backstabbing maid of honor should do it?”
Jordan shakes her head. “I still can’t believe that. I mean, I guess I do believe it a little. …” She pauses and then frowns. “Except that I don’t.”
“In hindsight, maybe I can see it,” I grudgingly admit.
My cheeks grow hot and I shrink into myself as I remember how Stacey flirted with Neil. She was always hugging him, touching his arm, or tapping his knee. And, of course, everything and anything he said, she always laughed the loudest, sympathized the most, or complimented to over-the-top heights. I had assumed she was turning on the charm toward Neil for my benefit, and—stupid me—more than once I thought about how lucky I was that my friend and fiancé got along so well.
I suspect Jordan noticed it too but doesn’t want to kick me when I’m already down. Although she does say, “Remember when you were trying on wedding dresses?”
I groan. “Yes.”
“Ugh. Every time you tried something on that was gorgeous on you, she’d make that weird face and say, ‘You’re so pretty, but I just don’t think it works on you,’ in a totally passive-aggressive way.” Jordan purses her lips and scrunches up her nose, mimicking Stacey that day.
I emit a bitter laugh both at Jordan’s dead-on impression and the memory. “Yeah, then she’d pull out some fluffy horrid monstrosity—‘just for fun’—but then she’d always gasp and say, ‘This is the one!’” I dramatically gasp and clutch my heart, à la Stacey.
“When it sooo clearly was not!” Jordan adds. “What a cow.”
This makes me think of my beautiful wedding dress being made right now. I had selected a figure-hugging, ivory, silk charmeuse gown with a plunging back. It was elegant and graceful and perfect for the sophisticated Chicago hotel wedding I had planned.
“Well, despite Stacey’s ‘help,’ you picked the right one.” Jordan pats my hand.
I sigh in response, since it seems beside the point now.
“So, speaking of difficult personalities, have you told your parents yet?” Jordan asks.
“Not yet. Somehow I can mentally handle canceling the wedding stuff, but not that call to my parents.” More specifically to Theresa James, my mother. I brighten up for a second with a thought. “Hey, you did such a great job calling Neil today, so perhaps you can make the call to my mom?”
“Sorry, Allie. You know I love you, but even love has its limits.”
I’m the only daughter of Patrick and Theresa James, both of whom desperately want a grandchild. While I think my dad has resigned himself to my choice (or more like happenstance circumstances) to focus on my career first before children, Theresa, not so much. I can’t even count how many times the discussion of freezing my eggs has come up. Neil and I had planned to start a family right after the wedding. Unfortunately, Neil running off with Stacey wasn’t in the plan. I’m still in a state of shock. But my mother? She may have to be placed on suicide watch.
“Anyway, I can’t think about it right now. I’ll think about that tomorrow,” I say, in what I hope sounds more like a Scarlett O’Hara impression than an ostrich with its head in the sand.
“Didn’t someone famous once say that?”
“Shut up and finish your drink.”
Jordan laughs and when she does I notice that two guys around our age turn around. Jordan follows my eyes and notices them. Holding her glass up to hide her lips, she comments, “Cute.”
I nod, then pick up my drink and take another sip. I’m obviously not into men at the moment, but I can pretend to appreciate them for Jordan’s sake.
One guy nudges the other and says something, and then they both turn their attention back to the bar and away from us.
“Oh, well. I thought for a second that my two days of singlehood were going to pick up.” I intend this to come out jokingly; instead, the words sound morbid when I actually say them.
Jordan looks at my hand holding my drink. “It’s your ring!”
“Oh, yeah. My ring,” I say, suddenly sad again. I hold out my left hand and admire the large, cushion-cut diamond embraced by smaller diamonds on their platinum Tiffany band and sigh. “I really, really love this ring.”
I’ve been wearing it every day for almost six months now, and even though the engagement is over, I’ve kept it on the last couple days out of habit … or so I tell myself. Once it’s off my finger, it will be off for good, and I’m not quite ready to break up with it.
Neil had let me choose my own ring. For years, we had talked about getting married and when it would be most convenient for us. There was no mystery of the “will he or won’t he ask” variety. (Though, admittedly, later on, his ideal timing for marriage and kids seemed to be a moving target.) The only question was “when.” With my thirty-fifth birthday approaching (and my fertility dwindling), I decided “when” was now or never, and Neil acquiesced. Even though I picked out my ring in August, he still left me sweating for the next several months. I had thought that over the three-day Labor Day weekend, when we visited his parents’ summerhouse in Michigan, he would propose. But no. Then I thought surely he would do it before Thanksgiving, so we could announce it to everyone at dinner. Still no proposal. By the time Christmas was around the corner, I was quietly freaking out.
The night before Christmas Eve, Neil took me on a snowy horse-drawn carriage ride through Chicago. Since it was unlike him to plan an elaborate date night, I was fully expecting him to propose in the carriage and so I kept my gloves stuffed in my purse. Even though the ride was “romantic,” the shivering was a slight problem, and I worried that we would drop the ring or I’d lose my ring finger to frostbite. Turned out that I didn’t need to worry about dropping the ring. The carriage ride ended at Spiaggia, an Italian restaurant at the top of Michigan Avenue. All during the meal, I kept waiting for Neil to get down on a bended knee, but he didn’t. When he insisted that we order dessert, I figured that he must have hidden my ring in it, and so I played along even though I rarely order dessert. The idea of my beautiful ring buried in the flourless chocolate cake we shared made me shudder, but after a few tentative bites, it became clear that nothing was hidden except the calorie count. After dinner, we headed home in a cab, with no proposal and no ring.
When we got home that night, I couldn’t help myself and blurted out wistfully, “That was such a romantic date. I have to be honest, I kind of thought you were going to propose.”
Neil’s face immediately turned red. He paused in the middle of taking off his coat, and I had a moment of dread—Uh-oh, did I just ruin his big moment? Am I pushing? Or, oh god, what if he’s changed his mind?