It feels like I’m looking over my shoulder for someone who isn’t there, when I almost cry during the vows and have to stop myself from leaning over to see his reaction; when Mavis’s uncle gives a toast that involves a god-awful slideshow, and my mom doesn’t seem to find it as funny as I do.
I decide that, if this is how things are going to be between us, I need to start having fun without him. It’s a beautiful wedding, my family who I don’t get to see all that much is here, and I don’t often have opportunities to fully unwind like this.
I spend an hour dancing with a couple of my cousins, even Claudia, to a slew of wedding classics, nineties hits, songs they played at bars when we were in college. All around us, people are celebrating, champagne glasses in hand and the sky going dark. I dance with my dad to ABBA, let my mom tell me I look more well rested today.But there’s no one to smirk at her comment with.
By the time anextremelydrunk Charlene takes control of the playlist and leads everyone in a rousing rendition of “All Too Well,” Mavis beaming up at her, the camaraderie around me is too much. I’ve been putting all my energy into proving I can have fun without Ren, into ignoring what’s going on between us, and I’m tired. I wonder, vaguely, as I sing half-heartedly along to the last verse, if it’s not just work that’s been wearing me out, but my relationship with Ren.
When I leave the dance floor, cheeks rosy, Ren is waiting for me at the table, a glass of champagne in each hand. Selfishly, I don’t hate that he looks a little like I feel. But there’s some hope too in the way he tilts toward me, offers me one of the flutes.
I take it, still wary, one arm crossed in front of me like a barrier between us.
“Phone’s off for the rest of the night,” he says.
“Is it?”
“It is.” He taps his knuckles against the back of a chair, a nervous tic. His eyes lock onto mine. “I’m sorry. Can we enjoy the rest of the weekend?”
I want him to mean it, more than anything. Ren has never given me any reason not to trust him. But this weekend has shown me that something real has shifted in our relationship, and the idea makes me unsteady. I try to smile. “Of course.”
Ren nods toward the open barn doors. “Want to?”
We walk out to a seating area set up between the barn and the goat pens. There are even more stars than the night before, sparkling in the deep blue sky. I angle my head back to look at them.
When I drop my gaze, Ren is staring at me. I let the silence sit between us as we communicate something wordlessly.I’m sorryandMe too. And maybeYou don’t need to beandBut I do, because I’ve been doubting our friendshipand there’s no way Ren is actually getting all of this,and I’ve gone and made up some metaphysical connection.
A breeze wafts down from the treetops and I suppress a shiver. Ren sets his glass on a nearby fence post, shrugs off his jacket, and settles it over my shoulders, standing in front of me and tugging at the lapels like he’s trying to bring it tighter around me. He takes a breath, then lets go and walks us in another direction.
We drift over to a small circle of chairs, sinking into two next to each other. I kick off my heels and curl my legs under me, burrow deeper into Ren’s jacket, which smells like him. We look up at the stars, until the silence begins to last too long. I want us to figure this out, not just silently agree it’s over.
I’m tracing the line of the Big Dipper with my eyes when I ask the question I’ve been holding back. “Does Amanda not trust you?” This has to be why he’s been aloof this weekend. Why that moment in the yurt had shut something down in him, why he slept on the ground when he never would have in the past, why he’s been glued to his phone.
I can hear Ren shift in his chair. “Yes, she does. Why are you asking me that?”
I glance over at him. “You just seem so stressed about keeping in touch with her, and she should trust you even if you’re not checking in 24/7. I don’t like seeing you feeling this way.”
“It’s not like that,” Ren says. He leans forward, forearms on his knees, champagne flute dangling between them.
“You’ve hardly looked up from your phone all weekend.”
Ren sits back in his seat again, letting out a sigh. “She just got freaked out,” he says. “When I stopped responding for a while.”
“So she doesn’t trust you,” I say, defensiveness on Ren’s part flashing through me.You have the best person in the world, I’d say to Amanda if she were here now.You have nothing to worry about.
“That’s not it,” Ren says. He thinks for a minute, and my eyes catch on the spot where his teeth sink into his lower lip.“Her last relationship ended badly. The guy was carrying on a whole other relationship for months before she found out. So I think this weekend is just hard for her.”
“Fuck,” I say on an exhale, knowing for sure that I’m the asshole, trying to draw Ren back into every moment like he belongs to me. “If I’d known that, I—”
“No,” Ren says. “I should have reassured her more before I came. If I had, she wouldn’t be calling so much.”
“She knows we’re just friends, right?” I say.
Ren pauses for a moment, then nods. “She does. And, I honestly didn’t think about it until we got here, but—I mean, we’re staying in a room with one bed.”
“We didn’t sleep in it together.”
“You’re right,” Ren says. He goes quiet, then says, “I like Amanda a lot.”
“I gathered.”
