I grab the only thing in this room that feels remotely mine: my old denim jacket. The bridal stylist had side-eyed it this morning like it might stain the air. I press it to my face anyway. It smells faintly of vanilla andhome, and the instant I do, my lungs remember how to work.
Nothing has felt right for a long time.
Not just the wedding. Not just the way my dress costs more than my first car or the fact that my flowers were “curated” by a designer with her own reality show. It’s all of it. The last year. The way my life has quietly shifted into something glossy and heavy, and so far from anything that ever felt like me.
A sharp knock sounds on the door.
“Faith? Sweetheart?” It’s the wedding planner. “We really do need to line you up now. Your father’s asking.”
Of course he is.
A familiar numbness tries to slide over me, the same kind that got me through all the tastings and walkthroughs and seating charts. Just smile, Faith. Just nod. Just say, “Whatever you think is best, Dad.” He loves you. He knows what he’s doing. He’s built a life where nothing ever cracks or fails or embarrasses him.
“I just need another minute,” I call, hoping my voice doesn’t betray the fact that I’m hanging on by a fraying thread. “Please.”
A tiny pause. Then the wedding planner’s brisk, “One minute,” follows, and her clipped heels retreat down the hallway.
One minute.
One minute to decide if I’m going to walk out there and give away the next fifty years of my life because everyone expects me to.
I drag in a breath. It scrapes on the way down.
I think of my job. “Our little stepping stone,” as my father calls it. The one he arranged with his old college buddy, Charles Whitmore, CEO of Whitmore Event Holdings. It sounds glamorous on paper: assistant coordinator for high-profile events. Charity galas. Product launches. Holiday parties where you have to sign an NDA just to refill the champagne tower.
What it really means is twelve-hour days, making other people’s nights look magical while they drift past me as if I’m part of the decor. I design floor plans and draft schedules and remember that Mrs. Stanton is allergic to shellfish, that the CEO’s wife hates sitting near speakers, that the lighting needs to be blue, not purple, because purple “doesn’t photograph well.”
I don’t get credit. I don’t get thanks. Charles barely looks at me unless it’s to squint over the top of his glasses and say, “Your father tells me you’re still getting the hang of this, Faith. Don’t worry, we’ll get you there.”
We.
Like I’m another one of his little investments that my father dropped onto his desk.
The last event I worked before the wedding was a corporate holiday party in a hotel ballroom just like this one. White linens. Crystal. A string quartet in the corner playing unobtrusive carols while men in expensive suits talked about fourth quarter earnings, and women in glittering dresses nodded and laughed and pretended they weren’t exhausted. I stood near a pillar with my tablet, making sure the caterers were on time and the speeches didn’t run over. Not one person knew my name. Not one person cared.
That’s where I keep ending up lately: in rooms full of people where I’m invisible.
Except to my father when he needs me to smile and to Evan when he needs me to fit into a polished picture.
I am so tired of being a prop.
“Get it together,” I whisper, but my voice shakes.
I press my fingertips into my thighs through the satin, trying to ground myself in something solid.
In the mirror, the bride in the white dress stares back at me with wide green eyes that don’t look like mine. She looksstunned. Like someone painted a smile on a mannequin and forgot to teach her how to breathe.
Another knock, sharper this time. I flinch.
“Miss Ross?” The makeup artist filters through the door. “Just going to do a final touch-up, okay?”
“No!” The word bursts out of me too fast, too loud. I scramble to soften it. “I mean no more preparations, please. Could I just… have the room? For a few minutes? I really do need to center myself.”
There’s a murmur on the other side, multiple voices consulting, before the door eases open an inch and a perfectly contoured face peeks in.
“Are you sure? We’re cutting it close.”
“I’m sure.” I force a smile so my refusal looks less likepanicand more like poise. “I just need a moment alone. Really. I’ll be right out.”
