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All the while, Ian was still holding my hand. I looked at his hand. It looked just like it had when we were in Social Circle. I held on tighter and he looked at me for a second. It was like we went away together and came right back. I needed to talk to him. I needed to say what I’d been feeling.
“Can we talk later about—” I tried to whisper, but then the fighting with the parents got louder.
“You don’t even know my daughter to talk about her like that,” Mrs. Bloom said.
“Maybe that’s the problem,” Mrs. Dupree said.
The entire wedding party looked on with their mouths open.
“Esta mujer es un imbécil!” Mrs. Bloom shouted.
“Imbecile?!?” Mrs. Dupree said. “I got your imbecile!” She was about to take off her shoe, but Mr. Dupree stopped her.
“Ian, stop them!” Scarlet yelled at Ian.
Ian let go of my hand. “Mama, stop it. What are you doing? You’re ruining everything. Everyone stop!” His voice shot through the atrium and everyone stopped talking. “Now, listen. We’re going to get through this rehearsal like adults.”
“But I—” Mrs. Dupree tried to jump in.
“Mama, sit down!”
Mrs. Dupree sat with her husband and Ian pointed to Krista to begin again.
She moved me into my place with the bridesmaids and summarized what would happen with Scarlet and Ian during the ceremony. To avoid having another war break out, she and Uncle Cat demonstrated how the wedding party would leave the atrium after the ceremony was over.
Every face in every seat at the dinner in the Belle Suite after the rehearsal was streaked with “salt.” The whimsical, antique charm in the design of the room that was set up to seat twenty-two guests along either side of a long, Tudor-style dinner table was in direct contrast with the inhabitants. After what happened at the rehearsal, folks were picking sides, frowning, and sucking their teeth. While the dinner was supposed to be used to unify us, everyone there seemed so far apart, avoiding eye contact and rolling their eyes way far back in their heads. Things were just that tense.
Ironically, the only smiling face was that of Mrs. Dupree. She seemed to be getting what she’d wanted: the upper hand.
Scarlet’s parents completely stopped speaking in English. They’d refused the food Mr. Dupree had paid for and were going to sit at the table plateless until Krista insisted they put in special orders with the chef.
Sitting between his mother and Scarlet, Ian looked like he was slowly suffocating. I knew I was running out of time, so I tried to make eye contact with him, hoping maybe I could speak to him, but he hardly looked in my direction. Just down and across the table. He’d smile flatly at someone. Accept a hug and a well wish.
The awful air latched onto the champagne toasts. As Krista selected people around the room to share a few words and well wishes with the couple, each speech seemed to focus only on one person. Mrs. Dupree’s speech was about how much she loved Ian. The matron of honor’s speech was about how much she loved Scarlet. After a while, it seemed like they were in a competition to see which one in the pair was the best. Scarlet’s mother sounded like she’d started speaking in tongues in Spanish again when Uncle Cat alluded to Scarlet as having been “lucky” to have met a man as intelligent and strong minded as his nephew. Mr. Dupree looked like he was about to walk out when Scarlet’s father seemed to suggest that he’d kill Ian if he cheated on his sweet, demure little flower of a daughter.
“This is falling apart. I need to say something to get these people together,” Krista whispered in my ear, holding the microphone she’d been giving to people behind her back.
“What?” I waved at Ian again, trying to get his eyes so I could ask him to come meet me outside, but he looked right past me.
“I have no idea what to say,” Krista said.
“I’ll say something.” I reached for the microphone; if I wanted to get Ian’s attention I had to do it right away.
“I don’t think that’s a good idea. Not after what just happened in the—”
I don’t know what came over me, but I snatched the microphone.
“Hello everyone!” I started. I didn’t know what I was about to say, but I was tired of being quiet. I looked at Ian.
He was smiling at me in his way.
Scarlet was right there on his arm. She’d produced a half-decent smile that looked a lot like a friendly grimace in case she was caught on camera. She looked so nervous. Had the tense air that I’d seen on so many brides I’d ushered into their new lives. I knew that this was also my job with her, but I couldn’t think about her at that moment. I was two people—Ian’s best friend, who was in love with him, and the wedding planner. In that moment, I could only satisfy the needs of one of those titles.
“What do we know about love? We know that it’s hard to maintain. It’s hard to control. It’s hard to stop. It’s hard to understand,” I said. “A wise man once told me that none of that matters one bit when you find love. And perhaps that’s the reason love is so sacred to us: it’s hard to find. But when you do find it, you hold onto it. You nurture it. You choose it every day. Abide by it. Invest in it. Protect it with all your heart. Ian, this is how I’ve felt since the first day I met you.” I looked right into Ian’s eyes and locked in, ignoring all the interrogating looks around the room. “You’re more than just my best friend. You’re my heart. The love I found when I wasn’t even looking.” Ian swallowed deeply and his Adam’s apple seemed to stall as it rolled back into position. “And it’s not always easy to love you. But I do. I choose to love you every day. Even when I don’t know it, my heart chooses to love you all on its own. And I hope you’ll choose me, too.” Krista had made her way to the other side of the room and was standing behind Ian rubbing her right ear, which was our internal distress signal for STOP!, but I couldn’t. I had more to say. “Life is about choices. The choices we make and the risks we take.” I started hearing people mumbling and looked over at Mrs. Dupree, who was frozen in a state of amazement. Suddenly, I realized what I was saying. What I was doing?
Krista’s attempt to stop me nonchalantly was out the window. She was cutting herself off at the neck to get me to wrap it up before a riot broke out and Scarlet stabbed me in the eye.
I looked back at Ian. He’d put his arm around Scarlet and was giving me a serviceable smile that openly detailed his desire for me to stop whatever I was doing.
