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Like being caught crying in my wedding dress wasn’t embarrassing enough; I’ve misconstrued why Jack’s ex is here, lied to him and now I’ve pushed him away. I did the one thing I didn’t want to do, but a part of me wonders if this was my way of making him leave on my terms.
He didn’t leave me.
I made him leave.
After I flung off my wedding dress, leaving it in a heap at my front door, I desperately chased after Jack. But in my haste to remove the toxic relationship-ruining dress, I gave Jack enough time to lose me.
I searched the vineyard for what felt like forever, but with a place this massive, it’s easy to find a place to hide, and I wasn’t about to go asking around to see if anyone had seen him.
With my red-rimmed eyes and swollen lips, it’s obvious that I’d been crying and I didn’t need any of my employees delving too deeply into my personal life. That’s already happened once before; no need to make a habit of it.
I left in my car shortly after, driving to all the places I thought Jack might be, trying to remember what he loved when he was here all those years ago. But in the end, I come up short and eventually find myself pulling back into the vineyard on the verge of another breakdown.
When I reach my front door and open it, a gust of wind blows through, ruffling the white silk and tulle that lies crumpled on the floor. I kick at it with a rage that burns inside me.
I hate this fucking dress and everything it once symbolized.
I yank it from the floor, taking everything I feel inside me out on the dress, but damn this well-made piece of shit, because when I try to tear through the fabric with my bare hands, it doesn’t budge.
“What the fuck!” I scream out loud, shaking the dress in front of me like a ragdoll.
Turns out it’s far easier to destroy a wedding than it is the dress, but that doesn’t stop me.
Dragging the dress behind me in a blind rage over how majorly I fucked up with Jack, and with how angry I am at myself for lying to him, for keeping this stupid dress in the first place; I heave it out the back door.
I return to the house paying attention to nothing but the fury I have and my need to rid my life of this fucking dress.
I grab a shitty bottle of red wine from the rack, knowing I’ll never drink it, not even remembering where it came from, and I twist off the top as I widely stride to the open door that leads to my backyard.
Dragging the old metal garbage can from behind the shed, I shove the wedding dress into it as I hold the bottle of wine in my other hand, careful not to spill a drop.
Once the dress stuffed in, I take one long pull from the bottle of wine and pour the rest over the dress, watching the deep red color saturate the bright white.
Taking it in, symbolic of the death of everything I’ve grown to hate, I light the match and toss it in.
The wine is an unnecessary accelerant, because the tulle goes up like a field of hay after a ten-year drought, and the flames practically reach the height of the small cottage’s roof.
I chuckle to myself as I watch it burn, finally feeling lighter and freer than I have in years.
But all of this is at the expense of my relationship with Jack, and while I feel like I have finally rid Nate from my life, a weight still presses down on me; the guilt and enormity of losing Jack.
I feel the tears fall through the laughter that still comes from my lips and when I turn around, I find Ellen watching me from the doorway.
Shaking her head, she says nothing, just walks over to me, her eyes closing in a slow blink as she embraces me.
“Jesus fucking christ, Lauren. What the hell is going on?” she asks as we separate and both take in the raging makeshift bonfire.
“What does it look like? I’m burning my wedding dress,” I state matter of factly. My hands now on my hips as the tears spill from my eyes, noiselessly and cathartic.
“Who would’ve thought it would burn like that?” she says, giving me a little smile as she pokes my side.
“It wasn’t even made in China,” I say in all seriousness, but my voice still has a playful tone to it. It’s not like Ellen or me to take anything seriously, and maybe that’s how I got myself into this whole mess in the first place.
“Do I even want to know what this is about?” Ellen asks after a few seconds of silence, both of us mesmerized by the flames that dance in front of us.
“I fucked up so badly, Ellen. Like the worst I’ve ever done,” I start and the tears return, falling hard and fast as I unload everything on her.
After listening to me ramble on about everything that has happened in the past week since she’s been gone, she smiles at me, but nothing about it is remotely comforting.
