The Wedding Veil(17)
He was trying to maintain his usual upbeat attitude, but I could see in his face that he knew what was happening.
I shook my head, tears filling my eyes.
“Jules,” he said softly. “It’s okay. We still have five minutes before the service starts. We can pretend this never happened.”
I was swamped with guilt. I had sworn I would never leave him. “I can’t marry you, Hayes. I’m sorry.”
“Jules, come on. We’ve been through all this.”
“I love you,” I whispered. “But I can’t live my life like this.”
“But—”
I put my hand up. “I can’t marry someone I don’t trust.”
“After all this time, after all these years, after all this love, you trust an old video more than you trust me?”
That was the root of the problem—I trusted an anonymous video more than I trusted the man I was supposed to marry. Even still, I let him pull me to him one last time; I let him kiss me. Even after all these years, he made me melt; because of all these years, we fit together seamlessly. I felt breathless in his arms. Just as I was about to change my mind about leaving him, though, I thought of Chrissy Matthews. Had he made her feel breathless too? Did he have what we had with someone else? My heart shattered all over again.
“I can’t go through with it, Hayes. I’m sorry.”
He just shook his head, staring at the ground. Then he looked back up at me. “Go on our honeymoon.”
“What?”
“Right now. Change your ticket on your Delta app. Get your bags out of my trunk. Take some time. Clear your head.” He rubbed my arms. “You’ll come back to me after you do some thinking. I know you will.”
That was when I knew, for sure, that he had cheated on me. Jilted men do not offer free honeymoons if they don’t feel guilty about something. They just don’t.
As I climbed back into Babs’s car to leave the church for the second time that day, Alice ran out, clipboard in hand. “Where have you been? We’re off schedule!”
Hayes almost looked amused when he put his arm around her and said, “I think you can throw the schedule out, Alice.”
Now, three hours later, on a tiny commuter flight, “What can I get you, shug?” rang out, making me jump. The flight attendant in her blue Delta uniform was wearing tons of makeup, and she looked tired. I guessed she could have said the same about me.
“Alcohol,” I replied.
She raised her eyebrow. “Uh oh.” She scooped ice into a plastic cup and poured vodka over the top of it. “That bad, huh?”
I nodded as she splashed Dasani Lime over the vodka.
“I’m going on my honeymoon.”
She looked around and, obviously not identifying anyone who could be my brand-new husband, said simply, “This one is on the house.”
I took a swig that burned as it went down as she handed me a pack of cookies and moved down the aisle.
The few sips of vodka must have done the trick because the next thing I heard was the captain’s voice over the loudspeaker: Flight attendants, please prepare the cabin for landing.
I blinked a few times, and it all came flooding back. Today was supposed to be the happiest day of my life. I was supposed to be married. But just a few hours ago, I had changed out of my wedding gown in the airport bathroom and given Sarah my dress. As she’d left the airport lobby, she turned to me and said, “You deserve to find the love of your life, Julia. You deserve someone who sends you flowers and writes you love letters.” I hugged her, my tears wetting her shoulder. As she walked away, still in her bridesmaid’s dress, I felt fiercely alone. I almost didn’t get on the plane. But somewhere deep inside I knew I should. Tears pricked my eyes.
I probably could have slept all the way to St. Thomas had it not been for the plane change in Charlotte. Charlotte. Chrissy Matthews. I was furious all over again. How could Hayes have done this to me? Just like that, my tears dried, and righteous indignation took their seat at the table.
I deplaned and waited around in the Jetway for my valet-tagged bag. I could see my nondescript black suitcase out the small window of the door as a man in an orange vest unloaded it. I grabbed it practically as it touched the floor and was off, suddenly needing some air. I also realized I was positively starving.
Even still, as I walked, I savored the light in the airport atrium. The elegant glass wall rolled and arched into the ceiling, creating a moment of modern splendor in an unlikely place. I wondered how many passengers bustled through this airport every day, never noticing the beauty surrounding them, never considering the hours of brainstorming and drafting, planning and constructing, that went into something like this. I wondered how many people spent their lives missing what was right in front of them.
The line at Chick-fil-A was punishing, but I needed Chick-fil-A. The buttery bun, the two pickles, the crisp, never soggy chicken skin—nothing else would do. As I stood in what was more a massive conglomeration of people than a line, considering the number one with half unsweet tea, half lemonade I’d order, the wedding that wasn’t—and my mother’s furious voice over Babs’s Bluetooth when she told her we had fled—felt so far away. No, not far away. Impossible.
With only three people in front of me, I unzipped the top pocket of my suitcase and reached in. When I didn’t feel my wallet, I rummaged around, grabbing what I thought was a rolled-up T-shirt and instead yanking out a pair of men’s boxers for the entire line to see. But they weren’t Hayes’s brand. And I knew I had put my wallet there.