“I was serious when I said I’d give you dating advice. You can do this the right way, you know.”
He looks a little hurt, and I feel guilty for it. His fiancée did break up with him, after all. But he doesn’t show any animosity when he elaborates. “I’m required by the family trust to be married before my thirty-second birthday.”
Afamily trust? I turn my gaze back to the river. “You’re asking the wrong person.” And here I was thinking Noah was different.
“I actually… I actually thought you’d be great for the role.”
“The what now?”
“It’s temporary. Just to meet a stupid condition. It’s just that… so much depends on this. I thought you’d… you know. Like I said, I’ll make it worth it.” From the corner of my eye, I see him spread his hands as he continues, “We’ll go to Vegas, to avoid questions here. And there’d be an end date, obviously, and… you know… whatever you need. Just ask for it.”
My throat tightens at the sadness of it all. So much so that I can’t look him in the eye and instead focus on the Emerald Creek flowing like a poetic reminder of time passing us by. When tears start prickling my eyes, I take a calming breath.
I doesn’t matter how I feel about this. My hang-ups about marriage have nothing to do with Noah. He’d be a great husband, I know it. And he deserves better than a temporary Vegas sham.
My heart breaks for him. “You don’t need to live your life the way a piece of paper tells you to. If you don’t want to get married, then don’t. Though I hope you do, someday,” I add, my voice catching a little.She’ll be a lucky bitch.
“But when you propose,” I continue, “you need to have butterflies in your stomach and lose your appetite for days before and-and-and… your wedding day needs to be the most beautiful day of your life, and you need to marry your bride in your own garden, under the arch of roses your grandmother planted, overlooking the river.”
I can just see it, touch it. Noah’s wedding should be perfection. He deserves nothing less. “The whole town needs to be there, like today but even better, and everyone will be happy and your wife will be wearing some family heirloom jewel and you’ll have plenty of babies wearing glasses and when they grow up they’ll be driving Ms. Angela crazy and sneaking into Shy Rabit to read forbidden books and you and your wife and all your children will be on the store’s carriage at Laskin and, by the way, you’ll rename the store after her because truthfully that store needs a name.”
Laying out Noah’s married life the way it should play out, is a delicious pain. It’s not like I was ever going to have that type of life. But he should.
So I turn to him to make sure he understands the magnitude of the error he’s willing to make for some stupid reason. “None of this will ever happen if you married Willow-Fontaine-from-the-wrong-side-of-the-tracks in Vegas and divorced her months later. No woman in her right mind would want to marry someone who made such a poor decision! I mean think about it, Noah.”
He takes his glasses off and rubs his eyes. He looks exhausted. “This isn’t about love. It’s… You’re really telling me you’re turning down my financial help becauseIshould have some stupid fairytale wedding althoughyoudon’t believe in marriage? None of this makes sense.”
On the surface he’s right, he’s absolutely right. But we’re way below the surface now. We’re deep into emotions I can’t allow myself to have.
How do I tell him the only reason I won’t marry him is because I wouldn’t be able to bear the fakeness of it all? If I live next to him for months, that crush I’ve been trying to tame will only blossom into something much more. I know it will. And what will be left of me when my time is up?
When just the sound of his voice turns me to mush. When I can feel the phantom brand of his hand on my back. When I know his scent from just a five-minute dance. When I won’t ever hear the tuneI love you babyand not think about him.
In what kind of state will I be after six months of daily exposure?
I can’t subject myself to that kind of torture.
“Think of it as a piece of clothing, Willow. It’s nothing. Doesn’t define who you are. Temporary. Totally returnable. In fact, think of it as just another dress!”
I slip my feet in my shoes and stand, hollowness in my stomach. “You’ll have to find someone else.” Tears spring to my eyes, and I turn away and leave before he can see them.
five
Willow
Five days later and the dress is still on its hanger, unstained, tag dangling to the side. It stares at me every time I go into my bedroom. It watches me sleep. It glistens in the morning, taunting its beauty at me, daring me to return ittoday, never to be mine again. So that someone else can look fabulous wearing it.
Every time I look at it, Noah’s words ring in my memory.“It’s nothing. Doesn’t define who you are. Temporary. Totally returnable.”As if marrying Noah, even on paper, could ever feel as shallow.
Enough.
I’ll return it tomorrow.
Thankfully, tonight I have Game Night to change my mind, so I ditch my work clothes for yoga pants and an oversize T-shirt. Before driving the short distance that separates my apartment inSunrise Farms from town, I go into Kiara and Colt’s apartment one floor below to water their plants.
I took over Colt’s apartment when he moved in with Kiara. We see each other a lot, and I gained a really cool space to call my own. As opposed to renting out the furnished studio apartment above Ms. Angela’s garage, complete with doilies and cross-stitched artwork—which I love (being a stitcher myself), but in moderation. I promised to look after their place while they’re away on their Parisian honeymoon.
Plants watered, I drive down to Cassandra’s lingerie boutique, where the women in Emerald Creek meet on Thursday nights to play games or just gossip. With the sun setting, the sky is turning all hues of pink. The air is humid, and dark clouds on the horizon promise rain. If it’s over by tomorrow, it’ll be a beautiful weekend.
