Tom scoffs, but I walk over to him and kick him right in the fucking nuts because I’m on a fucking roller coaster without brakes. Three times in a row, bitch.
“And he prefers the term ‘adult content creator,’ dick. And you know what’s amazing about adult content creators?” I shout over his groans. “People choose to watch him. Every single time. He’s not just fucking people in secret, hiding behind NFTs and crypto and chinos and his fiancé’s money. He gets paid to be seen. You? You couldn’t pay me to look at your dick. I hope it’s broken now.”
“And you,” I hiss at Elodie, who has since run over to help Tom off the ground. “Not fucking cool. Haven’t you ever heard of girl code?”
There’s a beat of stunned silence.
Then my mother shrieks, “Annie!”
I turn to her and fire back in Cantonese. “You should be yelling at him! Your perfect little son-in-law was getting his dick sucked by the maid of honor fifteen minutes ago, and all you can say is my name?”
My dad tries to speak. I talk right over him.
“For once in your lives,” I say, trembling, “you could thank me. Or check on May. Or ask if she's okay. Or maybe—just maybe—you could drag Tom out by his hair and ask him what the fuck he thinks he’s doing cheating on her minutes before the ceremony!”
I gesture around us, to the stunned wedding guests, the shattered silence, the pieces of a lie they all helped build. “You want to be mad at someone? Be mad at him. Not me. I didn’t destroy this. I just refused to let her walk into it blind.”
My voice keeps rising, sharp and fast, powered by years of held-back rage. “You’ve called me selfish since I was twelve, when I told you May didn’t want to be a doctor. You said I was poisoning her, corrupting her, dragging her down. But you didn’t want to hear what she wanted—only what you wanted.”
“I got grounded every time I told you the truth. You told me I was difficult. Dramatic. Disobedient. But I was just trying to protect her—when neither of you ever did.”
I step forward now, my hands shaking. “I cleaned up her messes. I took the fall. I stood between her and every cruel thing you said when she didn’t meet your expectations. I made myself the bad one so she could be your good one. And guess what? I’d do it again. I will always protect her.”
My mother’s face is white. My father is stone. But neither of them moves.
“Just once,” I say, breathless now, “I wanted you to see me. Not as the problem child. But as the person who’s been holding this family together by the seams, even when you were too proud to admit it was always broken.”
The silence is brutal. No apology. No thank-you. Not even a blink.
“You can all go to hell,” I finally announce to the room in English. “I’m gonna go get my sister.”
I search for Nico on my way out of the room. But when I do finally find him, I stumble over my feet, as if it’s now dark, because someone has blown out the final candle lighting the space.
He’s looking at me like I am someone he doesn’t know. As if the mask has cracked, and what’s underneath is something ugly.
And when I finally leave the suite, heart splintering in my chest, I feel something deeper underneath the panic and fear for my sister. I feel grief for both of us. For love lost, right there in that room.
I can’t find May, and she finally picks up the phone after I run all around the hotel for fifteen straight minutes.
“Plum,” I breathe, voice cracking. “Where are you?”
“I’m gone,” she sobs. “I left.”
“What? Where are you? Can I come get you?”
“No, I—” There is a rustle of fabric, and… a deep voice murmuring to her in the background. “It’s okay, Annie.”
“Plum. What thefuck?!Where are you?Who is that?!” I shriek.
“Annie, I’m okay. I’m going to be okay,” she cries. “I swear I’m okay and I’m safe. I swear. I have to go. I can’t be around—” she heaves a shaky breath. “I love you. Thank… Thank you for telling me. None of this is your fault. Thank you. I love you. I’ll see you back home.” She hangs up the phone.
I stare at my phone, feeling adrift and totally lost, standing on the carpeted floor of a random hallway.
And then I get a visit from a friend.
Old Annie taps me on the shoulder. The miserable little attention whore that Tom was talking about, the one whose parents have scolded and blamed and harassed her whole life. The Annie who dated a coke dealer/tattoo artist/criminal for free coke and tattoos. Nasty, selfish, problematic Annie. The Annie that Nico finally got to see.I’m here, she whispers in my ear.Let’s go.
I nod.Okay.
