My eyes burn when I crack them open to find bright light streaming through my windows. I’m asleep on top of my bed, and must have been too tired or too hot to get under the covers when I snuck back to my own room in the early hours of the morning.
There’s pounding on my door, as though someone has knocked a few times and is frustrated that I haven’t answered yet. A small part of me worries it might be Nicholas, or whoever he really is, upset that I snuck out of his room. But when I push myself off the bed and look through the peephole in the hotel room door, my mom stands there looking equal parts peppy and annoyed.
I guess her flight got in okay this morning. I swing open the door and force a bright smile onto my face. “Hi, Mom!”
She lets out a deep sigh as she sweeps her highlighted blonde hair off her shoulder. “Oh good, she lives.” Her eyes scan my face and track down my body, taking in my rumpled dress from last night that I never changed out of. “Rough night?”
“Sort of. I got caught in the rain coming back from dinner, and didn’t get much sleep because of the storm.” Damn, that lie came a little too easy. At least it’s partially true.
“That’s okay, our spa day and a good makeup artist will do wonders for those bags under your eyes and your puffy face.”
The way she says it so cheerfully, like she’s trying to convince herself that she can somehow change the way I look so I don’t ruin her wedding photos, is an instant reminder of why I see her as infrequently as possible.
At least this time, with her flight delay and the wedding happening tonight, the weekend will be over before I know it. I should be thanking the weather gods for their intervention, because last night wasexactlywhat I needed. And if my phone hadn’t died in the middle of the night with no way to charge it, I’d text AJ and tell her she was absolutely right about having a vacation fling.
Best sex of my life, with a hot guy I’ll never see again and who therefore can’t disappoint me. Less than twenty-four hours into the weekend, and I’m already winning.
“With the power outage, is the spa even open?” I ask. Honestly, I hope that it is because my whole body is sore from last night’s activities, and the massage my mom said she booked sounds perfect.
“It is,” she confirms. “They have a generator, and they’re expecting power to be restored to the rest of the hotel before tonight, so it shouldn’t impact our wedding dinner. I did have to talk to the wedding planner when I arrived about the condition of the outdoor space, though. It’s absolutely unacceptable to expect that I’ll be getting married with palm fronds and flower buds littering the ground.”
I try not to laugh, I really do. But the amused giggle slips out anyway. My mom’s eyes narrow in response.
“Sorry, it’s just that, you know... tropical storm cleanup probably takes a while.”
“It wasn’t like it was a hurricane,” she says with a dramatic eye roll as she walks into my room, forcing me to step back inthe narrow hallway to accommodate her entrance. “I still can’t believe they cancelled our flight and then we arrived to the resort looking like this.”
“Well, I certainly hope they apologized for the inconvenience,” I say as I close the door. When I turn to face her, she’s looking at me like she’s not sure if I’m being sarcastic or if I genuinely expected either the airline or the hotel to apologize that a tropical storm dared to interrupt my mother’s plans.
“One would think,” she says, then sighs. “Why don’t you get changed and clean yourself up so we can head to the spa.”
I try not to shake my head as I gather up a change of undergarments and clothes and head into the bathroom. I used to let my mom, and her small, cutting remarks—likerough nightandbags under your eyesandclean yourself up—get to me. It’s not like anything she’s said isn’t true, it’s that the remarks are unnecessary. Looking in the bathroom mirror, I can see how much of a wreck I am. I didn’t need her commentary on it.
At least the fact that she’s always made negative comments about my appearance taught me to do better. I’d never want to make anyone feel the way my mom constantly makes me feel.
Two more days.
“You look beautiful,” my mom says, as we stand under the overhang of the open bar. Now that it’s not raining, the glass doors have all been slid open along a huge track that leaves two entire sides of the bar wide open, nothing but the spectacular view of the bay beyond the balcony. The bright turquoise water becomes a lighter aqua as it approaches the shore and meets the pale pink sands that Bermuda is famous for.
“Thanks,” I say, truly grateful that she didn’t follow up with a remark about how much better I look now that a hairstylist and makeup artist have gotten their hands on me.
The hotel’s wedding planner standing next to my mom curves her hand behind her ear and takes a few steps forward to peek over the balcony that runs along the edge of the room.
“There’s the music, and it looks like we’re ready to go. Morgan, you’re going to go first. Be careful on the wooden path that leads along the cliffside because it may still be a bit slippery from all the rain. And then once you walk under the moon gate, you can take your place to the left of the officiant. Make sure to leave room for your mom. She’ll follow about thirty seconds behind you.”
I roll my shoulders, which are sore from the way the massage therapist tried to work the knots out while simultaneously asking me why I was so tense.
“Will do,” I say. I’m so flipping proud of myself at how I resist the urge to tell her how familiar I am with this process since it’s the third time I’ve done this with my mom.
I give my mom a small, encouraging smile and then turn to walk down the path. Even though this experience is old hat at this point, it’s the first time I will be meeting my future stepfather and stepbrother at the wedding itself. Even if my mom’s flight hadn’t been delayed a day, meeting them the evening before the wedding would still have been weird.
I navigate the beginning of the wooden path carefully so I don’t slip in my heels. Had I known I’d be traversing slick wooden slats, I wouldn’t have chosen three-inch heels with a single wide fabric strap across my toes.
The palm trees block my view of the deck until I’m at the bottom of the walkway. In front of me is one of the circular stone archways, or moon gates, that are built around Bermuda. Beyond it, I see the officiant standing at the farthest point of theround deck, and to the right of her I see the tan linen pants and matching brown shoes of two men, but their bodies are blocked by the thick stone arch and the flowering hibiscus plants that extend from the opening back around the edge of round deck where the wedding will take place.
Beyond them, there’s nothing but the beautiful water with shades of blue I’d never seen before coming to this island. It’s so serene, it’s hard to imagine that a tropical storm blew through here last night.
As I take the final step to the moon gate, a chill runs up my spine and trails its tentacles along my skin. But the air is humid and hot, the soft breeze too warm to cause a chill.
