My phone, now resting in my lap, buzzes again. I discreetly flip over the screen.
CONNOR:Are you seriously not going to tell me?
ANNIE:Ask nicely
“And we haven’t even picked a reception venue,” Shannon adds, oblivious to the fact that my attention is split.
I refocus.
“I thought it was going to be at The King’s Glen?”
The local golf course has been her venue of choice for as long as I can remember.
“A lot of our friends have got married there since I first got engaged. It needs to be different.”
I can’t tell if that’s a dig at me or not, so I say nothing.
It strikes me that Shannon is being incredibly evasive about all of this. Whether it’s because she doesn’t want to talk about the wedding or just doesn’t want to talk about it withmeis difficult to parse. Like with the engagement party, it might be that she’s made the strategic decision to tell me absolutely nothing until forty-eight hours before.
CONNOR:Please
“What about that new hotel on Main Street?” I suggest. “You know the old post office that they didup?”
“Mmm. Too small.”
“Really? A girl in my year got married there last summer. I swear she had, like, two hundred people.”
“A lot of important people from the town are going to be invited,” is all she says. “The guest list is going to be really big.”
“Will you go into the city then?”
“No,” Shannon says. “Dan is a councilor. We want it to be local.”
“Of course. Makes sense.”
Again, the conversation stalls. What else does one say to their beloved sister after a long period of estrangement that isn’twhy did you forgive Dan but notme?
CONNOR:I didn’t want to have to do this but…if you don’t tell me what the winning flavor is I will have no choice but to fire you
ANNIE:That’s not very nice
CONNOR:I’m never nice when it comes to ice cream
ANNIE:There’s…so much to unpack there
“And I’m really busy with work,” Shannon says, as if I’ve raised another point she needs to counter. “I’m coming into my busy season. So it might have to wait.”
Have I heard that right? I have never known Shannon to wait foranythingwhere Dan is concerned. This is the girl who dropped out of university in her final year because doing long distance was unthinkable.
I never got the impression that work was particularly important to her, though let’s be honest, I don’t have a clue what’s going on in her life. I’ve never even been to her house.
Maybe she really is busy. Or maybe…she just doesn’t want to marryDan.
My heart leaps at the thought. If Shannon is getting cold feet, I willhappilymake them colder.
“Well, no rush,” I say, trying not to sound eager. “The venue is super important, you need to get it right.”
She breathes a deep sigh (of relief?) as we slow down at a red light. “Exactly.”
