“That’s…different.”
We reached the “chapel,” aka Hall C, which from a quick glance as the door opened appeared to be a small room with a mural of City Hall painted on the back wall and a few rows of folding chairs. Other couples milled around, some smiling, some staring straight ahead like they were about to be shot into space. There was a vending machine with off-brand sodas and a dispenser of plastic-wrapped roses for twenty dollars a pop. I watched a couple in their eighties buy one, the man with gold-rimmed bifocals holding the rose out to his bride, her hands shaking so badly she nearly dropped it. She laughed, then started to cry, and he kissed her on the cheek. It was so tender I felt my throat close up.
Adam chose two empty seats in the corner, angled so we could watch the whole room. I didn’t miss his wince and the way the color drained from his face. He had physical therapy later today and should be resting this morning, not spending an hour on his feet. But the sooner he could get this money the better.
I lowered myself beside him, and we began to wait.
“What is?” Adam asked after a few minutes.
“What is what?” I asked.
“What is different?”
It took me a second to remember what his question was referring to. He wanted to know what was different about me not sharing things on my mind. “Some thoughts are for the general public and some are not.”
“Ah, so the general public doesn’t get access to Billie Bliss’s internal thoughts?”
“No.”
“What about me?”
If there was one person who definitely didn’t get access to my inner thoughts, it was Adam Knight.
“I am about to become yourhusband.” He held the marriage certificate and wiggled it a little, teasing me.
I rolled my eyes, pretending to act like the fact he’d said that hadn’t caused the butterflies in my stomach to start full-on raving. I’m talking glow sticks, blasting EDM music, dropping E. My entire body was going into flight or fight mode, and for the first time in my life, my instinct was not to stay and fight. I was voting for flight.
Adam must have noticed because he reached for my hand. “Hey.”
I pulled away, not because I didn’t want him to touch me, but because I knew, if he touched me, I might start crying and never stop. I was so angry at myself for being nervous that I wanted to crawl out of my own skin. This was supposed to be a nothing wedding, a blip on the radar, a transactional event with none of the pageantry or meaning of the real thing. I was wearing an off the rack dress from Aritzia not an original Birdie Bliss, like I’d been wearing when I walked down the aisle to Adam. So why was my pulse racing like it was Usain Bolt on an Olympic track, and why did my palms and cheeks feel like they were in a steam room?
“Billie?” Adam said my name so softly, tears sprung to my eyes.
I stood up. “Bathroom. I need to…don’t let them start without me.”
He nodded, watching me walk away, and I could feel his gaze on the back of my neck all the way down the hall. I pushed the door open, and the walls felt like they were closing in.
The bathroom was deserted, with three stalls on one side and mirrors so clean above the sinks they looked like portals to a parallel universe. I locked myself in the middle stall, sat on the toilet, and slowly inhaled the institutional scent of cleanser through my nose, trying to slow down my speeding heartbeat. I counted the tiles on the floor—forty-eight, turquoise blue, with one cracked in the corner—and focused on the sound of my own breathing.
This was stupid. This was so, so stupid. I was marrying a man I… well, let’s just say didn’t hate, a man I could see myself making blueberry pancakes with on Sundays for the rest of my life, and somehow it felt more terrifying than any catastrophe I’d ever managed at work, more paralyzing than any family tragedy I’d ever survived. I should have been calm, even giddy, but instead, I felt raw, exposed, like someone had pulled all my nerves to the surface and left me blinking in the daylight.
After sitting for more time than I cared to admit to and not being able to get myself under control, I stood and flushed the toilet out of habit, then washed my hands, scrubbing harder than necessary, the soap harsh and scented with fake oranges. I stared at myself in the mirror, searching for cracks. From the outside, no one could tell that inside I was having a breakdown. Every hair was in place, and the extra fifteen minutes I’d spent on getting ready paid off, I looked…hot. I did my makeup exactly like they had forThe Vowshoot, I figured go bridal with it. Everything was fine unless you looked in my eyes, there was a panicked expression I couldn’t quite blink away.
“That’s it?” I chastised my reflection. “You’re just going to stand here and freak out?”
The woman in the mirror had no answers. I leaned in closer. “There are worse things to be doing on a Thursday afternoon than marrying the man you love. Even if it’s fake. Even if it’s only for ninety days. You can survive ninety days. You’ve survived worse. You survived the girls getting lice in the first and second grade, you survived parent-teacher conferences when you went to the same school and convincing teachers you were the one responsible, you survived driving to Vegas and back to pick up Birdie after she got alcohol poisoning on her twenty-first birthday, passed out in the Bellagio fountain after she’d had one too many margaritas and her rock star boyfriend ditched her to hang out with his rock idol, and you had to come back to take your final exams on no sleep without our grandparents finding out and worrying, because if they had, it would have given them a heart attack even sooner. You can do this.”
I counted my blessings. My dress, while not classically bridal, was flattering. It was a white, square neck, body contour, tea length dress with thick straps. My nude five inch heels made my calves look great. I had not yet vomited, which felt like a win.
So why was my heart trying to punch its way out of my chest? Why did I feel as if, at any moment, someone would call my name and tell me it was all a mistake, that I was not supposed to be here, that I had failed to play by some unwritten rule?
I clutched the edge of the sink and tried to steady myself. I knew the right words. There’s nothing to be nervous about. This is just a legal formality. You’re not even signing up for a lifetime, just a few months. You’re doing the right thing. Adam and the girls need the money.
So why did it feel like all my organs were tangled together, and why did my throat feel as if I’d swallowed a marble? Why did it feel like I was about to pass out or throw up, or both, at any second?
I smiled at my reflection, then cringed at how green I appeared.
“You’re being an idiot,” I told myself in frustration. “What if it were Genesis marrying him?” I blurted out.
