Jamie followed, clearly flustered, as I pulled him a few yards back, over to a spot half-hidden behind the floral arch that served as an altar.
“Sybil, what the—” Jamie cut himself off. His brown eyes widened as he swallowed. “Wow,” he whispered. “You look beautiful. Really beautiful.”
“Thanks,” I whispered back, my lips forming a smaller, sweeter smile than the glowing one I’d tossed to our guests. A smile that was more real, and just for Jamie.
But this little bubble of happiness didn’t last long.
“We should get back over there,” he said stiffly. “Everyone’s waiting for us.”
“Jamie, no, they’ll be fine. We need to talk,” I said with a gentle hand on his arm. “I tried to find you in your hotel suite just now, but they told me they’d already brought you down to the altar.”
“We were running behind schedule,” he said flatly.
“I know. I know it’s all my fault.” I swallowed down the guilt. “Can we talk about where I went?”
“Well, I know it wasn’t to Vegas for an impromptu bachelorette party,” he said.
I felt a stab of guilt and gratefulness toward Willow, Nikki, and Emma for fabricating that story to cover for me, even when they had no idea what I was up to either.
“Did you know I went out there to be with you?” Jamie said. “I thought, ‘sure, I’ll blow off the welcome party and sneak away for a night in Vegas too. I can be spontaneous and fun, like Sybil.’ But when I showed up with the guys, you weren’t there. You weren’tanywhere. No one could reach you.”
“I know, I’m sorry. I left my phone in an Uber.”
A crease formed between Jamie’s brows—the same one that always appeared when I misplaced things, which, yes, happened pretty often. Keys, lipstick, my wallet, even oncemy left running shoe—while I was actively at the gym. But in this moment, his exasperation wasn’t tempered with its usual fondness.
“Losing your phone isn’t an excuse for being unreachable fortwo whole days. Were you even in Vegas at all? Or was that just a lie?”
I sucked in a breath. Jamie had every right to be upset with me, given the way I had just disappeared, but it still hurt to see him so readily think the worst of me. “Yes, I was actually in Vegas.”
I could feel everyone’s eyes on me; could hear the dull murmur of their whispers, wondering what was holding up the ceremony. My gaze drifted upward, as if the right words might be somewhere in the cloudless sky.
“Sybil,” Jamie said imploringly, bringing me back to the present moment. “Why? Why did you go?”
“I went to see Gwendolyn Green.” It was the most surface-level answer to his question, but it was the only place I could think to start my explanation.
Jamie looked at me like I’d grown a second head. “That woo-woo woman?”
“She’s a wellness coach,” I said, trying to push down the prickle of annoyance at Jamie’s dismissiveness. “I should have told you I was going to see her, but I was just so in my head. I—it’s been a really, really hard weekend for me.” I tried to find the right words, where to begin. “I needed some advice. Some clarity, I mean.”
“Clarity?” he repeated, and I could see he was getting fed up. It was all coming out wrong.
“Everything has been moving so fast, and then thisweekend I just—something happened. I started spiraling and wondering if I could evendothis, because—”
“Good,” Jamie said, his voice sharp and brittle. It was like something inside him had snapped. The Resting Asshole Face evaporated, leaving raw emotion in its wake. I’d never seen Jamie look so broken. Not even when his grandfather died. “Because I’m not sure I can do this either, Sybil.”
My heart plummeted to my stomach.
Jamie ran a hand through his hair, turning over his shoulder to look back at our family and friends. “You completely abandoned me this weekend. Everyone was asking for you, and I was forced to lie to them. It was humiliating.”
The truth hit me like a ton of bricks. I’d been so focused on my own drama, and then on the fear of ruining everything, that I ended up doing exactly that. “I’m so sorry, Jamie.”
“And you know what the worst part is? Part of me wasn’t even surprised.”
I flinched as if he’d reached out and slapped me.
“Don’t say that—I love you,I’m here, Jamie.”
“For now,” he says, “but what about five years from now? What about when you get bored? What about when we havekids, Sybil? You can’t fuck off to who-knows-where when there are people counting on you.”
