Page 127 of Slapshot Bride

It’s the first time I’ve seen her in what? Two months? Three?

Has it been that long since I ran away?

Her face is a mix of relief, grief, and hope. But her smile is what catches my heart. All at once, she moves, and so do I. The distance closes. She reaches for me, and I do the same. We embrace, and a sob breaks from my lips.

“Oh, Riley…” She pats my back gently, and I hear her own sob. “Honey… I’m glad you’re back.”

We pull apart, and I smile.

“Me too, mom. I… I’ve missed you, and Dad too.”

She hugs me again and kisses my cheek.

“Come.” She takes my hand and leads me in. I steal one last glance at Easton, and he winks.

I look at my mom. She hasn’t yet acknowledged the car, or the man inside, but I know it’s coming.

My father is in his chair in the living room. He stands when I come in.

“Riley.” A pause. “You look thin.”

I smile. Typical dad.

“I’m fine, Dad. I promise.”

My mom lets go of my hand, and I meet him. He hugs me without hesitation, burying his nose in my hair.

“God, you scared us. Don’t ever pull this stunt again.”

I laugh.

“Can’t say…”

“Riley…” He glares at me, and I chuckle.

“I’ll be more open next time. About everything, before it gets this far.”

The look in his eyes… All I see is a man who’s been worried for his little girl. That’s how he’s always seen me.

I pull away and look around, exhaling. I’ve missed home. I’ve missed being here, just to spend time with them. I’ve missed all of it. The life I had before Preston. But now, I’m here to get it back.

I sit on the couch across from him. My mother perches beside me, close, her hand finding my knee. I let it stay there.

“Mom, Dad…” When I see I have their undivided attention, I proceed. “I’m sorry for running away. At the time, it was the only way I could pass the message that I no longer wanted to be with him. I know, I chose the wrong time to do that. I should have said something when things began to get out of hand, but I didn’t think you’d believe me. Preston… he’s… he’s so charming to everyone, a-and I don’t…” I drag in a deep breath and look at them.

I see the confusion on their faces.

They still don’t understand it.

So, I start at the beginning, which is not the wedding. The beginning is years before that.

I tell them about the friends who became, one by one, problems Preston had reasonable-sounding concerns about, until my phone stopped ringing and I told myself I’d simply grown out of people. I tell them about the photography I put in a box in a closet because he called it cute, and how a grown woman can be talked out of the one thing that’s hers so gently she doesn’t feel the hands doing it.

“He never yelled,” I say. “That’s what you have to understand. There’s no bruise. There’s no screaming match you’d have heard about. He explained me out of my own life so patiently that for six years I thought I was the one who kept getting things wrong.”

My mother’s hand tightens on my knee.

I tell them about the cheating. Not just the hallway on the wedding day—the first time, a year and a half ago, when I found nothing I could prove and asked him anyway, and he sat me down and told me how worried he was about my anxiety, and by the end of the week, I was the one apologizing. I tell them how he called them that time. How he framed it as concern. How he took me to Cabo, and I came home grateful.