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“You thought?” I was beyond shouting now. My voice had gone quiet in that way that meant I was beyond shocked. Beyond hopeless. I was numb. “You thought it was fine for them to cheat as long as nobody told me about it?”

“I didn’t want to hurt you!”

“No, you didn’t want drama. You didn’t want scandal. You didn’t want to deal with the mess.” I took a step back. Then another. “You sat in the front row, Mom. You watched me walk down that aisle in white, knowing I was about to promise my life to a man who’d been betraying me for years. You cried happy tears while I said my vows to someone who probably fucked Sophie this morning.”

“Samantha…”

“Was everyone in on it? Uncle Ray? Pat? Did everyone know but me?”

Her silence was answer enough. What the actual fuck?

“Jesus Christ.” I ran my hands through my hair, probably destroying whatever was left of my updo. “My whole family knew. My whole family watched me play the fool for two years.”

“We wanted to protect you.”

“From what? From making an informed decision about my own life?” I laughed again, but it came out more like a sob. “You didn’t protect me, Mom. You just helped them humiliate me. You made me complicit in my own betrayal.”

“That’s not fair…”

“Fair?” I was done. So fucking done. “You want to talk about fair? Fair would have been telling me before I spent thousands on a wedding. Fair would have been letting me decide if I wanted to marry a cheater. Fair would have been being my mother instead of Sophie’s enabler. You chose to protect her. She’s more your daughter than I ever was.”

“I’m both of your mothers!”

“No.” I shook my head. “No, you’re Sophie’s mother. You always have been. Perfect Sophie who got married first. Perfect Sophie who got pregnant first. Perfect Sophie who could do no wrong.”

“That’s not true…”

“Isn’t it? If I’d been the one sleeping with Joel, would you have kept that secret too? Or is it just Sophie who gets a free pass to destroy lives?”

My mother had no answer for that. Of course she didn’t.

“I’m done,” I said, turning away. “I’m done with all of you.”

“Sam, where are you going? You can’t just leave…”

“Watch me.”

I found my car in the back row of the parking lot. Thank God I’d driven separately to the venue that morning because I’d needed to drop off the centerpieces early. My hands were shaking so badly it took three tries to get the key in the ignition. The engine turned over and I just sat there, wedding dress pooling around the gear shift, bare feet on the pedals because at some point I’d lost my shoes and couldn’t bring myself to care.

I couldn’t go to the hotel. The honeymoon suite was probably already contaminated with Garrett’s concern and false apologies. I couldn’t go home. Home was Garrett’s too, filled with his things and our things and all the lies we’d built together.

I had nowhere to go.

So I drove. No destination, just away. Through downtown Charlotte with its Saturday night crowds who had no idea a bride was falling apart behind tinted windows. Past the restaurants where Garrett and I used to eat. Past the park where he proposed. Past every landmark of a life that had been a lie for two years.

I ended up in the parking lot of Southgate Mall, engine idling, because my hands were shaking too hard to keep driving. The lot was mostly empty this late. A few scattered cars near the movie theater entrance. A janitor pushing a mop bucket through the glass doors.

My phone was still exploding, but I ignored everything and opened a browser instead, typing with trembling fingers: “Houses for sale far from North Carolina.”

I scrolled through listings with the desperation of someone looking for a life raft. Virginia. No, too close. Florida. Fuck. Too humid. Texas… Too big.

A pop up ad caught my eye, a tourism one with rolling green hills and a sunset that looked photoshopped, offering experiences in TENNESSEE THE VOLUNTEER STATE. I stared at it for a long moment, then added “Tennessee” to my search.

That was when I saw it.

A cottage in Cedarbrook, Tennessee. The pictures were terrible. Grainy and clearly taken with a phone from 2010. The house looked like it hadn’t been updated since the Carter administration. The price was suspiciously low…

But fuck, it was perfect.