How to be Forever Alone [#Wattys2020]

55.

I couldn't believe how anxiety-ridden everything got as soon as the final flowers, baby breath, were placed in my hair. From then on, we became a dysfunctional assembly line, we weren't one to begin with, but we got progressively worse to the point where my mom started screaming that we were going to be late. They didn't even give me the time to put on my high heels, I had to run all the way down to the black car in my bare feet. The shoes I had worn here in the first place were too "extravagant", as my mother put it. I think she thought that I was going to wear them during the ceremony, which I wasn't, yet it bugs me a little that she thinks I would. I'm not that evil. I do care about my brother's happiness and I still have plenty of time later to annoy the crap out of him.

Once we had arrived at the small church, and with my feet firmly in my light tan heels, we hurried as quickly as we could up the stairs and through the doors without making much of a scene. And, I wasn't sure why everyone was freaking out, because Robin wasn't going to show up for another ten minutes. On the other side of all of this, I quickly searched the room to see if I could find Tess or even Chase, I needed a sign, but they weren't here. Not everyone had shown up yet either, so for a while, I still held some hope that they would come.

When the church organ started playing and I had to stand up beside my brother at the altar, something in me just shut off. My inner auto-pilot held up that fake smile for the whole hour, I don't even think it was convincing, except maybe for the photos, but I had to keep going for Flint's sake. I had to at least pretend to be happy for him, yet behind this wall in my head, there's a crying girl who believed that she could be just as in love as everyone around her. It's horrible to think at one point she didn't even want anything to do with love, but maybe she was right, it's just absolute torture to think about it all.

I followed behind the wedding party as we left for the banquet hall about ten minutes away. The roads were covered in black ice making the ride a little more tumultuous than usual, but we all seemed to have made it there in one piece. 

I've never really understood the whole thing about announcing a newly married couple when they enter their reception for the first time. It's not like it's news for anyone who's actually here.

Hooray! Congratz! Now you're stuck together forever, hopefully.

With dinner and speech after speech, I probably had about three or maybe four glasses of champagne. I drank them slowly enough that it wouldn't give me too much of a buzz, but perhaps it would give me the opportunity to let loose just a little. Knowing myself, at this point, I should have known that it would do utterly nothing. All I could feel was the pins and needles from sitting on my left leg tucked under me on the chair.

As soon as the last toast was made and everyone got up to dance, I made it a priority to get out of the room and take a minute outside.

I don't know why I was expecting it to be warmer than it was. It's the middle of winter and this minus 20 degrees temperature seemed to soothe me more than any of the alcohol did for my soul. One breath and then another, I hoped that I would just freeze out here and forget any hope I had of seeing her... the only person that I know deep down that I've loved, like really loved and I went and screwed it all up.

She was never going to forgive you. You've known this all along, I know you have.

For a second, I was sure that I could feel my tears pooling under my eyes and turning to ice as they fell down off my chin. The only thing that stopped me was the slamming of a car door out too far in the parking lot for me to see, especially since all the daylight had faded away.

I take the right sleeve of my suite grasped in my hand and try wiping away any evidence that I had been crying. I still don't want to go inside either, so I move off to the side of the entrance and lean on the old metal railing leading down the few stairs that were there.

When I hear more movement coming towards me, I look to see who it is. For a minute I only notice the slight light coming from the reflection of the moon contouring the two people walking arm in arm towards me. Their conversation just sounded like mumbles to me, so I stopped paying attention, but when they went silent I decided to gaze up again. They stood there and didn't take another step. I straightened myself out.

"Hi," the most beautiful woman in the world says in her pink silk dress.

I didn't know if I should run up to her. I didn't know if I should just stay where I am, yet everything was telling me to hold her in my arms.

When she lets go of Chase's arm and starts walking closer to me, I walk down the steps to meet her.

"Tess," I say my heart pounding out of my chest, "I'm... I'm so sorry. I'm an absolute idiot. I get it if you never want to talk to me again. What I did was not okay. I-"

"Shut up."

"What?" I question her words.

"Shut up and kiss me."

She pulls me in close and wraps her right arm around my waist and places her other hand on my cheek. I barely had time to figure out what to do when she placed her lips on mine. Her warmth broke through every frozen part of my body and it was almost impossible to describe this lightness I felt from the tips of my toes to the ends of the hairs on my head.

When we part, I couldn't help but tell her, "I love you."

We lingered millimetres apart taking in all of each other. Every breath and smile and touch from her hands brought me back from the empty corpse I felt like for so long.

After standing on the snow-covered pavement for so long I could begin to feel the frost spread up from my feet and up my legs. This coldness ended near the right side of my hip where I could sense something digging into me. I look to see a porcelain figure grasped in Tess's hand. She pulls it out from behind me to give me a better look.

I tried to hold back my laughter, "You brought it all the way here? I sent that for Potato."

The figurine used to sit on the shelf above my desk. It was a sparkling hollowed cat that I ended up using as a paperweight when I was in high school.

"It's too big for his bowl," she replies.

"...But you got my letter..." I was scared of saying those words.

"I got every single one of them. I didn't read them until a few days ago," she says almost ashamed to tell me. "I've missed you... a lot. I was angry and sad for so long, but I kept all those letters and something inside me knew that this wasn't over. You're crazy and insane and write in that stupid journal and I... after everything, still love you, Claire Paisley."