The Wedding That Was Supposed to Be Mine

Jamie slides an ivory envelope toward me.

“Avery wanted you to have this.”

I see the gold seal and know exactly what it is before I open it.

I thought seeing Avery marry someone else would be the part that hurt.

It is not.

June 14.

The date Avery and I once chose for our own wedding.

I can still see us on the floor of our first apartment,

circling it like the future was guaranteed.

Avery had laughed.

“Promise we will not become one of those couples who keeps waiting for the right time.”

I promised.

Then I spent two years asking for more time.

Jamie watches my face.

“You okay?”

I say yes too quickly.

Because the truth is worse.

I am not jealous of Morgan.

I am jealous of the version of Avery who finally stopped waiting.

And of the version of me who might have existed

if I had been brave enough to stop asking life for later.

I break the seal.

The first line is dated three years ago.

“Dear me on June 14.”

“If everything went right, today you marry Avery.”

I stop breathing for a second.

Then I read the next line.

“But if you do not,

please do not make losing them the day your life stopped.”

My hands go still.

I had written this before I knew we would end.

“You wanted more than a wedding.”

“You wanted courage.

A home that felt like yours.

Work you were proud of.

A life you chose.”

I look at Avery’s invitation again.

June 14 was never proof that Avery took my future.

It was proof that I left my future waiting beside the life we lost.

I was not grieving the life Avery built without me.

I was grieving the one I never built without Avery.