After My Groom Chose His Wife Over Me

The morning light came through the hospital window too bright, too clean. I stood in front of the mirror in my mother's room and let the nurse zip up the dress.

It was my mother's gown. She'd worn it thirty years ago. The seamstress had taken it in at the waist, let out the hem, replaced the yellowed lace at the collar. The fabric smelled faintly of lavender and mothballs. When I turned, the skirt moved like water.

Margaret sat in her wheelchair by the window, oxygen tubes running beneath the cream-colored shawl draped over her shoulders. She'd insisted on coming. The doctors had argued. She'd signed the release forms anyway.

"You look beautiful," she said. Her voice was thin. Careful.

I smoothed the front of the dress with both hands. The wire around my ribs had been there for three weeks now. I'd learned to breathe around it.

"Thank you for this," I said. "For the dress."

She reached for my hand. Her fingers were cold and light, like bird bones. "Eloise."

I knelt beside the wheelchair. Eye level.

"I need you to know something," she said. She pulled a small folded piece of paper from inside her shawl. Pressed it into my palm. Closed my fingers around it. "Read it later. Not now. Later."

The paper was warm from being against her chest. I tucked it into the hidden pocket inside my coat without looking at it.

"Mom—"

"Later," she repeated. Her eyes were bright. Too bright. "Go. They're waiting for you."

I kissed her forehead. Her skin was thin as tissue paper. Then I stood, picked up my bouquet, and walked out of the room before I could change my mind.

The private ambulance took us to the chapel in silence. Margaret dozed against the pillow. I watched Manhattan slide past the tinted windows—glass towers and scaffolding and people who had no idea what was about to happen.

The baby inside me was twelve weeks old. I'd told no one. Not even my mother.

Especially not my mother.

The chapel was old stone and stained glass, tucked between two modern buildings like something out of time. Three hundred guests filled the pews. I could hear the low murmur of conversation, the rustle of programs, the string quartet playing something soft and forgettable.

They positioned Margaret's wheelchair in the front pew, left side. The nurse adjusted her shawl to hide the oxygen tubes. My mother's hands rested in her lap, folded and still.

I stood alone in the vestibule. No father to walk me down. No bridesmaids. I'd wanted it simple. Clean.

The doors opened.

The music changed. Everyone stood.

I walked.

One step. Then another. The aisle stretched longer than it had during rehearsal. Faces turned toward me—Kian's colleagues, his family, the few friends I still had who hadn't drifted away during six years of being his. I didn't look at them. I looked at the altar.

Kian stood waiting in a charcoal suit, his hands clasped in front of him. When our eyes met, he smiled. It was a good smile. Warm. Relieved.

Like he'd been worried I wouldn't come.

I reached the altar. Took my place beside him. The officiant was an older man with kind eyes and a voice like gravel smoothed by water.

"Dearly beloved," he began.

I felt Kian's hand brush mine. I didn't take it.

The officiant spoke about love. About commitment. About two people choosing each other every day for the rest of their lives. The words washed over me like rain on glass.

I counted my breaths. In for four. Out for four.

Four minutes passed. Maybe five.

Then the doors exploded open.

The sound was a crack of wood against stone that silenced the chapel instantly. The string quartet stopped mid-phrase. Three hundred heads turned.

Aleyna stood in the entrance.

She wore a pale dress—cream or ivory, something soft that made her look like she was dissolving into the light. Her hair fell loose around her shoulders. Her hands trembled at her sides.

She took one step forward. Then another. Then a third.

Her knees buckled.

She collapsed onto the marble floor with a sound that echoed through every corner of the chapel. Her body folded in on itself, graceful even in falling, one hand reaching toward nothing.

Someone gasped. A woman in the back pew stood.

I didn't move.

Kian did.

He dropped my hand—didn't release it, didn't let go gently, just opened his fingers and let it fall—and ran. Down the three altar steps. Up the aisle. Past his mother. Past his business partner. Past every single person who had come to watch him marry me.

He dropped to his knees beside Aleyna and gathered her into his arms.

The officiant stood frozen, his book still open.

I stood at the altar alone.

In the front pew, my mother made a sound. Small. Broken.

I turned toward her.

Her hand was pressed against her chest. Her mouth was open. The shawl had slipped from her shoulders.

I took one step down from the altar.

My heel caught the hem of my dress.

I fell.