Chapter 4 - The Woman I Had Blamed
Kelsey's words stayed with me long after she drove away.
I don't think he ever intended to give you a real choice.
The problem was that she was right.
But I was not ready to forgive her simply because she had finally admitted it.
“You knew he was asking for something I hadn't agreed to,” I told her before she left.
She stood beside her car with the invitation proof pressed against her cardigan.
“I knew he was pushing you.”
“And you let him.”
“Yes.”
It was the first answer anyone had given me that didn't arrive wrapped in excuses.
I almost wished she had argued.
Instead, she looked exhausted.
“I wanted a wedding my mother could attend,” she said.
I knew her mother had severe arthritis. I had met her twice at holiday gatherings, when she had needed help getting up from low chairs.
“Her surgery is scheduled for July. They don't know how long rehabilitation will take. When our original venue got expensive, I started worrying she wouldn't be able to come.”
That explained the urgency.
It didn't explain why my consent had become expendable.
“You could have told me.”
“I was embarrassed.”
“So you let me be embarrassed instead.”
Kelsey lowered her eyes.
“I did.”
After she left, I returned to work and spent the final hour correcting a drawing with dimensions that should have been checked the previous week.
I measured the same wall three times.
At five, my supervisor, Denise, stopped beside my desk.
“You've had a rough day.”
I didn't ask how she knew.
My eyes probably explained enough.
“I need Friday off,” I said.
“Take it.”
“I haven't finished the warehouse revisions.”
“I'll give them to Mark.”
I stared at her.
Denise was not sentimental. She could spot a misplaced decimal from six feet away and had once sent a birthday cake back because the bakery misspelled someone's name.
“Are you sure?”
“Julia, the building will still be there Monday.”
It was such a practical kindness that I nearly cried.
That evening, Dad was repairing a loose hinge on a kitchen cabinet when I arrived.
He had already made spaghetti.
He watched me place the cream-colored invitation proof on the table.
“What's that?”
“The wedding I apparently agreed to in April.”
He studied it.
Then he looked at me.
“Who printed this?”
“Adrian ordered the proof.”
Dad set down his screwdriver.
“Come sit.”
I sat across from him and told him about the email account, the bank transfer, and what Kelsey had said.
He listened without interrupting.
When I finished, he took off his glasses.
“I'm going to ask you something.”
“Okay.”
“Were you happy with him?”
I opened my mouth.
Then closed it.
I remembered the spare key Adrian had brought when I locked myself out of my car.
The dinners he cooked when I worked late.
The way he remembered Mom's birthday and bought flowers for her grave without reminding me.
“Yes,” I said finally. “Most of the time.”
Dad nodded.
“That makes this harder.”
“I keep wondering whether I'm throwing away four years because of one terrible decision.”
He shook his head.
“One decision can tell you a lot about what somebody believes they're allowed to do.”
I looked at the invitation.
“Mom would have been furious.”
“She would have been.”
He smiled slightly.
“But she would have been more interested in what you wanted to do next.”
I hadn't considered that.
For two days, everyone had been discussing whether Adrian could fix the wedding.
Nobody had asked what I wanted my life to look like afterward.
The next morning was Friday, June fifth.
The cancellation deadline.
I drove to Cedar Mill Hall at nine.
Naomi met me in the empty reception room.
Without the floral arrangements and place settings, it was simply a large space with wooden beams, tall windows, and polished concrete floors.
I had loved it the first time I saw it.
Now I felt strangely detached.
Naomi carried a blue folder.
“I've separated the contracts you signed personally from the ones Adrian signed.”
“Thank you.”
“The photographer has agreed to release your date if you confirm by noon. The florist can credit part of your order toward another event.”
I nodded.
Then she opened the folder to a page marked Payments.
“The venue deposit came from your father's check.”
“I know.”
“And the additional two thousand four hundred dollars was paid Wednesday.”
I looked up.
“Wednesday?”
“Adrian made a payment after your walkthrough.”
My stomach tightened.
“Why?”
“He said he wanted to keep the revised arrangement available.”
The amount matched the withdrawal from our account.
Adrian had transferred the money to himself on May twenty-seventh, then used it to hold the expanded wedding after I had canceled.
“Does that mean the new charges are already covered?”
“Not all of them.”
Naomi turned the page.
“The payment covered the revised room arrangement and a portion of the increased catering minimum.”
“Can it be refunded?”
“Not automatically. It depends on whether the event proceeds and who requests the adjustment.”
I rubbed my forehead.
“So my money is still paying for their wedding.”
“At the moment, some of it is attached to that event.”
She looked uncomfortable.
“I want to be very clear, Julia. I didn't know the two of you were in disagreement.”
“I believe you.”
“And I haven't accepted any further changes to the booking.”
That relieved me.
Until she said, “There is one more issue.”
She pulled out a single-page agreement.
“Adrian has asked to transfer the entire event to Wes and Kelsey.”
I stared at her.
“Can he?”
“Potentially, as the original signer. But we haven't approved the transfer. We need to settle the financial arrangements.”
“Does my father's money go with it?”
“That's one of the things we need to resolve.”
The thought of Dad's retirement savings funding the ceremony I had been pushed out of made my hands go cold.
Naomi continued.
“I asked Adrian to identify which contributions belonged to each couple.”
“And?”
“He sent me a statement.”
She placed it in front of me.
There were three columns.
Adrian.
Kelsey and Wes.
Julia.
Beside my name was a figure that made no sense.
Four thousand dollars.
I had contributed far more than that.
“Where did he get this number?”
Naomi pointed to a note at the bottom.
Remaining payments were gifts to the event and are not subject to individual reimbursement.
I read the sentence twice.
Then I recognized a familiar phrase beneath it.
Per the family's understanding.
My father's six thousand dollars had been classified as a general contribution.
Our joint savings had been divided without my involvement.
And at the bottom of the statement was a signature.
Adrian's.
But beside it, under Acknowledged by Other Contributing Party, someone had typed my name.
Naomi watched me carefully.
“Julia, did you authorize this?”
“No.”
She slid the document back into the folder.
“Then I'm not processing the transfer.”
I exhaled.
But her next words stopped me.
“There's something else I think you should know. Adrian told me your father had already approved using his contribution for both weddings.”
I looked at the paper.
Dad had never said that.
Naomi turned the folder around.
Attached to the statement was a photograph of my father holding a handwritten card.
I recognized the kitchen in the background.
May you like
And I recognized the words on the card.
Whatever makes the kids happy.
