Of all the lies I have conjured up in my life, this is the only one I never intended to tell.
24.
Week One
I WAKE UP A wife!
* * *
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I wake up a wife and I don’t even realize it, not at first, because my brain is burning and my mouth is chalk and I can still taste the tequila in my throat. I forgot to draw the curtains last night so it’s the morning sun that wakes me, too early, awfully bright because of the reflection off the fresh snow outside. It’s been a good long while (was it Copenhagen? Miami?) since I woke up in this state and it takes a minute to orient myself: I’m in the velvet canopy bed in Stonehaven’s master suite, where my parents once slept, and my grandparents and great-grandparents before them, and so on and so forth for the last hundred-plus years.
I wonder if any of them ever woke up like this: blind with pain, still drunk, mind wiped clean of memories from the night before.
But no—not entirely wiped.
My eyes fly open. Memories are surfacing, startling creatures swimming up from the dark. I roll to one side to check if I’m remembering correctly. And there he is, naked in bed beside me, wide-awake and smiling at me like I am a warm latte that he is about to drink up.
My husband. Mr. Michael O’Brien.
* * *
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I wake up a wife, and I wonder what on earth have I done?
* * *
—
“Good morning, my love,” he says in a voice still crackled with sleep. “Wifey.”
A callback to a moment the night before, after we said I do; I remember that much, and I also remember what I said back. “Hubby,” I whisper. The word is strange in my mouth, but also comforting, a feather duvet settling over my limbs. Then I giggle, because of all the impulsive things I have done in my life this has to beat them all, and laughter seems the appropriate response.
Oh. Smiling hurts.
When I wince he brushes a thumb over my brow. “You doing OK?” he asks. “That was a new side of you last night, one I didn’t expect. Not that I’m complaining.”
So it’s true. Last night we got drunk on tequila and champagne, and he asked me to marry him, and we called a town car to take us across the border to Reno, where we got married at a shabby little place called Chapel o’ the Pines just before midnight. There was an officiant in purple nylon vestments and a professional witness who knitted baby socks while we took our vows. I seem to recall that we laughed, a lot.
He asked me to marry him!
Or maybe we asked each other?
I can’t quite remember.
Do we even have photos from last night? Blindly, I feel around for my phone—under the pillow? next to the bed?—thinking that my social media feeds will help fill in the gaps. (How many names and faces and unforgettable moments would I have lost, were it not for the convenience of hashtags?) But then I remember that Michael made me leave my phone behind at Stonehaven before we climbed in the car, whispering “I want this to be just for us, just about us” as he gently pried it from my hands. A little burp of panic: If we didn’t document our marriage, if it isn’t in my public photo stream, did it really happen?
I peer over the edge of the bed and see a heap of clothes on the floor. Apparently I got married in a pair of jeans and a stained Yeezy sweatshirt. (So maybe I am glad there are no photos.) This, despite the fact that somewhere in the packing boxes that still line the edges of this bedroom there is a wedding gown, a custom Ralph & Russo, that has never been worn. Also, I do believe that I walked down the aisle to “Love Me Tender.” This is not how I once dreamed that my wedding would go. (“Halo,” that was always the plan.)