The Wedding - By Nicholas Sparks Page 0,34

and Noah. They’d met when they were teenagers and had fallen in love, but Allie had moved away and they didn’t speak for the next fourteen years. While they were separated, Noah worked in New Jersey, headed off to war, and finally returned to New Bern. Allie, meanwhile, became engaged to someone else. On the verge of her wedding, however, she returned to visit Noah and realized it was he whom she’d always loved. In the end, Allie broke off her engagement and stayed in New Bern.

Though we’d talked about many things, she’d never told me this. At the time, the story was not as touching to me as it is now, but I suppose this was a function of my age and gender. Yet I could tell the story meant a lot to her, and I was touched by how much she cared for her parents. Soon after she began, her dark eyes were brimming with tears that spilled onto her cheeks. At first she dabbed at them, but then she stopped, as if deciding it didn’t matter whether or not I saw her cry. This implied comfort affected me deeply, for I knew that she was entrusting me with something that she’d shared with few others. I myself have seldom cried at anything, and when she finished, she seemed to understand this about me.

“I’m sorry about getting so emotional,” she said quietly. “But I’ve been waiting to tell you that story for a long time. I wanted it to be just the right moment, in just the right place.”

Then she squeezed my hand as though she wanted to hold on to it forever.

I glanced away, feeling a tightness in my chest that I’d never before experienced. The scene around me was intensely vivid, every petal and blade of grass standing out in sharp relief. Behind her, I saw her family gathering on the porch. Prisms of sunlight cut patterns on the ground.

“Thank you for sharing this with me,” I whispered, and when I turned to face her, I knew what it meant to finally fall in love.

I went to Creekside and found Noah seated at the pond.

“Hello, Noah,” I said.

“Hello, Wilson.” He continued staring out over the water. “Thanks for dropping by.”

I set the bag of bread on the ground. “You doing okay?”

“Could be better. Could be worse, though, too.”

I sat beside him on the bench. The swan in the pond had no fear of me and stayed in the shallows near us.

“Did you tell her,” he asked, “about having the wedding at the house?”

I nodded. This had been the idea that I mentioned to Noah the day before.

“I think she was surprised she hadn’t thought of it first.”

“She’s got a lot on her mind.”

“Yes, she does. She and Anna left right after breakfast.”

“Rarin’ to go?”

“You could say that. Jane practically dragged Anna out the door. I haven’t heard from her since.”

“Allie was the same way with Kate’s wedding.”

He was speaking of Jane’s younger sister. Like the wedding this weekend, Kate’s had been held at Noah’s house. Jane had been the matron of honor.

“I suppose she’s already been looking at wedding gowns.”

I glanced at him, surprised.

“That was the best part for Allie, I think,” he went on. “She and Kate spent two days in Raleigh searching for the perfect dress. Kate tried on over a hundred of them, and when Allie got home, she described every one of them to me. Lace here, sleeves there, silk and taffeta, cinched waistlines . . . she must have rambled on for hours, but she was so beautiful when she was excited that I barely heard what she was saying.”

I brought my hands to my lap. “I don’t think she and Anna will have the time for something like that.”

“No, I don’t suppose they will.” He turned to me. “But she’ll be beautiful no matter what she wears, you know.”

I nodded.

These days, the children share in the upkeep of Noah’s house.

We own it jointly; Noah and Allie had made those arrangements before they moved to Creekside. Because the house had meant so much to them, and to the children, they simply couldn’t part with it. Nor could they have given it to only one of their children, since it is the site of countless shared memories for all of them.

As I said, I visited the house frequently, and as I walked the property after leaving Creekside, I made mental notes of all that had to be done. A caretaker kept the