“Thank you,” I say to him.
“You’re welcome,” he says, beaming. “Thanks for inviting me.”
“I didn’t invi—”
“So!” Adam cuts me off, trying and failing now to fight a smile. “We, um, we just came by to check in with you on a couple of details.” He glances at James. “Right, buddy?”
James nods. “Right.”
“First of all: Did anyone talk to you about your vows? Do you want to go traditional, or do you plan on saying something—”
“He’s going traditional,” Kenji says, answering for me before I’ve had a chance to respond. “I already told Castle.” He turns to face me. “Castle is doing the ceremony, by the way—you know that, right?”
“No,” I say, staring at him. “I did not know that. But what makes you think I don’t want to write my own vows?”
He shrugs. “You don’t strike me as the kind of guy who likes to get up in front of a crowd and shoot from the heart. But I’m happy to be wrong,” he says. “If you want to write your own vows, stand in front of a ton of people—most of whom you hardly know—and tell Juliette her face reminds you of a sunrise, no problem. Castle is flexible.”
“I would rather impale myself on a pike.”
“Yeah.” Kenji grins. “That’s what I thought.”
Kenji turns away to ask Adam a question, something about ceremony logistics, and I study the back of his head, confused.
How? I want to ask. How did you know?
Winston unfolds a garment bag, hangs it on a nearby door, and unzips the length of it while Brendan unearths a box of shoes from a dingy closet.
Adam says, “Okay, I still have a few questions for Warner, but I need to confirm with Castle about the vows, so we’ll be right back—and I’ll find out about the music—”
And I feel as if I’ve stepped into a strange, alternate reality, into a world where I didn’t think I’d ever belong. I could never have anticipated that somehow, somewhere along this tumultuous path—
I’d acquired friends.
THIRTEEN
The backyard is a modest rectangle of scorched land, the sparse and parched grass nicely obscured by a selection of time-worn wooden folding chairs, the arrangement parted down the middle by an artificial aisle, all of which face a hand-wrought wedding arch. Two thick, ten-foot cylindrical wooden stakes have been hammered into the ground, the five feet of empty space between them bridged at the top by a raw, severed tree limb, the joints bound together by rope. This crudely constructed bower is decorated with a robust selection of colorful wildflowers; leaves and petals flutter in the gentle breeze, infusing the early-morning air with their combined fragrance.
The scene is at once simple and breathtaking, and I am immobilized by the sight of it.
I am in a perfectly tailored, dark green, three-piece suit with a white shirt and black tie. My original suit was black, by request; Winston told me he decided to go with this deep shade of green because he thought it would suit my eyes and offset my gold hair. I wanted to argue with him except that I was genuinely impressed with the quality of his work, and did not protest when he handed me a pair of black, patent leather shoes to match. Absently, I touch the gardenia affixed to my lapel, feeling the always-present weight of the velvet box against my thigh.
There are folding tables arranged along the opposite end of the yard still waiting for their tablecloths, and I have been assigned the task of dressing them. I have also been ordered to see to the tables and chairs that need to be arranged inside the as-yet-unfurnished living and dining rooms, where the reception is meant to take place later this evening after a break post-ceremony, during which our guests will change work shifts, see to things back at the base, and Ella and I will have a chance to take pictures.
This all sounds so perfectly human as to render me ill.
I have, as a result, done none of things requested of me. I’ve been unable to move from this spot, staring at the wedding arch where I will soon be expected to stand and wait.
I clutch the back of a chair, holding on for dear life as the weight of the day’s revelations inhale me, drowning me in their depths. Kenji is right; I don’t enjoy surprises. This is fundamentally true, and yet—I would like to be the kind of person who enjoys surprises. I want to live a life like this, to be able to withstand unexpected moments of kindness delivered by the person I love most in the world. It’s only that I don’t know what to do with these experiences; my body doesn’t know how to accept or digest them.
I am so happy it’s physically uncomfortable; I am so full of hope it seems to depress my chest, forcing the air from my lungs.
I draw in a sharp breath against this feeling, forcing myself to be calm while doing, over and over, the mental gymnastics necessary to remind myself that my fears are irrational, when I feel the approach of a familiar nervous energy.
I turn around carefully to meet her, surprised she’s sought me out at all.
“Hey,” Sam says, trying to smile. She’s dressed up; she even appears to have attempted something like makeup, her eyelids shimmering in the soft light of the morning. “Big day.”
“Yes.”
“Listen, I’m sorry.” She sighs. “I didn’t mean to lash out at you like that last night. Really, I didn’t.”
I nod, then look away, staring into the distance. This yard is separated from its neighbor’s by only a short, shabby wooden fence. Kenji will no doubt spend the rest of our lives tormenting me from over top of it.
Sam sighs again, louder this time. “I know you and I don’t always see eye to eye,” she says, “but I’m hoping maybe—if we get to know each other better—that’ll change.”
I look up at that, analyzing Sam now.
She is being sincere, but I find her suggestion unlikely. I notice Nouria in my periphery then, huddled up with her father and three others, and shift my gaze in her direction. She’s wearing a simple sheath dress in a shade of chartreuse that compliments her dark skin. She appears to be happy at the moment—smiling—which even I realize is rare for Nouria these days.
Sam follows my line of sight, seeming to understand where my thoughts have gone. “I know she’s a little hard on you sometimes, but she’s been under crazy amounts of pressure lately. She’s never had to oversee so many people, or so many details, and The Reestablishment has been a lot harder to deconstruct than we’d thought—you can’t even imagine—”
“Can’t I?” I almost smile, even as my jaw tenses. “You think me incapable of understanding the weight of the burden we shoulder now?”
Sam looks away. “I didn’t say that. That’s not what I meant.”
“Our position is worse than precarious,” I say to her. “And whatever you think of me—whatever you think you understand about me—I am only trying to help.”
For the third time, Sam sighs.
Now, more than ever, those of us at the Sanctuary should be allied, but Sam and Nouria have grown to detest me over the last couple of weeks because I challenge them at every turn, refusing to agree with their tactics or ideology when I find it lacking—and unwilling to acquiesce merely to get along.
They find this fundamentally infuriating, and I don’t care.
I refuse to do anything that would put Ella’s life in jeopardy, and letting our movement fail would be doing exactly that.
“I want us to try again,” Sam says, steely now as she meets my eyes. “I want us to start over. We’ve been fighting a lot lately, and I think you would agree with me that it’s not sustainable. We should be united right now.”
“United? Nouria deliberately made me think I couldn’t get married. She willfully manipulated the truth to make the situation seem dire, simply to wound me. How can such petty machinations form any foundation for unity?”
“She wasn’t trying to wound you. She was trying to protect you.”
“In what alternate reality could that possibly be true?”
Sam’s anger flares. “You know what your problem is?”