Page 25 of Runaway Bride's Guide to Love

I shake my head. “Me. Only me.”

“Why?”

How do I say this that doesn’t make me sound completely pathetic? “Because everyone else was.”

“Oh, Stella…” Ainsley’s sympathy makes me feel slightly better.

“Who’s everyone?” Quinn asks. “It sure as hell wasn’t us. And Maeve was already divorced by the time you and Duncan got together.”

“Thanks for the reminder,” Maeve says dryly.

Quinn brushes her off. “Oh, like you miss being married.”

“You’re right. I don’t. Good riddance to bad orgasms.”

“I don’t think that’s how the saying goes,” Ainsley deadpans, which of course makes us all laugh.

“It should,” Quinn says. “But back to Stella. Who was getting married that you needed to marry the first guy you dated seriously?”

I look down and suddenly become very focused on the pillow next to me.

“Stella?”

“Everyone,” I say. “Everyone was. Every sorority sister. Every person I went to high school with. You know how many weddings I went to the year before I met Duncan? Seven. I’d seen six of my friends get engaged just in that holiday season. And there I was, no boyfriend. Barely dating. Thinking that I had all this time to have fun, when clearly I didn’t. And then along came Duncan…”

“Oh, Stella,” Ainsley says. “I hate that you felt that way.”

“Me too,” I say. “Because that feeling has led me here.”

“Don’t beat yourself up,” Quinn says. “This is who you are. You’ve always thought you wanted what others had.”

Now I know Quinn is the blunt one of the four of us, but that dagger she just threw hurt more than others. “Excuse me?”

“What our sister meant to say with more tact...” Maeve gives Quinn a glare before turning her sights back to me. “You’re the little sister. You grew up wanting what we had. You wanted to dance because Ainsley did. You wanted to ride horses because Quinn took lessons. When I said one time at dinner that I was becoming a vegetarian, you quit eating meat too.”

I laugh at the memory. “That only lasted a week. I missed chicken tenders.”

“Exactly. That’s the point. They weren’t your ideas. They were ours. Some of them you stuck with. The dance choice was great. Meat and the horses? Not so much.”

Ainsley reaches over and takes my hand. “We love you. And you’re one of the most amazing people I know. But you’ve always had a tendency to follow. To just want what others have wanted. What does Stella want? Without thinking of anyone else, what does Stella Banks want right now?”

Holy shit, when they put it like that, everything makes so much more sense. I have always been a follower. I’ve always wanted what my big sisters had. Or thought was cool. But it didn’t stop there. I pledged a sorority because it was the one my sisters were in.

But even in college, the need to not be left behind, or not have what others had, didn’t go away. I was smart, but never the smartest. I never had the popular boyfriend. Or any serious boyfriend at all. I was always scrounging up dates for formals because I refused not to go while my friends were taking their significant others.

I’ve always felt a step behind. That I needed to have what others had to measure up.

And I was willing to get married to fill that hole in my life.

“Fucking hell,” I say, falling back to the bed. “What the fuck is wrong with me?”

“Absolutely nothing,” Quinn says. “You are who you are, and we love you. And now that we know the problem, the next step is how we fix it.”

“Yes. How does Stella get her groove back?”

I sit up, wondering why Quinn is snickering at Maeve’s comment. “What?”

“You’re too young,” Quinn says. “But just know it was a wonderful, well-timed joke.”

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