Page 15 of Little Gray Dress

“Why are you here? You’re not in the bridal party, are you?” I glance at Hannah, who looks between Greta and me as if I’ve just asked her if I could take her spaceship for a drive.

“How do you two know each other?” Hannah asks us both.

“I… uh—”

“Oh, we go way back, don’t we Emi?” That’s when I watch her link her arm through Jack’s and give me the biggest fake smile I’ve ever seen. “Looks like we’re gonna share a sister.” She smiles sincerely over at Hannah.

“You are—” I swallow hard trying not to choke on my own saliva. “You and Jack?” This can’t be happening. “You’re Jack’s—”

She holds out her left hand, showing off the 3-carat diamond ring that once sat on my own finger. Why would he reuse the same ring? “That’s right, in just eight months I’ll be Mrs Jack Cabot.”

“But you said Jack’s fiancée was a girl named May?” I look at both Hannah and Lily, whose faces are even more shocked than my own. Both of them have every right to be just as confused as I am. There aren’t a lot of Gretas in the world; if they’d known her real name I’m sure they’d be rather less on board with this recent engagement. Obviously, Jack is a bigger liar than I thought. How did he keep her real name from surfacing? The biggest question I have now, though, is how the fuck did she weasel her way into my spot?

“I go by May now because Greta is just so… yuk, old-fashioned.”

“Why May?” I ask, wondering if she did this on purpose to slide into the spot of Jack’s fiancée with no questions from my friends and family. But no matter how she got there, Jack should have known better.

“From my last name, Mayfair…” She talks down to me, like she’s explaining a math problem to a first-grader.

“Oh my God…” I set my plate back on the bar. “I have to go.”

“What?” Evan asks, heading in my direction.

“Emi, don’t...” Jack starts towards me too, his voice hesitant.

“No. I’m fine. I just need some air.”

“She’s always been so over-dramatic.” Greta rolls her eyes and goes back to filling up her plate while everyone else watches me try to escape the situation.

“I think—” I need to stop trying to figure out what exactly it is that I think because I obviously don’t know. “I just need to go for a walk or something.”

“Do you want me to come?” Lily asks still looking as shocked as I am.

“Nope. No, I’ll be fine. It was nice to meet you all.” I glance around at everyone except Jack and Greta and beeline it to the front door.

I’m just going to walk. Walking can clear your head. I’m sure I’ve heard that somewhere. Not that I have any idea where I’m walking to, but I’m sure I’ll come across something. It’s not like I can clear this entire situation out of my own head quickly. With my luck I’ll walk long enough to get all the way back to Texas before I figure out exactly what it is that I truly think about all this.

I wish this beer would settle in a little quicker than it is. Maybe what I need is just another drink? Sounds like a perfectly bad idea to me. On our way here I know I saw a tiny hole-in-the-wall bar; maybe I’ll go there. It’s not exactly as far as Texas but it’ll have to do as a last-minute hideout for now. I doubt anyone is going to come looking for me after the weirdness that just happened. In fact, I don’t really want them to come looking for me at all.

The bar is just far enough away for the beer to blur my vision right about the time I push opened the giant, heavy front door with a porthole window in it.

The room is semi-dark with small lights hanging over each table. TVs on the wall play CNN News, and the patrons are few and far between. Mostly older men, a few with a friend, a man behind the bar and another one sitting at the counter.

“Can I get a shot of vodka?” I try and catch my breath from the quarter-mile walk that my poor size 12 body isn’t used to. Vodka is the last thing I need right now. I really don’t need to add a puking-in-public element to this future family story. Maybe food and water would be a much wiser order than just vodka. “Do you guys have a menu?”

“A menu?” the bartender asks me with a tilt of his head.

“Like, for food?”

“Nope. There’s a vending machine in the back.”

It’s not exactly the burgers and gourmet appetizers Evan had made, but it’ll have to do. Most of the time vending machines have all my favorite foods anyway. Salty and sweet. Perfect for my pending hangover.

“Can I get a water too?” Vodka isn’t exactly thirst-quenching, and considering I feel like I’ve just run a 5k marathon I probably should help myself to not have a stroke in a strange place.

The bartender nods his head, unenthusiastically, sitting both drinks on the bar in front of me. “Eight bucks.”

Oh no. I reach into all my pockets, hoping I accidentally shoved some cash into them the last time I wore them. No such luck.

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