Page 1 of Five Years
PROLOGUE
A wedding wasn’t a measure of someone’s worth. Leah found herself dateless, heartbroken, and determined to prove that planning a wedding—and committing your life to one person—was, quite frankly, a massive clusterfuck.
It was a façade, an illusion dreamt up by people who probably still thought the world was flat.
What good could possibly come from a wedding? If you were lucky, you might surpass the average six-year divorce mark. If you werereallylucky, you might avoid finding your spouse in bed with the next-door neighbour’s dog-walker. And if you were just a guest at yet another wedding, like Leah, there was the godawful possibility that you’d have to endure conversations about your ex of two years—while she pretended she wasn’t moving across the country to reunite with her ex-fiancé.
That last one was specific to Leah. But after she found out she couldn’t skip the wedding—bridesmaids, apparently, don’t get that option—she decided to make the best of it.
Her plan? Ask every married guest about the worst part of their own wedding day. After exchanging confused looks, most of them obliged. Lo and behold, not one person gave a glowing review.
It was a distraction—one that allowed Leah to process other people’s trauma instead of her own. Not the healthiest coping mechanism. Her therapist had been pretty adamant about the whole “needing to heal” malarkey. Leah preferred to bury her feelings six feet deep, unretrievable without a shovel and the upper-body strength of a wrestler.
A breakup was never easy—especially when one person was completely blindsided. She should’ve seen the signs.
What happens when you let your girlfriend hang out with her ex-girlfriend?
They play softball, crush cans of beer, and become besties? Nope.
They get monthly manicures, occasionally share a bagel over coffee, but it’s totally platonic? Wrong again.
Instead, they decide to give their relationship another try—because eight years together and a horrific joint custody battle over a dog, a cat, and a needy domestic rabbit with human eyes apparently wasn’t enough? Correct.
Leah had tried her best to portray the picture-perfect bridal party ideal. All she really wanted to do was stick her hand in the three-tier cake, devour a fistful of sponge, and tell everyone the whipped custard tasted like feet.
She should’ve been happier for her best friend—but her best friend also happened to be her ex-girlfriend’s sister, which meant Ariana had more of a right to be at the wedding than Leah did. Now, Leah had no choice but to fake close relationships with Ariana’s family and fumble her way through the waltz (a dance they were supposed to learn together) while dodging questions about the last-minute seating plan and Ariana’s plus one—who just so happened to be someone the whole family already knew. Quite bluntly, it was a fucking nightmare.
Weddings carried this huge societal pressure. Committing yourself to one person forever had once been something Leah truly believed in. Before Ariana, she’d been engaged to her partner of four years—until that partner decided she was “straight” and in love with a guy she met at Pilates.
Fun fact: Pilates guy turned out to be gay. Leah could laugh about it now, but at the time, it felt like her world had imploded.
She’d believed in forever with Ariana, too. They were about to reach milestone number one in mandatory lesbian culture—moving in together. Ariana had even suggested it, hyped Leah up about “the rest of their lives.” Then she sat in a vet’s office for three hours with her ex-fiancé, waiting on their nine-year-oldbeagle to recover from surgery, and came home saying she feltsomething.
Whateversomethingmeant.
Leah figured it was shared trauma. Instead of feeling alone in their fears, they found comfort in each other. Unfortunately for Leah.
The problem was, she couldn’t hate Ariana the way she wanted to. Ariana had been honest. She didn’t lie. She didn’t cheat. But that didn’t make the blow any less painful.
The only saving grace in Leah’s two months of ugly crying? Ariana was moving back to New York. She’d grown up there, moved to Michigan at thirteen, and had just accepted a job as a financial advisor in the city.
At first, it felt like someone had harpooned Leah’s heart with a javelin. But after some choice words from her best friends, a full bottle of whiskey, andTaylor Swift’s Loveralbum on repeat, she pulled herself together and accepted that Ariana moving was for the best.
Coincidentally—or not—Ariana’s ex-fiancé was also relocating to New York. Something about “opportunities” in thatspecificregion of the country. Not any of the other forty-nine states.
The pressure of being in the same room as Ariana again built for weeks, until one night Leah found herself sobbing at 2 a.m. while watching home improvement videos on YouTube.
She made it through the ceremony and most of the reception without incident. The day wasn’t hiccup-free—not ideal for the bride and groom, but the chaos helped steady Leah’s nerves. A bit of rain. Some drunken gate-crashers. A couple who decided the wedding was the right place to end their seven-year relationship... and then make up by having sex in the bathroom.
The only moment Leah came close to launching devilled eggs at someone was when she saw Ariana kneel to fix the strap onher ex-fiancé’s heel. A small gesture, but an infuriating one. She didn’t throw the eggs—but she did watch the entire scene play out like a child being forced to sit through a cinema screening without sweets or popcorn.
What else could she do? Life sucked sometimes. Ariana glanced at her across the dance floor and subtly ducked behind two couples to avoid drawing attention. Safe. Leah had no interest in making a fool of herself. There would be no cutting in. No hashing things out. No heated debates about the best pizza slice in New York.
They both knew what it was. They’d been there together, earlier that year. It was a tiny backstreet dive—unlikely to win a TripAdvisor award—but it wastheirpizza spot.
Why didn’t Leah bring a plus one? She sat at a table surrounded by couples—except for the groom’s twelve-year-old sister, who insisted on asking about the pizza-shaped tattoo on Leah’s right ankle.
She didn’t have many tattoos. A few fine-line ones here and there. But the pizza slice matched the one on Ariana’s ankle. They’d gotten them on their anniversary. It was the first time they’d said “I love you.” In New York. Over a slice of pizza. In a place that smelled like feet but somehow still felt romantic.
