How to Ruin a Wedding(15)

I jerk back, then soften my posture. I know Taina doesn’t mean it maliciously. It’s just, when she has a goal, she will do anything to reach it. She’s driven like that. Her current goal? Keeping me in the safety of her home.

I completely understand because, for most of my life, my thoughts were all just fragments broken from my singular purpose: Take care of my sister.

When we were kids, and our parents gave up dinner so we could split a bowl of Avena, I would give her my share. I worked multiple jobs and did under-the-table work at a bar to get her through college. Stole clothes from rich neighborhoods’ trash so she would have brand names in class when the other kids would sneer at a knockoff. At my lowest, I “borrowed” books and supplies she needed from department stores.

And now her bank account looks like a phone number, while mine looks like the receipt for a hamburger.

“I just need to get through the slow season. Or actually get a call back for an interview somewhere. I’ve started applying outside of the city.”

These past months have felt like a yearlong slow season. It’s not like I can hang around wedding venues and hand out flyers. I don’t have a large pool of clients to draw from.

“What you need is help,” Taina says, softening. “The job market sucks right now and—”

“And after I was fired, I destroyed my supervisor’s desk and had to be escorted out of the building,” I finish for her.

That day is still fresh in my mind. My condescending, aging prick of a supervisor sat me down, called me the name of the only other woman in the department, and asked me to wear looser clothes because I was distracting my peers. If I was going to continue to dress that way, I was basically “asking for it.”

Taina was ready to sue the second I got fired—Mathew’s a lawyer, and she practically had the paperwork drafted before I’d even made it home.

But buried in the mountain of new-hire paperwork I signed on my first day was a clause that waived my right to sue the company. I didn’t catch it. I was too busy feeling grateful—after years of juggling part-time jobs, night classes, and overdue bills, I would’ve signed a napkin if it came with health insurance and a 401(k).

“I’m sure they’ve warned every firm in the tristate about me. My resume is too impressive not even to get a callback.”

And yet, given the chance, I’d for sure say yes if they offered me my position back in the field rather than the high-risk, low-opportunity, anxiety-inducing trade of wedding wrecking.

I’ve always been happier with the ability to keep a roof over my head. And when you try to live without it, you find that money does indeed buy happiness—something achievable with a stable, salaried job like my marketing role at a New York City tech firm.

“Clearly not impressive enough,” Taina points out.

“How I wish I shipped you off to military school to learn some manners.”

“Sorry.” Taina salutes. “Clearly, it’s not impressive enough, sir.”

I reel my arm back, ready to slap her. She dodges me, sticks out her tongue, then grabs my phone from the coffee table, flips it over, and points to a Polaroid photo tucked beneath the clear case—my pit bull terrier gleefully demolishing my couch.

My heart lurches at the loss of her, still fresh even though it’s been a year. I’ve always thought photos held an impossible responsibility, carrying the weight of memory even if the people in them are gone. It keeps the moment alive, anyway.

“If you won’t officially move in with me,” Taina says, “or let me commit murder, let me help pay for your share of Save a Paw.”

Anxiety bites at me when she mentions the animal shelter.

Save a Paw is my real dream, not this wedding-wrecking mess I’m in. A haven for dogs that provides services for homeless animals, like vet care and any necessary surgeries, nurturing and caring for them, and trying to house them where they can get all the love and care they deserve.

Since I was sixteen, the owner had promised me that once he retired, he’d sell the business to me. I was supposed to have years more time to be able to buy it from him. But a couple months ago, Joshua told me his wife wanted him to retire earlier, spend the rest of their years traveling the world, so he’d come to me first, like he promised. Save a Paw could be mine for $30,000.

I’d been putting aside small amounts for years and had already saved up $10,000 for it. I’m nowhere near the other $20,000. When I told him that, he said his wife gave him a year to get his affairs in order, therefore, I had a year (now three months left) to buy it off him.

A stressful fact made more anxiety inducing when he informed me that his partner, the other shareholder, already had someone interested in buying.

In a cruel and genius way, Taina goes into my photos app and starts playing videos of Storm and me. “Think of all the Stormys that need you to keep the business thriving. What would have happened to her if you hadn’t found her?” she asks, knowing damn well she probably would have died. “Don’t you remember? How much pain she was in?”

Of course I do. How could I not? My dog was my everything. “Don’t be cruel,” I tell her.

“I’m just saying, Storm helped you realize your passion in life. Animals. You can’t let the shelter go to some Wall Street, high-water, cufflink-wearing asshole.”

I rub my palms against my eyes. “I’m pretty sure it’s a former veterinarian wanting to take over.” But she’s right, Storm had helped me.