My Wedding Gift: His Public Execution

é-the man who swore to heal my abandonment iss

d then he had the audacity to beg me to g

but I planned a different kind of show: a we

pte

Higgi

found a single, long blonde ha

sn't

in closet, a space that smelled of his cologne and my perfume, a symphony of our six years together. The air was thick with anticipation. Our weddin

mb and forefinger. It was unnaturally bright, almost white. A

dozens of people every day. A hug, a handshake, a crow

of abandonment left by my father, a wound that had never truly healed. That wound made loyalty not just a preference, bu

matic smile and earnest brown eyes melting the walls I'

ow, tainted by this single,

r my fear. I walked out of the closet, the suit jacket still in my hand, my steps silent on the plush car

ck, when Mark's laughter floate

s before the wedding? Yo

hickened, pressing in on me

he same voice that had whispered promises to me just last nigh

mped a hand over my mouth to stifle it. My bod

'taste' is a social media influencer with half a mill

e and impossibly toned body were all over Instagram, usually draped in designer clothes and leaning agai

in his voice that made my stomach clench. "Exac

with something like concern. "What about her? She'

ld seemed to stop spinning. I held my breath, praying, beggi

t ever since her father left, she's had this... reservation. This quiet sadness. It's exhausting sometimes. I need someone who is just

deepest wound of my soul, the very trauma he had sworn to protect, and twisted it int

my numb fingers and fell to

urtured for six years, was extinguished in that single,

f, robotic. I didn't run. I didn't cry. A c

an old apartment there, a safety net my mother had left me, one I' d kept despite Derek' s insistence t

or ten days from

freedom. I would give

ty that settled deep in my bones, tha