She Can Have My Groom

The night before our wedding, at our joint bachelor-bachelorette party in a dimly lit VIP lounge downtown, Jason’s childhood best friend, Rory, suggested an auction game. The rules were simple: everyone wrote down an offering on an index card, tossed it into the center of the low table, and the rest of the room bid on it. I had played along, just as I always did. I wrote down an offer—home-baked sourdough and a personalized dinner menu—hoping, pathetically, to be a good sport. Nobody placed a bid. My card sat on the lacquered wood like a piece of litter. Then Rory tossed hers into the center of the ring. She leaned back on the velvet sofa, boots kicked up on the edge of the table, radiating that reckless, swaggering bravado she wore like armor. Her card read: “My first time.” The room erupted. Beer sloshed over cocktail glasses, and a chorus of hoots ricocheted off the leather booths. “Holy shit, Rory!” one of the guys bellowed. “Now that’s playing for blood!” Rory didn’t flinch. She took a pull straight from her beer bottle and grinned, her eyes glinting. “Put your money where your mouths are, boys. I can handle whatever you dish out.” Fueled by bourbon and herd mentality, the guys started throwing out numbers. Five hundred. Two thousand. Ten thousand. It was crude, chaotic, and loud. Then Jason, who had spent the entire evening slumped beside me nursing an old-fashioned with an air of complete detachment, suddenly dropped his glass onto the table with a sharp clatter. “Fifty thousand,” Jason said cleanly. “I clear the board.” The room went dead. Before I could breathe, Jason leaned into my ear, his breath warm and smelling of rye. “They’re completely hammered and out of line,” he murmured, his voice dropping into that protective register he always reserved for her. “I’m just bailing her out before someone takes it too far.” A sick, cold weight settled in my stomach. I gave a stiff nod, unable to force words past the lump in my throat. The next second, Rory grabbed Jason by the crook of his elbow and yanked him toward the private restroom in the back of the lounge. Through the heavy frosted glass of the door, the club’s neon backlight threw their silhouettes into sharp, undeniable relief. I watched as Rory backed Jason hard against the glass, framed his jaw with both hands, and pulled him down into a searing, open-mouthed kiss. My blood ran to ice. I sat frozen in my seat, the air sucked entirely out of my lungs. The guys around the table noticed my rigid silence and immediately began patting my shoulders, waving it off with practiced ease. “Hey, don’t read into it, Bridget,” Brett laughed, nudging my arm. “You know how Rory is. She’s practically one of the guys. They’ve been wrestling in the dirt since preschool. They don’t have boundaries because they don’t need them.” I stared at the frosted glass, watching the rhythmic shift of their shadows against the pane. A quiet, brutal clarity settled over me. They didn’t need boundaries. The only person who needed to step back, the only person who was out of place, was me. … I grabbed my clutch and stood up. Instantly, two of Jason’s groomsmen stepped into my path, their hands outstretched to block the exit. “Whoa, easy, Bridget, sit back down,” Drew pleaded, his tone patronizing. “Rory’s just high-energy. She acts like that with all of us when she’s wasted, but she knows where the line is.” They practically steered me back into the booth by my shoulders. Twenty agonizing minutes later, the restroom door finally clicked open. Jason, a man who prided himself on surgical sobriety and self-control, walked out with his gaze unfocused, his eyes glassy and heavy-lidded. Rory sauntered out behind him, licking her bottom lip before reaching up to casually thumb a smudge of plum lipstick from the corner of his mouth. She caught my eye and smirked. “Did we scare you to death, Bridget?” She giggled, tucking a stray lock of hair behind her ear. “Relax. I’m not letting this idiot take my maiden voyage. We were just putting on a show to screw with the guys.” Jason cut her a mock glare, muttering a half-hearted, “Shut up, Rory, you’re ridiculous.” Then he slid into the booth beside me, pulled his suit jacket off, and draped it over my shoulders as if he were an attentive, loving fiancé. “You didn’t actually take that seriously, did you?” he asked, keeping his voice light. “She’s an absolute menace when she drinks. Nothing happened in there. It was just theater for the table.” I looked at him. I looked at the smear of liquid foundation smeared along his stiff white collar. I looked at the dark, blooming purple mark peeking out from the hollow of his collarbone, half-hidden beneath his unbuttoned shirt. His skin told a story his mouth was too cowardly to confess. The lounge music swelled again, drowning out the brief lull. Jason leaned back, resting his arm along the leather behind my head, ready to resume the evening. My voice came out low, even, and terrifyingly flat: “Cancel the wedding.” The booth fell instantly into a suffocating hush. Rory broke it with a sharp, incredulous snort. “Jesus, Bridget. Are you seriously that fragile?” She rolled her eyes, shaking her head. “You should see how we party when you aren’t around. I was actually holding back tonight out of respect for you. You make a mountain out of every damn molehill.” At her cue, the rest of the table shifted. The groomsmen shot me looks of open annoyance and disdain, silently branding me as the humorless shrew who had just ruined everyone’s buzz. Jason’s jaw clenched, embarrassment and irritation flaring in his eyes. He exhaled a long, strained breath through his teeth. “Bridget, everyone here is going to be part of our lives after we’re married,” he whispered sharply. “Rory has been my best friend since we were five years old. When you act like this, you put me in an impossible position.” He could only think of his position. He didn’t spare a single thought for what it felt like to sit five feet away while my fiancé made out with another woman against a bathroom door. As the silence stretched thin, Rory suddenly reached down into the neckline of her dress, plunged her hand into her bra, and pulled out a glittering platinum band. She held it between two manicured fingers, letting the diamond catch the strobe lights. “Hey, Jason,” she called out playfully, swinging it back and forth. “You were careless in there—the ring dropped right down into my cup. Come on, big spender. Pay up if you want it back.” My breath hitched. That ring was custom-designed. I had spent eight months meeting with an independent jeweler, sketching the band, waiting for the stone to be sourced from Antwerp. It was supposed to represent my future. And now it was being pulled out of another woman’s sweaty lace bra as a bar trick. My vision blurred with heat. Beside me, Jason let out an amused, affectionate chuckle. In that single second, the illusion finally shattered. I was the only person who had ever treated this marriage with any reverence. Noticing the blood draining from my face, Jason quickly snatched the ring from Rory’s hand and grabbed my fingers, trying to force it onto my knuckle. “She’s just keeping the room lively,” he said defensively, kicking Rory playfully under the table. “Don’t let her get under your skin.” I yanked my hand back with enough force to knock his arm away. Then I grabbed the platinum band from his palm, stood up, and shoved it onto Rory’s left ring finger. “Congratulations,” I said, my voice steady. “I hope you two have a wonderful life together.” Jason’s face dropped. Before he could react, he grabbed my wrist and dragged me out of the lounge, pulling me through the heavy fire doors into the concrete service corridor. The muffled thumping of the bass faded behind us. Dropping my wrist, he turned on me, his patience entirely worn through. “Bridget, what the hell is wrong with you?” he hissed. “You’ve spent months whining about wanting to feel included in my inner circle. I brought you tonight to help bridge that gap! Can’t you see I’m trying?” For two years, I had bent myself in half so he wouldn’t have to choose between his fiancé and his friends. I drank sour IPA beers that made me gag. I listened to their repetitive inside jokes from high school. I smiled politely through conversations about people I had never met. I had convinced myself that if I just endured enough, they would eventually let me in. Instead, every inch of ground I gave was handed directly to Rory, who took pleasure in ensuring I remained an outsider looking in through a locked window. The metal door creaked open. Rory slipped out into the hallway, pulling the ring off her finger and tossing it against my chest. “You don’t have to guilt-trip him into abandoning the people who actually know him,” she said, leaning against the cinderblock wall with crossed arms. “When his startup was going under two years ago, it wasn’t you who helped him raise angel capital. It was us. We’ve bled for each other.” She tilted her chin, her gaze cold and proprietary. “You don’t even drink. When he needs to vent over a whiskey, I’m the one he calls. When he has real problems, I’m the one who carries the weight. Even six months ago, after your miscarriage.” A physical jolt struck my ribcage. “You should really ask yourself why you’re so incapable of fitting in,” Rory added smoothly. “Stop holding his feet to the fire just because you’re insecure.” My ears began to ring. Six months ago, when the doctor told me the fetal heartbeat was gone, I had wandered through the hospital parking lot in a daze, nearly stepping in front of an oncoming SUV. Blinded by grief, I had called Jason twenty-two times. Every call went straight to voicemail. He had told me he was stuck in a pitch meeting with an overseas investor. He was drinking with Rory. A crushing, suffocating pain clamped down on my chest. I couldn’t even close my fingers into a fist. Jason finally turned on Rory, his face darkening with panic. “That’s enough, Rory. Get back inside.” Rory rolled her eyes, holding up a fresh index card she had brought from the table. “Fine, I’m out. But the auction’s still going. Next up is the keycard to my hotel room tonight. If you don’t want to bid, someone else will.” Jason’s expression fractured. His eyes tracked her silhouette as she walked back into the lounge, his body leaning subconsciously in her direction. Then he reached out, giving my forearm two brief, dismissive pats. “Call an Uber and head back to the apartment,” he said, already turning away. “She’s completely wrecked. She’s going to do something stupid if I don’t watch her.” I looked down at the cold platinum ring resting in my palm. Every sacrifice, every swallowed grievance, every tear I had shed over the last three years suddenly looked like a pathetic joke. By the time my rideshare dropped me off at our brownstone, my phone pinged with an Instagram notification. Rory had posted a video to her story. The caption read: “Bros who share beds, stay ahead!” In the photo, she was wrapped loosely in a hotel bath sheet, an expanse of bare skin showing above the terry cloth. Beside her, sprawled face down across the crisp white sheets, was Jason, sound asleep. The comments underneath were already pouring in. “Wait, you guys actually roomed together? Savage!” “Jason’s such a buzzkill. We were gonna drink till sunrise, and he threw down three grand just to kick us out and keep the suite to himself.” “Bridget’s gonna have an absolute aneurysm if she sees this, lmao.” I didn’t cry. My hands didn’t shake. I double-tapped the screen, leaving a small, red heart on the photo. Five minutes later, Jason’s name flashed across my screen. “What the hell are you doing liking her post? Are you trying to embarrass me?” “Your mother pulled this exact unhinged shit when your dad walked out, and look where that got her. You swore you weren’t going to turn into her. I thought you had more sense than this.” I stared at the glowing blue text for a long, quiet minute. Years ago, when my father cheated, my mother had gathered the hotel receipts, the credit card statements, and threw them in his face. My father had simply packed a duffel bag, walked out the door with his mistress, and never looked back. My mother had unraveled, piece by piece, until she ended up in a long-term psychiatric facility. For years, she held my hand during visiting hours, repeating the same broken warning: “Don’t get married, Bridget. Men will carve you hollow.” I had always hugged her and smiled. “Mom, Jason is different.” He wasn’t different. He was just better at dressing up his cruelty as loyalty. I dialed the night desk at the care facility. “Mom,” I said, keeping my voice gentle when she was brought to the phone. “I’m taking your advice. The wedding is off. I accepted the overseas transfer to the London office.” The next morning, the sound of raucous laughter woke me. I pushed open the bedroom door. The living room was packed with Jason’s friends, empty coffee cups and takeout boxes littering the marble coffee table. Sitting cross-legged in the center of the sofa was Rory. She was wearing my wedding gown. “Honestly, the cut of this bodice is ridiculous,” she was saying, tugging at the sweetheart neckline with theatrical disgust. “If she actually walks down the aisle in this, everyone’s going to see she has absolutely nothing to fill it out.” A roar of laughter shook the room. “Brutal, Rory, absolutely brutal!” Brett wheezed. Jason was sitting at the breakfast bar, sipping an espresso. He wasn’t laughing, but he wasn’t stopping them, either. When his eyes found me standing in the hallway, the faint smirk on his lips vanished. He set down his mug and walked over, reaching for my wrist. “Why didn’t you answer my texts last night? You had me worried sick.” I didn’t take his hand. My eyes burned as I looked directly into his. “You sat there and let them mock my body in my own home?” Jason’s breath hitched. He scrambled for an excuse, his eyes darting toward the living room. Rory hopped off the couch, smoothing the delicate lace over her hips with total nonchalance. “Oh, please, don’t be so dramatic. It was an honest observation. What, are we not allowed to state facts anymore?” She walked over, her tone adopting that false, saccharine sweetness she used whenever she wanted to sound like the bigger person. “Look, we came over to give you your bridal gift. Yesterday was a mess, so let’s just clear the air.” It was always the same script. If I reacted, I was the one who lacked grace. She reached into her canvas tote, pulled out a glossy, silver gift box, and shoved it into my hands. “Open it. It’s a total game-changer.” I didn’t move. Jason gently nudged the box forward, his voice a low, pleading rasp: “Just open it, Bridget. Do it for me.” I untied the satin ribbon and lifted the lid. Inside lay an assortment of high-end silicone vibrators, leather cuffs, and lubricants. A chorus of low whistles and chuckles broke out behind us. Rory gave a loud, hearty laugh. “Look, I’ve known Jason forever, and the man doesn’t have much of an engine under the hood. You’re gonna need some backup after the honeymoon.” She stepped closer, leaning in with a conspiratorial smirk that didn’t reach her eyes. “Because Jason told us you’re pretty insatiable behind closed doors.” The room erupted into another wave of howling laughter. My stomach turned. My teeth clicked together, shivering with cold fury as I snapped my gaze to Jason. “You told her about our sex life?” A flicker of panic crossed Jason’s face—a rare, fleeting break in his composure. “I was drunk, okay? We were talking shit. Rory’s like a sister to me, she doesn’t count. Stop making a scene.” He shifted his stance, his body instinctively placing itself between me and Rory, shielding her from my anger. That was the moment I finally understood. I was never going to be his partner. I was an accessory he had acquired, while Rory was the anchor he refused to cut loose. I didn’t yell. I didn’t throw the box. I simply turned around, walked into the master bedroom, and turned the deadbolt. I packed my life into two heavy suitcases. At noon, my phone chimed with an email from human resources: “Flight departs JFK for Heathrow tomorrow at 8:00 PM. Travel itinerary confirmed.” I replied with a brief confirmation. Then, I called our broker to list the brownstone on the market at a discount for a quick liquidation. More than two-thirds of the down payment had come directly from my personal savings. Ten minutes later, the broker called back, his tone apologetic and hesitant. “Miss Campbell? I’m looking at the county deed registry right now. Are you certain this property was titled under your name?” A knot tightened in my throat. “What do you mean?” “According to the title transfer filed last month, the sole owner of record is a Miss Rory Flynn. You don’t have legal standing to list this property.” Every drop of warmth drained from my limbs. I stared at the PDF deed the broker forwarded to my phone. “Rory Flynn.” The letters blurred into black smears. My mind raced back through Rory’s social media feeds, scrolling frantically until I found a post from three weeks ago. It was a photo of a brass key resting on a mahogany console table. “My boy made sure I’m set for life. Bought me a sanctuary all on his own dime. Nothing beats living rent-free!” A silent tremor ripped through my chest. When my father abandoned us, he had left behind a lump-sum trust settlement. I had sworn never to touch a penny of his blood money. But two years ago, when Jason’s firm faced a severe liquidity crunch and the mortgage lender threatened to pull the loan on our dream home, I swallowed my pride. I broke into that trust to secure the down payment. And he had quietly, deliberately, put her name on the deed. Four hours before my flight, I took a cab to the psychiatric facility on the outskirts of the city to see my mother. When I stepped onto the sunlit corridor of the ward, I saw two figures standing beside her bed. Jason. And Rory. A violent dread spiked behind my ribs. “What are you doing here?” Rory scoffed, crossing her arms. “I’m not a monster, Bridget. I came to pay my respects to your mom before the big day. In fact, I brought her an outfit.” I turned toward the bed. My mother was standing in front of the mirrored wardrobe, clapping her hands with vacant, childish glee. Draped over her frail frame was an ornate, high-collared crimson burial shroud—the traditional silk garments used to dress the dead for cremation. My vision flared white. “Are you out of your goddamn minds?” I lunged forward to strip the garment off my mother, but Jason grabbed my shoulders, pulling me back. “Bridget, stop! Rory didn’t know! She found it at an antique boutique, she just thought the embroidery looked festive for a wedding!” Rory offered an innocent shrug, her lips twitching with suppressed amusement. “Seriously, how am I supposed to know what people get buried in? It’s red and silk. The mother of the bride is supposed to stand out, right?” My skull felt ready to crack open. I stared at Jason, my eyes burning. “She didn’t know? Did “you” not know?” Jason’s face hardened, his jaw setting into that familiar, stubborn wall. “Watch your tone,” he warned quietly. “It was an honest mistake. We take it off, it’s done. Rory’s pulled pranks like this since we were kids. If you want to be my wife, you need to develop a thicker skin.” “Thicker skin.” To endure her humiliations. To swallow her intrusions. A profound, suffocating exhaustion washed over me. “Jason,” I whispered. “We’re done. We are completely through.” Jason froze. A flash of disbelief warped his features. “Are you really this pathetic? You’re throwing away our entire relationship over a misunderstanding about a dress?” He grabbed my arm, his fingers digging into my sweater. “Stop throwing the word ‘breakup’ around. You aren’t eighteen anymore, Bridget. It’s not cute.” He didn’t care about my mother. He didn’t care about me. We were props in his curated life, expected to absorb whatever disrespect his favorite person chose to inflict. I wrenched myself out of his grip, shoving him backward toward the door. As he stumbled, his phone slipped from his breast pocket, clattering against the linoleum. The screen lit up on impact. The lock screen was a high-resolution photo of Rory sitting on his lap, pressing her lips firmly to his cheek. My mother glanced down. Her smile vanished. Her pupils contracted into tiny, terrified pinpricks. The past crashed back into her fractured mind like a tidal wave. She began screaming, pointing a trembling finger at Rory. “Whore! You’re the whore from the hotel! You stole him!” My father’s infidelity had shattered her sanity; the sight of another woman claiming a man was the match that lit her trauma. Jason immediately stepped in front of Rory, shielding her with his entire frame, disgust dripping from his voice as he looked at my mother. “Ma’am, that was a dare from a bachelor party. Learn some respect.” He grabbed Rory’s hand and pulled her into the hallway. At the doorway, he looked back at me, his eyes cold and clinical. “Keep your mother here tomorrow,” he said flatly. “She shouldn’t be at the venue. I won’t have her embarrassing my family in front of our guests.” The heavy fire door slammed shut behind them. My mother’s screams escalated into an incoherent wail. She grabbed a plastic butter knife from her lunch tray, attempting to saw at her own wrists in blind panic. I threw my arms around her thrashing body, pinning her hands, wrestling the plastic away as my tears finally spilled over. “It’s okay, Mom,” I wept into her thinning hair, rocking her back and forth. “It’s okay. I’m not marrying him. I swear to you, I’m never going back.” Once the nurses administered a sedative and my mother drifted into a medically induced sleep, I returned to the empty brownstone to collect my bags. On the dining table, Jason’s MacBook sat open, screen pulsing with incoming notifications from an iMessage group chat. The group name was: “Operation: Keep Jason’s Old Hag Away.” Brett: “Finally got the beach house locked in for the weekend. The nag isn’t gonna crash this one, is she?” Drew: “Looking at the return flights. If the surf is good, we might cut it close to the ceremony call time. That cool, J?” Rory sent a laughing GIF: “Careful, Jason’s whipped. If he’s a minute late, she’ll make him sleep in the kennel.” Then came Jason’s reply, rare and condescending: “Bridget knows her place. She isn’t the type to cause a scene over a delay. She’ll wait at the altar until I get there. Drop the chatter.” I stared at the screen. A slow, bitter smile touched my lips. I shut the laptop. “I will never wait for you again, Jason.” I picked up my passport, rolled my suitcases out the front door, and left behind the home I had paid for, draped in paper flowers and ruined promises. Two days later, Jason cut the beach trip short. He didn’t stay for the final bonfire. He booked the earliest morning flight back to the city, carrying a box of hand-carved seashells from the boardwalk—a souvenir he knew Bridget had once mentioned wanting. He unlocked the front door of the apartment, humming under his breath, and pushed open the master bedroom door. The breath caught in his throat.

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