Page 109 of The Wedding Menu

I get back into bed and hug my knees, burying my face against them. My mind can’t process coherent thoughts. I’m overtaken by nausea, my head thumping with pain and my heartbeat rising with each passing moment of silence.

Frank must have gone to his parents’ place, a few blocks away.

As I sob, hugging my pillow, I try to wrap my head around it. Frank and I just broke up. It happened, and it was so anticlimactic, it almost doesn’t feel real. You’d expect, after fifteen years, that we’d have a huge fight lasting for days. That we’d cry and scream for hours, throw plates and glasses at the wall or something.

But he just left. And now it’s over.

Violent anger takes hold of me.

Hejustleft. If that’s what he wanted to do, then why not leave before? Why did he put me through the past six months if it was all meant to end like this anyway?

The ring around my finger feels heavy, a foreign object. Pulling at it with the other hand, I slide it off and set it on the nightstand, sniffling.

It doesn’t feel any more real. It doesn’t fill me with sadness, either, because I can’t focus on a thought long enough. I dread the wedding I’ll have to cancel, then think of our apartment: Who’s going to keep it? I picture the way he fixes his glasses, and it makes my heart squeeze, then I imagine him talking about whatheneeds and want to rip my hair out.

It’s too silent in here. Empty and silent and miserable.

Sitting up, I look at my phone on the nightstand. I shouldn’t. It’s been almost two months, so Ian probably moved on, but if I call and he has enough pity left in him to answer, it’ll set him back. I shouldn’t but, fuck, I want to.

I miss him so much. I think about him every day—hell, every damn minute. I haven’t been able to delete a single message or image, hanging on to them with every pathetic shred of myself, scrolling through them whenever I get the time.

I miss him, and I’m drunk, and I’m throwing myself a pity party he’s definitely invited to, so I scurry up and grab my phone. My fingers shake with adrenaline as I press his contact and the call button.

Beep.

It’s late, so he must be asleep. But he’s the one who always said,If you text me, I’ll wake up.I guess that applies to phone calls too. Right?

Beep.

“Amelie?”

My breath catches in my throat. His voice is groggy, raspy, so he was definitely sleeping. And it immediately soothes me, my body relaxing against the cold wall.

“Amelie? Are you okay?”

“I’m okay,” I whisper. I can barely talk with the way the thumps of my heart are making my whole body shake.

“You don’t sound okay.”

I walk to the bed and slowly sit, as if any sudden movement could break the balance of this reality in which I’m talking to Ian again. “It’s my birthday. Well, it was until midnight.”

Silence. Then: “Happy birthday.”

My lips twitch with a smile that dies out in a second.

“Did you have a good day?”

“Yeah. The girls took me out for drinks.”

“Just the girls? No Frank?”

I swallow. “Just the girls. It was also my bachelorette party.”

“Sounds like it wasn’t too fun.”

“It was.” I smile lightly at the memory of fluorescent drinks and penis-shaped cookies. “I just… Frank and I… we had a fight.”

“What happened?”