At dinner, Claire asked where Ryan had lived before, what jobs he had, and whether he always moved around this much. Afterward, when I cornered her by the sink, I whispered, “Can you please stop?”
“I’m asking questions, Ally.”
“You’re picking at him, Claire.”
She looked past me toward the dining room. “Maybe you should ask why he makes me want to.”
That stayed with me. When I asked Ryan about it in the car, he gave a small shrug.
“Maybe your sister just doesn’t like me.”
He said it kindly, like I was the one making it bigger than it was. Maybe that was the first moment something drifted, though I didn’t name it then.
“You’re picking at him, Claire.”
***
The closer the wedding got, the stranger Claire became.
One evening, the four of us were at my parents’ table eating pot roast when Claire set down her fork and looked right at me.
“You should reconsider who you’re marrying, Alice.”
My mother’s glass stopped halfway to her mouth.
“What?” I laughed, because I thought she had to be joking.
Claire didn’t laugh. “I mean it.”
My face went hot. “What is wrong with you?”
The closer the wedding got, the stranger Claire became.
Mom snapped, “Just because your sister found someone nice doesn’t mean you get to ruin it, Claire.”
Claire’s expression changed; that old family hurt where she’d been cast as the “difficult one” so many times she almost wore it like a name tag.
“I’m not trying to ruin anything,” she shot back.
Dad pushed back from the table. “Then stop talking like this.”
Claire stood, left the room, and her door slammed down the hall. No one followed her. I sat there and let my parents turn her warning into bitterness, into jealousy, and into Claire being Claire.
She’d been cast as the “difficult one” so many times.
The next night was my bachelorette party. Balloons, sparkling drinks, and too much pink. I was trying to be present in my own happiness when Claire walked in late, hair damp from the rain, still in her work clothes.
She found me near the bar. “Alice,” she said, looking like she’d run out of time, “cancel the wedding.”
I stared at her. “What did you just say?”
“Please. Just cancel it.”
