My Wedding Dress And Ring Were For My Best Friend Chapter 02

My Wedding Dress And Ring Were For My Best Friend Chapter 02

Half an hour later, Paige arrived carrying coffee.

Ethan got up and hurried to the entryway, kicking my slippers aside as if they were in his way. Then he reached up to the top shelf of the closet, pulled down another pair, and handed them to her with a smile.

“I bought these for you.”

They were pink bunny-face slippers with wide, round eyes.

I had kept that exact pair in my online shopping cart for six months. Every time I wanted to order them, Ethan stopped me.

“Aren’t you a little old for shoes like that? Aren’t you worried people will laugh?”

But when it came to Paige, there was no lecture about being too old and no concern about anyone laughing.

He had even charged them to the credit card tied to my account.

When Paige noticed me looking, she turned, smiled, and waved.

“Nora, I brought you coffee.”

Just as I expected, there were two iced Americanos and one hot oat milk latte.

When she handed me the latte, I suddenly remembered that Ethan’s favorite drink had once been a latte too. He had a serious sweet tooth.

He used to say a hot latte was just like me—warm, sweet, and impossible to forget after a single taste.

I would blush and thump him on the arm, making him burst out laughing as he ran off and begged for mercy.

After that summer, I had traded my Americanos for lattes.

Somewhere along the way, though, the latte in Ethan’s hand had turned into an Americano.

I thanked Paige and carried my drink toward the kitchen.

She dropped onto the couch right beside Ethan and leaned against his shoulder, waving off my thanks.

“We’re best friends. You don’t have to thank me.”

She thought I was thanking her for the coffee.

I was really thanking her for showing me exactly what kind of man I had planned to marry.

Oil hissed and popped in the skillet, but even that could not drown out the raucous laughter and banter from the living room.

Ethan kept firing questions at Paige.

“Have you finalized the designs for the flagship project? Make sure you give it your best. Senior leadership is watching this one closely.”

“What do you want for breakfast tomorrow, pancakes or a breakfast sandwich?”

“Have you bought the jewelry for your bridesmaid dress yet? Want me to get it for you?”

I listened in silence until the knife slipped and sliced into my finger.

I hissed in pain.

Paige called out, “Nora, what happened?”

Pressing my injured finger, I mumbled, “I cut myself.”

“Oh.” She added, “Be careful.”

Ethan leaned around the kitchen doorway and glanced at me. Once he had confirmed that I was not seriously hurt, he shook his head and scoffed.

“You’re really slipping. You can’t even chop vegetables without cutting yourself.”

He did not bring me a Band-Aid or offer to take over. He merely leaned against the doorframe and took a cheap shot at me.

Back in college, I had once bumped myself lightly while riding on the back of his scooter. Ethan had panicked and insisted on carrying me to the campus clinic.

Only after the doctor assured him over and over that I was fine did he take me back to class, his eyes still red.

As I rested against his back, I thought he was the one.

I had never imagined that a few years later, I could be standing there in pain right in front of him, and he would barely react before turning back to laugh with Paige.

My finger throbbed with pain as I wrapped it in a towel.

Eventually, Ethan could no longer pretend not to see it. He sighed and stepped forward.

“Go bandage that. I’ll take over.”

I looked up at him.

“I thought you hated cooking.”

Ethan had chronic sinus problems and always complained that cooking fumes made him miserable. Ever since we moved in together, both cooking and washing the dishes had become my responsibility.

Just last week, we had bickered over who should cook and who should clean up.

Now he gave a dismissive snort, pulled on an apron, and slowly rolled up his sleeves.

“What choice do I have? Someone said she was really hungry.”

Paige immediately shouted from the living room, “Ethan, you’re the bottomless pit!”

He gave a low laugh and pushed me out of the kitchen.

I stood there, frozen. His laughter grated on me.

Paige set down her phone, pulled me onto the couch, and knelt in front of me with the first-aid kit, just as she had in the old days.

She cleaned the cut with an antiseptic pad, then carefully wrapped gauze around my finger.

As I looked at the woman who had been my best friend in college, conflicting emotions churned inside me.

When I had acute appendicitis and was writhing in pain in bed, she stayed with me at the hospital all night.

When I was broke at the end of the month, she had bought a case of instant ramen and lived on it with me.

When Ethan and I made our relationship official, she had hugged me and cried so hard she shook.

“You can’t leave me behind just because you have a boyfriend.”

That was why, when she followed me from Boston to New York City, I pushed through a special hiring exception to bring her into the product design department.

That was also why, when she volunteered to take charge of planning my wedding, I handed every detail over to her and devoted all my energy to the company’s flagship project.

I had anticipated how it would start, but I had never imagined how it would end.

After tying the final knot in the gauze, Paige looked up at me.

“Nora, can you let Ethan go?”