“Pay for it?” I echoed, incredulous. “Why would I pay for a wedding I wasn’t even invited to?”
There was a brief pause on the line before my mother spoke again, her tone shifting from panic to something more pleading. “Emily, we thought you would want to contribute. It’s your sister, after all. Family should help each other.”
I couldn’t help but feel a bitter chuckle escape my throat. “Family, huh? That’s rich coming from the people who kicked me out at the door and told me I wasn’t family.”
“Emily, please, be reasonable. You know these things are expensive, and your father and I have been under a lot of stress—”
“Mom,” I interrupted, my voice firmer than it had been in years. “I’m not paying for it. I came to the wedding because I thought maybe we could put everything behind us. But instead, I got treated like a stranger. If you wanted family to pitch in, maybe you should have treated me like family.”
There was a silence on the other end, the kind that seemed to stretch for miles. I imagined my mother standing in her kitchen, probably wringing her hands the way she did when she was upset or when something didn’t go her way.
“Emily, we didn’t mean—” she started, but I cut her off again.
“You didn’t mean to what? You didn’t mean to make me feel like an outsider? Or you didn’t mean to call just because you needed money?”
Another pause, then a sigh. “Emily, we love you. But you left us years ago and—”
“And what? I left because of a job. I left because I wanted to build a life that mattered to me. That doesn’t mean I stopped being your daughter or Sophie’s sister.”
Her voice softened, almost like she was trying to reach across the phone and touch my hand. “Things have been hard without you here. Sophie felt abandoned.”
Maybe that was true. Maybe Sophie did feel abandoned. But I had felt abandoned too, standing outside that venue, watching as people I used to know moved on without me.
“I understand, Mom,” I said, quieter now. “But I can’t help you with this. Not after what happened.”
Before she could say anything else, I added, “I’m going to hang up now. I need time to think.”
“Emily,” she said, desperation creeping back in, but I had already pressed the end call button.
I sat there for a long time, the silence of the hotel room pressing in. The sun was just beginning to rise, painting the sky in shades of pink and orange. In that moment, I realized that maybe I needed to let go of the hope that a wedding could fix everything.
I had my life to live, a plane to catch, and maybe, someday, the courage to reach out to Sophie on my own terms. But for now, I needed to move forward. I needed to start writing my own story, one where I was enough, just as I was.