After the ceremony, Moni came up to us both. She clutched both of our hands, feeling so strong right then, her knuckles smooth. She pulled us together and nodded.
“Have a good life together,” she said in Korean and let go and turned away.
The reception was held in our backyard. We had transformed it with lights strung over the trees and bushes, a firepit in the middle. A few paparazzi had caught wind of Marlow returning home for her sister’s wedding. They lingered outside in the street, waiting for a shot of her in a bridesmaid’s dress.
But she was upstairs in her room again. Her morning had begun vibrantly, chitter-chattering around me as I got ready. She seemed to lose steam right before the ceremony, and I saw her throw back two glasses of champagne.
I didn’t see her emerge until later in the evening when it was time for her toast. Her breath was stale and she smelled of cigarette smoke as she muttered something about how she had stepped on her dress and ripped it. I smiled at a few neighbor guests staring at her, and held her arm.
“Maybe we should go get some water?” I suggested.
She shook her head. “It’s time for my speech.”
“It’s okay. We can do toasts later. There’s no rush—”
“No. It’s time.”
She clapped her hands forcefully and stood in the middle of the yard. The hum of the wedding guests came to a halt. I spotted Sawyer across the lawn with Ada, who was seated in one of the white wooden folding chairs. He had taken his tie off by then, his jacket draped around Ada. I almost forgot about Marlow in that moment, as I could not have loved him more right then.
I looked up to Marlow, standing on a chair. Her heel slipped and I lurched forward to catch her but she regained her balance.
Mom and Dad stood with Moni near the makeshift bar we had created. I saw Mom grab ahold of Dad’s elbow.
“Unbelievable,” Marlow mumbled. She held her hands up. “It is unbelievable that two of my favorite people in the world are now man and wife . . . wait, is that sexist? Excuse me. Husband and wife. Or partners in life?”
She adjusted her bra and I wanted to close my eyes and make her disappear. Twitch my nose like Samantha from Bewitched and the reception could go on without her.
“I love my sister, Isla. She knows it. I hope.”
Her words had become waves of slurred syllables and points of forced enunciation. She pointed to me. I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t feign a smile. I could only look back at her, hoping she would stop.
“I have a lot of high hopes for you two.”
She crossed her arms and held out her index fingers, pointing at each of us.
“I hope that every day is better than the last. That there be more sex than fights!”
The guests laughed nervously, sympathetically. I hated that they were being polite; it made it all that much worse. I wanted to leave right then, rush across to Sawyer and tell him to take us out of here.
“But hell. We all know that isn’t always the case . . . look at . . . look at the parents of the bride.” She clapped her hands toward them. “Professor of linguistics? Or is it really professor of the student lay?”
She laughed hysterically and Mom bolted, charged Marlow like a linebacker, and threw her arm around her, swooping her down from the chair. I followed them inside.
Marlow continued to laugh, little bullets of heaving as she slid down the refrigerator door. Mom grabbed her by the shoulders and forced her up.
“What the hell is wrong with you,” she growled, her face inches from Marlow’s.
Dad forced her back. “She’s not of sound mind right now, Stella. Let her sleep it off.”
“No!” Mom shouted.
Marlow laughed harder.
“What’s wrong, Mommy?” she asked. Her makeup had seeped under her eyes, and I had never seen her look so haggard.
“I am not your mother. I wish to hell we’d left you that night!”
I didn’t have time to process her movements. Marlow lunged forward, a leap that startled every part of me, and reached for Mom’s throat. Her hands looked like two metal cages, wide and snarling.
They met her throat and clung.
“Marlow!” Dad yelled.
He yanked her down and held her against him. She thrashed like a wild animal, and I wished she was a fire right then. A raging fire that I could douse with water.
Flashes blinded us from the window. Three men with cameras stood on their toes, frantically taking photos.
I looked over to the sliding glass doors. Moni leaned against them, her face so small, her hand to her mouth. She had turned into stone.
CHAPTER 38
ISLA
2014
I wish I could say time healed us. That we learned to forget all the slashing words and venom that soaked into us all. But that would be a lie.
Time seemed to only crush the pain in as if slabs of cement were stacked against us.
