PART 1
The night before my wedding, my mother left me a voicemail at exactly 11:43 p.m.
I remember the time because I was sitting cross legged on the couch in my apartment, wearing an oversized gray T shirt and staring at my phone as if it might suddenly offer me a different version of my life if I stared long enough.
The place smelled faintly of hairspray from my trial earlier that afternoon, mixed with lemon dish soap because I had already cleaned the kitchen twice to quiet the storm inside my chest. My veil hung over the back of a chair, my heels waited by the door like obedient witnesses, and a half packed tote sat on the floor filled with safety pins, tissues, lipstick, and the marriage license I kept checking every twenty minutes as if it might disappear.
