Once Upon a Heartbreak

by Cassie Rocca

  “Good, that means I won’t have to argue with anyone else. I’ve still got so much stuff to organize that I really can’t waste any more energy with stupid problems.”

  “Are you getting stressed over the wedding planning?” asked Clover. “Anything I can do to help?”

  Right. The wedding. She sometimes forgot that she’d been officially engaged to be married for a whole month already…

  “No, it’s still six weeks away, and we’ve got everything under control. That’s the best thing about doing two weddings for the price of one – the other couple are going to take care of almost everything so I don’t have to worry about anything.” While she was speaking, Liberty heard Clover muttering something, but couldn’t quite hear what. “What is it now?”

  “Nothing, I’m fine.”

  “I thought you sounded annoyed. I must have misheard. Good.”

  Clover said nothing, but after a few moments she could hold it in no more. “Okay, I’ll tell you! Do you really want to know what irritates me? I can’t accept that you’re sharing your wedding with your sister in law!”

  “Why not? It’s the perfect solution. We’re going to join forces and only have the one ceremony. Do you know how much money we’re going to be able to save this way? Justin’s parents are really happy about it, and so is my mother.”

  “You’re right, it’s a great idea,” replied Clover sarcastically. “It’s a shame I can’t ask my brother and Sienna to get married the same day as me! I’d suggest it right away if they weren’t married already!”

  “You hate your sister in law and that’s why you can’t get your head around how come I’m fine with this arrangement. But the thing is that Janet and I get on really well.”

  “What I mean, Lib,” said Clover, a worried expression on her face, “is that your wedding day is the most important day of your life! Of you and your husband’s lives! How can you want to share such a significant moment with anyone except your loved one?”

  “What are you talking about? Each of us is going to experience our wedding individually – not as part of a group!”

  “But—”

  Liberty took her hands from the keyboard and turned to look at her friend. “Clover, I’m not like you. The only reason we’re not just having a very quiet civil marriage is that Janet offered to take care of everything. If it had been up to me to organize the ceremony, it would be lasting about ten minutes and would involve just me, my fiancé, the person marrying us and a couple of guests. In, out, a couple of group photos and then everybody off home. Ten minutes tops.”

  “Ok, I give up,” said Clover, getting up from the desk. “Zoe, you try and talk some sense into her, please.”

  Her eyebrows raised and her fingers steepled, Liberty turned towards the tall sexy brunette to hear what she had to say.

  Zoe shrugged. “What can I tell you? This time I have to agree with Clover. All the brides-to-be I’ve ever seen have been obsessed with their wedding. They’ve spent months choosing their wedding dress, scouting out the most romantic location and sampling food and cakes…”

  “I can happily do without the cake,” Liberty murmured. “And anyway, Janet has thought of that too. She knows about the problems I have dealing with food, so she’s deciding the whole menu, and this is a huge relief for me, I can tell you. In exchange, I have to organize the pre-wedding party which is going to take place a week before the marriage. She thinks I’ll be able to handle that, since it’s supposed to be very relaxed and informal, and there are going to be a lot less people than at the ceremony. Just a decent sized buffet and a couple of cakes should be enough,” she said. “They told me that the guests wouldn’t be happy with just nuts and berries.”

  “Aren’t you at all excited, Lib?” asked Zoe.

  Liberty smiled at both her best, and only, friends. She knew where they were coming from – their point of view was the same as that of any woman in who was in love with her boyfriend and about to get married. Her perspective, though, was different. Her attitude to life was always much more rational – she never wasted time and money on useless details if she could help it.

  “Girls, I appreciate your concern, but there’s absolutely no reason for you to be worried,” she said very calmly. “Marriage just isn’t that big a deal for me. It’s not something that ties you to one person for the rest of your life anymore – if it doesn’t work out, I can always get a divorce. Marriage is just a contract, which is more useful to society as a whole than it is to the couple getting married. I don’t see anything romantic about it… You can be in love even without signing a legal document that proves your feelings, you know? Or would you feel that Cade and Eric loved you less if you didn’t have a piece of paper that says you’re married? And personally speaking, I don’t actually think that your love gets stronger after spending a day in church promising before God that you’re going to love your partner forever – do you?”

  “You’re making me sad,” muttered Clover, putting her hands on her face.

  “You’ve been with your partner for such a short time that everything still looks romantic to you,” continued Liberty. “But Justin and I have been together for years. We’re a mature, solid couple and neither of us likes wasting time, energy and money on pointless ceremonies and frills. Justin’s sister has always dreamt of a fabulous wedding, and we’re just taking advantage of that by gatecrashing her party.”

  “You sound like you’re just reading a script that’s meant to convince you more than it is to convince us,” replied Zoe, hoping for a reaction from Liberty, but Liberty was too good at hiding her emotions to give her the satisfaction. “If what you said about the way you feel is actually true, how do you explain that a woman as rational and disillusioned as yourself can write such sweet, romantic stories for her clients? How can you describe emotions that you don’t believe in?”

  “Telling other people’s stories is easy – you don’t have to invent anything. My clients tell me what feelings the characters have for each other, and I simply write them down. You don’t need creativity to do my job, you just need to know how to use language,” she lied. It was total crap, but she decided that her friends didn’t need to know how important writing actually was for her.

  “I’ve had enough,” Clover bubbled, “I’m going home, where there is someone who will greet me with a smile and call me by adorable romantic nickname, which is just what I need to cheer me up.”

  “I’m not much on adorable romantic nicknames, but Eric is going to have to work overtime with the cuddles tonight,” said Zoe as she went to join her colleague who was already at the door. “Aren’t you leaving with us?”

  “Not yet, I need to do a bit of research about Cape May. Justin is thinking that he’d like to buy a holiday home there, and I think that breathing a bit of sea air would be really good for me, although I don’t think I’ll have time to go there every weekend.”

  “Did you say Cape May?” Clover suddenly appeared enthusiastic. “Cade and I are going there this weekend. We’re going to be staying with a friend who has a house on the beach. Why don’t you come with us?”

  “That would be nice, but I doubt very much that your friend would be happy to see his house overrun by strangers.”

  “He actually offered to put up my whole family too, but of course I would never take them on holiday with me. And anyway, you two and Eric are my real family, so I’m sure he’d be perfectly happy for me to bring you along,” Clover trilled happily. “We’ll get to spend two days far from the city in a wonderful Victorian house! I can’t wait!”

  “Eric and I are coming for sure,” Zoe smiled. “We couldn’t say no to a weekend at the seaside after the awful long, snowy winter we had this year!”

  “Well, in that case, I’ll ask Justin if it’s OK with him,” Liberty said. “Spending the weekend at your friend’s might be useful for getting to know the place and deciding if we really do want to have a house there, anyway.”

  “Great, and I’ll have
Cade call his friend and tell him that you’re all coming.”

  *

  Once her friends had gone, Liberty stretched back on her chair and began massaging her temples.

  She hadn’t been feeling particularly well for a few days now, and her headaches just kept getting worse. She was beginning to worry that she might be coming down with flu and had thought of closing the shop for a week during the Spring break just to get some rest, but in the end she had dismissed the idea, as she was sure that one way or another she would end up using the time to work anyway. The following week would be quite a busy one, and she still hadn’t finalized her orders for St Patrick’s Day and Easter. As well as that, she had dozens of stories to write, shop windows to decorate, products to organize on the shelves and accounting work to do. There were so many things to think about that she couldn’t afford such a long break or she would end up with a backlog she’d never get through.

  Work was her only priority in life – there wasn’t room for anything else. Well, almost anything.

  At the sound of her telephone ringing she gave a loud groan: she didn’t want to have to deal with any more work calls that day as it was already past seven, but when she looked, she saw that the name on the display was ‘Mom’, so she sighed resignedly but answered the call just the same.

  “Hey Mom, what’s going on?”

  “Nothing darling, I just need to ask you a couple of things,” replied her mother, coming straight to the point, just as usual. Lilian Keller was a very active woman with a busy life who, after her ex-husband had run away with his secretary, had thrown herself wholeheartedly into all kinds of activities. Not long afterwards, she had found a new partner and calmed down a little. A quiet life, though, wasn’t for her, or maybe she was just afraid of relaxing too much, so she was still always busy doing something.

  Liberty realized that she had turned out to be very similar to her mom, and smiled bitterly to herself.

  “Ok, shoot – I’ve got a couple of minutes for you,” she joked.

  “Well, thanks,” the woman laughed. “you’re always so generous. Listen, I’m organising Bryan’s birthday party, and I need to know if you’re coming. Will you be able to stop by this weekend?”

  Liberty slapped her forehead and raised her eyes to the ceiling: how could she have so completely forgotten about her stepfather’s birthday? Bryan Andrews was such a lovely patient person and he had tried his best to be a father figure for her and her sister Katherine for the past eight years. Liberty sincerely appreciated his efforts, but tried to steer clear of him anyway. Not out of meanness, but… well, it was just that caring for someone always exposed her to risks that she preferred not to run.

  “I’m sorry, but I’ve already made other plans for the weekend and I won’t be back in town until Sunday evening. I do have a present for him though, and I’m going to send it as soon as I can,” she said, while writing a note for the next Monday in her planner and underlining it three times:

  Send Clover to get Bryan a present!

  “I’d like to say I’m surprised, but the truth is that it’s exactly the answer I was expecting from you. I do hope you will at least remember to call him, Liberty. Bryan is a lovely man and he never makes a fuss, but I’m sure he would be happy to hear your voice. You’re so far away and so busy that sometimes it’s hard for him to remember that he has two daughters instead of just the one.”

  Liberty couldn’t help feeling annoyed: “Well, that seems to be something that happens to all your husbands eventually, doesn’t it? Luckily this one only forgets part of the family.”

  The poisonous words had flown out of her mouth almost without her realising it, but she immediately regretted not having been able to bite her tongue in time. She hated talking about Jim Allen and the way he had abandoned them all, and had stopped feeling sad, angry or anything at all about it a long time ago. She rarely thought about that depressing old story nowadays, but lately she had been feeling so stressed, anxious and tired that sometimes she just couldn’t control her reactions.

  “Lib, honey, that wasn’t what I meant. It just came out wrong…” apologized her mortified-sounding mother.

  “Don’t be sorry, Mom,” Liberty stopped her, “I know that that’s not what you meant. Bryan really is a lovely guy, and I’m happy that you married him. I’m just tired and busy and organising a million things. And when my mind is full to overflowing with stuff to take care of, I sometimes can’t keep the nasty side of my personality under control.”

  “You don’t have a nasty side of your personality! You’re just a little… tense sometimes. You didn’t use to be like that, though, honey, and frankly, I’m starting to get a bit worried about it.”

  Liberty lowered her head to the desk. Oh God, she thought. Here we go again!

  She could have guessed every single word that her mother was about to say because she repeated them, in exactly the same order, at least once a month.

  “Are you sure that everything is OK with you, Libby?” her mother started. “You used to be so warm once; you were always so cheerful, and you always had a smile, even in the darkest times. But nowadays it almost seems like you don’t feel any emotion at all, and you seem to get more and more distant and cold every time I see you.”

  Liberty stood up and went over to the window, from where she could watch the traffic on Fifth Avenue. She stared at an infinite line of yellow taxis while she tried to think of a way to reply to her mother.

  “For the hundredth time, Mom: I’m fine, I’m just busy! And I also grew up in the meantime! You’d really have a reason to be worried if I’d remained the same naïve little girl that I used to be, don’t you think?”

  “I don’t know, Lib. I’m proud of the woman you’ve become: you’re smart, beautiful and successful. But ten years ago you seemed happier. You seemed… well, more human, I guess.”

  Liberty gave a laugh that was completely devoid of amusement. “Are you kidding me? Ten years ago I was depressed, overweight, uncertain about my future and single. I might have been a lot of things, Mom, but I wasn’t happy at all.”

  “Well ok, if you say so. Maybe the problem is that I see you so rarely nowadays that I don’t really know how you’re doing,” sighed her mother, sounding unconvinced. “How is the organisation of the wedding going, by the way?”

  “Thank God Janet is going to be taking care of pretty much everything. I’ll only need to plan a few little details.”

  “I would love to go shopping with you for your wedding gown and for all the other stuff you’ll need the way I did with your sister, but you’re always so busy, and I’m not sure how long I can stay away from home…”

  “Don’t worry about that, I already know exactly what I need to get. I can do it all in one weekend. Justin and me don’t want anything very fancy anyway – it’ll all be very sober.”

  “Don’t you think that your ideas are maybe a little bit too sober? Everything always seems so serious with you two – it feels more like you’re signing a contract than getting married. You’ve planned out your whole relationship so rationally… Sometimes it’s almost like you’re a couple of colleagues instead of two lovers.”

  Those words made Liberty start to feel anxious. Her mother was yet another person who was expressing her perplexities about her relationship with Justin, exactly the same way Clover had just a few minutes ago, while Zoe and Eric would always start to get puzzled expressions on their faces whenever she talked about Justin and their wedding.

  Could it be that it was because she was less than certain about it herself too?

  “Be honest,” continued her mother, “this is nothing like the wedding you’d always dreamt about.”

  She shook her head as though refusing to even consider the question, though it did seem to be cropping up more and more often lately.

  The problem was that everybody was always going on about love all the time! Clover’d had her fairy tale romance with a Hollywood prince, then Zoe and Eric had fallen in lov
e after having been friends for over ten years…

  She was different, though. She wanted nothing to do with all that sickly-sweet stuff. Not anymore. She needed someone who was as solid and as much of a realist as Justin was.

  Sure, his proposal might not have been the most romantic in history, but what did that matter? Her boyfriend had simply thought that their relationship was solid enough to move on to the next natural phase, so he had proposed. He hadn’t knelt at her feet holding out a little blue box the way Clover had hoped, nor had he given her a huge diamond whilst promising eternal devotion, the way Zoe would have liked. It had happened during a phone call a few days after Valentine’s Day, when Justin had been out of town for work.

  She had just finished dinner when he’d called. “Did you know that my sister and Travis are getting married? They’ve even planned a date already,” he had told her. “I was thinking that maybe we could get married too. What do you reckon? We’re ready to live as husband and wife, don’t you think?”

  A slightly taken aback Liberty had nodded, not realising for a moment that he couldn’t see her face, then she had cleared her throat and told him that she thought it was a good idea, and then Justin had gone on about the advantages of getting married together with the other couple.

  “Jan is going to be getting married in the last week of April. I think that’s a good time, I’d like to get married at that time of the year too. Two weddings in a row would be really too expensive, though, so I was thinking – what about a double ceremony? We could all get married together. What do you think? I know Janet likes the idea.”

  Liberty was shocked at first, but had soon accepted the proposal. They had sorted out all the details a few days later at his house.

  And that was the story of how she had ended up being officially engaged.