Chap­ter 8: The rehearsal for the wed­ding took place in the Globe, an out­door the­ater hid­den among the tow­er­ing pine trees, offer­ing a sense of seclu­sion and tran­quil­i­ty. How­ev­er, the atmos­phere was any­thing but serene as it was filled with an unex­pect­ed group of guests, each sip­ping wine and casu­al­ly nib­bling on snacks. What was intend­ed to be an inti­mate, sacred moment was quick­ly over­tak­en by the dis­joint­ed nature of the gath­er­ing, as peo­ple talked loud­ly and moved around, turn­ing the event into a pub­lic dis­play rather than the solemn rehearsal it was meant to be. The couple’s much-antic­i­pat­ed moment was over­shad­owed, and I couldn’t help but feel dis­heart­ened by how their wed­ding was being turned into a spec­ta­cle rather than a mean­ing­ful per­son­al expe­ri­ence.

RJ, a young man with curly hair, eager­ly intro­duced him­self as the ceremony’s host. Although he worked in human resources, he had obtained his offi­ciant cre­den­tials online specif­i­cal­ly for the event. He had lit­tle expe­ri­ence in lead­ing a wed­ding but was eager to get involved, and soon he sought out the groom, Aidan. Aidan, look­ing pale and unwell, was sit­ting with the grooms­men, his face marked with a rash. Despite try­ing to keep things togeth­er, it was clear that the stress of the event and his nerves were tak­ing a toll on him.

Errol Gard­ner, Aidan’s father, soon arrived, apol­o­giz­ing for his wife’s absence due to ill­ness but stay­ing opti­mistic about her join­ing the cer­e­mo­ny lat­er. Mean­while, Tam­my and Abi­gail prac­ticed their flower girl duties, though Abigail’s bound­less ener­gy caused her to lag behind, proud­ly declar­ing her­self as “the cousin of the bride.” Her enthu­si­asm, how­ev­er, irri­tat­ed me, and I strug­gled to mask my frus­tra­tion. Tam­my, notic­ing my irri­ta­tion, remind­ed me that Abi­gail had come from a bro­ken home, and this wed­ding was an incred­i­bly sig­nif­i­cant event in her life, one that she was clear­ly excit­ed about.

I shared my con­cerns with Tam­my, par­tic­u­lar­ly regard­ing Aidan’s obvi­ous dis­tress. I point­ed out his phys­i­cal symp­toms, such as the rash, which made me feel uneasy, but Tam­my reas­sured me that it was just nerves. She then remind­ed me of how I had been just as anx­ious before my wed­ding, sug­gest­ing that Aidan’s con­di­tion was more of a pass­ing phase than a sign of some­thing seri­ous. This per­spec­tive con­trast­ed with my own, as I couldn’t shake the feel­ing that Aidan might be deal­ing with some­thing more trou­bling. Despite this, I tried to calm myself and let the moment pro­ceed as planned, though unease lin­gered.

The rehearsal offi­cial­ly began, with RJ lead­ing the pro­ces­sion, his ner­vous ener­gy pal­pa­ble as he direct­ed the par­tic­i­pants. Abi­gail, adorably toss­ing flower petals down the aisle, was fol­lowed by the brides­maids and grooms­men, all of whom seemed eager to get through the process. When it came time for me to escort Mag­gie, the ten­sion between us was evi­dent. Our unre­solved issues sur­faced as we walked down the aisle, remind­ing me of the emo­tion­al weight that this wed­ding held, not just for Aidan and Mag­gie, but for me as well. Despite my per­son­al con­cerns about Aidan’s well-being, I tried to stay com­posed, rec­og­niz­ing that the focus should be on the bride and groom, not my anx­i­eties.

As the rehearsal con­tin­ued, RJ revealed that the “Bible” he was hold­ing was mere­ly a prop, some­thing meant to add weight to the cer­e­mo­ny, though it didn’t pro­vide the gen­uine com­fort that I had hoped for. Mag­gie and Aidan, still uncer­tain about the direc­tion of the cer­e­mo­ny, looked to him for reas­sur­ance. RJ, ever the opti­mist, offered a relaxed take on things, sug­gest­ing a more con­tem­po­rary approach, which did lit­tle to ease their minds. Tam­my, how­ev­er, con­fi­dent­ly prac­ticed her read­ing from the Bible, and as she recit­ed the words with such sin­cer­i­ty, the entire atmos­phere shift­ed. Her heart­felt deliv­ery filled the space with a rev­er­ence and calm that RJ had not antic­i­pat­ed, lead­ing him to ques­tion whether they should recon­sid­er the tone of the cer­e­mo­ny. Mag­gie, with a firm assur­ance, respond­ed that every­thing was per­fect as it was, which brought a sense of sta­bil­i­ty and calm to what had been a some­what chaot­ic rehearsal.