Chapter 3 - The Wife Who Didn’t Want an Annulment
At nine fourteen that morning, Ryan sat across from an attorney named Marcus Feldman and learned the difference between a joke and a legal document.
I know this because Emily told me later, though at the time I was sitting at my kitchen table calling wedding vendors one by one.
The venue was first.
Our coordinator, Denise, already knew something had happened because she had seen my message in the family group chat.
“Nora,” she said gently, “you don’t have to do this today.”
“Yes, I do.”
“Some deposits may be transferable.”
“I don’t want them transferred.”
“Are you certain?”
There was that word again.
Certain.
Yesterday I had thought certainty belonged to couples like the older pair from Chicago.
That morning, certainty belonged to me.
“Yes.”
I canceled the venue.
Then the florist.
Then the photographer.
The caterer.
The DJ.
The cake designer.
Every cancellation carried a fee, and every fee felt like tuition for the most expensive lesson of my life.
Meanwhile, across town, Ryan apparently entered Marcus Feldman’s office convinced he would be single again before lunch.
Marcus listened to the story.
Marriage license.
Chapel.
Officiant.
Witness.
Signed certificate.
Ryan and Ava had consummated nothing, Ryan emphasized, as though that detail transformed the paperwork.
Marcus asked whether either had been forced.
No.
Were they intoxicated to the point of being unable to understand the ceremony?
Ryan admitted he remembered everything.
Had there been fraud about identity?
No.
Were they related?
Obviously not.
Marcus reportedly removed his glasses and stared at him.
“You willingly obtained a legal marriage license, participated in a ceremony, exchanged vows, signed documents, and represented yourselves publicly as married?”
“It was a dare.”
“The state does not have a ‘truth or dare’ exception.”
Ryan’s face apparently went white.
“What do I do?”
“You may have grounds to pursue an annulment depending on the specific facts, but I cannot promise one. The alternative is divorce.”
“How long?”
“That depends.”
“I’m getting married in six weeks.”
Marcus looked at him.
“To someone else?”
“Yes.”
“Does your fiancée know you’re currently married?”
Ryan stared at the desk.
“She canceled the wedding.”
Marcus put his glasses back on.
“That may simplify one problem.”
Ryan did not appreciate the joke.
Then came the larger problem.
An annulment required cooperation or, at minimum, a legal basis that could survive scrutiny.
Ryan called Ava from the attorney’s office.
She didn’t answer.
He called again.
No answer.
Marcus suggested they schedule another meeting once Ryan had spoken to his wife.
His wife.
Apparently Ryan flinched every time Marcus used the word.
When he finally reached Ava shortly after eleven, she was having brunch with Chloe and two friends at a casino restaurant.
Ryan asked her to meet him at the attorney’s office.
Ava laughed.
“Already?”
“This isn’t funny.”
“You thought it was funny yesterday.”
“Nora canceled the wedding.”
There was a pause.
“Oh.”
“I need you to sign whatever Marcus prepares.”
“Who’s Marcus?”
“My attorney.”
Another pause.
“You hired an attorney without talking to me?”
“We agreed it was one day.”
“We agreed we’d get married for a dare.”
“And undo it today.”
“No, you said that.”
Ryan apparently stood from his chair.
“What are you talking about?”
Marcus motioned for him to calm down.
Ava lowered her voice.
“Can we talk privately?”
“Come here.”
“No.”
“Ava.”
“I’ll call you later.”
She hung up.
For the first time, Ryan understood that he had entered a legal marriage with someone whose intentions he had never seriously questioned.
At noon, I received a call from Ryan’s mother.
Linda Hale had always been kind to me. She was the person who cried hardest when Ryan proposed. She had spent weeks helping me collect childhood photographs for a wedding display.
“Nora,” she said, and immediately started crying.
I closed my eyes.
“Please don’t apologize.”
“I raised him better than this.”
“I know.”
“No, sweetheart, apparently I didn’t.”
Hearing her call me sweetheart nearly broke my resolve.
Linda asked whether I needed money for the lost deposits.
I refused.
She insisted.
I refused again.
Then she said something I didn’t expect.
“Don’t take him back because of us.”
I went quiet.
“I know you love our family,” she continued. “And we love you. But if he comes crying to you—and he will—do not confuse missing us with needing him.”
Tears filled my eyes.
“Linda…”
“I’m furious with my son. But more than that, I’m ashamed that we all laughed off Ava’s behavior for years.”
I sat straighter.
“What do you mean?”
“We saw it.”
Those three words hurt almost as much as the photographs.
“You saw it?”
“The touching. The jokes. The way she claimed him. We told ourselves it was harmless because Ryan told us it was harmless.”
“Why didn’t anyone say anything?”
Linda exhaled.
“Because you were always so gracious that we assumed you truly didn’t mind.”
There it was.
My silence had become evidence against me.
“I did mind.”
“I know that now.”
I cried after we hung up.
Not because I blamed Linda.
Because I finally understood how thoroughly I had participated in my own disappearance.
I had swallowed discomfort to look secure.
I had smiled when hurt to appear mature.
I had accepted disrespect because I thought demanding boundaries might make Ryan leave.
And he had left anyway.
Not physically.
Emotionally.
One compromise at a time.
That afternoon, I took the engagement ring to the jeweler where Ryan had bought it.
I didn’t sell it.
I asked them to package it securely.
Then I drove to his parents’ house.
Linda opened the door.
When she saw the box in my hand, she shook her head.
“You don’t have to give that back.”
“I want to.”
“It was a gift.”
“It was a promise.”
She started crying again.
I put the box in her palm.
“The promise is over.”
Linda hugged me.
When I left, Ryan was pulling into the driveway.
He saw my car.
I saw his.
For one second, our eyes met through the windshields.
He jumped out before I could reverse.
“Nora!”
I locked my doors.
He came around to the driver’s side.
“Please roll down the window.”
I lowered it two inches.
“Ava won’t answer me.”
“I’m not sure why that concerns me.”
“She’s acting strange.”
“Ryan, you married her.”
“I know what I did.”
“Then congratulations. You finally have a reason to learn what your wife is like.”
His face tightened.
“That’s cruel.”
I almost laughed.
“Cruel?”
“I’m trying to fix this.”
“No. You’re trying to restore everything to the way it was before you faced consequences.”
“That isn’t fair.”
“Neither was yesterday.”
He put both palms against the top of my car.
“Nora, I was drunk.”
“You were sober enough to fill out paperwork.”
“I wasn’t thinking.”
“That’s not better.”
“I didn’t love marrying her.”
“You posted that it was the best dare you ever lost.”
“It was a joke.”
“And the kiss?”
Silence.
His eyes moved away.
I knew the answer before he spoke.
“She kissed me.”
“And you stopped her?”
His jaw flexed.
“It happened fast.”
“Did you stop her?”
Nothing.
I nodded.
“Exactly.”
I raised the window.
He knocked on the glass.
“Nora, wait.”
I put the car in reverse.
Then he said something I barely heard.
“I think Ava did this on purpose.”
My foot paused over the brake.
I looked at him.
He stepped closer.
“She doesn’t want the annulment.”
For the first time since Valentine’s Day, I felt something other than heartbreak.
Not jealousy.
Not fear.
Something colder.
Understanding.
Ava had spent years treating my relationship like temporary furniture in a house she believed belonged to her.
Maybe the dare had never been a dare at all.
May you like
And if Ryan was finally beginning to see that, he was about to discover how many people around him had known long before he did.
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