I Waited Five Years to Marry Him, Then I Found Out He'd Married My Best Friend novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: The Garden Room
Eliza walks into a private room with a ring in her pocket and finds her fiancé toasting his wife and baby; she says one plain thing and leaves, and Chase calls to say her locks are being changed.
"The Ardmore party is in the Garden Room," the hostess said. "Right this way."
I followed her with a ring box in my coat pocket and my thumb on the lid.
It was a plain gold band, size eleven, and I had paid for it myself.
Last Tuesday my scan came back clear. Five years to the week since the surgery.
The night I was diagnosed, Chase held my face in both hands and said, "When you hit five years clear, I'll marry you."
We had six embryos frozen before my chemo. Two years ago Chase handed me the lab's letter saying none had survived a freezer move.
I had waited anyway. He hadn't mentioned the promise once since the scan, so tonight I was going to ask him.
He had told me he had a client dinner. At five he had texted, Eat something real tonight. Proud of you. I had found the restaurant in his calendar.
My phone buzzed with a text from Greer, my best friend since freshman year.
Do it tonight. He'd be a fool to say no. Call me after!!
I smiled at it and put the phone away.
Greer had been back in Chicago for four weeks, after two years in Singapore. She had married a man over there, and in all that time I had never met him.
The hostess opened the door.
The Garden Room had a glass wall, a long table and about twenty people.
There were silver balloons and a cake with one candle and the name OTTO in blue icing.
At the head of the table stood a woman in a navy suit with a glass raised. It was Chase's mother, Constance.
Beside her stood Chase.
His arm was around the waist of a blonde woman in a pale cardigan, and she was holding a baby.
"To Chase and Greer," Constance said. "Thirteen months of marriage, and one year of this boy. May we have fifty more."
Everyone drank.
Half the room had a phone up, filming.
I stood in the doorway and watched my fiancé kiss my best friend on the temple.
The baby grabbed at Chase's tie. Chase laughed and let him.
Greer looked up and saw me.
"Eliza," she said, very softly.
The room turned one face at a time.
Chase's hand came off her waist. "Eliza. You can't be here."
"Chase," Constance said, without raising her voice, "take care of this, please."
Nobody was holding my arm. Nobody was shouting.
I had two choices. I could be the woman who screamed at a baby's birthday, or I could be the woman who said one plain thing and left.
I took the ring box out of my pocket and opened it.
"I came to ask you to marry me," I said to Chase. "Five years, remember? Your words."
He looked at the box. He didn't look at me.
"It's a size eleven," I said. "I'll keep it. I paid for it."
I closed the lid and put it back in my pocket.
Then I turned to Greer.
"Where's your husband?"
Greer's mouth opened.
Chase had flown to Singapore four times last year, and every trip had been for the firm.
Nobody in the room answered me.
The baby began to cry, and Greer bounced Otto on her hip and turned her face away.
I looked at the phones. There were more than a dozen, and every one was pointed at me.
"Please get my good side," I said. "I won't be back."
By the door stood a tall man in a dark jacket with a glass of water in his hand.
He had not raised it for the toast. He stepped back to let me pass, and he met my eyes.
So I stepped out.
On the sidewalk the air was cold, and my hands wouldn't stay still.
A black SUV idled at the curb. A driver opened the rear door, and Constance got in.
Chase came out next with the car seat and buckled the baby in. Greer climbed in after him.
Chase didn't look back at the restaurant.
The door shut. The SUV pulled away, and its taillights went around the corner.
I stood there for a long time, looking at the place where it had been.
Then my phone rang.
It was Chase.
I answered, because I wanted to hear what he would say.
"Eliza." His voice was gentle and even, the voice he used when I was frightened of a scan. "Listen to me. Don't go home tonight."
"Why not?"
"My mother's people are changing the locks. It's her building, you know that. I'll book you a hotel and we'll talk in the morning."
I said nothing.
"Nothing has to change between us," he said. "Okay?"
I hung up.
"He's lying about the hotel," said a voice behind me.
It was the man from the door, and he was standing under the awning with his car keys in his hand.
"My brother has never booked anything he wasn't planning to cancel."
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