While I Couldn't Breathe, He Was With Her novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: The Appointment
The clerk says Kirsten's marriage slot is already taken, and across the street Nolan is feeding Polly ice cream while Kirsten's call is cut mid-attack.
At the county clerk's window, a woman in a blue cardigan told me my ten o'clock slot had already been used.
"There must be a mistake," I said. "Kirsten Abbott and Nolan Haskins. We booked this six weeks ago."
"The slot was claimed this morning, ma'am."
I looked at my watch.
It was nine forty.
Nolan had said he would meet me on the courthouse steps at nine thirty, with the rings and the legal counsel's paperwork.
I walked back out into the cold and took out my phone.
That was when I saw him across the street.
He stood outside a dessert shop in the old green Forest Service jacket he had worn every weekend since April.
He told me it belonged to Polly's brother and he would return it someday.
Polly stood in front of him, holding a cone.
She had pink ice cream at the corner of her mouth, and Nolan was wiping it away with his thumb.
They were both laughing.
I had not seen him laugh like that in months.
My chest tightened.
I knew the feeling, and I knew what came next.
My inhaler was in Nolan's coat, because he had insisted on carrying it for me.
He had made himself my emergency contact on every form we ever filled out.
I pressed his name with my thumb.
The phone rang once, and he looked down at his pocket.
It rang twice.
He looked at the screen, and then he looked at Polly, and he pressed a button.
The ringing stopped.
I tried to say his name to nobody.
The air would not go past my collarbone.
I slid down the courthouse wall and sat on the freezing step with my bag in my lap.
A man in a delivery vest crouched in front of me.
"Ma'am, are you okay? Can you talk?"
I shook my head.
"I'm calling an ambulance," he said, already dialing.
The last thing I saw before the edges of the street went gray was Nolan, across the road, putting his arm around Polly's shoulders.
In the hospital, a doctor with a clipboard stood at the foot of my bed.
"You have asthma," he said. "Why would you leave the house without your rescue medication?"
"It's with my fiancé," I whispered.
"Then your fiancé should be here."
He pulled the curtain back to check the monitor, and I saw my phone lighting up on the tray table.
It was a message from Nolan, sent half an hour ago.
Nolan: I'm sorry, Kirsten. The legal counsel has an emergency. We'll have to reschedule the registration.
He had sent it while Polly was eating ice cream in front of him.
I opened the county records website.
You could search anyone's marital status there, and I had never once thought to search his.
I typed his name.
Haskins, Nolan A. Marital status: Married. Spouse: Ostrow, Polly R.
Filed today at 9:02 a.m.
That was the slot.
He had registered his marriage in the same office, under the same ceiling, while I waited upstairs in line for mine.
I took a screenshot.
My hand shook, but it did not shake for lack of air anymore.
The doctor was looking at my left hand.
"Is that an engagement ring? Where is he?"
"He's busy marrying someone else," I said.
The doctor did not answer.
He wrote something on the clipboard and left me alone.
I scrolled down the record to the line that said Application Received.
It had a date eleven days ago.
I counted back.
Eleven days ago, Nolan had taken me to a bakery on Capitol Hill to taste wedding cake.
He had fed me the lemon one with his own fork and told me he could not wait to be my husband.
He had already filed for another wife that afternoon.
I took the ring off and put it in the pocket of my coat.
Then I signed the discharge form the nurse brought me and went to find a taxi.
I was going home to get my things.
Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend