30 Days of Love

Wedding Planning

Joanna's POV 

I stare at the wedding ring as Trina, Liam, and my wedding planner speak.

According to Barbara, Trina has been a part of this tradition for years; she's been the one to plan the weddings. And because of that, she explained that both Liam and I should trust her and that she can do spectacular things.

However, I keep my guard up and strengthen my wall against her while Liam surrenders; he dropped his walls, putting every piece of faith he has within her.

Am I being rude? I question, unable to keep my eyes grasped onto my ring.

Slowly, I look up at Trina, my eyes connecting with something new: the mysterious scar that imprints a lighting bolt onto her pale skin.

What happened? I wonder though I'm erased from my thoughts as Trina's eyes connect with mine.

"So." She clears her throat in a way that makes me believe she saw my curious eyes staring. "Where do you want the wedding to be?"

I move my eyes up to Trina's, as Barbara answers the question for us. "My grandmother's house."

Flipping her orange ponytail behind her head that looks from Barbara to me, I nod, permitting her to write the location in her book.

She does so, and as the words release into her hand that stops every second, crocking her letters, making sure they're as perfect as she made her hair before meeting us, my breathing halts and oxygen fights against me.

This is real. I prompt. You're getting married in just a few weeks.

Although this feeling is familiar: the feeling of oxygen ceasing from my body and the detection of eyes haunting me, searching for all the mistakes my painter made in which I've adapted to, this time it's a timer beeping in my ear, ticking faster and faster to the speed of my heart.

Not even reminding myself to breathe will help me; each inhales I take escapes from me and feels like I haven't taken a breath at all.

And for the first time, while glued onto the sight of Trina writing down the number of Barbara's grandma, I've concluded that going to a therapist like Rylie's Mom, Mable, said I should, maybe a good thing.

That the anxiety I've been capable of fighting with since I was a child is slowly defeating me, and that with the tradition, the decision to choose if marrying Liam is what I truly want, and the never-ending demons full of my past haunting me every day, I might not be capable of fighting alone anymore.

Yet, when the realization hits me like a semi, I perceive that I have neither money nor time; they're the two things that have always been able to conquer me, and once again, they do.

And while thinking of how I can maneuver around that, Trina asks another question. "Have any of you thought about a color theme? Like red and black or black and white."

"No," Liam admits. "We haven't come to a decision yet, but Mom and I were thinking about blue and white?"

"Jo.. is blue alright with you?" Barbara asks.

I nod and smile. The knives that once swam in my stomach turn to butterflies that awaken from their slumber at the fact that Liam, along with Barbara, thought about me.

I attempt to flood myself with this feeling.

"Okay... well that's tricky," Trina confesses. "But if we pick the right color, we can make it not clash with Jo's hair."

While Trina stands up from the maroon color seat and walks over to a drawer, I watch as Liam's body stiffens; his eyes stare at Trina with absences as if his body was here, but he wasn't.