White Veil Occasion: short story [h.s.]

2 - you should call her

HARRY

I've never really gave any insight on my view of love when I was younger. I had a good view of what love was in my house. I had two parents that were madly in love with each other. They barely fought and when they did, they almost immediately apologized to each other a few hours later.

I just didn't know what love meant to me.

Not until I met Stella. She changed my view on love the minute we made eye contact the first day we met. She was like a hurricane and I was caught in the storm, and happy to be there. I fell deep into the blues of her eyes and it was like everything was clear to me then.

The storm clouds cease to exist and the sun came out, shining down on her.

All my thoughts were surrounding her. Everything about me longed to be close to her. And I may have only been seventeen at the time when I fell in love with her. But I knew one thing and one thing only.

I was going to marry Stella Taylor.

I've been in love with my best friend for eight years. Possibly even longer than that. Years I have spent pining after her and wishing for her to lean over and kiss me whenever we studied together at the dinner table after school. And for the longest time, I thought she felt the same way about me.

The simple touches in the hallways of my house. The longing looks from across the courtyard at school. The gleam in her eye that told me that she was feeling the same as me. Nothing ever had to be spoken between us. We were so in-tune with each other and we just knew how the other felt all the time.

So, you can imagine how weird it is for me not have her be at my wedding. She's not the person walking down the aisle to me, and she won't be in attendance. Kiera said we could only invite a certain amount of people and Stella was unfortunately cut from the final list of guests.

I don't know even know if she would have come if I were to invite her. We haven't spoken in two years and in my mind she still hates me for what happened that summer, two years ago.

But, my mind can't help but think Kiera didn't want Stella at the wedding because she secretly knows I'm still in love with her. And I think Kiera chooses to ignore my harbored feelings for Stella because she loves me that much to disregard the fact that she'll never fully have my heart.

And it kills me inside because in the end I feel like I'll just be stringing her along our entire marriage. Leading her to believe that maybe one day I'll be able to love her back the same way she loves me. But I just don't think that's going happen.

I've waited every day since I proposed and she started wedding planning, I've waited for her to wake up one day and realize that she doesn't want this kind of life with me. A life where she has to share her husband's heart with another woman. I've waited for her to tell me that she wants to call off the wedding during casual conversation over the breakfast table. I've waited for her to realize that she is worth more than me and what I can't give her.

But she continues to stay with me. I think she's still holding onto the hope that maybe I will be able to love another who isn't Stella.

"Why did you insist on having pink being the detail color of our wedding?" Kiera's voice pulls me out of my thoughts. I look up at her as she stands holding an arrangement of pink flowers in her hands. Her face scrunched up at them, and I can tell she hates them.

I met Kiera almost almost two years ago. She was taking summer classes at my college and we just clicked when she sat down next to me. She was sweet and cute, and I liked her. We started dating pretty quickly and I stopped going home for the summer because Kiera insisted we move in together and start our lives with one another. Within a year of dating, we were engaged.