bookloveraus
Genre: Contemporary romance, Emotional / relationship-driven, Low-angst ending, high emotional realism.
Kate and Brad are newly engaged and impossibly happy-until wedding planning turns their love into a negotiation.
What should be joyful becomes suffocating. Kate is pulled into dress appointments she dreads. Brad is cornered by family expectations disguised as generosity. Every compromise costs them a piece of themselves, until the wedding feels like it belongs to everyone but them.
The breaking point comes quietly.
Kate admits she no longer recognises herself.
Brad realises he's been choosing peace over protection.
They call off the wedding-and in doing so, lose each other.
A month apart is long enough to grieve, grow, and understand the truth: it wasn't the wedding that mattered. It was always the marriage.
When they reunite, they don't plan. They decide.
No guest list debates. No money strings. No approval required.
Kate wears jeans, a soft white top, and a simple veil. Brad wears a t-shirt and denim. A single red rose rests between them as they promise forever-privately, honestly, and without fear.
Later, they share a low-key lunch with both families-not to perform their love, but to include them on their terms.
This time, the ending is theirs.