Walking down the sidewalk he stops and looks up at the church, squinting his eyes in the sunlight as he looks all the way up at the bell tower. He mumbles a curse under his breath about being back here again before he makes his way up the steps, to the open doors. When he reaches the top step he stops just outside the doorway and takes a look inside. There are sounds of instrumental music playing from inside along with the hushed sounds of the people chatting in the pews which are almost all filled with people, some of which he doesn't recognize but most of them he does. There is a small glass lantern with a burning candle at every pew and the entire row in front of him is lined with flower petals all the way up to the altar which is decorated with an arbor that is covered in flowers and greenery.
He sighs "You always have to be over the top.." he says to himself with a shake of his head.
He looks around one more time before he lifts his foot and steps inside. He hesitates when people turn and look back at him with a confusing stare. He glances down at his feet again, wondering f if his footsteps were loud enough to get everyone's attention at once. He looks back up again, scanning the crowd for their friends finding them a couple pews from the front of the church. He quietly makes his way down the aisle, trying to avoid the stares and the whispers coming from the pews behind him.
Hey…" he sighs when he reaches their friends all sitting on the row, making them all look up in his direction.
"Hey...hey man." Toby says as he stands to give him the guy hug with a pat on the back "What are you doing here?" Toby asks quietly as he backs away and glances around, looking confused as to why he is here.
He chuckles and lifts his eyes brows "You know…I don't really know…she uh, she actually invited me..." he says with a shrug of his shoulders.
Toby opens his mouth to start asking more questions so Caleb shakes his head from side to side to keep his friend from delving any farther into his intentions of being here and Toby closes his mouth and shakes his head in understanding.
"Noble. You're a good friend Caleb." He says with a grin and a nod over his shoulder "Come on, we have enough room for you." He nods over his shoulder as everybody starts to move down to make room for him to sit down just as the music starts to play louder and they shut the doors in the back of the church.
He looks up at the front of the church as the side doors open and Pastor Ted walks out, the groom following behind and he can't help but roll his eyes and shift uncomfortably in his seat. A new song begins to play as Hanna's grandmother is ushered to her seat in the front pew by Tom, followed by what could only be the groom's grandmother and his father to the other side. One by one the girls walk down the aisle, each one looking more surprised when they see him standing there and he begins to feel out of place, even with his friends. The song ends and another song starts to play just as Pastor Ted motions for everyone to stand. A loud squeak comes from the doors as they are being opened and after that everything falls silent except for the ringing in his ears. He hesitates as he takes a deep breath before he stands, but he never turns in the direction of everyone's focus. Instead he lets his eyes linger on the man at the front of the church. He watches as the groom shifts nervously and looks down at the floor before he lifts his gaze down the aisle as she approaches. He watches as the man smiles at the sight of his soon to be bride, his eyes filling with love and awe for her. He watches until all he can hear is the sound of his heavy breathing and his heart beating so loudly, it sounds as if it might beat completely out of his chest. Only then does he look away.
He lowers his head and blinks once and then again to try and stop the pounding he can feel in his chest. He tries to look up but he can't make his line of sight fall on her as she walks down the aisle. He swallows hard when he can feel the hair on his neck stand on end as she gets close. He finally glances up and into the blue eyes staring back at him and it sucks the breath right out of his lungs. Her eyes stay locked on his for only a split second and then they are gone and he practically gasps for air as she walks past him.
Tom walks with Hanna up to where Ted and Jordan stand at the front of the church and the beating he hears gets louder, then all of a sudden it stops and the next eords spoken echo through the church so loudly it makes him jerk his attention to the front.
"Who gives this beautiful young woman to be married to this man?"
"Her mother and I do." Tom speaks loudly as he turns to kiss Hanna on the cheek and shakes Jordan's outstretched hand before unwrapping Hanna's hand from the crook of his arm and placing it in Jordan's.
Caleb shifts again and glances around the room before he looks back up at them. Hanna turns to hand her bouquet to Spencet who stands behind her, and their eyes lock again, this time lingering.
Moving as if he has no control over his body, he stands steps into the aisle. "Hanna...wait." he yells in her direction, never taking his eyes off of her.
She blinks once and shifts her eyes to Jordan, who still holds onto her hand before glancing back to Caleb that still stands in the aisle.
"Please wait..." he says exasperatedly as he throws his arms out by his sides "I love you."
She opens her mouth to speak, glancing back at Jordan before she does. "Caleb, I can't. I'm sorry...I love Jordan." she says.
Suddenly he feels like he is spinning out of control. Like the floor underneath his feet has buckled and sent him falling.
Caleb jerks awake, sitting straight up in the bed with a huff. He looks around his empty hotel suite and then falls back into the bed with a loud groan. He rubs his hands over his face, then runs them through his hair before he slings the blankets off and rolls himself out of bed to walk by over to the mini fridge by the built in kitchen area. He opens up the fridge and grabs a bottle of water out before slamming the door shut a lot harder than he meant to. Pulling the top off the bottle he slings it onto the counter and turns the bottle up, drinking most of it in one gulp as he tried to slow his heartbeat down. He had been doing a lot of this recently. Having the same dream over and over again and waking up out of breath with his heart racing, like he had ran a marathon and not being able to go back to sleep, which led to him working a lot more than he ever wanted to just to keep his mind husy.
He walks over to the desk and runs his finger over the mousepad of his laptop, making the screen spring to life. The screen showing multiple camera angles all over the Radley. He hits a couple buttons and the angles change to show different places throughout the hotel. He can see people coming and going down the hallways and hanging out in the lobby bar downstairs.
"Who the hell is out roaming the hallways at 3 AM?" he whispers to himself as he notices the timestamp on the videos. He briefly thinks that maybe he needs to roam the halls for a while to clear his head and it makes him chuckle. Leaning back in his chair, he picks up the envelope addressed to him and pulls out the invitation, looking over it closely.
She had sent it to him two weeks ago, and he could resight what it said now by heart. He had done nothing but read and reread it for 14 solid days, everytime hoping that it was some kind of sick joke that he had gotten one. That hope was crushed when she asked him at their weekly dinner at Alison and Emily's last week if he had gotten it yet. They had made a point to get together every single week to hang out since Charlotte's funeral and every single time it got harder for him to see her...to be friends with her. Friends? How could they ever be friends?
Coming back to Rosewood was supposed to only he temporary, he was only supposed to come back to make sure everybody was okay with Charlotte getting out at least that is what he told himself. He said when he started the trip back that he was only coming back for a couple days and here he was months later, sucked back into this place, the only place he had ever considered home - with the only people he had ever called family. He had missed home and his friends all these years but he missed Hanna most of all.
The way they left things in New York, it had never settled right with him and when she opened her door that day at The Radley, the words almost came flying out of his mouth but they didn't. Instead, they hoth agreed that they were friends. Friends was not what he wanted, but being a friend in her life was better than not being in it at all. He always wondered if their paths were to ever cross again, what would it be like, knowing that he probably wouldn't like the outcome. He was right, he damn sure didn't like this one. He wished he could go back and change everything, but now it was too late - she was engaged to someone else and the day he would have to say goodbye was fast approaching.
He tosses the invitation back onto the desk and leans back in his chair, lacing his fingers together and putting his hands behind his head as he stares up at the ceiling. The thought of packing his bags right now and skipping town in the middle of the night crosses his mind but that wouldn't solve anything. Plus, he couldn't leave Ashley high and dry like that. Not after she had given him a job he actually enjoyed and place to stay even if it was just a hotel room. Groaning to himself he walks back to the bed and throws himself back onto it, knowing that sleep was not an option at the moment because he had too much on his mind.
Tomorrow was the big day - the day he dreaded more than anything else in the world. Tomorrow he would let her go, give her up. Tomorrow he gave away the only person he has ever really loved...and at this moment he didn't know how he would ever get through it but he knew he would find a way to - for her.