She could not say that she did not expect she would end up exactly where she was tonight.
There was no anxiety, no over planning, no drama, no ludicrous demands when she was settling the details of her wedding. The planner she hired to help her noted on more than one occasion how easy-going she was being about the whole thing.
Casey knew all along she would not be getting married that beautiful Sunday morning. She always knew that, much before she was even engaged. So, there was no need to strain herself.
She is getting ahead of herself. Perhaps it would be of value to revisit the story from the beginning.
Well, Casey met her future fiancé at lunch hour, some weekday in Spring, when she was fourteen years old.
It sounds romantic, but it really was not. She was furious with him because he found it very amusing making one of his minions, as she would have put it, to pretend to be himself.
She really hated her mother at that moment, to consider being married to the father of that menace.
Oh yeah, they were stepsiblings. Their parents got married, and were still happily together. Everything ended up being much less weird than she would have expected it to be.
Anyways, she and Derek had to live together and it was an absolute hell, because he insisted in making her existence an argument in Old Testament theology, and, well, she was annoying too. Less annoying, but still annoying.
She had the decency to feel embarrassed by it all, at least. She was a keener to end all keeners, after all.
Their teen years went by like that, fighting and exhausting each other. Like World War I, each to their own trench, throwing grenades to the other side, even without any hope of winning, even when victory lost all meaning.
She thought she would be finally free of Derek for all eternity when she got to college, but, with her acceptance letter, there came his, too. With a freakin' hockey scholarship.
God, she hated him.
Time and coexistence, because of course they had to share an apartment in Kingston, and being away from everything they knew and were, they got attached to each other. She started loving and respecting Derek, and she knew more about him, and so did him, her.
He was Casey's closest and dearest friend. The first thing she thinks after waking up and the last one before she goes to bed.
She loves him to the point of obsession.
That is exactly why she knew she would never marry him. It was not for them; she knew something would happen and they would not get marry. He would bolt, she would blow up with something and send it all to the devil, one of them would just die.
Honestly, she might not have locked her guess on that, but she always considered this her best bet, ever since he told her. Or, rather, she stumbled upon.
Looking back, it was inevitable, living together in close quarters and all. Even if she would say she should have guessed it before.
Just after they got together as boyfriend and girlfriend, Casey was cleaning up his bedroom when she found it. A small plastic phial with the white dust. It was hard to pretend it was sugar or flour.
She confronted him, and while he held out protocollary resistance, he ended up telling her all about his cocaine addiction. To the smallest and negligible detail. He said he wanted to tell someone for so long, but was too afraid, he felt too alone.
Yet, he did not tell her, she found out. He was set free, but she was burdened with it.
Over the years, Casey insisted for him to seek out help, to give it up, to cut down, but he would not do it. Worse, he bought more, used more, got visibly sicker. To "deal" with "life". With her.
It hurt her. She was concerned with his health and well-being, within reason, but at the same time, she felt like the one driving him to cocaine. Like not only she could not alleviate his anxiety and self-deprecation, she was just another source of stress.
Despite all the pain and effort, she did not leave. She could not leave him, she loved him too much, she could not see herself away, and, it must be said, she did not respect herself enough to have the strength to leave.
So, the time went by, and she got more and more entangled with Derek, and him with her. Soon enough, rather surprisingly, he proposed, and she did not have the heart to deny him.
She planned the wedding with care, just enough so she would not feel involved with it, would not feel disappointed when it did not go through.
On the eve of the day, instead of having a bachelorette party with her friends, she spent the night crying her eyes out, feeling the dread on her heart, feeling the impending disaster.
In the morning, her mother and sister came and she got dressed and had the make-up on point, she put on her beautiful dress and the Belgian jewelry which belonged to her grandmother Felicia.
The entire time, she said nothing. She did not utter a single word to her family, and was silent even when directly spoken to. They were starting to be concerned with the funereal attitude of hers.
She put on the finishing touches to her hair and sit on an armchair placed on her hotel room specifically for that purpose, and waited.
When her schedule, which she would have pushed to the chagrin of everybody else if this were a normal situation, was already substantially behind, when her sister paced and tried to calm her down, even if she was unnervingly calm, her mother got a call.
That was it. The moment she was heavyheartedly waiting for.
Nora answered with an even voice, and one might be fooled with her coldness in the conversation, but she knew the slight lip twitch, the instructions given by text message so she would not be overheard.
Her mother was so transparent.
She approached Casey and informed her, comfortingly: "Honey, we have a problem. Derek is at the hospital."
"Oh." It was the first word out of her mouth that morning. "I suppose we ought to go, too, then."
Lizzie and Nora exchanged a look, but her mother walked her to the car, while her sister was trusted to disperse the party and manage the vendors.
Once at the hospital, Casey sat, once again silent, at the waiting room, still wearing her wedding dress and jewelry, certainly attracting the attention of the people around her, but she paid them no mind. She was completely still, as if she was the one about to die.
She did not know how long it was before a doctor came out and gave the news to her family. Derek was still alive, and would probably survive, but he was currently unconscious, and they would be keeping him for forty-eight hours for further observation.
Her relatives cheered around her, while she was taken for a quick visit. She then saw his body laid still, hooked to machines, the palest he ever was.
Casey was taken out of the room soon enough by her sister, who said she would take her home so she could shower and change, and then she would be able to return and stay the night with him.
She let herself be taken away. She needed a bath.
Once out of the bathroom, already wearing some cotton dress that would be comfortable enough to sleep in, she saw the wedding gown laying orderly on her bed, next to the Antwerp diamonds in their own cases by the sides, like a fashion display.
It was then that she cried.
She was angry. Angry with herself, angry with cocaine, angry with hockey, angry with Bolivia, angry with the world. Above all, she was angry with Derek.
Nonetheless, she wiped her tears and faced the music.
Back at the hospital, she met Sam as he was leaving her fiancé's room. He was an absolute mess, still on his tuxedo, with the eyes puffy by crying.
He hugged her, and cried and apologized, saying he should have taken better care of his best friend, that he did not knew about that habit of his.
No-one did, only her.
She hugged him weakly, and tried to say something, but nothing would come out of her mouth.
He released her, and she walked the path towards the room.
She sat down next to him, and prepared to wait.
To wait and to think.