Author's Note: I won't be home tomorrow so I'm probably going to be posting the last chapter a little bit later than usual, but the good news is that my timezone is 7 hours earlier than EST (which I feel like is the most common timezone of the people reading this story but I don't know?) so I'll definitely be posting on time so be prepared for a happy ending :)
The walls were draped in gauzy white curtains and the archway was covered with flowers that twined all around until the floor. Chairs stretched all the way to the back of the long room, covered in thick white fabric that was tied to hold it in place so it would hide the plainness of the chairs underneath. Candles in tall glass cylindrical holders lined the back edge of the raised podium where the altar was. The chandelier hung low, right in the center of the ceiling, the crystals glittering in the dimly lit room.
When Sansa had taken the task of planning her own wedding (which was without a doubt the best option for everyone—if someone else had tried to plan her special day, there would have been an all-out catfight that Arya wouldn't have been so fast to stop), she had been adamant that the hall where the ceremony would be held would be decorated elegantly, tastefully, and, by Sansa's standards, simple. And, as Arya looked at it from the doorway so she could get a perfect view of the entire hall, it was actually rather simple. The white and gold color scheme of the room somehow worked to provide the effortless kind of elegant simplicity Sansa had imagined. There wasn't an obnoxious oversized heart-shaped flower archway to frame Sansa and Willas under the altar. There were no tacky decorations thrown around the hall.
It really was what Sansa had envisioned. Arya wasn't surprised that she had somehow made it all come to life. The ballroom where the reception would be, Arya thought, would be even more beautiful.
"Arya!" Margaery Tyrell called out from behind her. Arya turned to look at the tall woman standing just outside the hall for the ceremony, already dressed. Sansa had been kind enough to let her bridesmaids choose their own dresses as long as they were the same dusty rose color that matched the dress she'd picked out for Arya. Margaery's dress was made up of layer upon layer of gauze, flowing down her body delicately, with a lace illusion back etched with small flowers that also decorated the thick straps of the dress. "Sansa's looking for you. She wants you to finish your hair before they start working on her."
Margaery's own hair hadn't been done yet, but out of all the girls in Sansa's wedding party, Arya did have the shortest hair. She followed Margaery back to the bridal dressing room that had been set aside for them. It was a huge room, decorated all in white and lace. The size of the room was perfect for the large number of people bustling around the space, all professional looking women with perfect makeup and shiny hair wearing different variations of black dresses and tall black heels. They all had earpieces attached to their heads so they keep both of their hands free as they rummaged through various cases of makeup, hair products, and sewing tools.
And right in the center of it all was Sansa, sitting on the white ottoman in the middle of the room with her hair wrapped in a towel and a fluffy white robe knotted tightly around her waist. Her face was clean of all makeup, and it was slightly red, looking like she'd just washed it thoroughly.
"God, Arya," Sansa said exasperatedly when she came into the room with Margaery. "You still have to do your hair! Jennifer, can you work on my sister, please?"
Arya sat obediently in one of the chairs that had been set up at random in the room, and almost immediately, the woman named Jennifer had started attacking her freshly blow-dried hair.
By the time her hair had been carefully arranged in a waterfall braid, the room seemed to have multiplied in numbers. Catelyn had come in but had to leave a minute later because she started crying when she saw her daughter and didn't want to ruin her makeup. Somehow, it looked like there were more makeup artists and hair stylists in the room than when Arya had first sat down to get her hair done ten minutes ago.
It was another two hours before every girl in the room has their hair artfully done, their makeup applied perfectly, and their dresses put on with last minute pins and sewing emergencies taken care off swiftly and efficiently.
Sansa, who looked like she wasn't even breathing in her beautiful dress, looked at herself in the mirror and took a deep breath she didn't seem to be letting out any time soon. "Margaery," she said hoarsely, "get my mom, please."
Margaery, fiddling with the tail end of her side braid, disappeared and came back a few moments later with Catelyn, who immediately started crying again.
"Mom," Sansa said softly, "please. Stop crying. If we have to do your makeup all over again, we'll just be wasting more time." She closed her eyes and finally let her breath out ever so slowly. When she reopened her eyes, she faced her mother and her sister and took one of their hands in hers. "Thank you for putting up with me for the past few months."
Arya felt tears begin to prick behind her eyes, so she sniffed once and laughed. "As if I had a choice," she joked.
Sansa tried to give Arya one of her stronger glares, but the impact was watered down by the fact that she was trying to hold back tears, and her eyes were practically glittering with them. "Don't make jokes now. I'm trying to have a serious moment."
Arya bit her lip cautiously, squeezing Sansa's hand just slightly. "You have the rest of your life to have serious moments with whoever you want. But now you're supposed to be getting married, and I don't think Willas would appreciate Mom and me keeping you in here because you want to ruin your makeup for the sake of sentimentality."
Catelyn let out a watery little laugh, and carefully used the edge of her index finger to wipe under eyes. "Leave it to Arya to make sure we all stay our prettiest for Sansa's wedding by putting our priorities in order," she said, letting go of Sansa's hand and gathered the skirt of her dark blue dress and turned towards the door.
Sansa faced the mirror one last time, running her fingers along the edges of her veil as she arranged it over her head. "How do I look," she asked Arya through her reflection.
Arya came to stand behind her, shifting it this way and that so it hung straight down her back. "Like a princess—now let's go. Of all the things to be late for, and you want it to be your wedding."
"I won't be late to my wedding," Sansa said, finally moving towards the door. "And even if I am, so what? I'm the bride. They have to wait for me."
"I bet Willas won't," Arya piped up as she led the group of bridesmaids and Sansa down the hall to where Catelyn was waiting. "I bet he'll take up the first girl he sees if you're even a second late."
"That's not even close to being funny, Arya," Catelyn admonished, stopping in front of the set of large double doors that led to the wedding hall.
Sansa's face had gone practically white; she had her eyes closed and her hands were clenched rather tightly at her sides, her prominent collarbone showing as she kept taking deep breaths to a rhythm in her own head.
"Hey," Arya said, snapping her fingers in front of Sansa's face. "There are a lot of people in there. You can't leave them waiting."
Sansa opened her eyes and looked back at Arya, their eyes meeting. There was a fierce sort of determination in Sansa's blue eyes, her face alight with a sort of anticipation Arya hadn't expected. "I don't care if they wait," she said. "I care about me today. And I want to get married."
Arya grinned. "Then get in line," she told her, gesturing to the back where bridesmaids and groomsmen were pairing up, "so that we can open the doors."
( O O O )
While the hall had been decorated with an elegant flair of simplicity, the ballroom where the reception was held was absolutely breathtaking. White and pale pink flowers cascaded down the gold-colored walls like waterfalls, and round tables were set up on the floor around the large dance floor that dominated the center of the room, with a raised podium holding the long table draped in white tablecloth at the head of the room for Sansa and Willas to sit with their families. The room was swathed in a golden light from the chandelier reflecting off the walls, crystals twinkling every second.
The long table reserved for the Starks and Tyrells was rather beautiful, but it really wasn't even that functional.
Sansa, who had been eager to find the perfect caterer for everyone to enjoy, hadn't been able to sit down yet and she was going crazy.
"Arya, you don't understand," she said. "I'm starving."
"I'll try to get you some food," Arya said to placate her.
"No, you don't understand," she repeated urgently. "I want to be able to sit with my new husband at the head of that expensive table I ordered and eat the expensive food I chose, on the expensive china I picked out. But no one is letting me get past the first few tables without ambushing me and telling me how happy they are for me."
Arya raised one eyebrow mockingly. "What did you think was going to happen at your wedding, Sansa?" she asked. "As you said earlier, you're the bride. Did you think that everyone was just going to leave you alone for the entire night?"
Sansa sighed mournfully and cast a look at the locked door of the bathroom. "In a perfect world," she bemoaned.
Arya laughed and stood up, brushing off the skirt of her gown. "Okay. I'm going to get you some food. Not a lot, don't worry. And then I'm going to bring it back to you so you can get something in your system before you pass out from hunger. And then, we're going to announce that you'll be having your first dance with Willas, and right after, you'll be escorted right to the table where you'll be able to eat all you want, and no one can make you get up because you're already sitting and no one would do that to a bride."
Sansa was looking at Arya with astonishment. "I knew I chose you to be my maid of honor for a reason," she breathed. "Margaery would have just created a scene so I could stuff as many dinner rolls down my dress as I could."
"I mean, we can always do that. I tried one of the dinner rolls, and trust me, you did well on the caterer."
Sansa laughed and stood up, smoothing down her dress. She had opted to get a second, simpler dress for the reception so she would be able to move around freely, but it was just as pretty as her first dress. It was a sleeveless plain tulle dress with a hem that rested just above her knees and a lace bodice with a high collar. But for some reason, she still chose to wear her white satin heels, to Arya's amazement. Ginger Rogers really didn't have anything on Sansa Stark.
( O O O )
An hour later, Sansa was happily sitting right in the center of the table, taking slow and savory bites out of her food while Willas gazed at her adoringly from the seat next to her. Arya was sitting a few chairs down, sipping on champagne and spearing small bites of chicken onto her fork. A few minutes into eating her food, she spotted a familiar face traveling between tables, and she straightened in her chair.
Arya had seen glimpses of Gendry during the ceremony, but he had been lost in the sea of faces sprawled out in front of her under the altar. By the time they'd made it to the ballroom, Arya had been caught up in her sister, guests approaching her, and trying to find her own way to the food.
As if he felt her eyes on him, Gendry turned around, and their eyes met. They looked at each other from across the ballroom for several uncomfortable moments before he slowly motioned with a slight tilt of his head for her to come over to him. Arya nodded once and set her fork down, picking up her glass of champagne while she stepped down from the podium and began the walk across the room.
When she finally made it in front of Gendry, he gave her a smile that she felt pained to return. "You look beautiful," he said hesitantly. Arya tried to smile but then she remembered that she already was, and even though it wasn't a large one, it was all she could bring herself to manage at this point. He seemed to notice her discomfort because he cleared his throat awkwardly.
"How's Sansa doing?" he asked.
Arya looked back over her shoulder where Sansa had one hand resting on Willas's shoulder, her body turned completely towards him as he spoke eagerly. They were both smiling unbelievably wide. She wondered if their cheeks were hurting.
"She's doing...wonderful. Really. Even while she was complaining about not being able to eat, she couldn't stop smiling."
Arya turned back to face Gendry, her eyebrows furrowed together slightly. She could practically feel the permanent wrinkle settling in between her eyebrows. "How are you?" she asked.
"I'm doing good," he responded, just a bit too quickly to seem natural.
She wanted to kick herself, she really did.
They stood there in silence for a few more moments, Arya with her hands clasped loosely behind her back as she looked down at the floor, her lips pursed, and Gendry with his arms hanging limply at his sides as he tried to find something over Arya's shoulder to pretend to be interested in.
"I wanted to apologize—"
"I wanted to ask you—"
They both stopped short, trying to let the other speak first as they opened their mouths at the same time.
It ended with them lapsing back into silence once again. Arya's heart felt like it was about to burst out of her chest from how hard it was pounding inside her rib cage. "You go first," she said. She really wasn't ready to apologize yet.
"No, no. You go first."
And of course, Gendry would want to hear that apology.
Because he deserved it.
Because she had been a total bitch to him the last time they saw each other.
"Okay," she said. "I, um...I—I just wanted to tell you that I...apologize. I'm sorry. For the last time we...saw each other."
Gendry looks at her like he forgot what they even said the last time they saw each other. Then his eyes clear and he nods a few times, his head bobbing up and down rapidly like a bobblehead. "Right," he said. "I know that you were...mad at me then. And I was pushing you to say something you obviously didn't feel, so I guess, in a way...it's a good thing. That you did it. I won't let myself get...caught up in anything like you said. I just...wanted to say that I still want us to be friends."
Arya wants to kick herself and cry herself to sleep. She wants to yell at herself about how she's a horrible person who doesn't know how to hold on to something good when she has it right in her grasp.
She's not one of those people who doesn't know what she has until it's gone.
She's someone who knows how good it is and destroys it because she doesn't think she deserves it.
But this time...this time, she doesn't yell at Gendry, or tell him to leave her alone, or kick him out. This time, she smiles because even though she knows she's lost her chance with him, she can still hold on to this. Their friendship.
"Wanna dance?" she asks.
He looks surprised. "I thought you hate dancing," he said. "I mean, Arya, I'll dance with you all night if you want, but...really, neither of us knows how to dance. Like, at all."
"When has that ever stopped you from doing something before?" she asked.
Gendry's eyebrows rose at the challenge she presented in front of him, and a slow smile began lifting the corners of his mouth. "Okay, Stark. Let's dance."
( O O O )
Gendry made good on his promise. They didn't dance together for the whole night, but they did dance for as long as Arya wanted. Granted, she got frustrated after about four minutes, but she kept her hand in his. She was reluctant to let go.
They continued their slow and rather awkward movements across the dance floor, stumbling into each other and stepping on each others' feet every other few steps, but this was good. This was familiar—this was normal.
It was only when a slower song came on that Arya took a step back. The other songs that had been playing were slow, but this was like...a slow slow song. She didn't quite know what the difference was herself, but whatever it was, it set off some kind of warning bell in Arya's head that had her letting go of Gendry's hand.
He let go of her without preamble, and they both walked to the table he'd seated himself at in silence.
She sat in the chair next to his, arranging the layers of her dress around her so she could sit comfortably and not rip anything by accident. "What did you think of the ceremony?" she asked him after several minutes of uncomfortable silence.
Gendry looked up from the spot of tablecloth he'd been focusing on intently and his eyebrows drew together as if he forgot he was at a wedding and had just seen Arya's sister get married not even three hours ago. "Oh," he said distantly. "It was...it was really nice. Sansa really knows how to pull off a wedding. Honestly, she should pick that up as a career."
Arya cocked her head to the side. "You know, that might not be such a bad idea. Stark Wedding Planning. She could make it work."
"Too bad she's already married. She could have been the real life Jennifer Lopez from The Wedding Planner."
"Nah, she's too much of a romantic to be like Jennifer Lopez in that movie."
"She was totally a romantic."
"Uh, no, she wasn't. That was literally the whole point of the movie? To show how Matthew McConaughey made her believe in love again?"
"She was already a romantic before she met Matthew McConaughey—she just had way too many issues to work through."
Well, Jesus, doesn't that sound familiar, Arya thought to herself bitterly.
"Yeah, well, I still think—wait, when did you see The Wedding Planner?" Arya asked, suddenly interested.
Gendry pretended not to hear her. He only stood up to ask if she wanted to dance again.
And really, what was she supposed to say to that except for yes?
( O O O )
Okay, so Arya and Gendry are starting to feel more like themselves again. It's a relief. If their fight had been the other way around (which, Arya realizes, never would have happened because she would never have told Gendry about her feelings for him) and he had reacted the same way she had, she would have held on to that grudge for longer than necessary. Longer than anyone had ever held a grudge in their entire life.
Holding grudges had kind of become Arya's thing. It was like after she finished school and no longer had to channel all of her energy into dance seven days a week, she decided to use her new free time to hold grudges.
She really hated things. She wanted all things to disappear. Like the thing that had existed between Arya and Gendry for the past few weeks. The thing that was still kind of present between them right now. She wasn't sure how she felt about it, because she still wasn't sure if it was a good thing or a bad thing, but all Arya knew was that she hated things, and she wanted it gone.
But if there was anything awkward between them now, it was definitely in Arya's own imagination. Because while she would have held on to that grudge if their roles had been reversed during The Fight, as Arya liked to call it in her head, Gendry meant it when he said he would let it go and be ready for her to come back to him when she was ready, whether it was as a friend or a girlfriend, or whatever it was. If she had ignored him the second she saw him across the ballroom, he would have been hurt, true, but he would have made his peace with it eventually.
She really didn't deserve him. Maybe that's why she decided to do something about it halfway through her fourth dance of the night in Gendry's not-so-capable hands.
By the time they sit back down, while Arya dutifully ignores the curious looks she's getting from literally every single member of her family up on that raised table as they watch her sitting with Gendry after she'd resolutely told them they'd decided to break up, she tries to force the words out before she loses her nerve. The issue with that, though, is that she's never had that much nerve, to begin with when it came to Gendry. It's not like she has much ground to work with over here.
"Do you think..." she starts off cautiously, avoiding his eyes as she stares down at the tablecloth. "Um...do you think we can talk, maybe? Tonight? Or tomorrow, probably, because the whole..." She waves a hand vaguely at the room. "You know. The wedding thing. I'll probably be busy tonight, but...tomorrow..."
Gendry looks at her carefully. It's like he's waiting for the other shoe to drop, waiting for her to take it back.
But she doesn't say anything else. There's nothing left for her to say anymore. All she can do anymore is wait for Gendry to answer and pray that she's still enough for him, hope that he can give her a chance again, even after their mess of a fight that had ended with Arya throwing him out not once, but twice the other night. Hoping and waiting had never done Arya much good before, but this was Gendry. She'd wait if she had to.
He stays quiet for another beat of silence before he nods his head twice. "Yeah," he says. "I think we should definitely—talk. Talking is good. We need to...do that." He was stuttering over his words, which was, surprisingly, a good sign from Gendry. It meant that he was thinking about what this conversation could mean. It meant he was open to discussion, instead of planning on shutting her down immediately when they finally did talk.
"Great," she breathed. The relief she felt that he had even agreed to speak with her after their truce for the wedding was so strong she could cry. "I'll just...come over. Tomorrow. Um, we could—"
"Order Chinese food?" he asked wryly, an eyebrow raised knowingly.
Arya grinned at him. "You're starting to know me a bit too well, Waters," she said teasingly.
Gendry snorted. "Please," he said, sitting back in his chair and drinking from his glass of champagne. "We crossed that line years ago."
( O O O )
"I think it's time for my speech soon," Arya mumbled, clicking her shoes together methodically.
Gendry looked over at Arya, where she had decided that she needed to slump against the wall of the bathroom and splay her legs out in front of her like a five-year-old trying to take up all the room they could just because they wanted to.
"But what about your dress?" he'd asked.
Arya had sent an infamous glare his way, and damn, did it feel good to do that again with him. "Oh, please. You can eat off this goddamned floor, it's so clean," she'd told him, and promptly thrown herself onto the shiny tiles of the bathroom floor unceremoniously, trying to maneuver around her gauzy skirts.
Now, she had slowly lost any strength to keep herself sitting upright. Over the past twenty minutes, she'd slowly begun to slide down the wall, her skirts riding up the floor as she did so.
"Did you ever finish that speech?" he asked her.
The truth was, she had. Right after Gendry had left—right after she had thrown Gendry out, she reminded herself—Arya had sat down at her desk and written out an entirely new draft for her maid of honor speech. It hadn't been good, but it had been something. She continued revising it over the next three days until she had finally come up with something she considered to be passable. Sansa, at least, would like it. And really, what else mattered except for that?
"Yep," Arya declared proudly. "Finished it, revised it, revised it again, revised it again, then, and I know this might shock you, but I revised it again, and then I—"
"No, wait. Let me guess. Did you revise it again?" Gendry asked dryly.
"No way, how did you get that on the first try?" she shot back without missing a beat. "After that, I made a few more quick changes, moved a sentence or two around, tried to add some nicer words so they'd be fit for the wedding, and then, I finally finished the damn thing after turning it into something that's barely passable."
"Can I hear it?"
"Absolutely. As soon as Sansa tells me it's time to stand up in front of everyone and deliver it."
"Is that why you're hiding in here with me?" Gendry asked, casting a glance at the door she'd locked as soon as she dragged him in the ladies' bathroom.
"I don't know what you're talking about," Arya replied immediately.
Gendry sighed, suddenly feeling very tired. "Arya, come on," he said. "You knew this speech was coming. And you finally finished it. And you clearly like it, or else you would be shitting on it right this very second."
Arya held up a finger in his face. "I do believe I said that the speech ended up becoming something barely passable. Now, I don't know about you, but to me, that sure as hell doesn't sound like the words of a maid of honor who actually likes what they ended up writing in the end." She looked away from Gendry's prying eyes and focused on a small crack in one of the black tiles.
All of the cracks that dotted the black and white tiles Arya and Gendry were currently sitting on seemed to have been placed there on purpose. They'd been filled in with gold paint, making the eternally polished floor look even shinier than they already were.
"I think you like to doubt yourself," Gendry said softly. He didn't lower his voice to sound gentler. Instead, it sounded like he was observing her from afar and had just spoken his thoughts aloud. It was as if he didn't even realize she was sitting right next to him anymore. "I think you want other people to doubt you even more than you doubt yourself."
Arya folded her arms across her stomach, using it as a shield. Against what, she didn't think she would ever be one hundred percent sure of. Some days, she wanted to protect herself against Gendry. Other days, it was her family. Most days, she just wanted to be protected from herself.
"That's ridiculous," she said, but her words didn't have the venom she wanted. They fell limply in the air between them, non-threatening and meaningless. She didn't have the energy to try and sound like she had any fight in her right now.
"Tell me I'm wrong," he challenged. "I've never seen someone get so down on themselves for no good reason and then look at everyone else like they want them to agree with everything they're saying—"
"Um, Gendry?" Arya said, pointing to the mirror above them. "I don't know if you've ever heard of this before, but have you looked in the mirror lately?" she asked. "You're basically describing yourself."
Maybe her words were harsh, but she couldn't bring herself to care. She tried to justify it by telling herself that he was basically saying the exact same thing to her, and he didn't seem to be losing any sleep over it. This normality that was hanging delicately over their heads felt like it was a thundercloud approaching an otherwise blue sky...and it was bound to start raining sooner or later.
God, how many times would she ruin this? She'd just resolved to try and have a good night with Gendry so she could talk to him tomorrow night, over Chinese food and shitty wine like they always did, and instead, here she was. Sitting on the bathroom floor wallowing in her own pitiful self-deprecation and lashing out at Gendry when he gave her exactly what she wanted and called her out on it.
"Sorry," she whispered hoarsely, her words coming out of her throat rather scratchy. "I keep ruining things for some reason. Maybe you're right. I want everyone to doubt me so I can yell at them for it."
"It gives you an excuse to run away," he said quietly.
Arya didn't even bother trying to deny it. "Yeah, I guess you're right."
"Well," Gendry said, suddenly standing up from the floor with an abrupt burst of energy. "I'm not letting that happen today." He held out his hand to her and waited for her to fit it into his before pulling her up to stand in front of him. "Come on, Stark. It's time for your maid of honor speech."
( O O O )
The second Arya returns to the ballroom, Sansa spots her from all the way across the room. She doesn't even pay any attention to Gendry coming in behind her—she just gives her younger sister a look that says she's grateful she didn't run away before it was time to make her speech.
Honestly, Arya is still wondering why she hasn't done that yet. It's like everyone's been waiting for her to come in, although she knows Sansa would have told Ned not to announce it was time for Arya's speech before she was even in the room. Coming back in to find everyone's eyes actually on her would have done nothing good for her nerves.
It's just that she feels like everyone's eyes are already on her. Truthfully, it's only the people who were sitting at the tables closest to the door, and they had only turned around because they heard someone coming in. Arya knew a few of the guests by face; she smiled at them politely as they recognized her and said hello as she passed through the gaps between tables. She tried to skirt along the edges of the walls as best as she could while Gendry disappeared to sit back down at his own table, right where he could get a perfect view of Arya's speech.
When she gets up to the table, she squeezes Sansa's shoulder as she passes by.
Sansa catches her hand in hers and turns her head slightly to the right so she could see Arya. "Hey," she whispers quietly. "Where have you been? No one could find you for the past twenty minutes." She must be thinking it has something to do with Gendry, and it really does, but right now, Arya's not in the mood to divulge all of her secrets to her sister in the middle of her own wedding.
Sansa really must be invested in Arya's love life if she was willing to turn away from all of her guests and still manage to pry her sister for whatever information she could get out of her. Arya felt a rush of affection for her older sister. Her sickeningly pink bedroom from her childhood, her closet of frilly clothes, and the bathroom in hers and Willas's apartment that smelled like a shrine to Chanel No. 5 aside, that affection didn't budge one bit. "I was just—in the bathroom. Trying to steady my nerves," she explained.
Sansa raised an eyebrow. "For twenty minutes," she repeated slowly as if trying to help Arya catch a hint.
She didn't need to catch any kind of hint.
"For twenty minutes," Arya confirmed.
"With some help or..." Sansa trailed off as Arya squeezed her shoulder once more and went back to her seat without answering. From a few chairs down, Arya caught the wink Sansa sent her way, and she rolled her eyes but didn't shake her head no. Instead, Arya shrugged her shoulders, letting some of the hope she'd been trying to keep under control show on her face.
Was this what sisters did? Did they have secret, silent conversations with just their facial expressions and subtle body movements mid-wedding where everyone was probably looking at them? Was this normal for two sisters to do?
Even if it was, even if it wasn't, Arya didn't care. It's not like her relationship with Sansa had ever been considered anything close to normal.
It's only a few minutes later when Ned stands up to make his own toast. Arya can see Sansa's eyes start to well up with tears even from her spot at the table, and he hasn't even spoken yet. Ned looks like he's about to start crying as well, but everyone knows he'll hold it in.
"I want to thanks everyone for coming tonight to see my oldest daughter get married to one of the kindest men I've had the pleasure of meeting. I'm...at a loss when it comes to speaking about how proud I am that Sansa has made a life for herself both independently, and as well as a partner to Willas. She's always dreamed of a big white wedding and seeing that she's finally gotten it, well. No one can deny that she deserves as much happiness as she can get and not a bit less." Ned clears his throat and picks up his glass of champagne. "I only know how much Willas loves Sansa because of how fearless he was when he told me he was planning on proposing to her. He told me that it wasn't my decision to say yes or no for Sansa before she even knew a question was going to be asked, let alone a question like this. He told me that he had decided a long time ago that he wanted to marry my daughter, and that if I had any objections to it, then I should have done something about it a long time ago."
Willas was hiding his red face behind his hands as Sansa stared at him with such adoration on her face that Arya couldn't even join in with the laughing guests. She felt like looking at the two of them right now was like spying on a private moment.
"So," Ned continued, "I think that I, as Sansa's father, am probably the person most qualified to know when something is good for her. Apart from her mother, of course." He smiled down at Catelyn for a brief moment. "And I can say without any doubt that Willas is the best thing that's ever happened to her. Cheers."
Sansa was already crying, and Arya knew she wasn't imagining how rough her father's voice had gotten towards the end of his speech. She wiped at her own eyes and sniffed once, already standing up for her own speech.
Willas nudged Sansa and gestured to Arya with a slight movement of his chin. Sansa looked up at Arya and smiled widely at her. She had wiped away her tears, and though her cheeks were a bit red, she still looked flawless. She mouthed Good luck in Arya's direction. Arya smiled back at her nervously, mouthing back her thanks, and turned to the crowd.
Gendry's eyes met hers from his table.
She picked up her glass, and he winked at her, nodding once in encouragement.
"Um. Hi," she started out shakily. "I, uh, I know most people here know me well enough to know that I am...probably not the person best suited to be up here right now." There were a few polite laughs in the sea of guests, and Arya smiled tightly for a second. "To be honest, I was surprised when Sansa asked me to be her maid of honor. Most people don't know this, but we didn't exactly get along when we were younger," she said sarcastically, prompting a few more laughs. "But as we got older, we realized we didn't have to make it so hard for each other. And then we ended up becoming pretty close. But still, I never imagined she would ask me to do this for her. Sansa's pretty particular about how she likes things to be done, so I was at a loss when she asked me to take on the responsibility of planning everything that she couldn't. But I guess I underestimated my sister since she didn't let me do a single thing by myself. And it's not because she didn't have any faith in me, because if that were the case, then I wouldn't be up here right now. But it was because she always knows when I need help and when I'm too afraid to ask for it. And that's just one of the things that make Sansa so great." Arya turned to look at Sansa, who looked like she was about to start crying again.
"I think that a lot of people underestimate her, which is a tragedy because she's so wonderful. Even three weeks before her wedding, she still found every opportunity to help me with whatever I was dealing with, and she did it without a second thought. I know most sisters who don't get along when they're younger like to say that they wish they had always been close to each other, but I wouldn't give up the years we spent fighting for anything, because all it did was bring us together as close as we are now. And Willas...who I've known for most of my life, somehow makes Sansa into a better person than she already was, which really tells you all you need to know about their relationship. I've known them separately, and I've known them together, and while neither of them are the type of people that need to be with someone to feel whole, I can't even begin to express how grateful I am that they have each other."
She took a sip from her glass, trying not to drink everything in it, and sat down.
She still felt a little shaky on her feet, but the feeling of the chair beneath her grounded her.
Sansa was openly crying again, leaning into Willas as he whispered something in her ear. Arya could hear her laugh from her own seat.
"That speech was beautiful, Arya," Margaery said genuinely from the seat next to her.
Arya smiled at her and nodded once. "Thanks. I hope Sansa thinks it was good, too."
Margaery snorted. "Are you kidding me? She probably wants that entire speech written on her tombstone after she dies from a tsunami of emotions."
The glass was still half full, so Arya quickly drained what was left of it and stood up.
The second Arya got to her chair, Sansa stood up and hugged Arya tightly, throwing her arms around her neck. "That was amazing," she whispered into her neck.
Arya grinned and wrapped her arms around Sansa's waist. "I'm glad you liked it," she said, leaning back and moving Sansa's hair back from her face. "Stop crying. You're going to ruin your makeup."
"As if I didn't make sure to only use waterproof makeup," Sansa scoffed. "What do you think I am, some kind of amateur?"
Someone cleared their throat from below the raised table, and Arya pulled back from Sansa long enough to see Gendry standing there.
"Hey," she breathed.
"That was an incredible speech," he said immediately. "Absolutely wonderful."
Sansa held Arya a little closer to her and smiled proudly. "Wasn't it just the best? I have to start writing my speech for her wedding now if I want to top it."
Arya blushed bright red and ducked her head. "Okay, guys, calm down," she muttered. "It wasn't that great." She was still flushed with pride and nerves, but she faced Gendry with a shy smile. "Thanks," she said quietly.
They stood like that for a few more beats, Arya and Gendry looking at each other with Sansa glancing between them.
Finally, Sansa coughed once and let go of Arya. "Well, I'm going to sit with my husband," she said.
Arya looked over at her. "What?" she said blankly.
Sansa rolled her eyes and kissed Arya's cheek. "Have fun. Go dance. Dance with each other. Dance with other people. Go eat some food somewhere other than this table." She smirked. "Go back to the bathroom."
Arya kicked her swiftly in her exposed ankle, but Sansa only gave them one last parting smile before returning to her seat.
Gendry helped her down from the table, his eyes bright. "Your speech really was amazing," he said sincerely.
Her blush only deepened, and she lowered her head so she was looking down at the floor as she shrugged her shoulders. "Yeah, well." She shook her head. "I had someone breathing down my neck for three weeks making sure I actually wrote it, so."
"Oh, come on. You can't deny all credit," Gendry said as they began to walk back to his table. "You were amazing, and—and that was all you."
"Yeah, but I wouldn't have actually written anything if you hadn't kept buying me frappuccinos at Starbucks," she pointed out. "Let's be honest, I probably would have convinced Sansa to let me pawn the speech off on Margaery or something."
Gendry shook his head confidently. "Nope," he declared as he sat down in his chair and grabbed a glass of champagne from a passing waiter. "I think you wanted to do the speech the whole time but it took a lot of work to get the confidence up so you could actually do it."
Arya looked down at the table and stole the glass he'd just gotten, taking a sip from it before passing it back to him. "Maybe," she said, shrugging her shoulders carelessly.
They sat quietly next to each other for the next few minutes, but...
It wasn't a bad kind of quiet. It wasn't the uncomfortable silence she'd been afraid of for so long. It was a nice kind of quiet that let them sit with their own thoughts for a few minutes without dealing with the pressure of always having a continuous stream of conversation coming out. She had really missed this, even though there had only been three days where they didn't talk. But those three days were incredibly hard for Arya, especially knowing that she was the reason why they hadn't spoken. She had ruined it, but Gendry was giving her another chance.
Finally, Gendry looked up from the table and glanced over at Arya. "Hey," he said, poking her in the arm.
Arya looked at him, her eyebrows raised high on her forehead. He was giving her some kind of look, both hopeful and anxious at the same time. His lighthearted attitude of the entire night had helped to ease the tension between them that Arya had been so scared of, and he just kept on proving how wonderful he was by making such an effort with her when really it should have been her that tried to smooth everything over. Her heart ached with how much she appreciated him, admired him, loved him—as a friend, of course, but that tugging on her heartstrings told her that her feelings for him might be a bit stronger than what she'd originally thought.
"What's up?" she asked, still waiting for him to say what he wanted.
Gendry opened his mouth but didn't speak for a few more seconds, looking out at the dance floor and then back at Arya, still waiting patiently. He shrugged his shoulders, as if he was telling himself Fuck it, and raised his eyebrows. "Wanna dance?"
( O O O )
Sansa stopped by the house after the wedding to say goodbye to everyone. Willas had insisted they book their flight for immediately after their wedding, declaring that it was romantic in its rushed state. Sansa had been resistant, but she'd eventually given in and agreed when he told her he was getting them two first class seats so she'd be able to catch up on all the sleep she'd be missing out on after they spent a few hours together as husband and wife, as Sansa had not-so-subtly put it when she'd explained it to Arya. It had led to them having to catch a plane that was set to take off at six in the morning. They had decided to go away for a month and travel across Europe, spending each week in a different country.
By the time all of the guests had left, it was one in the morning. Sansa and Willas had disappeared immediately to go to their apartment and do whatever consisted of spending time together as husband and wife, while Arya had followed Catelyn and Ned home, practically falling asleep in the car.
When Sansa finally knocked on the door, it was just past two in the morning.
She came in to say goodbye to Arya, who had just finished putting on her pajamas for bed. She was wearing a pair of black leggings and an oversized beige open knit sweater that hung off one of her shoulders and had stitches wide enough to see the black tank top she'd put on underneath. Her hair had been thrown up in a messy bun on top of her head, some of the curls managing to escape.
"Hey," she said, coming into the room and putting her tote bag on Arya's dresser.
Arya turned around from where she stood in her closet, putting her heels back on the shelf. "Oh. Hey."
"Willas is in the car, and he's already texted me like seven times to hurry my ass up because I'm taking too long," she said, rolling her eyes and holding up her phone. "Like it's my fault that Mom took one look at me with the wedding ring on my finger and started crying. She spent the past fifteen minutes hugging me and crying about how happy she was that I'm finally happy."
"Well, what did you expect?" Arya asked, climbing into her bed and burrowing herself under the blankets. "She's seeing you go off on your honeymoon and then when you come home, you'll be, like...married married. Like, really married."
Sansa wrinkled her eyebrows together and joined Arya on the bed, laying down on top of the blankets after she kicked off her sneakers. "I have no idea what that even means. I'm already married. You were there. You walked down the aisle right before I did. How much more married could I get?"
"No, like when you get home...you'll really start your life with Willas."
Sansa shook her head. "No. We started our lives together a long time ago. Only now, we just wear this." This was Sansa's wedding ring. It was a plain silver wedding band that she now wore stacked on top of her engagement ring.
"Then what was the point of getting married?" Arya asked, yawning.
Sansa looked at her like she was crazy. "Because. I like knowing he's...mine. I mean, he's always been mine, but I like knowing that we did it in front of everyone. I like knowing that if something ever God forbid happens...we were able to make it official in front of everyone we cared about."
Arya couldn't think of a response to that, so she just stayed quiet and picked at a loose thread from her comforter.
"You should probably go downstairs to Willas," she says softly.
Sansa shifts so she's leaning all of her weight on one of her arms and sitting on her side to face Arya. "What's wrong?"
Arya shrugs, the sheets rustling with the movement against them. "Nothing."
Sansa rolled her eyes and sat up all the way, putting her back against the headboard and curling her legs up to her chest, her sock-covered feet still hidden under the blankets. "Don't give me shit, Arya," she says. "I was at my wedding tonight, and I still somehow managed to pay enough attention to see you and Gendry tonight. What happened?"
She tries to shrug her shoulders again but Arya doesn't want to just not answer her.
Also, she feels like her head is going to split from overthinking, so it's not like she has a real choice or anything.
"Well," she begins hesitantly, "you know that we...broke up. The other day. A few days ago, I mean," she said. Sansa nodded, patiently waiting for her to continue. Her phone started vibrating. "You should get that," Arya said, pointing.
Sansa lets out a noise of frustration and taps the screen, holding it up to her ear. "I am having a heart to heart with my sister, Willas, and if you try to interrupt me one more time, I will take her with me on our honeymoon and leave you in our apartment all month." She hung up and looked back at Arya, her face completely smooth like she hadn't just snapped at her new husband.
Arya raised her eyebrows questioningly.
"He'll be fine," Sansa said, waving away her concerns. "He's acting like we don't have two more hours until we have to be at the airport."
"But...traffic..."
"Arya," Sansa said sternly. "Talk."
So she did. Not for too long, because she didn't want to see how much of Sansa's time she could take up before Willas got really mad, but...she talked. For the first time in what felt like months when it had only been a few weeks, she actually put her thoughts into words and told Sansa everything she was feeling and how she didn't know what to do or how to deal with it.
When she finished, Sansa pursed her lips thoughtfully. "I'm sure you guys will work it out," she said with finality, and then got up.
Arya stared after her incredulously and sat up in her bed, suddenly feeling very awake. "I'm sorry, what? You're sure we'll work it out? That's the best you can do?" she asked.
Sansa leaned over so she could tie her white sneakers, yanking the laces tightly. "Yeah," she said conversationally. "Because you guys have been friends forever. I mean, I can't imagine you guys not being friends." She finished tying her shoes and straightened up, squinting suspiciously at Arya. "If there's a part of you that can imagine a life where Gendry isn't in it, then...you should be okay. But if you can't imagine him not being there, whether it's as his girlfriend or his best friend, then you're going to work it out."
Arya thought over Sansa's answer and bit her lip. "What if I can't imagine it, but he can?" she asked nervously.
Sansa laughed and walked over to give Arya a kiss on the cheek. She shook her head at Arya and began walking to the door. "Oh, sweetie," she said even as she continued walking. "If that's what you think, then you really are blind."
( O O O )
"You're supposed to be at Gendry's."
Arya looked up from her cereal bowl to find Jon staring at her, his hand still on the doorknob.
"Oh," she said. "Hello."
"You're supposed to be at Gendry's," he repeated.
She nodded. "Yep. I'm going over there later today. But I deserve to eat some breakfast first, don't you think?"
Jon walked into the house and closed the door behind him, joining her at the table. "I think you need to get over there as fast as you can to fix whatever you two messed up," he said.
Arya paused and peeked up at him from under her lashes, her head bent over her spoon. "What's that supposed to mean?" she asked.
"It means you guys aren't together even though it's really obvious you both want to be."
Her spoon clattered to the table and Arya covered her face with her hands. "I'm really sick of everyone telling me what I want without even bothering to ask if they have any idea what it is," she said, voice muffled.
"Okay, fine," Jon said. "Do you want to be with him?"
She removed her hands so she could glare at him. "That's not the point," she mumbled under her breath.
Jon sighed. "You two are probably the most stubborn people in the world," he said.
"Yeah, well."
"You know, it's better if you just don't get together for real. It's better if you just stay apart because you two in a real relationship would be like hell."
"Oh? How do you figure that?"
"All day we'd have to hear the arguing. Every second it would be something new. To be honest, I don't have the patience to hear it from both of you."
Arya looked at him closely, but Jon's face betrayed nothing. "Really?" she asked, and he nodded. Just like that. A simple nod. She snorted. "Your reverse psychology won't work on me, or whatever it is that you're trying to do to get me to go over there—"
"I thought you said you were going over there later today anyway."
Arya glared at him again. She was getting really tired of having to do that all the time.
He stared at her. She stared at him.
Finally, she dropped her spoon back into her bowl and stood up. "Fine," she said, throwing her hands up. "I'm going. See? You're forcing me to leave without even having some breakfast. What kind of a brother are you?"
"Technically, I'm not really your brother," he called after her.
The door slamming behind her as she stormed out was her only response.
It was a shame that she didn't stay a bit longer, or she would have seen the satisfied smirk on Jon's face as he pulled her cereal towards her and dug in.
( O O O )
Gendry answered the door on the third knock. As soon as he saw her standing there, he opened his mouth, probably to tell her that she could still use her key, but Arya spoke first.
"Hey."