Ditched at the Altar, but I'm Thrilled

I didn't stay to watch them make their toasts. I went straight home.My neighbor spotted me on the way in and looked stunned. "Brynn, what are you doing here? Isn't today your wedding?"I'd been planning this wedding for so long that practically everyone knew about it, which meant getting played at the last minute left me no room to pretend otherwise. I kept unlocking my door without missing a beat."Called it off," I said evenly. "He's busy."He was busy giving his first love a wedding.Pity flickered across my neighbor's face, but she was kind enough not to press further.I shut the door and rushed to the bathroom. I barely made it before I was throwing up violently, and I didn't stop until there was nothing left in my stomach. Then I collapsed against the floor, completely drained.I have a moderate adverse reaction to sleeping pills. Jared knew that, and he drugged me anyway. The fact that I woke up at all today was pure luck.When I got up to rinse my mouth, my phone blew

After leaving the hospital, I dropped off some of my luggage at a storage unit. By the time I got home, Jared was already back, and Amber came up to greet me like she owned the place."Brynn, we're out of slippers, so just use the disposable ones."I looked down. She was wearing my home slippers, the ones Jared had bought me. They were a size five because my feet were small, and her heels stuck out the back. They didn't fit her at all, but she wore them in front of me on purpose just to get under my skin.I glanced further inside. Jared was on the couch playing video games with his friends, completely tuned out. I didn't say anything and bent down to put on the disposable pair.When I stepped into the hallway, a blast of cold air hit me and set off my allergies. I sneezed three times in a row. The thermostat had been turned down from 75 to 64. Jared noticed this time and took the remote out of my hand."Amber runs warm. She can't take it if it's any higher. Just tough it out for a

Jared's mind went blank, like the words hadn't registered. He turned around slowly. "What did you just say?"The guy immediately shut up.Jared grabbed the phone himself and opened the post. The marriage license in the photo had my name on it, and the color drained from his face instantly.Amber glanced at the screen and suppressed a smile. "This is what happens when you're too good to someone who doesn't deserve it. She threw a tantrum over nothing and ran off to marry someone else. Just let her go, Jared. She was always punching above her weight with you anyway."The others piled on right away."For real, man. She was probably stringing Garrett Anderson along the whole time, holding onto you with one hand and hooking up with him on the side.""Just forget about her. There's a million women who look like that. She probably did this on purpose to get back at you and Amber for the wedding. That's seriously twisted.""Come on, let's keep drinking. Stop thinking about her."A scre

I shook my head. "I'll never forget it for the rest of my life. I should honestly be thanking you for pulling that stunt at the wedding for Amber's sake, because otherwise I would've actually ruined my own happiness."The thought sent a chill through me. "Every time I think about how close I came to marrying my own bully, it's enough to give me nightmares."In that moment, Jared understood what it meant to have the heart cut right out of him. Everything went muffled, like he couldn't hear anything anymore. All he could see was my mouth moving, and every word landed like a knife twisting into his chest."Why?" he asked.I stopped mid-sentence and looked at him, confused. "Why?"I almost laughed. "Because I don't like you.""How could you do this to me?"His tears spilled over, and his shoulders shook. I stared at him, genuinely taken aback.Jared had never cried before, not even when he and Amber broke up. Something strange stirred in me. A man like him actually cried when he go