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life for my sake. I loved you. I wanted you to be happy.”
    “What about all those brochures? The trade school applications? That didn’t exactly seem supportive.”
    “What are you talking about?” I ask. I try to scan back through my memories to figure out what he is referring to, but come up empty.
    “I came to see you the morning of the rehearsal. I had been on the phone with my agent, and a studio wanted me to come down to California for an audition. I went to your house to tell you about it, but you were out doing something for the wedding. I don’t remember what. Anyways, I had brought some flowers, so your mom let me in and when I put them down on the table I saw an envelope with a sticky note that said ‘For Brandon.’ I assumed it was from you, so I took it home and it was full of brochures for different schools and training programs, things like plumber, electrician, EMT, and more.
    “Seeing all that gave me this picture of what you wanted, and I knew that I wouldn’t be able to live up to that. You wanted a normal life with a normal guy, and I just didn’t fit that mold. I felt like I would be a disappointment.”
    My heart is beating too fast, and my mind is spinning as his words tumble out.
    “Brandon, I didn’t leave that package for you. I have no idea what you’re even talking about!”
    He looks completely stunned before asking, “Well if you didn’t, then who did?”
    I can’t say for sure, but my top suspect would be my mother. She was always rattling on about Brandon needing to get more serious about finding a career. We had received our two-year degrees, but had not returned to college to finish the full four-year program. Neither of us had a solid plan of what we wanted next, so we had decided to take a year off to get married, get settled, and then go back to school. Thinking of her packaging up career options and leaving them for him like that makes me want to hit something. Hard. Anger boils up, mostly directed at my mother, but it spills over onto Brandon as well.
    “How could you feel all this and not bring this up to me? You didn’t let me have a chance to work this out with you! Why just run away without getting all the information first? After all the years we spent together, I feel like I should at least have been given a chance to explain!”
    “I wanted to talk to you. I tried. I was upset, but I still showed up at the rehearsal and was still planning to go through with everything. Then, there was this moment of clarity. Or confirmation I guess.”
    “What? What happened?” I demand.
    “At the dinner, my dad asked how you felt about the possibility of moving to California, and you said we’d have to wait and see about that.”
    He pauses.
    “So? What’s wrong with saying ‘wait and see’?”
    “Cherry, we both know that is what you always said when you didn’t want to do something, but you didn’t want to just say no outright. It was like a cover.”
    “You cannot be serious. That’s what this is all based off of? An assumption?”
    I take a deep breath and try to slow my heart rate. It feels like I’m going to have a panic attack…or maybe an aneurysm.
    “It wasn’t an easy decision. I wrestled with it all night, going back and forth, trying to figure out what to do, but in the end I took the selfish road.”
    My voice sounds hollow when I finally speak, “Brandon, do you know how many times I said ‘we’ll wait and see’ that week?”
    I stare at him, keeping my hands level on the wheel. “Everyone wanted to know everything all at once. When are you going to have kids? Where will you live? Are you going to keep your job at the library? Are you going to move to the city for more jobs? Are you going back to school?”
    I sigh and fix my eyes back on the road.
    “I didn’t have the answers for any of them, so my default became ‘wait and see’ with a big, fake smile to convince everyone that we had all our ducks in a row. You think you were scared?