I pushed through the crowd before I had even decided to move.
Ryan and Jade were still at the front of the room, smiling as people I had met barely twenty minutes ago congratulated them, and I walked straight toward them without thinking about what I was going to say, I just knew I had to get to them, and when I got close enough Jade saw me first, her smile never slipped, not even for a second, and Ryan turned, saw me, and looked away almost immediately, like he'd been waiting for this moment and still wasn't ready to face it.
"Melissa," he said.
"Outside," I said. "Both of you. Now."
Jade rested a hand on my arm before Ryan could speak, then guided me toward the side door and into the corridor, and I let her because the last thing I wanted was to fall apart in front of a ballroom full of strangers.
The door clicked shut behind us.
"You need to calm down," she said.
"Don't tell me to calm down," I shot back. "How long, Jade, how long has this been going on?"
"This isn't the place."
"No, answer me." I looked at her hand, then at the ring on her finger. "You're wearing his engagement ring, when did he give you that, before or after he called me this morning and told me to wear the dress he bought me?"
"Melissa..."
"No." I cut her off. "You're my sister, you're supposed to be my sister."
She gave a small shrug.
"Adopted," she said. "Let's not pretend we're more than that."
I stared at her.
Three years. Three years with Ryan. Three years believing every promise he made me.
Jade smiled and said, "You really thought he was going to choose you?"
My hand moved before I even thought about it.
The slap echoed down the corridor.
Her head snapped to the side, then she turned back so fast that I barely caught her wrist before she could hit me.
"You thief," I said, my voice shaking as I held on. "You've spent your whole life taking things from me, and now you've taken the only good thing I had, the only thing that was actually mine. You and your parents never stopped finding new ways to hurt me, and I'm tired, Jade, I'm so tired of all of you."
She looked down at my hand around her wrist, then back into my face.
"I wonder what Ryan would say," she said, "if he found out his perfect little girlfriend, the one who was saving herself for marriage, spent last night in a hotel room with a man she doesn't even know."
I froze.
"How do you know that?"
She smiled.
That was all it took. I saw it all at once. She knew because she'd planned it. Every piece of it. Every single piece.
I swung at her again, but she was quicker, she slapped me hard across the face and shoved me at the same time, and I lost my balance, my knees hit the floor, and before I could get back up she was standing over me, looking down like I was something she'd scraped off her shoe.
"Don't you ever put your filthy hands on me again," she said. "Do you hear me? My family took you in when you had nothing, and now you're standing here acting like everything belongs to you."
She smoothed the front of her dress as though nothing had happened.
"You're a slut, Melissa."
She said it so casually that it sounded like she was talking about the weather, then she turned, opened the door, and walked back into the ballroom.
I stayed where I was.
The applause on the other side of the wall carried into the corridor, loud enough to remind me exactly what everyone inside was celebrating.
I never went back in.
I sat on a bench outside the venue for three hours because I had nowhere else to go and no idea what to do next, and I replayed the whole night over and over, Jade walking onto that stage, Ryan refusing to look at me, the way everything had gone so smoothly, and the more I thought about it the clearer it became that this hadn't happened overnight, it had been going on for a long time, and everyone had known except me.
The cab home cost almost everything I had left in my purse.
I saw my luggage before I saw the house, two bags sitting neatly outside the front door, zipped up and waiting for me, and I stood on the path looking at them because Jade's mother was home, which meant she knew exactly what had happened.
After a moment I walked up and knocked.
Jade's mother opened the door. She was already wearing her dressing gown. She'd been expecting me.
"What is this?" I asked.
"I think you already know," she said.
"You can't throw me out tonight," I said. "I have nowhere to go, I barely have any money, you can't just do this."
"We don't need you here anymore," she said. "Jade has found her future, and your place in this family was always tied to Ryan, now that's over."
"I've lived here for fifteen years," I said, and my voice came out louder than I meant it to. "Fifteen years. I cooked, I cleaned, I kept this house running while Jade did whatever she wanted. I helped Ryan build that company from the ground up, I stayed awake working when I should've been asleep, and now you're standing there acting like I'm nothing."
"You're ungrateful," she said. "After everything this family has done for you, the least you can do is let your sister enjoy her happiness."
"My sister's happiness?" I laughed, but there wasn't anything funny about it. "Where was this family when I was the one suffering? Where were any of you when..."
She stepped back. The door closed in my face.
I knocked again, harder this time.
"My piggy bank is still inside," I called through the door. "My savings are in this house. Just give me what's mine and I'll leave, I'll leave tonight, I promise, just give me my money."
I heard footsteps.
The door opened again.
Jade's mother stood there holding a bucket. For a second I just looked at it, trying to work out why she was carrying it, then she threw the water straight at me.
It hit me full in the face. Ice cold.
I stumbled back, soaked from head to toe. She looked at me without a shred of guilt.
"The next bucket will be hot," she said. "So I'd suggest you get away from my door."
She stepped inside again. The lock clicked.
I stood there on the doorstep, dripping wet, my eyes burning from impact of the water and glue from my eyelashes, my bags sitting beside me, and I stayed exactly where I was because I honestly didn't know what I had left anymore.
After a while I picked up my bags. Then I started walking.
I walked for what felt like hours, without paying attention to where I was going, just putting one foot in front of the other because standing still felt worse, and I tried not to think about anything because thinking meant replaying the whole night, and the cold air clung to my wet clothes, my shoes rubbed painfully against my heels, but I kept walking.
I didn't notice the car until the headlights were almost on top of me and I was standing right in the middle of the road, and I'm not proud to admit that I didn't move, I just stood there, then two hands grabbed my arms and yanked me backward so hard my feet left the ground for a second.
