“How long were you seeing me while you were still engaged to her?”

“Megan, please.”

“How long?”

Jason rubbed his forehead.

“A few months.”

She nodded once.

Then she reached behind her head and removed her veil.

She handed it to one of the bridesmaids.

“I’m not getting married today.”

Jason stepped toward her.

“Don’t do this because Rachel showed up angry.”

Megan looked at him.

“I’m doing this because you let a woman attend your funeral while you were alive.”

Jason’s face hardened.

“Can we please discuss this privately?”

“No.”

Her father put a hand gently against her back.

Megan turned to me before leaving.

For a moment, I thought she might apologize.

She didn’t.

She didn’t owe me one.

She just said:

“I didn’t know.”

I nodded.

“Neither did I.”

Then she walked away.

Jason watched her go.

The hallway stayed silent until the ballroom doors closed behind her.

Then he turned toward me.

His expression wasn’t ashamed anymore.

It was angry.

“Are you happy now?”

I Only Brought the Flowers

I looked at him.

“What?”

“You came here and destroyed my wedding.”

Eric muttered his brother’s name.

Jason ignored him.

“You couldn’t just leave. You had to tell her everything right before the ceremony.”

I stared at the man I had mourned for three months.

There had been nights when I had replayed our last conversation because I couldn’t remember whether I’d said I loved him before he left.

There had been mornings when I’d reached across the bed before remembering he wasn’t there.

I had blamed myself for every stupid argument we’d ever had because I thought death had taken away my chance to fix any of them.

Now Jason was standing in front of me blaming me for telling his bride he was alive during his own funeral.

I adjusted the strap of my purse.

“I didn’t destroy your wedding.”

He laughed bitterly.

“Really?”

I looked toward the ballroom, where my white roses were sitting on every table.

“I brought the flowers.”

Then I looked back at him.

“You did everything else.”

Jason’s mouth tightened.

“Rachel—”

“Don’t.”

Linda stepped between us.

Her eyes were wet.

“Rachel, please. I know you’re angry with me.”

I looked at her corsage.

It was still pinned to her wrist.

Mother of the groom.

Three months earlier, she had worn black and held my hand while I cried over her living son.

“Why?” I asked.

Linda looked confused.

“Why what?”

“Why did you sit beside me at the funeral?”

Her face crumpled slightly.

“I didn’t know what else to do.”

“You could have told me he was alive.”

“Jason begged me not to.”

“So?”

She looked toward her son.

“He’s my child.”

I nodded slowly.

“And I was what?”

“Rachel, I cared about you.”

“You watched me bury him.”

She covered her mouth.

I didn’t raise my voice.

I didn’t need to.

“You held my hand while I cried because I thought we were grieving the same person.”

Linda wiped beneath one eye.

“I was trying to protect my son.”

“From what?”

She didn’t answer.

I looked at Jason.

He didn’t either.

That was the part that stayed with me.

There was never a good answer because there had never been a danger.

Jason wasn’t trapped.

I hadn’t threatened him.

There was no financial dependency, no child tying us together, no reason he couldn’t have simply said he didn’t want to marry me.

He had been afraid of an uncomfortable conversation.

So he chose a funeral instead.

I walked back toward the ballroom.

Kayla was standing near the entrance.

Her face told me she’d heard enough to understand that something was terribly wrong.

“Rachel?”

I handed her my keys.

“Can you finish teardown tonight?”

“Of course.”

I looked around the room.

White roses on twenty-four tables.

Candles.

Place settings.

The arch I’d spent two hours decorating that morning.

For months, I had wondered whether I would ever be able to work on another wedding without thinking about the one I never got to have.

Apparently, this was my answer.

“Invoice them for everything,” I said.

Kayla nodded.

“Everything.”

I walked outside.

Jason followed me into the parking lot.

“Rachel, wait.”

I kept going.

“I said wait.”

I turned beside my car.

He stopped a few feet away.

For a moment, neither of us spoke.

He looked tired now.

Not like a ghost.

Not like the man from my funeral photographs.

Just Jason.

The same man who left wet towels on the bathroom floor and forgot birthdays unless his phone reminded him.

That ordinary version of him somehow made what he’d done worse.

“I panicked,” he said.

“Okay.”

He seemed surprised.

“Okay?”

“You panicked.”

“I never meant for it to go this far.”

“But it did.”

“You don’t understand what it was like waking up after that accident.”

“You’re right.”

I unlocked my car.

“I only know what it was like believing you didn’t wake up.”

He looked away.

I opened the driver’s door.

“Rachel.”

I waited.

“I’m sorry.”

It was the first time he’d said it.

Three months late.

I got into my car.

“I believe you.”

He stepped closer.

“Can we talk tomorrow?”

“No.”

“Next week?”

“No.”

He stared at me.

I shut the door.

The Funeral Flower I Finally Threw Away

I didn’t drive home immediately.

I sat in a grocery-store parking lot about two miles from the venue and called my therapist.

I’d stopped seeing her two weeks earlier because I thought I was doing better.

When she answered, I said the strangest sentence I’ve ever said in my life.

“Jason isn’t dead.”

There was a pause.

Then she said:

“Where are you?”

I told her.

“Are you safe?”

“Yes.”

“Can you drive?”

I looked at my hands.

They weren’t shaking anymore.

“Not yet.”

“Then stay where you are.”

So I did.

A few weeks later, I heard through Kayla that Megan had ended all contact with Jason.

I also learned there were questions surrounding the identification error after the accident. The family of the man who had actually died had begun pursuing answers through an attorney.

I didn’t follow it closely.

For the first time in months, I didn’t want information about Jason.

I wanted less of him.

I blocked his number after the fourth message.

I blocked Linda after the second.

Eric sent one email apologizing.

I didn’t respond.

What surprised me most was how quickly ordinary life returned once I knew the truth.

Grief had made everything feel permanent.

The truth made things practical.

I had appointments.

Rent.

Invoices.

A cooler that needed repairing.

A bride who changed her centerpiece colors three times.

A mother of the bride who cried when she saw the bouquet I made for her daughter.

About six weeks after that wedding, I accepted another full-service ceremony.

I almost said no.

Then I saw the bride’s notes.

She wanted white roses.

On the morning of the wedding, Kayla watched me open the first box.

“You good?”

I touched one of the roses.

“Yeah.”

And I was.

That evening, after we finished setting up, I returned to my shop and opened the bottom drawer of my desk.

Inside was a dried white rose from Jason’s funeral.

I had kept it because throwing it away had once felt like throwing away part of him.

Now I understood there had never been anything sacred about it.

It was just a flower from a funeral that should never have happened.

I carried it to the trash.

Then I went back to the cooler, picked up a fresh bucket of white roses, and started preparing them for someone else’s wedding.