Rachel Dyken - Fearless

“Hey…” Lisa held out a dress. “You ready for the fairy tale?”

I gasped when she zipped open the garment bag. The color white made everything more real. The material shimmered and beckoned from the bag. The lamplight from the room gave the beading a warm glow. I was almost afraid that if I touched the dress it would disappear. “Is that for me?”

“From your future husband—he flew it in from France.”

“WHAT?” I shrieked.

“Wes Michels does style good.” Lisa’s smile grew to epic proportions. She clapped her hands in excitement. “Then again he may have had the super awesome best friend of the bride help out a bit with measurements.” Lisa giggled and thrust the dress into my arms. “Now hurry and get dressed, we don’t have a ton of time.”

The type of love that makes you want to laugh out loud—scream a bit—run in circles—and then repeat? Yeah that’s how I felt about Wes. Totally. Out. Of. Control. Giddiness.—Kiersten

Lisa

My smile felt so forced that it ached. Don’t get me wrong. I was really excited for Kiersten—what type of friend would I be if I wasn’t excited?

I felt like the last one. The redheaded stepchild. However, you want to look at it. Wes had Kiersten…Gabe had Saylor…

And I had…a shady past filled with the memory of a guy I’d betrayed. A guy I could have loved—but had destroyed instead.

Yeah, so much for happy memories.

“How’s it look?” Kiersten emerged from the bathroom and twirled. The dress was actually an embellished bodice with a sweetheart cut, while the skirt was around seven layers of lace and intricate beading. It had a definite Spanish flair. It was something I knew Kiersten would love.

And when I’d tried to show Wes, he’d covered his eyes and pulled out his credit card and mumbled something about not wanting to see the dress before the wedding and that I should do “whatever it takes” to make the love of his life happy.

I snatched that credit card with lightning speed—no girl should say no to a Wes Michels credit card, those bad boys have no limit, which was also a perk since I’d had it shipped that very day.

“You look beautiful.” I fought the tears clogging my throat as Kiersten’s smile filled the room with joy. I had to look away. I needed to look away because it broke my heart that I would never have that same type of joy. That same smile. I didn’t deserve it and part of me wondered if I ever really wanted it in the first place. When you want something, you fight for it, right? And I never fought. I just gave in, over and over again. I gave in to the nameless faces, the touches, the numerous advances…and then there was Taylor.

I didn’t give in to him. Not the first time. Or even the second, but the third? The fourth? The fifth? Sixth? Seventh? I’d lost count. And he’d turned out to be a monster. So I’d tried to leave. But the thing about leaving someone who’s a sociopath? They always find you.

For years, I’d never regretted what happened, what I did. It had to happen in order for me to survive…but watching Wes and Kiersten—it made me regret things, things I had no business regretting, because in the end I couldn’t turn back time. I couldn’t get my dignity back, my pride, my heart. Those had all died right along with his black soul.

Plato believed that reasoning originated within the brain, but passion? Passion originated in what he called the fiery heart. Separate from all logic—fueled by blood, driven by passions. I for one, completely side with Plato, how else could I explain the way she made me feel? It went against logic. It went against life. Against death. It was transcendent. —Wes Michels

Wes

Being nervous hadn’t really occurred to me—not until Gabe mentioned a text from Kiersten where she used lots of exclamations points and enough emoji to illustrate her own graphic novel. By the time we’d gotten to the location and I saw the decorations—I started freaking out. Probably not to the level that Kiersten was freaking out, but my hands were shaking and I was pretty sure that if Gabe offered me a shot of tequila I’d toss it back like water. I wasn’t nervous about the marriage—I was nervous about everything before that point.

I sucked in a nervous breath as Gabe slapped my back. Either Kiersten was going to flip in a bad way, or she was going to think it was the coolest thing I could do.

Yeah, the very fact that Gabe flipped should have given me a hint. After all, the guy had just visited hell and back. To say his life had been an emotional roller coaster for the last few months would be a huge understatement. It probably didn’t help that in the process I’d given him, what? Two black eyes? Hey, that’s what friends do. They punch you in the face when you act like a jackass.

“It’s creepy.” Gabe sniffed and looked around the white room. “You know those movies where people go to heaven and everything’s white?”

“Yeah?” I touched some of the flowers sitting on the table. “What about them?”

“We are freaking in that movie dude, I’m a bit worried the door’s going to close on me and then a trapdoor on the floor’s going to open revealing the fires of hell and a booming voice is going to come on the loud speaker and say ‘MAKE YOUR CHOICE!’”

“Paging Doctor Smith,” boomed a voice over the loud speaker in the ceiling

With a giant-assed start, Gabe grabbed my arm and let out a streak of curses.

I burst out laughing as I lifted his hand and dropped it. “You still worried they don’t want you upstairs?”

“Cautious.” Gabe pointed at me and rolled his eyes. “Just cautious.”

“Everything ready?” My dad came barreling in, JoBob and Sandy in tow. Even though we were loaded, we’d had a hell of a time actually getting all the big shots at the hospital to agree to this. But honestly? Any other way and it wouldn’t make sense.

I hoped Kiersten would realize that.

Saylor popped into the room and shut the door behind her. “Okay Lisa has Kiersten in the car and they’re driving in this direction, so everyone?” She waved her hands into the air.

“She dancing?” I asked Gabe.

He tilted his head and squinted at her then shook his head. “Not sure.”

Saylor sighed in irritation. “Just get in your places like we practiced last night.”

“That was fun.” Gabe smirked. “Last night.”

“Can we not?” I smacked him on the shoulder. “Wedding day? Hello?”

“Sorry.” He licked his lips and winked at Saylor who in turn blushed so red that I was convinced she was going to stop breathing altogether and pass out on the table. Hey, at least we were close to the hospital.

I tugged at my tie again and told myself to calm down.

But instead of calming down, my heart slammed against my chest. Funny, how I’d come so close to never having that feeling ever again. Yet there it was, slamming in perfect cadence. Announcing to the rest of my body that I was nervous, that I was excited. It’s funny, we all have hearts, but do we ever truly listen to them?

Its’ true, death had made me all kinds of philosophical, swear it made Gabe want to strangle me most the time.

But the question remained. How often do we hear our hearts and stop to appreciate the fact that it’s been beating solid, strong, for our entire lives? God willing, your heart never stops until you finally die. It beats harder when you’re sick, it beats softer when you sleep, it beats harder again when you’re excited, and sometimes it physically hurts when you’re in pain.

Your heart isn’t just a muscle.

Though I’m sure people would disagree with me.

Your heart is everything. Why else would God ask for it first? I mean, why not ask for your mind? Your soul? Instead, God asks for our hearts. Our significant others ask for our hearts. Family…they ask for our hearts. Friends ask for our hearts.

It’s not just a muscle.

I truly believed that the heart stored the essence of everything a person possessed. The human body didn’t start with the brain or the legs…no…when we were conceived…the first thing doctors searched for?

The heartbeat.

When you get married…you don’t just ask for your wife’s hand. The first thing you search for? Her heart.

When you’re sick. The doctor doesn’t ask about your heart—he listens to it.

Seems to me like we’ve had it wrong all these years.

If you have a heart—I guarantee—there’s someone out there who wants it. Who’s searching for it. Who dreams about it.

“Wes?” Gabe knocked me in the shoulder. “You okay?”

“Yeah, just thinking about…things,” I lied.

“Well,” he said, sighing. “Pretty sure all thinking will cease the minute that girl walks through that door.”

“Oh yeah?” I smirked. “Why?”

Gabe gave me a knowing grin.

Kiersten walked through the door, her eyes already pouring tears down her cheeks.

And then I looked at the bouquet she was holding.

Red roses. In the shape of a heart.

She was holding my heart.

He’d given me his heart a long time ago—and now I was giving it back, not because I didn’t want it. But because I wanted to share it. With him. Forever.—Kiersten

Kiersten

When Lisa drove me up to the hospital, my first thought was something had happened to Wes. Funny, how you think you can be totally over something. And then one tiny little thing happens and immediately you’re back to that place. I wondered if PTSD was like that.

You live your life every day, going through the motions, and then BOOM! Something suddenly happens to throw you off kilter and the only thing you want to do is go sit in a corner and rock back and forth.

When she parked and didn’t start crying or saying that we were there because the man I loved was dying—again. I lost it.

Too close to home.

I wanted to leave.

Actually, I wanted to smack Wes and then I wanted to leave. How dare he scare me like that!

“Hey!” Lisa grabbed my hand. “You need to do this.”

“I don’t want to.” I knew I sounded like a whiny child, and Wes had probably gone to a lot of trouble to use the little chapel at the hospital. But I didn’t…I couldn’t. My throat felt thick as I tried to swallow.

I hadn’t had a panic attack in a really long time.

But being back in that hospital, even in the parking garage, was doing some serious damage to my nervous system.

I didn’t want to stay and fight. I wanted to run away. I wanted to run in the opposite direction of the memories of Wes lying in that hospital bed. Of the look on his face when he said goodbye. My breath hitched in my chest as my stomach clenched with fear.

Of the tears in his eyes when he wasn’t sure if it was going to be for a few hours—or forever.

I sniffled.

Lisa handed me a tissue and started slowly rubbing my back. “Talk to me, Kiersten.”

“It feels like yesterday,” I whispered. “I’m terrified that when I walk in that door, he’s going to be back in that hospital bed, or worse, something’s going to happen. I just—I know it’s not logical but I don’t feel very logical right now.”

“It’s your wedding day.” Lisa shrugged. “Who says you have to be logical?”

I smiled through my tears.

“If it makes you feel better.” She continued rubbing my back, totally something my mom would have done. I loved that girl, I would seriously die for Lisa, and I think she knew that. “I haven’t gone back either.”

“To the hospital?”

“No.” She stopped rubbing for a minute. “Home. I haven’t faced my demons at all. It doesn’t make it easier you know.”

“Are you sure?” My lips trembled as a few tears ran over them.

“Positive.” Lisa handed me another tissue. “Just because you avoid something, doesn’t make it disappear. I think we’d like to imagine life works that way. But I’m sure if I went back home…everything would be just how I left it and I’d be bombarded with the same memories, the same regrets, the giant never really dies Kiersten, not until you throw the damn rock.”

“Nice metaphor. Hanging out with Wes too much I see.”

Lisa snorted. “Swear his philosophies just rub off on everyone in his path.”

I twisted the tissue between my hands. “Your giants…what are they?”

A troubled expression clouded her eyes, and Lisa sighed. “They’re ugly.”