I was the “big girl” all the time. Early on, the person learnt how to be amiable, helpful, and unobtrusive in order to keep others around. Because I was told that my physicality made me difficult to pick, I made myself easy to love. I believed that I had finally been picked for who I was, not how I appeared, when I met Sayer. We spent nearly three years together. I helped him through long nights of self-doubt, family strife, and job upheavals. I thought we were creating something solid and tangible. I never thought the two individuals I trusted the most would betray me.
The evidence was indisputable when I found out he was having an affair with my best friend Maren. Messages. Images. I used to have inside jokes. He didn’t plead or refute when I challenged him. He simply stated it. She was slender. She was stunning. It was important. The sentence that broke something inside my chest then appeared. I hadn’t taken care of myself, he remarked. that he was entitled to a partner who was just like him. Not more gentle. Not more devoted. Simply slimmer. Overnight, Maren vanished from my life, and six months later, they became engaged.
Silently, I reached my lowest point. Don’t give dramatic speeches. No posts about retaliation. Just lengthy nights when it seemed hard to get out of bed. Survival eventually took over. To prove anything to them, I didn’t change. I couldn’t keep vanishing from my own life, so I altered. Walking turned into running. Running turned into lifting. On certain days, I sobbed in the restrooms of the gym and sat in my car, persuading myself not to give up. Slowly, then suddenly, progress was made. My physique transformed over the course of six months, but more significantly, my voice returned. I had to retrain how to maintain the bits of confidence that came back.
Their wedding took place today. I was not invited. I was going to hide away, put my phone on silent, and wait for the hours to pass. My phone then rang. An unidentified number. I nearly disregarded it. A woman inquired if I was Larkin when I responded. She spoke in a tight, hurried tone. She claimed to be Sayer’s mother. Then she said something that will always stick in my memory. She insisted that I come right away. that what had occurred would be unbelievable to me. Even before she completed the phrase, my heart began to race.
The situation was in disarray when I got there. Outside, guests stand in bewildered groups. Smeared makeup. Flowers were left behind. I discovered the truth inside. Sayer had been caught with another woman just hours before the ceremony, not with a complete stranger or out of the blue. Someone Maren was unaware of. Someone he had been discreetly seeing. His mother was the first to learn. I wasn’t called for drama by her. She finally understood, so she called. She informed me that although her son took without appreciation, she had seen me give and give.
I didn’t feel victorious. I experienced clarity. I knew the ending I previously pleaded for wasn’t supposed to include him as I stood there, transformed in ways that could not be quantified. Before the ceremony was formally called off, I thanked his mother, wished her peace, and departed. I felt lighter when I got home than I have in years. Not due to losing weight. because I was no longer burdened by the disgrace of another person. The cosmos sometimes provides you truth, distance, and the silent awareness that you made it through what was supposed to break you, but it never gives you closure.
