It happened so fast. It was romantic, magical, spontaneous, and impetuous. So not me. Clearly not. But it was done, and I had married the man I loved. It wasn’t until the next day that I thought: “Holy shit—I eloped without my girls or my men.”

I called Henry to give him my nuptial news. “Geez, Bailey. Are you pregnant?”

“No, Henry. I’m happy.” I waited.

“Well, okay then.” To say his enthusiasm was muted would’ve been an understatement. Maybe his loyalty was divided. But I was his sister. “Listen,” he added. “You’re going to have to deliver the news to Griffin yourself.”

“Can’t you tell him for me?”

“Shit, Bailey. He deserves to hear from you,” Henry said, deflecting my question.

And then there were the girls. “What? You get a purse or a pair shoes on impulse,” Elle said.

“Not a husband,” Reggie added. They eventually came around and embraced me, Elliott, and our quickie marriage.

For weeks I called Griffin without success. His message, “This is Griffin. You know what to do,” had become the most annoying words in the English language.

I even had a hard time talking to Henry. When I finally got in touch with him a few weeks later, it was not pretty. “Things are fucked up pretty badly here. I told you to get things straight with Griffin. He’s a mess. He gets drunk. I sober him up. Repeat. It is all I can do to maintain my own sobriety and not to drink myself. It’s a shit show. I think under the circumstances you should postpone your trip home until I can get things sorted out down here. I have no idea how long that will be. It’s a mess,” Henry added again for emphasis. Most of the time, both men refused to talk to me, and it left me reeling. So, it turned out my marriage was the life-shattering event that caused Griffin to get drunk. But what about Alex?

Guilt, worry, and something I couldn’t put a name on took up residence inside me. Elisabeth Kübler-Ross’s five stages of grief bounced around, and with each bounce, the grief multiplied. I was angry. This was supposed to be the happiest time of my life, and Griffin was robbing me of it. He was the one who turned me down. Then I would become sad. What if history repeated itself and he ended up like his parents? For the first time, I felt truly isolated, forsaken by my men. Utterly alone. Had my impetuous marriage done something to the three of us that was beyond repair? Had I caused the three of us to permanently break apart? Then I would be angry because I didn’t want to take ownership for the whole bloody schism. For weeks I couldn’t sleep or eat. My hair and patience grew thin. The girls noticed. They listened. Their loyalty seemed divided too.