The scene opened on a house, one of those country manor type of houses with sprawling green lawns and a pebbled driveway. A soft violin played something familiar and the camera panned to guests milling in dated sherbet-colored dresses with spaghetti straps and suits that looked the same as every suit I’ve ever seen. I didn’t recognize many of the people there. Aunt Claire and her ex-husband; Mum’s parents, I recognized them from photos. Dad’s parents were there and I felt a twinge of sadness for my granny who died when I was eight or nine. I didn’t think of her often anymore. A woman in a silvery slip dress with chunky highlights was kind of familiar. She might have stayed with us a few times when I was younger. A fuzzy memory came back to me, her and my mother laughing in the living room late at night while I begged to stay up so I could be included. The memory smelled like grown-up perfume and red wine kisses on my forehead.

I fast-forwarded through the next few minutes, a squiggly, blurry mixture of people milling around and wide landscape shots of the house. I pressed play when the location shifted to inside. Everyone was seated, the camera only catching the backs of their heads as they turned to face the door. Then Mum appeared, a grandfather I didn’t know on her arm. A dress so familiar from photographs it was like I’d seen her in it in real life. She wasn’t wearing a veil. A memory came back: being at Izzy’s house when we were really little. She put on her mother’s veil and flounced around the house, declaring herself a fairy princess. I ran home and asked my mother for her veil and she told me she didn’t have one. I was so jealous. Watching the video, I was glad I could see her face.

She was thirty-six, thirty-seven in the video, but she seemed younger. There was a giddy energy radiating from her. I couldn’t help but smile as she tried with little success to force her features into solemn repose. The camera cut to my dad. He was only twenty-six or so and he looked far too young to get married. He wasn’t trying to look serious; he was smiling in a way that lit up not just his face, but his whole body. Like he might burst with it. I paused the screen on his face. He must have known in that moment that there was a good chance my mother would end up as she had, and I searched for the slightest hint of doubt in his expression. All I saw was a glimmer when his eye caught hers. They looked like they were sharing a wonderful secret.

When it ended, there was an ache in my throat from trying not to cry.