‘It . . . it hurts,’ she stuttered. ‘I haven’t cried all day because it didn’t feel real, but now . . .’ She felt the warm, constant trickle across her cheeks. ‘You’ve broken my heart, Digby.’ Her voice faltered. ‘You’ve absolutely broken my heart. You’re listening to your mother over me and I guess that’s the point at which we fall apart. You choose her. I get it.’ She let this sink in, her sadness pulling her down and rendering her weak. ‘But in the process, you sold me a dream . . . and now you’ve humiliated me in front of my family, my neighbours, all the people I care about. All my life I’ve tried to live well, live quietly, knowing how reputations can be made or broken in a small place. It was important to me; I am a Kellow and we built Port Charles. This is my home, I’m part of it and it’s part of me and now I’m marked: I have a story, a scandal that will follow me like a bad smell.’ Her voice was now no more than a rasp. ‘This is the day people will talk about. The day I put on a wedding dress and everyone in the village turned out in their finest clothes and you didn’t show.’ Her tears fell and her eyes felt sore, as hysteria reached for her and held her fast. ‘I shan’t shake that off, not ever. I’ll be the new Lizzie Lick.’ Her voice croaked at this truth.

Digby shook his head, as if this very thought was absurd.

‘And I could never have imagined that you would do something like this to me, not ever. I would have thought you’d be the last person to do something like this.’ She swiped at her nose with her fingertips, caring little how she looked or that she had smudged the artfully applied slick of mascara or that her eyes might be bloodshot and her nose running.

It was not the fairy-tale beginning she had been planning and picturing for months. It was in fact their ending. This was happening. It was real. They were done. Her body felt hollowed out, scooped of all substance, and she was no more than a shell of her former self, frail and pulled eggshell thin with disappointment.

‘I can’t believe it.’ She whispered the truth.

‘You are the most amaz—’

‘Shut the fuck up, Digby!’ she snapped. ‘Don’t you dare give me that bullshit about how fantastic I am and how someone will be lucky to have me, or whatever other crap you are about to spout.’

He closed his mouth.