My sister Kayla has always needed to be the center of attention. At my high school graduation, she “fainted” during my speech. At my college graduation, she announced her engagement at my dinner. That engagement lasted three months.
My sister Kayla has always needed to be the center of attention. At my high school graduation, she “fainted” during my speech. At my college graduation, she announced her engagement at my dinner. That engagement lasted three months.
So when Nate and I got engaged, I asked for one thing. “Kayla, please. Just let this one day be about us.”
She hugged me and said, “Hannah, I would never.”
The Dress
My bridesmaids wore sage green. Kayla was supposed to wear sage green too.
She arrived at the church ten minutes before the ceremony in a floor-length white lace gown.
“The green one didn’t fit,” she said with a shrug. “This was all I had. Relax, it’s ivory, not white.”
It was white.
My mom begged me not to make a scene. “It’s your day, honey. Don’t let her ruin it.” So I swallowed it. I walked down the aisle. I married the love of my life. In every photo from the ceremony, there are two women in white, and only one of them is the bride.Track Pregnancy
The Microphone
The reception was perfect for exactly forty-five minutes. Then the best man finished his toast, and before the DJ could take the microphone back, Kayla stood up and grabbed it.
“Hi, everyone! I’m the sister of the bride. Since the whole family is here, I just couldn’t wait any longer.”Plan Family Trips
She put one hand on her stomach and beamed.
“I’m pregnant!”
Half the room gasped. My aunt screamed and ran over to hug her. My grandmother started crying. Someone yelled, “A toast to Kayla!” and people actually raised their glasses.
I stood frozen in my wedding dress in the middle of the dance floor, watching my own reception turn into my sister’s party.
What Nate Did
My eyes were filling with tears. Then I felt Nate’s hand on my back.
He wasn’t looking at Kayla. He was looking at the DJ booth. He walked over calmly, leaned in, and said something I couldn’t hear. The DJ nodded and started typing on his laptop.
Nate came back and squeezed my hand. “Do you trust me?”
“What did you do?”
“I asked him to play the video. Now. Not at the end of the night.”
My heart stopped. There was only one video. The one Nate and I had made together and planned to show at the very end of the reception, just for our families. I hadn’t even told my mother what was in it.Track Pregnancy
The lights dimmed. The big screen behind the head table flickered on. Kayla was still holding the microphone, smiling, when the first image appeared. Then her smile disappeared.
What was on that screen would change how everyone in that room saw my sister forever.
The Video
The video started with a black screen and white letters: “Hannah & Nate have one more announcement.”
Then came a clip of the two of us in our kitchen three weeks earlier, holding a tiny pair of baby shoes. Then an ultrasound picture, with a date in the corner. Then the words: “Baby Brooks. Coming this June.”
The room exploded. My mother shrieked. My grandmother stood up and nearly knocked over her chair. Nate’s dad started clapping and couldn’t stop.
The Bathroom Trash Can
Later, I learned what had really happened.
The night before the wedding, Kayla stayed at my apartment. I had taken a second pregnancy test that morning, just to be sure, and wrapped it in tissue at the bottom of the bathroom trash can. Kayla found it.Book Venues
She knew I was pregnant before almost anyone. And she decided to get there first.
Nate figured it out before I did. He’d seen the trash can lid crooked that morning and Kayla acting strange all day. When she grabbed the mic, he knew exactly what she was doing, and decided she wasn’t going to take this from me too.
“What Baby?”
But the biggest moment of the night came twenty minutes later.
My mother, overjoyed and three glasses of champagne in, wrapped Kayla in a hug and said, “Two grandbabies! When are you due, sweetheart?”
Kayla stammered. “Um… summer. Late summer.”
Her boyfriend, Tyler, who had been at the bar during her speech, walked up holding two drinks. “Due for what?”
“The baby,” my mother said. “Kayla’s baby!”Track Pregnancy
Tyler looked at Kayla. Then at the full glass of wine in her hand. “What baby?”
There was no baby. Kayla had made the whole thing up on the spot, the second she realized I was pregnant, so that she could be the one everybody celebrated.
After the Wedding
Kayla left the reception early. Tyler drove her home and broke up with her a week later. He told my mom he couldn’t be with someone who would lie about something like that.
For the first time in her life, the family didn’t rally around Kayla. My grandmother told her, “You wore white to your sister’s wedding and lied about a child. Go home and think about who you want to be.”Book Venues
It took four months, but Kayla eventually showed up at my door with a gift bag. Inside was a tiny sage-green baby blanket she had knitted herself, badly.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I’ve been jealous of you my whole life, and I never told anyone. I’m seeing a therapist now.”
Our son, Owen, was born in June. Kayla was in the waiting room. She wore green.
And whenever anyone asks about our wedding, Nate tells the story of the night he hijacked the DJ. He still says it was the best decision he ever made, right after marrying me.