MY BELOVED ESCAPED IN TEARS AFTER I SHED MY BRIDAL ATTIRE ON OUR NUPTIAL NIGHT Thus, my wedding ceremony with Greg was picture-perfect. His parents invested a significant sum to render it memorable, and Greg couldn’t avert his sight from me. Throughout the entire day, he murmured sweet nothings near my ear, clearly eager for our initial night as husband and wife. Once the celebration concluded, we proceeded to the dwelling his parents permitted us to occupy. The very second we reached the primary bedroom suite, the intensity was discernible. Greg wore a wide smile as he commenced undoing the zipper of my wedding gown, expectation hanging in the environment. Yet, as the garment descended to the floor, I rotated to confront him, and his demeanor shifted instantaneously. His face twisted into disbelief and dread. “No… no, no, no!” His speech broke as he dropped to his knees, his hands shaking. “Good heavens! Just who precisely are you?I stared down at him, the heavy silk puddling around my ankles, exposing not the smooth, pale skin Greg had adored touching all day, but flesh that shimmered with a strange, faint luminescence. Intricate, dark lines pulsed just beneath the surface, swirling like celestial currents across my torso and limbs. It wasn’t a scar, not a mark of injury, but a part of my true nature, concealed by layers of fabric and illusion for this single, perfect day.
My heart sank. This was the moment I had dreaded, the inevitable reveal I had hoped, perhaps foolishly, that love might bridge. I felt a cold knot form in my stomach as I saw his terror solidify, the disbelief morphing into utter revulsion.
“Greg, please,” I whispered, my voice raw. “Let me explain.”
He scrambled backward on the floor, bumping into the footboard of the bed, his eyes wide and fixed on my form with a horror that went beyond mere shock. He wasn’t just seeing something unexpected; he was seeing something that fundamentally broke his reality.
“Explain?” he choked out, pushing himself further away. “Explain what? What in God’s name are you?” His gaze darted from the strange patterns on my skin to my face, searching for the woman he thought he married, finding only a stranger cloaked in the fading glow of something alien.
Tears welled in my eyes, hot and stinging. “I told you… I told you there were things about me you didn’t know. Things I had to hide.” My voice trembled as I lowered myself slowly to the floor, sitting amongst the folds of the wedding dress. “This is me, Greg. Or part of me. The part the light weaves through. It’s why I… why I couldn’t always be in direct sunlight, why I needed… I needed to be careful.” The words tumbled out, desperate and clumsy, trying to explain a truth I had guarded my entire life, a truth I had believed *he* could accept.
But the look on his face offered no hope. It was pure, unadulterated fear. The adoration from moments before had completely vanished, replaced by a primal need to escape the unnatural thing before him.
He pushed himself to his feet, shaking his head, his breathing ragged. “No,” he repeated, louder this time. “No, I can’t… I don’t know you.” He backed away slowly, his eyes never leaving me, until he reached the door. His hand fumbled for the knob, his movements jerky and panicked.
“Greg, wait!” I cried, reaching out a hand.
He flinched as if I were about to strike him, his eyes widening even further. Then, he turned, wrenched the door open, and fled the room.
I heard his footsteps pound down the hallway, followed by the sound of the front door slamming shut, the noise echoing through the silent house his parents had so generously provided.
And just like that, I was alone. The dream of the perfect wedding night, the perfect marriage, shattered around me. The shimmering patterns on my skin seemed to mock me in the dim light of the bedroom. My beautiful wedding dress lay abandoned at my feet, a husk of white silk around the rejected reality it had briefly hidden. The only sounds left were my own quiet sobs in the empty room.