Fiancé Discussed Academics With Childhood Friend at Wedding, I'm Done

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My best friend and my boyfriend were both Asperger's cases, high-IQ geniuses.

And I was the genius's tagalong.

At seven, they debated high school textbooks while I packed their backpacks.

At seventeen, they got early admission to the country's top university and casually picked me a second-rate school next door.

At twenty-five, they finished their doctorates and became the twin stars of the elite research institute, and I was the receptionist.

We shared an apartment, where I handled the meals and the cleaning and never once managed to break into their conversations.

Even my own wedding turned into a place for them to discuss an experiment.

"Ray Dickerson, the ceremony's starting."

I tugged Ray toward the stage, frantic.

"What?"

"The wedding..."

"I wasn't asking you."

Ray didn't look at me. He was watching my best friend.

"What was that parameter you just mentioned?"

Peggy Baxter soothed me in a low voice.

"Don't be difficult. We're in the middle of talking about the experiment. Just hold things together for now."

"It's only a wedding. Worst case, we throw another one some other day."

The two of them fell back into data I couldn't follow.

When they hit the exciting part, they left me and a hall full of guests behind.

Both of them rose in a hurry and rushed off toward the lab.

On their way out, they even knocked over the champagne tower.

Leaving me standing there, a mess.

But this time, I didn't clean up the wreckage the way I always had.

Throw another one? I didn't need it.

The genius's bride, I wasn't going to be that anymore.

...

At two in the morning, the lock at the entryway rattled.

The two of them pushed the door open, talking at no small volume.

Waking me up the moment I'd fallen asleep, without a second thought.

"Ray, see? I told you the parameter had to be tuned my way. It worked right away, didn't it!"

Ray, unwilling to concede, pinched Peggy's cheek.

"You just got lucky!"

When he saw me come out of the bedroom.

Ray dropped his clothes on the floor and said, offhand,

"Sally Henson, wash these for us."

"And make us a bowl of ramen. Peg's hungry too."

He didn't seem to care in the slightest how today's wedding had ended.

"I'm tired."

The words came out of me abruptly. The first time I ever refused.

Ray froze.

Peggy rammed her shoulder hard into him and made a face.

"Idiot! Your EQ is so low! Can't you tell Sally's upset?"

"You ignored her all day for the experiment, and now she's angry!"

Then she pinched him hard on the chest and laughed.

"There, there! I punished him for you, so stop being mad, girl!"

Ray hissed and pressed his fingers wearily to his brow.

"Sally, we're exhausted from the experiments. Can't you give us a little peace?"

"It's only a wedding. How could it matter more than our research progress? Nobody cares about that thing except the bride."

"Worst case, we throw an even better one to make up for it."

But I'd lost count of how many times this had happened.

Two years ago, on our graduation trip, the three of us.

I waited seven hours for them at an airport in a foreign country.

In the end Ray told me they'd lost track of time doing an experiment.

A year ago, at the engagement dinner.

Peggy said an instrument was acting up and called Ray away, leaving me to handle the aftermath alone.

From half a year ago until now, I'd set four dates with Ray to register our marriage, and been stood up every time.

Every time, Ray said he couldn't get away from the lab.

In their world of research, everything about me was always beside the point.

"What do you mean, it's only a wedding?"

Not even my challenge reached anyone.

Because the two of them had already started talking over a stack of materials again.

Everyone envied me for having a fiancé and a best friend who'd both made something of themselves.

But me, I really didn't want to be this invisible person with no presence anymore.

Quietly, I opened my phone, sent out my résumé again, and bought a ticket to Northport.