6. Avery

Get up, Avery.

Every now and then, I would wake up in bed and be unable to move.

I had never told anyone about the struggles of not being able to physically pull myself out of bed, but lately, it had been happening a lot more than I felt comfortable with. On those mornings, I felt breathless. It was as if the weight of the world sat heavily on my chest, and I couldn’t remove it, no matter how hard I tried.

That morning was one of those mornings.

Wesley had already left for his morning workout. He always woke before me, before the sun, too, and he’d be gone by the time my eyes opened.

I lay in bed as the weight of my own breath felt like a boulder on my chest. The sunlight crept through the curtains, a slimmer of light in the darkness of my room, mocking the darkness that currently clung to me like a second skin. I hated these moments. The moments when I slipped into a type of sadness I couldn’t make sense of.

I’m not depressed.

I’m not depressed.

I’m fine.

I’m fine.

Those words kept playing repeatedly through my mind. They were trying to push out the other thoughts that seemed to grow louder and louder with every passing second.

Stay down.

What’s the point of getting up?

I hated days like today. Days when the battle inside me raged fiercer than I’d had the strength to fight. Depression was an uninvited guest to my soul, and it had thrown a shroud over my will, leaving me paralyzed in the sanctuary of my bed.

The digital clock on my nightstand kept changing, a relentless reminder of the world moving forward without me. I wanted to get up and shake off the despondency sticking to me, but my body refused to obey my wants.

I was tired.

So desperately exhausted.

It was as if my limbs were tethered to the mattress, each attempt to move quashed by an invisible force.

“Get up, get up, get up, Avery,” I whispered to the hollowness, a feeble attempt to summon any shred of willpower. My voice sounded foreign to my own ears, as though it belonged to another person. I felt as if my own soul had abandoned my body, and I was left with nothing more than emptiness.

I had many reasons to be happy.

Sure, a few things had gone wrong lately, but there was more good than bad. I was getting married in three weeks. In three short weeks, I’d be saying “I do” to someone who loved me. Someone who chose me even though I never felt good enough.

I wasn’t good enough.

“No,” I murmured, knowing those thoughts were not my own. It was the depression seeping in, feeding me with its devilish lies—lies I was trying my hardest to fight.

As I lay there, my phone suddenly rang, breaking me out of the small trance I found myself in. Yara’s name flashed across the screen. I stared at it but didn’t answer.

She called back again.

And again.

It was clear she needed me when the fourth call came in. That was enough to slice through the room”s silence—people needed me. Her persistent calls were a telltale sign of that fact. I didn’t have time to freeze because people outside counted on me to defrost myself to help them with their own issues.

I reached for the phone with shaky hands.

“Hello?” I asked as my voice croaked.

“Avery,” Yara cried with a frantic tone, a tone that mirrored the turmoil within my own soul, yet it was external, real, and urgent. Not like my issues. My issues were not as important.

Her tearful tone made me prop myself up to a sitting position.

“Yara. What is it? Are you okay? Is the baby all right? What do you need?” I said, pushing down my own issues to focus on hers. That was the quickest way to knock me out of my darkness. I’d focus on other people’s issues and put mine on the back burner.

“The baby’s fine. It’s just…can you come over? I need you.”

I need you—three words that got me out of bed. I didn’t have time to be sad. I was needed by others. At that moment, the fog of depression that clouded my thoughts began to lift slightly. Not enough to dispel it, but enough to give me a sliver of energy to go to my sister’s to make sure she was all right. That was my job as an older sister, after all. To be altogether for others so they felt safe enough to fall apart.

With a resolve that seemed to come from outside myself, I swung my legs off the bed. My body protested, but I forced myself to stand. The room swayed around me, a sign of the effort it took for me to simply exist at that moment.

I steadied myself.

I had to.

For her.

I’d always steady myself for my sisters.

“I’m on my way. Be there soon,” I told her before hanging up the phone.

After I hung up, I stood still for a moment. I shut my eyes and took in a few deep inhales. Each one was a reminder that I was still here, I was still breathing, and I could still go on.

Then I shook off the shadows hanging on tightly and headed over to Yara’s to make sure she was all right.

“I’m so sorry,”Yara cried, covering her mouth with her hand. She was in a state of full panic as she stood before me wearing her bridesmaid dress, which was clearly too small. The black silk gown set tightly around her stomach as she had a full-blown meltdown. “I tried everything, and I mean everything, to get it on,” she swore. “I even laid down on my stomach to try to have Alex zip it that way, but it wouldn’t get past my hips.” She sobbed.

I sat in front of her on her couch with a slight snicker slipping through me.

“Avery! It’s not funny!” she ordered. “Your wedding is in three weeks, and my dress doesn’t fit! How can I be your matron of honor if my gown doesn’t fit?”

My wedding was in three weeks.

That sent a panic through my system that I wasn’t prepared for.

“It doesn’t matter,” I swore. “You could wear a trash bag, and it would look good, Yara. Who cares?”

“A trash bag is all I’ll be able to fit in soon enough,” she said, still crying, still convinced she would ruin my big day. Truthfully, though, I didn’t care. If I had it my way, my bridesmaids could’ve worn any dress that they felt comfortable in. Wesley had a very different idea of what our wedding would be, though. I never really saw myself as a woman who’d have a wedding, let alone be married, but I knew it was important to Wesley. Therefore, I let him take the lead.

He wanted a formal black-tie event, with the ceremony in our small town, then the reception at a fancy mansion on the outskirts of Chicago, which cost more than I was willing to admit.

Daddy covered many of the wedding costs even though I told him not to. It was just last year when he paid so much for Yara and Alex’s nuptials, yet he said it was not a big deal at all. “I’d been saving up for these days,” he told me. I asked what he would have done with the money if we didn’t get married. He replied, “Given you a big check to use of your free will.”

That was a tempting option to me instead of having a whole wedding. I did not like the spotlight on me, and the idea of wearing a wedding gown all day instead of jeans and a T-shirt was enough to make me groan from discomfort. A nice courtroom wedding would’ve been fine with me. I didn’t need the glints and glimmer. Unfortunately, my fiancé did.

“How about this?” I took Yara’s shaky hands into mine and led her to the couch. As she sat, I heard the seams of the dress rip more, which brought on more tears. I tried my best not to laugh, but it was slightly funny. “We will go into Chicago a few days before the wedding and pick out a black dress that fits you perfectly. We’ll try all department stores until you feel at your utmost comfortable.”

“I won’t match Willow’s dress,” she warned.

“Willow will come with us, and she’ll get the same dress as you. It’s not a big deal. And even if your dresses don’t match, they are both black, which is wonderfully close enough to me.” I wiped at her tears. “This is not a reason to fall apart, okay?”

She sniffled and nodded. “Okay.” She wiped her tears away and shook her head. “I just feel so bad. I want this day to be perfect for you. I don’t want to be the reason things look bad in pictures.”

“You could never look bad in pictures, Yara. Get those thoughts out of your head. And all I care about is saying ‘I do.’ Nothing else really matters. I’m just ready to have a husband.”

I think.

Maybe.

How did people know when they were ready for marriage?

“They are pretty nice when you get the right ones,” she agreed.

“Speaking of good husbands, where is Alex?”

“Oh, he didn’t know how to manage my breakdown, so he went to buy me donuts.”

“Smart man.”

“The smartest man.” She shook her head and gently chuckled. “Gosh, I’m so sorry for being a hot mess. My emotions are all over the place lately. The past few weeks have been so wild. Pregnancy is intense.”

“But beautiful,” I told her. I couldn’t wait to hold my niece or nephew one day. Alex and Yara weren’t finding out the baby”s gender until birth. My anxiety could never wait that long but to each their own. What mattered most was their having a healthy baby to bring home.

A part of me felt selfish for the thoughts that raced through my head when I learned my sister was pregnant. There was a touch of jealousy, of longing, that I felt from the news. Don’t get me wrong, I was truly happy for Alex and Yara. They would both be amazing parents. I just thought that by age thirty-six, I would already have the things my younger sister was experiencing.

Of course, I never spoke about my fear of falling behind. I didn’t want to make anyone else feel bad or have pity for me. Still, my heart longed for children someday. At least Wesley and I were on the same page about that. We planned to start our family shortly after our wedding. Only three weeks until the rest of my life took off, like my sister’s.

“Enough about me and my tears,” Yara said, wiping away the final emotions falling from her eyes. “How are you?”

For a moment, my mind traveled back to my morning struggles. My heart beat faster as I thought about the panic I’d felt as I lay in the darkness, not wanting to get up at all. Almost unable to move from the shadows of the hovering depression that floated over every inch of my being.

I couldn’t tell Yara that.

It would’ve broken her heart, and her sweet heart was already fragile.

Besides, I’d be fine.

I’d always be fine.

Being fine was my default setting.

The sprouts of depression were only something that came every now and again. It wasn’t anything worth making others feel bad about.

Instead of telling her the truth, I pushed out a smile and said, “I’m good.”