The donkey’s face was hard and gray against my palm. I stooped down, snatched a fistful of clovers, and held them out to her. Her lips flapped across my palm like wet wings.
“I’m getting married today,” I said aloud. The one large eye that pointed my way blinked, then stared blankly past my shoulder. I grabbed more clovers.
“I’m a little nervous,” I told her.
One of the bridesmaids had given me sleeping pills the night before. I awoke refreshed after several nights of jittery half-dreams. I rolled over to Libby, my little sister, and told her I was going for a run. She sighed.
The donkey shared a pasture with two horses. One of them was black and white, speckled like a Dalmatian, and the other, amber-colored horse was the largest I had ever seen. They trotted and preened behind the donkey, glossy haunches twitching in the crisp light.
We were at “The Farm,” a wedding venue located just outside Asheville. It was tucked in the Blue Ridge Mountains, meaning the entire place glowed with blue and yellow and green. Animals roved in pastures surrounding the gazebo where couples were married. Gardens cropped up in strange shapes between stables, and the buildings were old and wooden. Nothing felt rigid or new. I fell in love when I saw it.
The wedding party and some family members were staying in cabins on the property, and my soon-to-be mother-in-law, Peggy, was fixing a group breakfast in one of them. I had run down the street across from The Farm, passing little brick houses and large pens with llamas and cows, before pausing at the donkey’s pasture when I returned to the venue. 
Everyone else was already at breakfast. I stroked the donkey’s ear, stepped off the fence slat, and ran to Peggy’s cabin.
Robby was pacing the little lawn in front of the cabin and talking to the bridesmaids, who were sitting on the porch. He and I had agreed that it was a little dumb to attempt not seeing each other the morning of the wedding when our cabins were twenty feet apart.
“Hey, buddy,” I said.
“Hey.” We hugged, a little awkwardly. It felt strange to look and act so normal.
“How do you feel?” he asked.
I’d had a hard time eating for days. A pack of sentences had been gnawing little holes through my psyche: I don’t deserve any of this. What if this ends up being a waste of money? This is all too much. My vows are too long. What if I do something that embarrasses my parents? What if I don’t have fun? What if Robby doesn’t have fun? I do not deserve any of this.
In the (admittedly small) body of literature I’d read about weddings, the aspect of guilt was not discussed. I had skimmed pieces about the logistics of the event and which Bible verses were good for the ceremony and the responsibilities of bridesmaids and what to do if you spill red wine on your dress during the reception. None of these articles or blog posts quelled my deepest worry: This wedding was big, and the venue was stunning, and we booked a show-stopping band for the reception. The flowers, makeup, food, and booze all tumbled together into a price tag that I refused to look at. When I was CC’d on invoices, I didn’t open the emails.
At several points throughout the planning process, I asked my dad if he was truly comfortable paying 
for this wedding.
“I’ve been budgeting for this,” he said. “Hannah, it’s going to be the best day ever.”
My dad would say “best day ever” frequently in the months leading up to the wedding, as would my mom and sister, and the bridesmaids, and I would, too. When I said it, though, it was more of an incantation. I needed this to be the best day ever. I needed this wedding to be worth the work, time, cash, and emotional support that so many people were putting into it. I felt that I personally owed every single person a fun evening. I tried reminding myself that the wedding was about Robby and me—no one else—but I was hard to convince.
“Bridal guilt,” as I’ve decided to call it, has to be the epitome of First World Problems. It hit hard the Thursday before the wedding, during my bachelorette party. The seven bridesmaids and I had moved into the cabin that afternoon. Before I arrived, they spruced up the place with quintessential bachelorette décor: giant sequins shaped like diamond rings, balloons filled with glitter, red and 
white streamers (red is my favorite color), and the words “BRIDE TO BE” strung in shiny letters across the stone fireplace. There weren’t any penis-shaped decorations, which I thought was very classy of them.
Libby loaded everyone into an Expedition and drove 45 minutes to Black Balsam, one of my favorite hikes in the area. When we returned, everyone showered and got ready to go into downtown Asheville. It was then—now that we weren’t moving up a mountain, now that we were showering and putting on makeup to go on a nice excursion in downtown Asheville in preparation for a day that was all about me that these people had driven or flown in for and bought a dress for—that I grew quiet and started to panic. In 48 hours, I would be married. And all I could gather from this fact was that my wedding would be one of two things: too big of a deal to even guess what it would look like or know how to act or how to be in a relationship afterward since every single thing in my life was about to drastically change, or too small of a deal to warrant all this effort from the people I loved.
Either way, I figured, Robby was right: We should have gotten married on a beach in the Adirondacks with a keg and some family members and not told anyone.
“Okay, everybody!” Libby shouted. “I have waivers for the bike bar. Everyone needs to sign them before we call the Uber.” She pulled out a folder in which she had placed eight printed sheets. She distributed them to people while they were doing makeup or straightening their hair, then counted them up and placed them back in the folder. The bridesmaids were deeply amused by Libby. She was five years younger than everyone and couldn’t even legally drink, but she perfectly orchestrated the entire weekend. Even as a four-year-old, 
Libby had carried herself like she ran a Fortune 500 company.
I was taking a long time to put on my makeup. It was all a little overwhelming. I was glad that the bachelorette party was so close to the wedding for convenience’s sake, but it also meant that I was in less of a “party” mood and more of a “wow-my-life-is-coming-to-a-strange-sort-of-pinnacle” mood. Libby walked in.
“Hey, buddy,” she said. “Whatcha doin?”
“I’m freaking out a little,” I told her, swiping blush up and down my cheek.
“Why?”
I exhaled hard. “I just don’t think I deserve any of this.”
The other bridesmaids were giggling and playing music in the next room. The heels of their wedges clunked against the floor.
“If this were anyone else’s bachelorette party,” I said, “I’d probably be pouring a round of shots right now. But I’ve had a knot in my stomach for three days and I can’t calm down.”
Libby smiled and hugged me and probably said, “Aw, nugget.” She assured me that I absolutely deserved this, and that this was going to be a fun-yet-sort-of-calm night, seeing as we had the bridal luncheon and rehearsal dinner the next day. There was nothing to be afraid of. It was the only thing she could have said, but it was nice to hear.
It took about two drinks and four bridesmaid pep talks for me to calm down. When we arrived in Asheville, we found the bike bar we had booked and began to pedal. I was grateful 
to do something with my legs; pedaling took my mind off the weekend.
I was wearing a sash that said “Bride to Be” and a cheap veil that fastened into my hair with a little comb. As we pedaled up a hill, a gust of wind caught the veil and it floated down the street. For just a moment, it looked like a massive jellyfish glowing above the pavement. It landed fifty feet behind us. A man who was standing on the other side of the road bolted toward the veil as if it were a live baby left in the middle of traffic. I wanted to yell to him that it was fine, it was just a cheap veil, it would keep falling off my head anyway, but within seconds he had it in his hands. Then he powered up the hill and handed it to me.
“Thank you so much,” I said, trying not to laugh. His earnestness caught me off guard.
“Congratulations,” he said.
That night, after dinner in Asheville and some games back at the cabin, we went to bed. I curled up next to Libby and thanked her.
“You’re welcome, nugget,” she said, already drifting.
I stared at the ceiling and took deep breaths.
I didn’t feel anxious about marrying Robby, which was a pleasant surprise. My brain has a history of dredging up dark, pit-of-the-stomach fears whenever I’m feeling happy. I fully expected to have a bone-chilling realization that he was not the one, that this was a bad call and, while he was a good man, we were making a gigantic mistake. I waited for it to arrive so that I could tell it to shut up.
But, whether it was exhaustion or alcohol or residual joy from being with friends all day, the fear of marrying Robby never came. I sunk into another night of shaky sleep.
*
“How do you feel?” Robby asked.
The fatty smell of eggs and biscuits wafted from Peggy’s cabin. My hands smelled like donkey and we were getting married today.
Robby was nervous. His voice sounded steady as ever, but I could feel the tension that came off of him in zigzags. A rush of pride went through me. This man, who wanted to get married on a beach in the Adirondacks with a keg and some family members and not tell anyone, now stood in front of a cabin full of mimosas and crying toddlers and a porch crowded with bridesmaids in southern air thick with gnats and the knowledge that in about eight hours two hundred people were going to watch him read the vows he was still working on. He looked into my eyes and waited for me to answer.
“A little nervous,” I told him. “But I feel okay.”
IMAGE CREDITS
Horse: Blue Bend Photography
Cabin: The Farm Events
Flower Buckets: The Farm Events