I hold my breath as Michelle stares at William. He’s just asked her to admit if she has ever really loved Jason, and I swear the air has gone out of the room as I wait for her to answer.

Michelle removes her hand from mine, which I was holding across the table. She tilts her chin defiantly and looks at William.

“Who are you, the British Dr. Phil?” she snaps.

Okay, despite everything, the idea of William being Dr. Phil makes me want to laugh out loud.

“No,” William says, as if he gets asked that every day, “I am not. However, I do ask questions I think are important. And if you really loved Jason the way a woman should love the man she is about to marry, you wouldn’t be asking me if I were Dr. Phil. You’d just answer ‘Yes.’”

Michelle swallows hard, but says nothing.

“Michelle,” William says softly. “I’m not judging you. I want to help you. But you have to be honest. Not for me, not for Mary-Kate, but for yourself.”

“I’m not like MK!” Michelle suddenly snaps.

I feel as though I have been slapped. “What?” I ask. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

William reaches for my hand to comfort me. “Let her talk, Mary-Kate.”

“You’ve always been the smart one,” Michelle cries, the tears falling freely down her face. “MK was the one who was going to be a success. She always excelled in school, knew what she was going to do and exactly how she was going to do it since she was a little girl. You always had big plans, MK. Everyone knew you were going to be somebody!”

“But you didn’t want that!” I cry in confusion. “You always wanted to be married!”

“Like I had other options? I’m not you, MK! Why do you think mom always talked about the importance of finding a husband? Because she knew I would never be successful like you!”

I am reeling by her confession. I feel like the world has suddenly tipped upside down, and the blood is rushing to my head.

“I’m not good at things like you are,” Michelle says, angrily jerking her hand across her face to wipe the tears away. “You’re good at everything you do!”

“That’s not true! I have worked really hard to get where I am at!”

“But you knew what you wanted to do!” Michelle wails. “I never knew what to do. I’m just average at everything! The only thing I was good at was getting boys!”

I’m shell shocked as to what is coming out of Michelle’s mouth. She only wanted to be married because she didn’t think she was good enough to do anything else? How did I not know her self-esteem was so low? Guilt floods through me as I realize this.

“But Michelle, you do love Jason, right?”

“It’s not like what you have with William because that’s a fairytale,” Michelle says, as if we are the only people capable of having a love like this. “But of course I did,” Michelle says.

 Did, I think. She used the past tense.

“But the wedding,” William interjects slowly, “was your way of being successful. The big, elaborate wedding was what you could do to achieve more than Mary-Kate. And that is why you became obsessed with it. And that is why you were demeaning to Mary-Kate while you were planning it, and that is why you were livid when she began seeing me. All of this was about you being more accomplished in one area than your little sister.”

Oh.my.God. I turn to William as I realize, as usual, he has gotten inside Michelle’s head and figured out how she ticked.

Michelle begins sobbing at William’s accusations. She puts her head in her hands and I watch as her body shakes as she cries.

Tears fill my eyes as I watch her. My God, how did this all happen and I didn’t even see it?

“Michelle, I’m so sorry you felt this way,” I say softly, somehow getting the words out.

Michelle lifts her head up. “William is right.”

I swallow hard over the lump in my throat.

“This wedding was going to be more spectacular than anything you could ever do,” Michelle admits, reaching for a tissue and blowing her nose.  She wads it up when she is finished and looks at me. “I’m sorry I was so mean to you.” Her lower lip quivers, and she pauses before continuing. “Really, really sorry, MK,” she finishes, her voice wobbly.

 ”It’s okay,” I say honestly. “I chalked it up to getting wrapped up in a wedding.”

Michelle turns to William. “I promise I’m not a horrible person!” she blurts out.

“I don’t think you are,” William says softly.

Michelle looks relieved that we aren’t upset with her. Then tears fill her eyes again.

“The wedding,” Michelle says wistfully. “For once, I was going to be better at something. And now I don’t have that. I don’t have Jason. I have a job I hate,  I’m 26, and my life is just shit!”

Then, ever the dramatic, she puts her head down on the kitchen table and wails.

I look at William, who looks back at me, and then we both look at Michelle, who is sobbing into the tabletop.

Finally Michelle lifts her head and looks at William. “And I don’t care what you say, you really are the British Dr. Phil.”

“Then you need to ‘Get Real,’” William quips, using Dr. Phil’s infamous phrase.

I turn to William, shocked. “Since when do you know Dr. Phil sayings?”

“Since I have to compete against his show in many markets for daytime ratings, I know my competition,” William says easily.

Despite the drama, I find myself smiling. Oh, William, you are such a badass mogul, and I do love you. And I really want to see the expression on your face while watching a Dr. Phil show with all that American drama because that would be hilarious.

“But you do need to get real, Michelle,” William says, his voice firm and snapping me from my thoughts. “You have talents and abilities. You simply need to reach down and figure out what they are.”

“I’m not MK! How many times do I have to say it?”

“No, you’re not. But you need to quit using that as your excuse because you’re afraid.”

Now I see anger in Michelle’s brown-gold eyes.

“I’m not afraid!” she snaps.

“You are,” William insists.  “You’re afraid to even try because you don’t think you’ll succeed.”

“You don’t know me!” Michelle yells, anger taking over.

“I know fear when I see it,” William says firmly. “And right now I see a very confused, very afraid young woman who thinks she has no options. I see a woman who lost herself in the process of making a wedding her life’s accomplishment.”

He’s right, I think as I digest William’s words. And as I look across the table to Michelle, I see her expression is thoughtful. Deep down, she knows he’s right, too.

“So the question is, Michelle, where do you go from here?” William asks.

So what will Michelle do? To be continued…

And should she have her own book to explore that journey in? Leave your thoughts here as I’m considering writing Michelle’s own story. …