So, there I am, encased in alabaster and ivory, a pearlescent mist shrouding my vision, a radiant aura both fore and aft. I pause at the door, peering through the unyielding mist, a mist that softens and blurs defects, casting all about in the most positive of lights. My breath comes but shallowly, neither from anticipation nor fear, but from the iron cage of snowy silk that surrounds me, molding my very flesh to match their view of perfection.

Faded oak with a faint glow. Though the mist may soften, the portal before me is still solidly built. One final obstacle that I must yet surmount. There are voices within. Soft - so that I cannot discern words, yet I know that my friends and family wait beyond this portal, waiting to congratulate, waiting to celebrate my triumph over this final barrier.

My hand reaches out - a twist; a push; a glide down the aisle; a speech to listen to; a voice to say "I do..."

... through the unblemished weave of lace and silk, I feel the solidness of the wood and an icy chill radiating from wrought iron handle.

Then it hit me, as it does many others in many other situations. A flash of insight. Realization. A sudden burst of understanding. It was as if I had seen the whole of my youth played out before me, between my eyes and the obscuring mist.

I turned away from that portal into a new life; walked back down the sidewalk; got in my car; and retuned home. The 'happiest day of my life' would have to wait.

All those years... After all those years, I finally figured it out. I finally understood what was going on. It hadn't been Ben that I had liked then - at least, not the way that I had thought. It was his sister. And I never loved the man I was about to marry that day, either. I was merely following the path that my upbringing and the strictures of society had laid out for me - walking along with my subconscious desire to 'fit in' and 'be normal.'

I keep them still, the corset and the veil, though the rest of the gown is with me no more. I keep them to remind me. To remind me of how I willingly bound and blinded myself. To remind me of what society wanted me to be and what I have since rejected. To remind me of what I had learned about myself that day. And to remind me of who I am and who I am not.

(I later learned that he never showed, either.)