I Got Married Six Months Ago, but Ever Since Then There’s Been Something I Can’t Shake: The Unforget…

I married six months ago, and since then, something peculiar has lingered, slowly weaving itself into the fabric of my days and nights.

The wedding was held in a sprawling garden. The music blared out odd, rolling tunes, lanterns swung like dancing ghosts, and people glided across the grass, moving as if underwater. At some point I slipped away from the glowing throng, needing air that wasnt thick with laughter and music. Through the misty twilight, I saw my best friend, Anthony, and my wife, Harriet, standing together by an old wall near the gardens lavatories a curious spot, shadowed by rose bushes that grew bigger than houses.

They didnt look like people sharing pleasantries. Harriet’s hands were restless, plucking at invisible threads, her hair catching the light strangely. Anthonys jaw clenched so tightly he resembled a statue dug up from beneath Trafalgar Square. The racket of music blurred their words, but the tension was more solid than the marble lions in the city.

I drifted closer, unmoored and unseen for a while. It wasnt until I was swallowed up by their orbit that I overheard Anthony, his voice sounding sharp, almost made of glass:

This subject is finished. Not another word.

The words hung in the air like fog over the Thames his voice dry, cutting, final.

At that instant, their eyes snapped to me. I asked what was happening, what subject they were on about.

They both froze as if I had flicked a light on and found them somewhere they werent supposed to be. Harriet recovered first, dismissing everything as nonsense, a misunderstanding. Anthony swung in clumsily, muttering about an argument over a game, a wager something silly, nothing of any consequence. Their explanations tumbled over each other, quick and slippery, never settling anywhere solid.

They changed the topic immediately and drifted back into the lantern-lit crowd, pretending the shadows hadnt crept in at all.

The rest of the night, I tried to hold the celebration together with jokes, dancing on the lawn, and silly toasts, like stringing fairy lights through broken windows. But whenever Harriet and Anthony were near, their words were few and their eyes always slipped away from each other as if they were trying to catch sight of themselves in a funhouse mirror and failing.

Not another word was spoken about it that night.

Life went on after the wedding. I moved in with Harriet, learning the shapes of her routines. Anthony and his girlfriend, Lucy, came round for roast dinners and pub quizzes; we exchanged gifts on birthdays, laughter over burnt Yorkshire puddings, making normal plans as everyone pretends to do. No odd messages, no secretive phone calls, nothing tangible at all.

Only that moment.

It wont fade. The exact phrase. The blade in Anthonys tone. The abrupt way they snapped their words shut, the hurried return to the party, as if Id interrupted something that ought to be left sleeping.

I dont have a scrap of proof. No texts, no outbursts, no confession in the rain. There is only that strange quarrel on my wedding day, and the deep, persistent feeling that I intruded on a secret best left behind walls of rose and brick.

Six months have wandered past, and still it circles inside my head. I havent confronted anyone.

And now, I wake each morning wondering:

What does one do with such a shadow of doubt, when theres nothing you can hold but the sensation something strange happened that day?