My Broken Nose

By: Tim Law

Nobody wanted to admit that it was their idea, but somehow, after a few celebratory drinks, the Buck and the Hen both ended up at Fun Time Playhouse. We had a few laughs, showed off on the trampolines, and then Sammy bet Daph that the boys could beat us girls in a game of dodgeball. Now I suggested that a game like that, the night before our wedding was a dumb idea. I should have seen the red flags when my husband to be, Brad, got all up in my grill.

"You scared, babe," he smirked. "Big boy Brad is gunna mop the floor with you…"

"You wouldn't know what a mop is for!" I snapped back.

"It's something you find on your head, like hair…" Brad shot back, but I could see in his eyes he was less than certain.

Classic red flags everywhere there, but champagne muddles the mind, and I'd had a few.

"Thirty minutes, and then we're off to the next bar," said Daph. "Team with the most players still on the court after a half an hour of this stupidity we declare the winner."

"Do we call it a court if it's made up of tramps?" I asked.

"You're a tramp!" hollered Brad in my direction.

Surely another red flag.

Robbo organized one of the Fun Time Playhouse staff to ref our game, and then the clock started its countdown as the balls dropped from a net above us. I bounced toward the nearest ball and scooped it up. I felt the weight of it, and I knew exactly who I wanted to hit. Brad was jumping about like a four-year-old, wiggling his butt and pulling faces in my direction. That was when Steph threw her ball in his direction and almost clocked him in the side of the head. Best Man Robbo saved his mate with a sacrificial leap for the ages, the ball thumping into his chest before he barreled into the Groom. Brad dragged himself out from the mess and grabbed that ball, launching it as hard as he could in my direction. I thought I was smart as I intercepted the flaming asteroid with my own ball, hoping to stop it easily, sending it Steph's way for another go. Instead, the missile skimmed the top of my ball and smacked me straight in the face.

As blood streamed down my mascara, mixing with salty tears from my panda eyes, I saw the bachelor and bachelorette party gathered around me, looks of shock plastered across their faces. The one person I didn't see was my husband to be, Brad.

He visited me in hospital the following day, not so we could get married like we'd planned, but to tell me it was over. He just couldn't see himself living a life with a girl who had a nose bigger than his was. And that, thankfully, was the final red flag which helped me realize Brad and I were never meant to be.

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