"Just wait until tonight."
"We are ready now, Miss."
They both tun around to find one of the assistants gesturing at them to hurry up. Vera smiles, pats Hollie on the side and pulls her in toward the door.
"Let's go."
The ceremony itself passes in a blur.
A good blur, this time. But still a blur. The beautiful blue sky above. Clouds moving across it soft and smooth. Small paper lights lit all around the outdoor venue, moving softly with the wind. Hollie and Vera and Elena, moving into the venue all at the same time from three different directions, as the crowd watches intently. They are all dressed in traditional Doscorian clothes, in deep and rich colours, thick fabrics that wrap around the waist and reach up to their shoulders. A large, glimmering body of water is right in front of them, and Hollie feels absolutely enchanted through it all.
They go through one ceremony after the next. Drinking strong alcohol from the same cup. Performing the traditional movements, a dance consisting of their hands moving softly to the sides in a steady rhythm, meant to honour the movement of the winds, the clouds, the sky, the sun and the stars and the moon. Everything that moves, time, life, nature and they themselves. And it is all done in complete silence, as an audience of at least a hundred familiar faces watch on.
Business partners, what little family they have, cousins that wanted to attend, friends that have been with them through thick and thin, employees that have stayed truthful since the beginning, their secretaries and all else who wanted and could attend. All of them watching in peace, knowing that a new era has begun. And Hollie watching only Vera and Elena, knowing that her new beginning has also just begun.
Hollie is too busy staring at her new wives to think of anything else. They look so beautiful under the light winter sunlight. All guests around her fall into the same blur. It is tradition to greet and thank all guests after the wedding, allowing them to leave, accepting their gifts and well-wishes. But Hollie barely registers her secretaries and her best friends, the rest are complete nobodies to her newly-married brain.
"Hilarie."
That is, until an all-too familiar voice snaps her out of her smiles, handshakes and thank-yous.
"Julianne!!"
Hollie rushes to hug her sister, her eyes wide and already filled with tears. Elena and Vera, standing next to her by the exit watch confused, as Hollie nearly cries into the arms of a, for them, completely unfamiliar woman. "It's been so long!" Hollie looks up at her older sister. It's been several years since she last saw her, and she has gotten older. Her hair is cut shorter, into a bob-style commonly worn by Esidian mothers, and she has a tired look in her eyes.
But despite that, she smiles wider, in an easier way than before. In a way she never did until now. Even when there is guilt in her chest and in her voice, she can't stop smiling. A mixture of pride and freedom. "I know, I'm sorry. I should've come sooner but my husband wouldn't allow it." She looks to the side to see if anyone is listening, and then turns back around with a whispered tone. "I know this isn't the right place to say such things but... I divorced him. I'm moving back home."
Hollie feels like her heart can beat again. She feels alive again, the kid kind of alive. It's a few years too late, but she still feels as happy as she would've back then. Her sister is moving back home. Away from that foreign country, away from her stranger husband and back home. Away from the plan their father set for her life, and into a life Hollie always wanted her to have. She can't help but turn that happiness into laughter. "Is it because I'm chairwoman now?"
Her sister rolls her eyes, a smile still on her face.
"Of course, little sister. I know you'll support me."