August 1

A wedding, a missing phone and a silent humiliation.

I didn’t do it

A Facebook People You May Know suggestion brought a familiar face to me and with it came a memory I had long forgotten and thought I had healed from. Just thought to share.

It was my sister’s wedding. She had no female friends close enough to stand with her, so she asked me to bring mine. I didn’t really have friends either so I reached out to a few girls from the choir. That’s how Catherine ended up in the bridal train.

The day was the usual wedding choreography: introduction, church service, photos, laughter, food in the background. At some point, while the couple disappeared to change into their reception outfits, Catherine asked me to accompany her to the restroom. I went. Inside, she handed me her purse while she went in. Harmless. A little favor between girls.

She came out, I returned her purse along with mine, and I went in to do my own thing. When I came back out, the atmosphere had flipped upside down. Catherine was on the floor, wailing profusely, crying like the world had ended. She said her phone was missing and not just any phone. It was her late father’s phone, the one thing she claimed she inherited from him. Then she added that some money was gone too but that didn’t matter to her. The phone was everything.

And then she pointed at me.

She said she had the phone when she gave me the purse. She accused me in front of everyone. Imagine being in your sister’s wedding dress-up break and suddenly you’re the thief in the room. I was searched like a criminal. Nothing was found of course. But the damage was done.

My sister, the bride, heard the noise. She didn’t want anything ruining her big day. So she promised Catherine a better phone after the wedding to calm things down. The party rolled on. No one asked me what happened nor defended me. No one said, “This girl didn’t do it.” It was treated like a silent truth like I must have been guilty because Catherine wailed hard enough. We never spoke of it till date.

There are different kinds of humiliation. There’s the loud one, the accusation, the crowd, the crying. And then there’s the quiet one, being erased for the sake of someone else’s happiness. The wedding carried on, laughter returned, pictures were snapped and I was left to walk around with a silence that bruised more than the words.

I’m not writing this out of anger. I’m not looking for revenge. What I want is simple: to put the memory down where it belongs. I held a purse. I did not steal a phone. But for years, I’ve carried the shadow of that day, replaying it in odd hours. Today, I’m setting it down in words so it no longer sits like a stone in my chest.

If anyone remembers that night differently, let them speak. If not, let this be the end of it.