The Accidental Matchmaker

Sarah Chen stared at the ruins of her carefully planned engagement party, watching the last of the guests shuffle out of the botanical garden with apologetic smiles and half-eaten cake plates. The string quartet had packed up an hour ago, right after the groom-to-be had announced to everyone assembled that he couldn't go through with the wedding because he'd "found his true calling as a documentary filmmaker in Nepal" and would be leaving on a plane that very evening.

"At least the flowers are pretty," her best friend Maya offered weakly, gesturing toward the elaborate orchid arrangements that had cost Sarah three months of overtime pay from her job at the marketing firm.

Sarah let out a laugh that sounded more like a sob. "I can't believe this is my life right now. Six months of planning, two hundred guests, and he decides NOW that he needs to find himself in the Himalayas?"

Maya wrapped an arm around Sarah's shoulders as they surveyed the aftermath. Tulle and fairy lights still hung from the pergola, creating a mockingly romantic scene for Sarah's public humiliation. Her phone buzzed insistently in her purse – no doubt more texts from relatives asking if she was okay, or worse, if there was anything they could do to help.

"You know what the really pathetic part is?" Sarah continued, bending down to pick up a scattered rose petal. "I'm not even that heartbroken about losing David. I'm more upset about losing the deposit on the venue and having to explain this to my grandmother for the hundredth time."