Chapter 40: The Wedding Wars
The move from penthouse fantasy to logistical reality was a jet-lagged blur. Two weeks had vanished into a whirlwind of cross-country flights, apartment listings on Mark’s laptop glowing in the dark of hotel rooms, and hushed, excited conversations that always ended tangled in sheets. But a week before Alexis’s spring break was over, Mark had a meeting he couldn’t skip. “Come with me,” he’d said, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear in their temporary Austin Airbnb. “See the machine. It’s part of the picture.”
Now, standing in the pulsating heart of RDCWORLD HQ, Alexis understood the scale of the machine. The lobby was less an entrance and more a sensory bombardment. Holographic titans from Attack on Titan loomed twenty feet tall, dissolving into serene scenes from Demon Slayer before morphing into hyper-stylized avatars of Mark and the other members. The air smelled like ozone, fresh popcorn, and the sweet, plastic scent of new merchandise. The low thrum of servers was a constant bass note beneath the sharper sounds of gaming keyboards and youthful laughter echoing from open doors.
A perky assistant named Chloe, who couldn’t be older than twenty, met them. “Mark! Hi! We’re all set up in the Brand Synergy Suite.” Her eyes flicked to Alexis, bright and assessing. “So great to finally meet you in person! Loved the interview. The analytics were chef’s kiss.”
“Thanks,” Alexis said, her voice feeling small against the glare.
The Brand Synergy Suite was a minimalist white box with one entire wall a seamless digital screen. Seated around a large, low table were three people: Ben, the lean and balding business manager; Lise, a sharp-eyed woman in architect’s glasses who handled “experiential marketing”; and a jovial, round-faced man named Dave, who apparently specialized in “partnership ideation.”
“Alexis! Welcome to the family!” Ben rose, shaking her hand with a firm, dry grip. Mark’s posture had shifted the moment they entered; his shoulders were straighter, his smile a fraction wider, the easy, private man from the Airbnb tucked away behind a pleasant, professional mask.
They made small talk about her flight, about Howard. Lise complimented her sweater. It was all perfectly nice. Then Dave clapped his hands together. “Alright, lovebirds. Let’s get to the fun stuff. We know you two are thinking long-term, which is fantastic. A stable narrative is a strong narrative. And we want to help you celebrate the next big, public step in that narrative.”
He touched a tablet. The wall screen bloomed to life.
It wasn’t just a mood board. It was a full-scale production timeline. The header read: PROJECT EVER-AFTER: ENGAGEMENT & WEDDING INTEGRATION.
Alexis felt the air leave her lungs.
The first image was a mock-up of an Instagram post. A ring—a stunning, vintage-looking art deco piece—rested on a velvet cushion. The caption mock-up read: “She said yes… to forever. #MoorePhillips #EverAfter Partner: @LuxuryGemCo”
“We’ve had four major jewelers reach out since the interview,” Lise said, leaning forward. “LuxuryGem is the most flexible. They’d offer a complete custom design in exchange for exclusive content across the proposal, the reveal, and the wedding day. We’re thinking a series of tightly edited shorts, leading up to a dedicated vlog.”
Images flipped: a storyboard of Mark nervously pacing in a picturesque vineyard at sunset. A shot of Alexis’s surprised hand covering her mouth, the ring catching the golden hour light. A follow-up photo of them laughing, her hand displayed perfectly on his chest.
“The vineyard is in Napa,” Ben added. “They’re a potential venue partner. Fully comped for a weekend shoot, in exchange for tags and a feature in the wedding vlog.”
“The vlog,” Dave jumped in, his voice vibrating with enthusiasm. “That’s the centerpiece. A multi-part series. The planning, the fittings, the bachelor and bachelorette parties—which, by the way, Spark! energy drinks is desperate to sponsor—culminating in the main event. We’ve got preliminary offers from three venues.”
The screen changed again. A breathtaking cliffside estate in Big Sur. A historic downtown loft space transformed into an anime-themed wonderland, with massive floral installations mimicking scenes from My Hero Academia. A full-blown destination resort in Tulum, complete with mock-ups of custom neon signs reading “Moore-Phillips” in a slick, modern font.
“Each venue comes with a suite of vendor partnerships,” Lise explained, as if discussing a software rollout. “Catering, florals, photography. We can bundle it. The audience engagement would be unprecedented. We’re projecting a potential seventy-two hour trend across platforms with the right rollout.”
Alexis sat perfectly still. She could feel the heat of Mark beside her, but he hadn’t moved, hadn’t spoken. She chanced a glance at him. He was staring at the screen, his jaw set, a faint tic in the muscle. His relaxed posture was gone, replaced by a rigid stillness.
“Alexis?” Ben prompted, his tone kindly. “We’d love your initial thoughts. We know it’s a lot. The aesthetic is just a starting point. We can tailor.”
She found her voice, but it came out flat, foreign. “This is… for a wedding?”
“For the wedding,” Dave corrected, smiling. “The community is invested. This isn’t just a ceremony. It’s a milestone event for the brand. For the both of you as a brand.”
The word hung in the ozone-scented air. Brand.
Her mind flashed to the quiet, desperate intimacy of the penthouse. To the blueprint of a shared home, of a yard, of a stupid-colored wall they’d negotiate. To her mother’s backyard in St. Louis, where she’d always vaguely pictured strings of fairy lights in the old oak tree, and her uncle manning the grill, and her law school friends laughing without a camera in their face.
“I…” She cleared her throat. “I think I had something smaller in mind.”
A beat of silence. Lise’s smile didn’t falter, but it solidified. “Of course. Intimate is a totally valid vibe. We can scale. The vineyard, for instance, has a private grove perfect for a micro-wedding. The content would be more… curated. Exclusive.”
“It’s not about scaling,” Alexis said, the words coming faster, sharper. “It’s about it not being content. At all.”
The temperature in the room seemed to drop five degrees. Ben steepled his fingers. “Alexis, we understand the desire for privacy. Truly. But Mark’s life, and by extension now, your shared life, exists in a public ecosystem. This event is of massive public interest. Managing that interest, and frankly, monetizing it responsibly, allows you to control the narrative and build equity for your future.”
“Control the narrative?” She heard the edge in her own voice, saw Mark finally turn his head to look at her, his eyes warning, pleading. She ignored it. “This isn’t a narrative. This is my marriage. You have storyboards for my proposal. You have sponsors for my bachelorette party. Where do we live in this? Where’s the part where we just get to be people who love each other?”
Dave chuckled, a warm, condescending sound. “That’s the magic! You get to be that, and we get to share the beautiful journey with the world. It’s synergy. The revenue from this alone could fund a down payment on a phenomenal house. That’s the trade.”
“I don’t want to trade my wedding for a down payment,” she said, standing up. Her knees felt weak. The holographic light from the lobby bled under the door, a sickly, shifting glow. “I want to get married in a backyard. With my family. With no hashtag. No series. No branded energy drinks.”
Lise’s professional demeanor cracked, just for a second. “A backyard,” she repeated, not hiding the disbelief. “After the platform you two built? That’s a… a monumental waste of commercial potential. And frankly, a slap in the face to the community that supports you.”
That was it. The unvarnished truth.
Alexis looked at Mark. He was still in his chair, caught in the crossfire. His team, the machine that built him, on one side. Her, with her impossible, quiet, un-monetizable dreams, on the other. The silence stretched, filled only by the hum of the screen showing the Tulum resort mock-up.
“Mark?” Ben said, his tone shifting from collaborative to executive. “You wanna chime in here? Help Alexis understand the bigger picture?”
Mark’s jaw ticked again. He looked from Ben’s expectant face to Alexis’s standing, defiant form. He saw the flicker of betrayal in her eyes, the fear that he would choose the machine. He slowly stood up.
He didn’t look at his team. He looked only at Alexis, his public mask completely gone, leaving only a strained, exhausted honesty.
“She said,” he stated, his voice low but clear in the sterile room, “she wants a backyard.”
He walked around the table, past the frozen smiles of his team, and took her hand. It was cold.
“We’re leaving,” he said to the room, not a question, not an apology. A statement.
He didn’t wait for a reply. He led her out of the Brand Synergy Suite, past the towering holograms, through the lobby buzzing with the energy of the empire he’d built, and out into the stark, bright, un-curated Texas sun.
The heat outside was a physical slap, dry and heavy, after the building’s artificial chill. He didn’t stop, leading her across the baking pavement to the rental car, his grip on her hand tight enough to feel the individual bones. He unlocked it with a sharp beep and opened the passenger door for her, a hollow gesture of courtesy.
She slid in, the black leather searing her thighs through her dress. The door thudded shut, sealing them in a sudden, pressurized silence. He got in the driver’s side, started the engine, and blasted the air conditioning, which roared like a jet engine.
For several blocks, he just drove. His knuckles were white on the steering wheel. The digital cityscape of downtown Austin streamed past the windows, all sharp edges and reflected sun.
“Say something,” Alexis finally said. Her voice sounded scraped raw in the tiny, cold space.
“What do you want me to say?” His tone was flat, careful.
“I don’t know. Maybe that was insane. Maybe thank you for walking out. Something.”
He switched lanes aggressively. “It wasn’t insane. It’s their job. That’s the machine. You wanted to see it.”
“So this is my fault?” She stared at him, her stomach tightening. “I ‘wanted to see it’? They had a storyboard, Mark. For your proposal. Which, by the way, hasn’t even happened.”
“I know that!” The words shot out, sharp. He took a controlled breath, his eyes fixed on the road. “I know. It was tone-deaf. They got ahead of themselves. But you shouting about a backyard in there doesn’t help.”
“Shouting? I was stating a preference. And since when is a backyard a radical concept?”
“Since my life became a product!” He glanced at her, his expression pained. “You think I want Spark! energy drinks at my bachelor party? You think I want to perform my proposal for a vlog? But this… this thing around us, it pays for everything. The penthouse. The future house. The security. It’s not just free money, Lex. It’s a system.”
“And I’m part of the system now.” She said it quietly, watching a food truck park blur past. “I have to be a feature. My wedding has to be an ‘event.’ My love is ‘commercial potential.’”
“It doesn’t have to be either-or.” His voice softened, straining for reason. “We can find a middle. A beautiful venue, just us and family, but we hire our own photographer. We control the pictures. We release a few, on our terms. That’s the compromise. We give a little to keep a lot.”
She was silent, chewing on the idea. A controlled release. A curated glimpse. It was logical. It was what he did every day. Give a piece to protect the whole.
“So, not a backyard,” she said, testing the words.
“A backyard in St. Louis isn’t secure. Paparazzi with long lenses, drones. Your parents’ neighbors could sell pictures. If we do a proper venue, we can control the perimeter. It’s safer, and it’s still private.” He reached over, his hand finding her knee. “We could find a place with a garden. With an old tree. We could still have fairy lights.”
The compromise hung there, meticulous and sensible. It acknowledged her desire for intimacy and his reality of exposure. It felt adult. It felt like a surrender.
“Okay,” she whispered, the fight draining out of her, replaced by a weary ache. “A garden venue. We hire everyone ourselves. No sponsors. No series. One photo, after it’s all over, that we choose.”
He squeezed her knee, a flash of relief crossing his face. “Exactly. See? We just… design it our way. Within the framework.”
The word ‘framework’ grated. But she nodded. “Okay.”
They drove back to the Airbnb in a quieter tension, the argument coiled and sleeping. He ordered Thai food. They ate on the floor, backs against the couch, watching an anime movie without really seeing it. The compromise lay between them like a truce, fragile and unsmiling.
Later, in bed, he pulled her close, his nose buried in her hair. “I hated that today,” he murmured, his voice thick with fatigue. “I saw your face. I felt like I’d brought you into a cage.”
“It’s not a cage. It’s just… a really complicated zoo.” She tried to laugh, but it came out brittle.
“We’ll make it work. Our way.” His arms tightened around her.
The next morning, the silence felt different. She scrolled through her phone with a new, grim purpose, searching for “private garden wedding venues near D.C.” He was on his laptop, clicking through emails with a focused frown.
“What about this?” she asked, turning the screen to him. It showed a historic inn in Virginia with a walled garden. “They do exclusive buy-outs. No other events.”
He scanned it. “The capacity is seventy-five. That’s… that’s probably just immediate family and the core team from RDC. Ben, Leland, Des, their plus-ones. We can’t not invite the team, Lex.”
The number felt like a punch. Seventy-five. Her mind flew to her mother’s side, a sprawling network of aunts, uncles, cousins, church friends. She thought of her father, the principal, who’d taught half the town. She thought of her own friends from undergrad, from law school.
“Seventy-five,” she repeated slowly. “Okay. So, your ten people. My parents, my sister. That’s fifteen. That leaves sixty for my side.” She started calculating in her head, the list growing, names stacking up. “That’s… actually tight, but maybe. If we cut cousins to just first cousins, and no kids…”
“Alexis.” He closed his laptop gently. “My ten people are non-negotiable. But that’s not the only thing. Security, hair and makeup, the photographer and their assistant—they all count towards the venue’s capacity. They need meals. They take seats. So it’s not seventy-five guests. It’s like, fifty-five.”
The room seemed to shrink. The walls of the garden venue felt like they were closing in, not keeping people out, but keeping her people out.
“Fifty-five,” she whispered. Her eyes stung. “I can’t tell my Aunt Brenda, who changed my diapers, that she doesn’t make the cut because the photographer’s assistant needs a plate of chicken.”
“It’s not about the assistant!” He stood up, running a hand over his head. “It’s about having a contained, manageable environment. Every extra person is a variable, a potential leak. A random plus-one with a iPhone can sell a video of our vows to TMZ for five figures. You have to understand the economics of this.”
“Economics.” She stood too, facing him. “That’s what this is. You’re doing a cost-benefit analysis on my family.”
“I’m trying to protect the day! Your Aunt Brenda will understand. We’ll have a big, public reception later in St. Louis. A party. Everyone’s invited to that.”
“A consolation party,” she shot back, her voice rising. “The real thing, the meaningful part, is for the brand and your inner circle. My family gets the after-party. That’s the compromise? That’s our way?”
“What do you want me to do?” His composure cracked, his own voice lifting to match hers. “You want the backyard? It’ll be a circus. Drones, Markiplier fans in the trees, the whole world judging your mother’s potato salad! Is that what you want?”
“I want a wedding, not a product launch! I want my people there, not strategic assets!” She was shouting now, tears finally breaking free. “You promised a door we control. But you’re just designing a nicer room in the zoo! You’re the zookeeper, and I’m the new exhibit, and you’re asking me to help choose the damn wallpaper!”
He flinched as if she’d struck him. The raw hurt in his eyes was instant and deep. “That’s what you think of me? After everything? That’s what I am to you?”
The momentum of her anger crashed against the shock on his face. She had nothing else to say. The words hung in the air, cruel and final. She saw him shut down, his expression closing off into something hard and distant.
He picked up his keys from the counter. “I need air.”
The door clicked shut behind him, a soft, definitive sound. The argument was over. The compromise was ashes. She was alone in the silent, rented room, the ghost of her own terrible words echoing in the space where he’d been.