Our Infinite Fates

Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of illness, death, child death, graphic violence, antigay bias, and substance use.

A bride and groom’s wrists are bound with a red ribbon. The groom is caught up in the moment, but the bride is alert. They exchange weapons instead of rings at her insistence. The groom recites the common vows in this Nordic ceremony, but the bride wrote her own. She tells him, “I love you, and I have loved you, and I will love you” (3), and he says this back. They expect the presiding elder to bless the union, but instead, she physically transforms and asks how they could have thought she would not find them. Without hesitation, the bride slits the groom’s throat. He falls, shocked, and she collapses a moment later, gasping even though her own throat is intact. The final thing that each of them sees is “the red ribbon of fate” around their wrists (4).

The table is set for a wedding, but there are no knives. The peace between the Sola and Quiñónez families is strained at best. The narrator, Adella, thinks about how much she is going to miss her father, Papá, when she dies; it will be soon, as her 18th birthday is only a few days away.