Phoebe rides alone in the wedding Mercedes to the Breakers, and the luxury of the trip makes her think about wealth, desire, and the question that has always interested her in novels about rich people: what people still lack after getting everything. That thought leads her back to Lila, who had all the outward signs of a perfect wedding but still could not go through with it.

At the ceremony, Phoebe walks down the aisle herself to face Gary. She tells him quietly that Lila is not coming, and Gary absorbs the news with almost no visible reaction. Phoebe then turns to the assembled guests and formally announces that Lila and Gary will not be getting married, thanking them for coming. The guests immediately begin asking where Lila is and why she has left, and while Phoebe answers them, Gary slips away from the Breakers without asking for comfort or creating a scene.

After the guests leave, Matt is waiting for Phoebe, and they get into the car together. Phoebe tells Matt immediately that she is not going back with him, not just to the hotel but to St. Louis at all. Because she says it directly, the conversation becomes a real separation rather than another delay. Matt responds with sadness rather than anger, asking practical questions, and Phoebe says she plans to take medical leave if she can.

The drive becomes unexpectedly tender as Phoebe and Matt fall into an old rhythm of joking about their university jobs. Phoebe then tells Matt more clearly what she wants: to sell the house, stay in the nineteenth-century mansion, and write. Matt tries to joke again, but he begins crying, and Phoebe realizes that although she still loves him, she cannot keep living in the analytical, emotionally controlled way that feels safest to him.

By the end of the ride, Phoebe chooses presence over avoidance. She opens the abandoned wedding champagne, and she and Matt toast to his first adult cry unrelated to sports. As they drink, Phoebe feels grateful simply to be alive, in a beautiful dress, tasting something excellent all the way home, and recognizing that she now wants a life built on honesty, sensation, and her own future.