I twist the ring on my finger and stare into space while Stacy's voice drones on in the background.

Technically, I guess it's droning on in the foreground. I mean, she is talking to me, after all. I'm just so tired of hearing her go on that I've started tuning her out.

It started before I even met Ryan. As soon as my sister found out I'd hired a match maker to find me a husband, Stacy started talking about wedding plans.

At first it was kinda fun. I mean, I've been thinking about this since I was little. So sitting around my place after work on Friday nights sharing a bottle of wine with my sister while we looked at bridal magazines and planned a wedding that was still in the future with a groom that was still, at that point, largely imaginary, was a lot of fun.

Then I actually met Ryan and-- I don't know-- it all became real. Suddenly Stacy's constant wedding talk didn't seem like a fun way to ignore a movie when we got together, it started feeling intrusive.

"Hello? Earth to Kimberly?"

"Huh?" I freeze with my engagement ring in mid-turn on my finger and bring my sister's face into focus.

"You're like a million miles away, were you even listening?"

Do I tell her the truth?

"Yeah, of course I'm listening."

No. The answer is no. I look down at the pictures that Stacy has in her hand and pretend like I know what they are.

"Nice try," she says, sounding only a little perturbed with me. "Here. You can read through it later. I'm just saying, it's a really cool venue and I think you should go check it out because if you fall in love with it, you have to book it pronto or you'll have to push your wedding date back another year."

The pictures are a series of brochures for some little venue upstate.

"We already decided we want to get married locally," I mention as I set the brochures on the end table.

"But you haven't booked anything yet," Stacy grabs her wine glass, takes a sip and sets it back on the other end table, "I just think you should at least look at it. Now, let's talk about your colors..."

I tune out again and look down at the ring on my finger.

We picked it out together 2 weeks after we met. We had to have it sized and Ryan surprised me with a real proposal a week later. He'd had the center stone upgraded while it was being sized for me.

It's gorgeous. I love it and for the first few weeks it made me feel like a princess.

I loved the way people seemed to look at my hand everywhere I went; the grocery store, the coffee shop, the fast food drive thru.

It was like I belonged to someone. The ring made me feel like Ryan was with me even when we weren't together. Looking down at it like I am now made me so happy my eyes would fill up with tears because I couldn't process how amazing it all was.

The closer we get to Kay and Brent's wedding, the more I find myself thinking about pushing back our own date.

Kay's a wreck. She doesn't even get excited about her wedding day anymore, she just gets more stressed out.

Her mom has been driving her crazy lately, trying to take over things and it's starting to make things tense between Kay and Brent.

I keep telling myself that it's just the stress of trying to plan my own wedding while we're still trying to get through Kay's but lately I've been having second thoughts.

Ryan's great, he really is, but maybe getting married isn't what I want after all? At least, not right away.

Going back to my new nervous habit of twisting the ring on my finger, I look up and try to pay attention to what Stacy's saying.

Maybe we should put off the wedding? Slow down, step back, get through Kay and Brent's first and then decide where we are about us?

Sure, Ryan and I both went into the arrangement looking for a serious commitment. I'm not saying I want to call it off altogether-- I don't think-- we just went from zero to engaged so fast.

These last few weeks I've been watching Kay and Brent discover things about each other that they didn't even know before they got engaged. It really makes me realize how fast Ryan and I have been moving.

We don't really know each other that well. We haven't had our first fight, or seen each other through any sort of tragedy, or even any major celebration-- although I guess that's kinda what our friends' wedding is supposed to be. If they ever get through it.

My sister keeps talking about her ideas for lighting and center pieces and I nod and force a smile when I think it might be appropriate but my fingers keep turning the platinum band on my finger.

The more people talk to me about weddings and babies and houses and futures, the more sick to my stomach I get at the thought of having to go through with it all.

Maybe Ryan and I could just live together for awhile? Take time to get to know each other the old fashioned way before we commit to going through with it?

By the time Stacy pronounces me a lost cause and says good night, I'm so overwhelmed with the stack of brochures and magazines and printed pages from websites that she leaves on my table for me to "check out" that I'm seriously starting to wish I had never heard of Raven Swann or her match making business.

Then Kay calls in tears.

The baker she wanted to make her cake just crushed her hand in some sort of accident involving a horse-- or maybe a hearse? I can't really tell because Kay's crying so hard I can't understand her.

While I listen to my bestie have a full on meltdown over the phone, doing my best to interject the appropriate "oh nos" and "no ways" at the appropriate times while I drain the last of the wine Stacy and I were having into my glass, I start seriously thinking I can't do this myself.

I like Ryan. I might even love him-- I think I love him, but it's only been a few weeks. I've never loved anyone enough to consider marrying them. What if I'm fooling myself? What if I got carried away with Kay and Brent's wedding and my jealousy and my own stupid, romantic notions when I found out there was such a thing as a real life modern day match maker that would do all the work of finding the right man for me?

When Kay has finally cried herself out and manages to drop the drama, I'm left with a truly devastated woman on the line who just sounds tired.

"I don't even care about the fucking cake, Kim," she tells me in an exhausted voice, "We could just put out a bunch of Twinkies for all I care at this point."

A sob catches in her throat that tugs at my heart. It's not the theatrics of her earlier melt down, it's a painful sound that's 100 percent genuine.

"I don't even know if Brent still wants to go through with it," she tells me quietly, "he was so into it in the beginning and now every time I bring up the wedding he gets irritated and snaps at me."

I hear her sniffle in the distance before she puts the phone back to her face, "He barely even talks to me lately. I think he's avoiding me. Kim? What if Brent doesn't love me anymore? What if this stupid wedding ends up ruining the best thing that ever happened to me?"

Her words cut into my own heart. Both for how much I wish I could promise her that Brent still loves her and that everything is going to work out great, and because it's like she just read my mind about me and Ryan.

Is Ryan the best thing that ever happened to me?

I say all the comforting things I can think of until Kay calms down and gets off the phone while I twist my ring until my finger is sore.

Kay and Brent seemed to know right from the beginning that they were in love. Kay says it was love at first sight-- their first date, chaperoned and all, was magic, she says.

Ryan and I got off to kinda of an awkward start with our chaperons up in our business and already planning out our future before we even had a chance to get to know each other.

Yeah, we clicked easily enough. But what if we're jumping in too fast? What if we're putting too much faith in Raven's ability to set people up? What if this is a huge mistake and a year from now we'll be married and maybe pregnant and stuck with each other?

The last thought through my mind as my head hits my pillow is that I'll run it all by Ryan tomorrow.