Chương 6
Emma’s yellow armchair had moved from the living room to the basement.
The framed travel photographs in the hallway had been replaced with abstract prints Vanessa chose.
The chipped blue mug disappeared from the kitchen cabinet. Daniel found it months later behind gardening supplies in the garage. Vanessa said the housekeeper must have moved it.
He had believed her because the alternative required action.
Sophie changed in her room while Claire ordered pizza. Margaret sat at the kitchen island, calling relatives to tell them Daniel and Sophie were safe. Daniel went into the study and turned on his phone.
There were eighty-seven messages.
Some came from guests expressing concern. Some asked what had happened. Several offered legal advice despite coming from people who sold medical equipment, taught Pilates, or had not practiced law since the first Bush administration.
Vanessa had called fourteen times.
Her last message contained only four words.
Please don’t do this.
Daniel set the phone down.
A voicemail from his business partner, Marcus Reed, had arrived twenty minutes earlier.
“Call me before you do anything else. Richard’s people have contacted the office. I’m serious, Dan. Call me.”
Daniel called.
Marcus answered immediately. “Tell me you did not punch anybody.”
“No.”
“Good. Low bar, but good.”
Daniel closed the study door.
“What did Richard do?”
“He didn’t do anything yet. His general counsel requested copies of all active contracts involving Hale entities.”
“That sounds like something.”
“It sounds like preparation. What happened?”
“Vanessa tore a photograph of Emma in front of Sophie.”
Marcus was silent.
“And,” Daniel continued, “she applied to send Sophie to a residential school without telling me.”
“What?”
“I don’t have all the details.”
“Did Richard know?”
“Yes.”
Marcus exhaled. Daniel heard a chair creak at the other end.
“Okay,” Marcus said. “Personal response: that’s horrifying. Business response: do not send any emails tonight. Do not leave voicemails. Do not accuse Richard of anything in writing.”
“I wasn’t planning to.”
“You ended his daughter’s wedding in front of two hundred people. Your planning standards are currently under review.”
Daniel pressed his fingers against his eyes.
“Sorry,” Marcus said. “That was cheap.”
“It was accurate.”
“Where’s Sophie?”
“Downstairs with Claire and my mother.”
“Is she okay?”
“I don’t know.”
“Are you?”
Daniel looked around the study. A framed photograph of himself and Vanessa stood on the shelf behind the desk. They were on a boat in Maine, both squinting into the sun.
“No.”
“Good answer,” Marcus said. “Call Helen tonight.”
Helen Park was the firm’s attorney.
“I will.”
“And Daniel?”
“Yes?”
“Don’t go back because of the project.”
“I’m not going back.”
“You say that now.”
Daniel’s hand lowered.
Marcus continued, “Tomorrow, payroll still exists. Forty-two people still exist. Richard knows that. He’s going to make this feel like choosing between your daughter and everyone who works for you.”
“It already feels like that.”
“Then remember he created the choice, not Sophie.”
Daniel looked through the glass doors toward the hallway.
Sophie had come downstairs in leggings and an old T-shirt with a sequined star. She stood outside the study holding the torn photograph.
“I have to go,” he said.
He opened the door.
Sophie entered and looked at the picture of him and Vanessa on the shelf.
“Is she coming back?”
“Not tonight.”
“Ever?”
Daniel pulled the desk chair around and sat facing her.
“We don’t know everything yet.”
“You said the wedding was over.”
“It is.”
“But is she over?”
He wished children would accept the nouns adults gave them. Wedding. Home. Family. Over. Each one should have held still.
“I don’t think Vanessa and I are going to be together anymore.”
Sophie stared at the torn photograph.
“Because she doesn’t like Mommy?”
“Because she hurt you.”
“What if I forgive her?”
Daniel leaned forward.
“You are not responsible for deciding whether I marry someone.”
“But if I don’t forgive her, then it is because of me.”
“No.”
“You keep saying no.”
“Because it’s true.”
She looked toward the shelf again.
“I liked her before.”
Daniel swallowed.
“I know.”
“She did my braids crooked.”
“I remember.”
“And she let me sleep in her bed when you were in Chicago.”
“I didn’t know that.”
“There was thunder.”
Daniel nodded.
Sophie rubbed one edge of the photograph between her fingers. “Can somebody be nice and mean?”
“Yes.”
“At the same time?”
“Yes.”
“Can they stop being mean?”
“Sometimes.”
“If they say sorry?”
“Sorry is part of it.”
“What’s the other part?”
Daniel looked at his daughter and felt the failure of every easy answer.
“Changing,” he said.
Sophie thought about that.
Then she set the photograph on his desk. “Can we eat cake before pizza?”
“No.”
Her face fell.
“We can eat it after.”
“That’s almost the same.”
“It is not.”
She turned toward the door. “Vanessa would say yes.”
The sentence was not manipulation. It was an observation.
Daniel sat alone after she left.
At seven, the pizza arrived. Margaret insisted on putting it on plates, though everyone ate standing around the kitchen island. Claire opened the cake box and examined the crushed frosting along one side.
“I can repair this,” she said.
“With what?” Margaret asked.
“A knife and confidence.”
“You have one of those.”
Claire ignored her.
Sophie ate two bites of pizza and a piece of cake large enough to concern all three adults. She talked about a boy in her class who had swallowed a Lego head and claimed it was not an emergency because the Lego had no body.
Ordinary conversation felt indecent and necessary.
At eight-thirty, Sophie fell asleep on the living room sofa with her head in Margaret’s lap. Her flower-girl dress lay folded over a chair. Claire had placed the photograph inside a cookbook to keep the pieces flat.
May you like
Daniel carried Sophie upstairs.
In her room, the night-light projected faint stars across the ceiling. Vanessa had chosen it after Sophie complained that her old rabbit-shaped lamp was for babies. Daniel lowered his daughter onto the bed and removed her socks.
