Chương 4
It turned into something dangerously close to crying, and she pressed her lips together until it passed.
I looked at the ground.
There are moments when witnessing somebody’s humiliation feels less like seeing the truth and more like stealing something.
For all the satisfaction I had imagined over the years, I did not enjoy this.
That bothered me too.
I wanted to enjoy it.
Some ugly piece of me had earned the fantasy.
The cousin who once told twelve relatives that my motel job was “basically professional bed-making” was standing behind my hotel with a declined credit card and no job.
There should have been symmetry in that.
Instead, all I could see was someone trying very hard not to fall apart in a dress she probably could not afford.
Diane broke the silence.
“Why this party?”
Emily closed her eyes.
“Mom.”
“No, I mean it.”
Diane gestured toward the ballroom beyond the wall.
“The flowers, the band, the champagne, all of it.”
“It was already planned.”
“You could have canceled.”
“The deposit was nonrefundable.”
“You could have scaled it back.”
Emily said nothing.
That silence answered better than words.
Robert looked stunned.
“You kept a ten-thousand-dollar birthday party because you didn’t want people to know you lost your job?”
Emily’s eyes flashed.
“You make it sound insane.”
“It is insane.”
“From you?”
“Yes, from me.”
“You threw a graduation party for me with an ice sculpture.”
“You graduated from college.”
“It was shaped like my initials.”
“That was your mother’s idea.”
Diane turned to him.
“Don’t drag me into the ice sculpture.”
Under different circumstances, it might have been funny.
Maybe it still was.
Emily looked at me again.
“How much exactly do I need tonight?”
“Forty-eight hundred authorization.”
“And after that?”
“Final charges settle after the event.”
“What if I pay part now?”
“Depends on how much.”
She opened her banking app.
I looked away automatically.
She noticed.
“You can look.”
“I don’t need to see your account.”
“You own the hotel.”
“That doesn’t make your balance my business.”
Her thumb moved across the screen.
“I have twenty-three hundred available.”
Robert immediately reached for his wallet.
“I’ll cover the rest.”
“No.”
Emily’s answer was instant.
“Don’t be ridiculous.”
“I’m not taking your money.”
“You’re already standing at a party I paid a deposit on.”
“You paid the deposit as my birthday gift.”
“Yes.”
“So the rest was mine.”
“And you can’t cover it.”
“I can fix it.”
“How?”
She did not answer.
Robert pulled out a card.
Emily stepped back as though he had raised a hand.
“No.”
His expression tightened.
“Why?”
“Because I said no.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“It’s the one you get.”
I intervened before the argument started climbing again.
“We can reduce the remaining cost.”
All three looked at me.
Emily frowned.
“How?”
“We stop premium liquor now and switch to the standard package.”
She looked horrified.
I almost smiled.
“There are worse things.”
“What else?”
“We cancel the late-night food station.”
Her face fell.
“The sliders?”
“Yes, Emily, civilization may survive.”
She glared at me.
There she was again.
I continued.
“We can cut the additional floral reset after dinner and reduce overtime by ending music at eleven instead of midnight.”
Her eyes moved toward the wall, mentally dismantling the party she had designed.
“How much?”
“Probably eighteen hundred, maybe two thousand.”
“That still leaves a gap.”
“Yes.”
Robert held out his card.
“Then I pay it.”
Emily stared at him.
“You don’t understand.”
“Then explain it.”
She pressed both hands against her temples.
“If you pay for this, every time you look at me for the next five years, this is what you’ll see.”
Robert’s face softened.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“No.”
“You already do it.”
He stopped.
Emily lowered her hands.
“When I dropped out of law school after one semester, you introduced me to people as ‘between programs’ for a year.”
Robert looked at the pavement.
“When I got the marketing job, you called three relatives before I got home.”
“I was proud.”
“When I got promoted, you bought champagne.”
“What was wrong with that?”
“Nothing.”
She shook her head.
“That’s the problem.”
Diane looked tired now.
“Emily, nobody expected you to be perfect.”
Emily gave her a flat look.
“You literally mailed me an article called ‘Ten Habits of Highly Successful Women’ on my twenty-seventh birthday.”
“I thought it was interesting.”
“It had sticky notes.”
Diane opened her mouth, then closed it.
I leaned against the brick wall.
The family I had spent years imagining as perfectly united had apparently been held together with expensive parties and selective reporting.
That realization did not make me feel better.
It made the past messier.
Robert looked at me.
“Can I pay the hotel directly without her knowing?”
Emily threw up both hands.
“I’m standing right here.”
“No,” I said.
He frowned.
“Why not?”
“Because she’s the contract holder and because she just said no.”
“You’d rather lose money?”
“I’d rather not participate in whatever this is.”
Emily looked surprised.
Robert looked irritated.
Diane looked as though she was developing a headache.
Then my phone buzzed.
Priya.
I answered.
“What’s up?”
Her voice was controlled, which meant something was not.
“We have a guest at the front desk asking about the event.”
“Okay.”
“He says he’s here regarding Emily Whitmore.”
I looked at Emily.
Her entire body went still.
“What’s his name?”
Priya hesitated.
“Daniel Mercer.”
Emily closed her eyes.
Robert noticed.
“Who is Daniel Mercer?”
She did not answer.
Diane’s face had gone pale.
I covered the phone.
“Emily?”
She whispered something I could not hear.
“What?”
Her eyes opened.
“He’s my former boss.”
Robert frowned.
“Why is your former boss showing up at your birthday party?”
Emily’s fingers tightened around her clutch.
“Because I invited him.”
Nobody spoke.
I returned to the call.
“Keep him in the lobby for a minute.”
Priya lowered her voice.
May you like
“He says he needs to speak with her privately, and he brought an envelope.”
Emily stepped toward me.
