Chương 13
“Yes.”
“What was the first meeting like?”
Graham answered.
“Awful.”
Nora almost smiled.
“It was.”
“Why?”
I asked.
“Millie refused to speak.”
Graham said.
“She hid behind my leg for twenty minutes.”
Nora nodded.
“Then she asked why my cat looked angry.”
Despite myself, I laughed.
“The hostile cat.”
“That’s Jasper.”
“He’s sixteen.”
“He hates everybody.”
“That seems healthy.”
“He’s consistent.”
Something loosened in the air.
Only for a moment.
Then I pictured Graham standing in that house with Millie.
The house Claire had once planned to share with Nora.
The place where another version of her life had almost happened.
“What did it feel like for you?”
I asked him.
He looked startled.
“What?”
“Being there.”
His eyes moved toward the parking lot.
“I don’t know.”
“That’s not true.”
He rubbed his thumb against his ring again.
“It felt wrong.”
Nora looked at him.
“And familiar.”
I frowned.
“You’d been there before?”
“Once.”
“When?”
“Before Claire and I got married.”
Lillian went still.
Nora’s head turned sharply.
“You never told me that.”
Graham looked at her.
“I didn’t think it mattered.”
“Apparently that’s the family motto.”
Beth muttered.
I ignored her.
“Why were you there?”
“Claire took me.”
Nora’s expression hardened.
“When?”
“About six months before the wedding.”
“What did she say?”
Graham’s face shifted.
“That it was a house her parents owned.”
“That’s all?”
“No.”
He looked toward Nora.
“She told me she had once planned to live there with someone.”
Nora stared at him.
“She told you that.”
“Yes.”
“Did she tell you who?”
“Yes.”
Nora blinked.
Something in her anger gave way.
“Before you married her.”
“Yes.”
“And you married her anyway.”
Graham’s expression sharpened.
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“Nothing.”
“It means something.”
Nora pressed her lips together.
“It means I spent years assuming she hid me from you.”
“She didn’t.”
“She hid pieces.”
“Everybody hides pieces.”
“No.”
Nora’s voice tightened.
“People choose what to tell.”
Graham stared at her.
I almost stepped between them again, then stopped.
Not every tension needed me in the middle.
That might have been the first useful thing I learned all night.
Lillian looked toward the ballroom.
“We cannot stand out here forever.”
I laughed.
“That is the first statement tonight I fully believe.”
Beth checked her phone.
“It is almost nine.”
My reception was supposed to end at ten-thirty.
The cake remained uncut.
The first dance had technically happened, though I barely remembered it now.
There were photographs of Graham and me smiling beneath strings of lights less than two hours before I learned about Nora.
I wondered if those smiles had become false retroactively.
The thought felt childish.
A happy moment did not become fake because something ugly existed beside it.
It just became complicated.
“What happens now?”
Beth asked.
Everyone looked at me.
I hated that.
“Why are you asking me?”
“You’re the bride.”
“That qualification has lost some authority.”
Graham stepped closer.
“Rachel.”
“What?”
“We should leave.”
The words hurt more than I expected.
“Leave our own reception.”
“We don’t have to stay for people.”
“No.”
I looked through the glass doors.
My mother was sitting beside Millie at a table.
Millie had an enormous piece of cake in front of her.
Someone had clearly surrendered to her before the official cutting.
There was frosting on her nose.
My mother saw me and lifted both eyebrows.
“I’m not leaving.”
Graham looked surprised.
“Why?”
“Because I want to cut the cake.”
He stared at me.
“That’s your reason?”
“Yes.”
“That’s all?”
“No.”
I took a breath.
“I want Millie to have the memory she was supposed to have.”
His face softened.
I raised a hand.
“Do not mistake that for forgiveness.”
“I won’t.”
“I also don’t want to wake up tomorrow and realize every photograph from tonight ends before everything fell apart.”
Beth frowned.
“What does that mean?”
“It means I want evidence that I stayed in my own life.”
No one spoke.
The words embarrassed me as soon as I said them.
They sounded too neat.
Too much like something somebody would put on a wall.
I shook my head.
“That came out pretentious.”
Beth smiled faintly.
“A little.”
“Thank you.”
“But I get it.”
Graham looked at me.
“Do you want me there?”
The question was harder than it should have been.
“Yes.”
His shoulders lowered.
“But I don’t want you touching me unless I initiate it.”
He nodded.
“Okay.”
“And no speeches.”
“Okay.”
“No fixing.”
“I don’t know what that means.”
“It means don’t turn the cake into some public declaration about how much you love me so everyone applauds and you get to feel absolved.”
His face tightened.
“I wouldn’t.”
“You might.”
He accepted that.
“Okay.”
I looked at Nora.
“You should leave.”
She nodded immediately.
“I was planning to.”
Millie appeared at the doorway.
“No.”
We all turned.
She stood there holding her plate with both hands.
A ridiculous mountain of cake leaned toward one edge.
My mother hovered behind her.
“Nora needs cake.”
Nora smiled.
“I’m okay.”
“You drove all the way here.”
The logic was unassailable.
Nora looked at me.
I should have said no.
It would have been reasonable.
Instead, I looked at Millie.
She was tired, confused, and somehow still determined to host.
“One piece.”
Nora hesitated.
“Are you sure?”
“No.”
That made her laugh.
“But you can come in for cake.”
Graham looked at me sharply.
I caught it.
“This is not your decision alone.”
His jaw tightened.
“I know.”
“Good.”
Nora stepped toward the door.
Lillian moved aside.
The two women almost brushed shoulders.
Both noticed.
Neither apologized.
Inside the ballroom, conversation dipped when we entered.
Not stopped.
Dipped.
People had noticed our absence.
They had noticed Nora.
They were pretending not to.
A cousin I barely knew looked at Nora, then at Graham, then immediately became fascinated by his dinner roll.
My mother leaned toward me.
“Do you want me to announce anything?”
“No.”
May you like
“Do you want me to remove anyone?”
I looked at her.
