Chương 7
“I’m not.”
“You are.”
He looked away.
“I don’t know what I am.”
“For once, that makes two of us.”
I lifted the front of my dress and walked toward the door.
Graham moved beside me.
“Rachel, what happens after the reception?”
“I don’t know.”
“Are you coming home?”
“I don’t know.”
“Can we talk tonight?”
“I think we’ve demonstrated that talking only happens when a six-year-old forces it.”
He flinched again.
I hated that part of myself which noticed.
I still knew how to hurt him.
Marriage had made that knowledge official only hours earlier.
Beth opened the door.
Music spilled over us.
Warm light, voices, glassware, perfume, roasted chicken, the stale sweetness of buttercream frosting.
The ordinary machinery of celebration struck me as almost violent.
Before stepping through, Graham caught my wrist lightly.
I looked down at his hand until he released me.
“There’s one thing I need to say before we go in.”
“No.”
“Please.”
I almost refused.
Then I saw the fear in his face again.
Different from before.
Not fear that I would leave.
Something closer to urgency.
“Say it.”
“Nora is coming here.”
I stared at him.
“What?”
“She texted me an hour ago.”
My heartbeat stumbled.
“Why would she come to our wedding?”
“She says she needs to talk to me.”
“Tonight?”
“Yes.”
“About what?”
“She wouldn’t say.”
I looked through the doorway into the reception.
Millie was standing beside my mother near the cake table, proudly explaining something with both hands.
“What did you tell Nora?”
“That this was not the time.”
“And?”
“She said it couldn’t wait.”
I turned back to Graham.
“Is she already on her way?”
He nodded.
“How far away does she live?”
“Forty minutes.”
“When did she text?”
He checked his watch automatically.
“Fifty-three minutes ago.”
Beth stood very still.
I looked at Graham.
“You knew she might arrive while you were standing out here making me drag every piece of this out of you.”
“I was trying to stop her.”
“Did you call?”
“Yes.”
“Did she answer?”
“No.”
The parking lot entrance was visible through the trees beyond the courtyard wall.
A dark sedan slowed at the turn, then continued past.
I found myself staring after it.
“Does Nora know we got married today?”
“Yes.”
“Does she know Millie is here?”
“Yes.”
My chest tightened.
“Does she ever show up uninvited?”
“No.”
Graham’s answer came too quickly.
Beth looked at him.
“Not normally.”
I caught the distinction.
“What does that mean?”
Graham glanced toward the parking lot.
“It means something must have happened.”
My anger did not disappear.
It simply had to make room for another fear.
Behind us, Millie called, “Rachel!”
I turned.
She came running through the doorway, bouquet abandoned somewhere, silver shoes flashing beneath her dress.
She stopped in front of me and reached for my hand.
“They’re going to cut the cake without us.”
Her outrage was so sincere that I almost laughed.
“That would be a serious crime.”
“I told Grandma.”
“Good.”
“She said nobody touches it until you come back.”
My mother appeared several steps behind her.
She studied my face, then Graham’s, then Beth’s.
Mothers do not need evidence for everything.
“Everything all right?”
“No,” I said.
Graham looked at me.
My mother’s eyes sharpened.
I squeezed Millie’s hand.
“But we’re going to cut the cake.”
Millie beamed.
As she pulled me toward the ballroom, I looked once more through the courtyard windows toward the parking lot.
A woman had just stepped out of a gray SUV near the far row of cars.
She stood beside the open door for several seconds without moving.
Graham saw her at the same moment I did.
His face emptied.
Millie followed his gaze.
Then she smiled and raised her free hand.
“That’s her,” she said.
“That’s my other mommy.”
My mother’s fingers closed around my elbow.
“Who is that?”
Millie answered before I could.
“Nora.”
Graham moved so quickly that the motion startled me.
He stepped toward the courtyard door, then stopped himself when Millie tightened her grip on my hand.
“Stay here,” he said.
“To whom?”
His eyes met mine.
“Rachel.”
“No.”
My voice came out calmer than I felt.
“You don’t get to manage the room anymore.”
My mother looked from me to Graham.
“What is happening?”
“Later.”
She frowned.
“That usually means something terrible.”
“It means later.”
Millie tugged on my hand again.
“Can Nora have cake?”
The question almost undid me.
Of course that was what mattered to her.
Cake.
Not the collision of six years of grief, secrecy, resentment, promises, and adult cowardice gathering in a parking lot outside a wedding.
“I don’t know, honey.”
“She likes chocolate better, but this one is vanilla.”
Graham crouched beside her.
“Millie, go with Grandma for a minute.”
Her face changed immediately.
“Why?”
“We need to talk.”
“You always say that when I can’t hear.”
Graham closed his eyes for half a second.
My mother looked at him sharply.
Millie continued.
“Are you mad because I told Rachel?”
“No.”
He answered too fast.
“I’m not mad at you.”
“You look mad.”
“I’m not.”
“You do.”
He exhaled.
“I’m worried.”
She studied him with the ruthless accuracy children sometimes have.
“About Nora?”
“Yes.”
That was enough to make her glance toward the parking lot.
Nora had begun walking toward the building.
Even at a distance, she did not look like someone arriving for a confrontation.
She moved slowly.
One hand held a phone.
The other was pressed against her stomach.
She wore dark pants and a loose gray sweater, clothes so ordinary they made her intrusion feel stranger.
My mother whispered, “Is that woman crying?”
I looked.
Nora stopped beneath one of the parking lot lamps and wiped her face.
Graham cursed under his breath.
Beth said, “Something happened.”
He pulled out his phone.
Three missed calls glowed on the screen.
All from Nora.
He stared at them.
“You said she wouldn’t answer.”
“She wasn’t.”
“Call her now.”
May you like
He did.
We watched through the glass as Nora looked down at her phone.
