Chương 5
Priya shut it off.
“Sorry.”
“No. Put it back.”
“What?”
“I don’t want dramatic music.”
Priya restarted the song.
A woman sang about dancing on a beach.
Elena rested her forehead against the passenger window.
They drove away from the estate while she was still wearing her wedding dress.
For the first ten minutes, neither woman spoke.
At a red light, Priya said, “Do you want french fries?”
Elena turned her head.
“What?”
“I’m hungry.”
“You ate six appetizers.”
“I was emotionally preparing.”
“For what?”
“Marriage.”
Despite everything, Elena smiled.
They stopped at a drive-through.
The teenage cashier looked at Elena’s emerald gown, Priya’s formal dress, the flowers still pinned in both their hair, and said nothing.
Professionalism, Elena thought.
Or fear.
Priya ordered two large fries and three milkshakes.
“Who’s the third for?” Elena asked.
“Future us.”
They parked beneath a broken light.
Elena ate six fries.
Then she began to shake.
Priya put down her milkshake.
“Elena.”
“I’m fine.”
“No.”
“I know.”
The tears came without drama.
They slipped down Elena’s face while she chewed a fry she no longer wanted.
She wiped her cheeks angrily.
“I hate this.”
“I know.”
“I hate crying in a parking lot.”
“Better than on a terrace with two hundred rich people.”
“That is true.”
Priya waited.
Elena cried harder.
There was no graceful collapse.
Her nose ran.
Mascara got onto her thumb.
Her chest hurt.
At one point she hiccuped and laughed at the sound and then cried again because laughing felt disloyal to herself.
Priya said nothing wise.
She handed Elena napkins.
Eventually Elena whispered, “He knew before he proposed.”
Priya nodded.
“That’s the part.”
“I know.”
“No, the baby isn’t even the part.”
“I know.”
“He stood in my parents’ kitchen. My mother made that terrible lemon chicken. He asked my father for his blessing even though I told him not to. He already knew.”
Priya looked out through the windshield.
“He probably loved you while he did it.”
Elena stared at her.
“That’s worse.”
“Yes.”
“Why would you say that?”
“Because you’re going to spend the next month trying to decide if everything was fake. It probably wasn’t.”
Elena’s mouth trembled.
“I would prefer fake.”
“I know.”
They drove to Priya’s apartment.
The cat hissed at Elena’s gown.
Priya said, “Her name is Susan. She has no compassion.”
Elena changed into borrowed sweatpants and an old Georgetown T-shirt.
Her phone had 312 notifications.
She turned it off.
At two in the morning, she woke on Priya’s couch because someone was playing trumpet downstairs.
The same four notes.
Again.
Again.
Again.
She stared at the ceiling and thought, irrationally, that this was proof the world had not ended.
Somewhere below, a mediocre musician still needed practice.
In the morning, Victor Vale’s attorney called.
Elena did not answer.
Adrian called seven times.
She did not answer.
Her mother called fourteen.
Elena answered on the fifteenth.
“Are you alive?”
“Yes.”
“Are you safe?”
“Yes.”
“Did that man hit you?”
“No.”
“Did anyone hit you?”
Elena closed her eyes.
“I hit him.”
Silence.
Then her mother said, “Well.”
Elena almost smiled.
“I know.”
“I raised you better.”
“I know.”
“Was it satisfying?”
“Mom.”
“I can disapprove and ask.”
“No.”
“Good.”
Another silence.
Then, softer, “Come home.”
Elena looked around Priya’s apartment.
Susan the cat was sleeping on her discarded wedding dress.
“I will.”
“Your father has been on the porch since five-thirty.”
“Why?”
“He says he’s trimming the hedge.”
“In August?”
“He is murdering the hedge.”
Elena rubbed her forehead.
“I’ll come this afternoon.”
Before they hung up, her mother said, “Do not make any decisions because people are watching.”
Elena stared at the dark television screen.
“What?”
“You married a family that thinks being watched is the same thing as being judged. It isn’t.”
Elena sat still after the call ended.
Her mother had never liked Victor.
Not because he was rich.
Because he remembered people’s names only when they were useful.
At nine, Priya made coffee.
At nine-ten, Elena turned her phone back on.
The wedding video was everywhere.
Not the professional footage.
Phones.
Dozens of angles.
Her slap.
Vanessa’s question.
Adrian saying the baby wasn’t his.
Victor ordering Vanessa to put the report away.
And Vanessa’s final sentence.
I never said Adrian was the father.
The clips ended there.
Of course they did.
The internet preferred detonations to debris.
Elena watched one once.
Her own face disturbed her.
She looked colder than she had felt.
A stranger in an emerald dress had already become a symbol for millions of people who knew nothing about her.
Comments called her iconic.
Abusive.
Brave.
Violent.
Humiliated.
Queen.
Gold digger.
Victim.
Monster.
A woman she had never met wrote, LEAVE HIM SIS.
A man with a profile picture of a truck wrote that no woman should assault a man for infidelity.
Elena agreed with the second half and wanted to throw the phone across the room because he had gotten the first half wrong.
Priya took it from her.
“Stop reading.”
“I need to know what’s happening.”
“No, you need coffee.”
The Vale family issued a statement at ten thirty.
Elena did not need to see the letterhead to recognize Victor’s voice.
A private family matter had been intruded upon during what should have been a joyous occasion. Misleading and unlawfully obtained medical information had been displayed without consent. The family requested privacy while counsel reviewed the situation.
Elena read it twice.
“Private family matter.”
Priya leaned over her shoulder.
“Apparently you’re not family.”
Elena noticed something else.
The statement did not deny the report.
At eleven, Vanessa posted a statement through an attorney.
It was three sentences.
The medical documents were authentic. They had been lawfully obtained by the pregnant patient and shared by her. She had sought private acknowledgment for months.
No names.
No accusations.
No explanation for choosing Elena’s wedding.
May you like
The internet supplied all three.
By noon, reporters had identified Vanessa as a former communications consultant for the Vale Foundation.
