Chương 4
“What do you want to do?”
Eleanor looked at the green bananas.
“I want to sleep.”
It was not an answer, but Mara let her have it.
At seven that evening, Celeste called.
Eleanor answered from the couch while Mara washed dishes loudly in the kitchen.
“How are you?” Celeste asked.
“Bruised.”
“I feel sick about this.”
“Do you?”
There was a pause. “Of course I do.”
Eleanor shifted the ice pack against her hip. “Did Mia go home?”
“Yes. She was shaken.”
“She needs to be paid for the full day.”
“She will be.”
“And tomorrow.”
“Eleanor, I’m calling about you.”
“No, you’re calling about the salon.”
Celeste exhaled. “The Waverlys have retained counsel.”
“So quickly.”
“They always have counsel.”
That was true. People like Claire did not search for lawyers after trouble. Lawyers waited nearby like umbrellas in a stand.
Celeste continued. “Their representative has asked that all communication go through him. He says Claire is deeply distressed and wants to make sure your medical expenses are covered.”
“She can start by saying she grabbed me.”
“I’m sure there will be an opportunity to discuss language.”
“Language is what happened.”
“Eleanor, please. I’m trying to handle this responsibly.”
In the kitchen, Mara turned off the faucet.
Celeste lowered her voice. “There are four hundred guests arriving this week. We have press coming for the gown. We have the Waverly foundation gala contract in the fall. This could become very damaging.”
“For whom?”
“For everyone.”
It was the sort of word people used when the damage had already chosen someone else.
Eleanor looked at her swollen wrist.
“Did you write an incident report?”
“I started one.”
“Send it to me before you submit it.”
“Insurance requires—”
“Send it.”
Celeste went quiet.
“We’ve known each other a long time,” Eleanor said. “Long enough that you know not to make me discover your version from an adjuster.”
“I’ll send it.”
The document arrived twenty-three minutes later.
Eleanor opened it on Mara’s laptop. Celeste had written that a client and employee became involved in a verbal dispute concerning a personal item. During the exchange, the employee lost her balance and fell. The item was subsequently located on the client’s garment.
There was no mention of Claire’s hand around Eleanor’s forearm. No mention of the bag being jerked away. No mention of the words wrong family.
Mara read over her shoulder.
“Oh, absolutely not.”
Eleanor scrolled to the bottom. The form had a blank line for her signature.
“She made it sound like you argued over a coat hanger,” Mara said.
“It was a garment bag.”
“Mom.”
“I’m tired.”
“That is not a reason to let this stand.”
Eleanor closed the laptop.
For twenty-two years, she had watched Celeste build Linden House Bridal from a second-floor alteration room into a salon where women drank sparkling water from cut crystal and paid deposits larger than Eleanor’s first annual salary. Eleanor had sewn through Celeste’s divorce, two recessions, a burst pipe, a pandemic closure, and the year Celeste’s younger brother died. She had worked Christmas Eve when a bride gained eleven pounds between her final fitting and the ceremony. She had slept on the workroom sofa during a blizzard to finish a gown for a governor’s daughter.
Celeste had once sat beside Eleanor in the hospital after Frank’s heart attack and fed her crackers from a vending machine.
None of those things changed the words on the screen.
They only made them hurt more.
The next morning, Eleanor woke before six from a dream in which she kept finding blue stones sewn into every dress she touched. She made coffee with her left hand, burned the toast, and ate it standing over the sink because sitting down hurt.
Mara had slept on the couch. She emerged with one side of her hair flattened and asked, “Pain level?”
“Four.”
“Truthful pain level?”
“Six.”
“Better.”
Eleanor checked her phone. There were nine messages.
Two were from coworkers. Three were from Celeste. One was from Daniel. Two came from unknown numbers. The final message was from Claire.
I am sorry for what happened. I was under enormous stress and genuinely believed the brooch had been taken. I never intended for you to fall. I would like to speak privately and make this right.
Eleanor read it twice.
Mara watched her face. “Her?”
“Yes.”
“Does she use the word grabbed?”
“No.”
“Does she say she accused you falsely?”
“No.”
“Then she’s sorry about the consequence, not the act.”
Eleanor put the phone down. “You should get ready for work.”
“I took a personal day.”
“You used one last month when your furnace broke.”
“The furnace was emitting carbon monoxide.”
“It was still a personal day.”
Mara opened a cupboard and frowned at its contents. “You have five boxes of tea and no cereal.”
“I don’t eat cereal.”
“You bought cereal when Dad was alive.”
“Your father considered cereal a dinner food.”
“He considered mustard a vegetable.”
For a minute, they spoke about Frank. Not the heart attack or the years after, but the time he had tried to fix the bathroom drawer and trapped all three screwdrivers inside it. Mara laughed with her mouth full of toast.
The ordinary memory loosened something in Eleanor’s chest. It also reminded her that there had once been a person in the apartment who knew when her silence meant anger and when it meant fear.
At nine, Celeste called again.
“I need you to stay home today,” she said.
“I assumed as much.”
“And perhaps through the weekend.”
Eleanor waited.
“The Waverly fitting schedule has been canceled, obviously. We need to review what happened before you return.”
“Review?”
“Insurance advised us not to make assumptions.”
“Daniel saw me on the floor. Mia saw Claire grab me. The brooch was in the gown.”
“I’m not questioning your account.”
“You wrote an account that removed Claire from it.”
May you like
“I was trying to be neutral.”
“Neutral language is very useful when one person is paying and the other person is bleeding.”
