Chương 13
Celia looked at him.
“No,” she said. “She did that.”
She stepped inside.
Her hands shook all the way to the lobby.
That evening, she told Marisol and Ben the gallery would close temporarily after the current exhibition. Marisol began crying. Ben asked whether there was an appeal. Celia explained the lease terms. She did not mention the wedding until Ben said he had seen the video and believed Sophie.
Celia thanked him, then went into the storage room and sat on an unopened shipping crate.
She called Margaret.
Her mother answered immediately.
“Celia.”
“You took the gallery.”
“The committee made a financial decision.”
“You control the committee.”
“I have influence. I did not attend the vote.”
“That was strategic.”
“Not every event is a trap.”
“Did you ask Robert to review the lease?”
A pause.
“I told him the foundation could not continue subsidizing organizations whose leadership publicly attacked its family.”
“My leadership?”
“You.”
“I didn’t post the video.”
“You refused to correct it.”
“Correct what?”
“The implication that I intentionally harmed Sophie.”
“You intentionally blamed her.”
“I panicked.”
“So did she. She told the truth.”
Margaret’s breathing sharpened through the phone. “I have apologized for my tone.”
“You haven’t apologized to Sophie.”
“Ethan has created conditions under which any conversation would be used against me.”
“He asked you to tell her the truth.”
“He has turned a child into evidence.”
Celia closed her eyes.
Margaret continued more softly. “Come home. Bring Daniel. We can fix the gallery. We can speak to Ethan together. There is no reason for this family to destroy itself.”
“Did you keep Claire’s phone?”
Silence.
“In the hospital,” Celia said. “Did you take it?”
“Claire misplaced several things.”
“She wrote that you answered when I called.”
“She was exhausted. The doctors said rest was important.”
“Did you tell her I didn’t want to visit?”
“I told her your anxiety was severe.”
“Did you tell me she didn’t want me there?”
“I tried to protect both of you from scenes neither of you could handle.”
Celia pressed her fist against her mouth.
Margaret’s voice softened further, becoming the voice she used when other people were crying.
“You were not well. Claire was dying. Ethan was hostile. Someone had to make decisions.”
“You made all of them.”
“Because no one else could.”
“You never gave us the chance.”
“I gave you a life in which you had choices.”
“No. You gave me choices you had already approved.”
“That is an ungrateful thing to say.”
Celia laughed through her tears. “There it is.”
“What?”
“The invoice.”
She ended the call.
For several minutes, she sat on the crate listening to the building’s ventilation system cycle on and off. Then she called Ethan.
“I’ll testify for you.”
He was silent.
“About the wedding,” she said. “About Mom. About Claire’s letter. About the gallery.”
“You don’t have to choose sides.”
“She filed against you and took my building.”
“I know.”
“I’ve spent my life not choosing because she made every choice feel like violence.”
“Celia—”
“I’m choosing.”
Ethan looked through the living-room window. Sophie was asleep on the couch with Pickle tucked beneath her chin.
“This will get uglier,” he said.
“It’s already ugly.”
“It can become expensive.”
“I have eight dollars now.”
He smiled despite himself.
“Daniel found another one?”
“No. I took his.”
Mediation was scheduled six weeks later.
During those weeks, Ethan worked too much.
He accepted a restoration job at a courthouse two counties away and left before sunrise three days a week. He told himself the money was necessary. It was. He also preferred damaged wood because it did not accuse him of using silence as a locked door.
His employee Marcus found him sanding the same section of railing twice.
“You trying to remove the whole staircase?” Marcus asked.
Ethan switched off the sander.
“Sorry.”
“You want me to take over?”
“No.”
“You sure?”
“No.”
Marcus waited.
Ethan handed him the tool.
At home, June helped with school pickups. Celia came on Thursdays and ate dinner with Sophie. Daniel arrived later, carrying books to grade. The arrangement was awkward at first. Ethan and Celia could move from ordinary conversation into old resentment without warning. Once they argued for fifteen minutes about whether Claire preferred chocolate or vanilla cake before realizing neither remembered the original question.
Sophie began seeing a child therapist recommended by Mara.
After the second appointment, she asked Ethan why adults called games “activities” when they wanted children to talk.
“What did you talk about?” he asked.
“That’s private.”
“Fair.”
“I told her Grandma broke the pin.”
“Okay.”
“She didn’t ask me five times.”
“Good.”
“She has a dollhouse with no bathroom.”
“That seems like a design flaw.”
“I told her.”
The repaired butterfly returned from Luis’s shop with a visible silver seam along one wing. It no longer opened smoothly. Luis had added a small support beneath the body so it could be worn without pressure on the old hinge.
Sophie examined it beneath the shop light.
“It has a scar,” she said.
Luis looked at Ethan as though waiting for a response.
Ethan said, “It has a repair.”
Sophie touched the empty crystal setting. “Can Aunt Celia have it now?”
“It was always for her.”
She shook her head. “It was Mommy’s. Then mine. Now I want Aunt Celia to have it.”
Celia came to dinner that night. Sophie presented the box again, using a new green ribbon because the white one had become tangled in her bedside drawer.
Celia opened it slowly.
When she saw the seam, she ran her thumb across it.
“It’s different.”
“That’s what I said,” Sophie replied. “Mr. Luis said old silver remembers being bent.”
Luis had said no such thing. Ethan decided not to correct her.
Celia pinned the butterfly inside the collar of her blouse, where it rested slightly crooked.
“Do I look fancy?”
“No,” Sophie said. “But you look like Mommy.”
May you like
Celia looked down.
Ethan pretended to be occupied with the salad.
