Chương 3
Anna looked at Daniel.
He was standing near the window, bow tie loosened, speaking quietly to Uncle Robert on the phone. Claire sat beside her. The diamond on Claire’s hand caught the gray afternoon light.
“It’s up to you,” Claire said.
“I don’t want police.”
“This isn’t police.”
“I don’t want Serena arrested.”
“No one said that.”
The medic waited.
Anna pressed the cold pack against the mark. “What happens if it’s recorded?”
“It stays in the hotel incident file. I note the condition, the time, what you report, and any care provided. You can request a copy.”
“Does Serena see it?”
“Not unless you share it, or the hotel needs to respond to a claim.”
“I’m not making a claim.”
“Then it’s still your choice.”
Anna imagined the record existing in a filing system beneath complaints about broken glasses and wet bathroom floors. A few clinical sentences proving that her wrist had been red for less than an hour. She disliked the thought. She disliked even more the relief Serena might feel if there were no record.
“Yes,” Anna said. “Write it down.”
The medic photographed the mark with Anna’s permission, checked her range of motion, and recommended ice. Nothing appeared sprained.
Daniel ended his call.
“Uncle Robert is keeping people out of the hallway.”
“Your grandmother?” Anna asked.
“She’s with Aunt Louise. She thinks the delay is because I’m afraid to get married.”
Despite herself, Anna gave a small laugh.
Daniel did not.
Claire touched his sleeve. “Sit down before you fall down.”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re standing like your knees are decorative.”
He sat in the chair across from Anna.
Without the ballroom behind him, he looked less like a groom. His tuxedo was suddenly just expensive clothing on a man who had not eaten since seven that morning.
“Tell me everything,” he said.
Anna pressed the cold pack harder.
“There isn’t much more.”
“There’s always more when somebody says that.”
Claire glanced between them. “I’m going to get water.”
“There’s water here,” Anna said.
“I know.”
Claire crossed to the kitchenette anyway, giving them the privacy of a room too small to contain any.
Daniel leaned forward, forearms on his thighs. “When did Serena tell you not to play?”
“This morning.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“You were getting married.”
“I’m aware.”
“She was stressed. I thought it was about timing.”
“And before today?”
Anna hesitated.
Daniel watched her face. “Before today?”
“She asked me to play it.”
“When?”
“In May.”
His eyebrows drew together. “She asked you?”
Anna retrieved her phone from the pocket Claire had insisted be sewn into her dress. Her hands were still unsteady, and she entered the wrong passcode twice.
The message thread with Serena was full of wedding details. Shoe colors. Transportation. Questions about Daniel’s childhood. Which relatives needed accessible seating. Whether their mother had preferred white roses or peonies.
Anna scrolled until she found the exchange.
SERENA: I had an idea. What if you played your mom’s song before the ceremony? Just family in the room, maybe while Daniel is waiting outside. It could be your gift to him.
ANNA: Are you sure? He might lose it.
SERENA: That’s sort of the point. In a beautiful way, not a cruel way.
ANNA: I’d like that.
SERENA: Then it’s settled. Keep it secret.
Daniel read the messages twice.
Claire returned with three bottles of water. “I assume that’s not good.”
Daniel handed her the phone.
Claire read the exchange and sat beside Anna again.
“Did she cancel in writing?” Daniel asked.
“No.”
“Did she mention it between May and today?”
“She asked me last week whether I’d practiced.”
Daniel rubbed one hand over his mouth.
Anna scrolled farther.
There it was.
SERENA: You still remember the arrangement, right? I don’t want you freezing up.
ANNA: I remember.
SERENA: Good. It matters to him.
The message had been sent eight days earlier.
Daniel stood and walked to the window. Twenty floors below, traffic moved along the avenue in orderly lines. A delivery truck waited beside the hotel. Pedestrians crossed under umbrellas, though the rain had stopped.
“She asked you last week.”
“Yes.”
“And this morning she told you not to play anything.”
“Yes.”
“What happened between last week and today?”
Anna looked toward Claire.
Claire twisted the cap off a water bottle and did not drink.
“Claire?”
“I don’t know all of it,” she said.
“What do you know?”
“Serena and Anna had an argument at the rehearsal dinner.”
“It wasn’t an argument,” Anna said.
“What was it?”
Anna wished the cold pack were colder. “Serena asked me to change my speech.”
“You’re not giving a speech.”
“I was supposed to.”
Daniel turned from the window. “Since when?”
“Your mother asked me to say a few words,” Claire said.
“My mother is dead.”
“Serena’s mother.”
Daniel stared at her.
Claire grimaced. “I heard it after I said it.”
Anna unlocked her phone again and opened the draft she had written for the reception. It was short. She had worried about it for three weeks, removing sentences whenever they sounded too sentimental.
She had planned to speak about Daniel teaching her to drive, about the way he called every Sunday after their mother died even when neither of them had anything to say, and about Serena making him laugh during the year when laughter had felt disloyal.
Near the end, she had written: Mom used to say love was not finding a person who never touched your grief. It was finding someone who knew when to sit beside it.
Daniel read the line.
“What did Serena want changed?”
“She wanted me to remove Mom.”
“From one sentence?”
“From the speech.”
“All of it?”
Anna nodded.
“She said there were already enough references to her. The flowers, the empty chair, the song.”
“The song she asked you to play.”
“She said she changed her mind.”
“When?”
“Last night.”
Daniel returned the phone.
May you like
“What did you say?”
“I said it would sound strange to talk about you without talking about her.”
