Chapter 7 - County Road Home
The gate at her condo complex stuck halfway and I had to wait in the passenger seat while she leaned out her window and punched the code in again. The headlights caught the rain starting to spot the windshield. My seatbelt cut across the gown and across my belly, and every time I breathed I felt the boning at the side press in.
I hadn't looked at my phone since the ballroom. I could feel it buzzing low in the little clutch on my lap.
"In we go," she said, quiet, like she didn't want to wake the whole building. She drove slow around the loop to the carport at the back. Her guest apartment was over the garage — she'd told me that once at Christmas, that she'd kept it for when family visited. I'd never been up there.
Up the wooden stairs, she carried my clutch and her own purse, and I carried myself. One hand on the rail, one hand under my belly. The motion light clicked on. A gray moth kept hitting it.
Inside smelled like lemon and clean laundry. Small living room, small kitchen with the light already on over the stove. A folded quilt at the end of the couch. She went straight to the thermostat and turned it up, then to the bedroom and pulled back the covers.
"Bathroom's through there," she said. "Towels are clean. Take your time."
I stood in the middle of the living room too long. The chandelier light from the ballroom was still behind my eyes. The music I couldn't hear anymore was still somehow in my shoulders. I slipped off my heels by the door and felt the cool wood under my stockings. That helped more than anything.
She set a T-shirt and a pair of sweatpants on the bed. Men's sweatpants, cut off with scissors at the drawstring frayed. "My late husband's," she said when she saw me look. "They'll be soft. There's a new toothbrush under the sink."
I nodded. "Thank you."
In the bathroom, I had to turn sideways to fit the dress through the door. The fluorescent light was unforgiving. Mascara smudged under both eyes. Hair coming loose at the temples. I worked the zipper down as far as I could reach and then had to stop, arm shaking.
She knocked lightly. "Honey? Can I help with that zipper?"
I opened the door a few inches. She stepped in without comment and eased it down the rest of the way, careful not to catch my skin. The dress loosened and dropped a little off my shoulders. I held it up with one forearm.
"I've got it from here," I said.
When the door closed again, I let the gown fall to the tile and stepped out of it. My legs looked pale and swollen at the ankles. The baby shifted hard to the right, like it finally had room. I put both hands on the sink and breathed until the spot in my chest eased.
I changed into the T-shirt and sweatpants and rolled the waistband down under my belly. I washed my face with the hotel soap she had in the dish. I left the gown where it lay for a minute, then picked it up and hung it over the shower rod so it wouldn't wrinkle into nothing.
The ring caught the bathroom light when I reached for the towel. I turned it around my finger once, then slipped it off. My finger was puffy underneath, a pale band where it had been. I held it in my palm a second too long. Then I set it on the edge of the sink, where I could see it, and left the door open when I came out.
She'd made tea. Chamomile, in a chipped mug. She'd put a glass of water next to it and two crackers on a napkin.
"You don't have to talk tonight," she said.
I sat on the edge of the bed and took the water first. My hands weren't quite steady. On the drive over, I'd kept seeing him across the floor — not his face, just the back of his suit, the way his hand rested low when he danced. He'd done that at the foundation dinner in March when I'd been sick in the bathroom for twenty minutes. At his cousin's wedding when I'd waited by the dessert table alone. Always smiling for the photo. Always finding me after.
I rubbed my thumb over the spot where the ring had been.
"I keep thinking if I make it easier to stay out there with everyone, he'll choose that," I said. "Every time."
She didn't argue with me. She pulled the quilt up over my legs and sat in the chair by the window.
May you like
"I'll be right out there on the couch," she said. "Door stays open unless you want it closed."
I left it open a crack. From the pillow, I could see the ring winking on the bathroom sink in the half-light. I didn't put it back on. I didn't put it away either. I just listened to the rain pick up on the garage roof and to her moving around in the kitchen, and let myself stay where he couldn't find me with music playing.
