Chapter 11
The chair across from me stayed empty and the room noticed it. My mother had taken her clutch and gone toward the hallway with the restrooms, her heels catching a little on the red patterned carpet. I watched her navy dress disappear between two tables and then I looked back at our round table.
The floral centerpiece was still there between us, red and pink roses crowded tight, and on either side of it our champagne flutes sat half full and going flat. The gold rim on my plate caught the chandelier light. My husband's hand was on the white linen, not quite reaching for mine.
For a few seconds we just sat there without an audience. The band was on break. I could hear silverware from the next table and a low murmur that wasn't about us anymore. It felt strange to be alone at a table that had been too crowded ten minutes before.
He turned his chair a little toward me so his knee brushed mine under the table.
"I said 'Mom, don't,'" he said. His voice was low. He didn't look at the other tables when he said it. "That was all I did. I said it like she might listen and then I just stood there while she waved over the MPs."
I nodded. My silver clutch was closed on my lap. I kept my hands on it because I didn't know where else to put them.
"I thought if I kept it quiet it wouldn't get bigger," he went on. "I was thinking about rank and about not making a scene in front of Bennett's staff. And I left you to handle it by yourself."
He swallowed. I could see the tight color along his jaw where he'd shaved that afternoon.
"I should have stepped in front of her," he said. "I should have physically stopped her. I didn't. I'm sorry, Claire."
I had waited all night to hear him say it without someone else listening. My throat got tight and I had to breathe before I answered.
"I needed you to say it sooner," I said. I kept my voice even. "You did say I'm your wife. But I needed it sooner and louder, before she got to the MPs. When you waited, it felt like you were deciding whether it was true."
He didn't flinch. He took that in and let it sit there.
"I know," he said.
"I also know what froze you," I said. "You were standing two feet from a general's table in your dress uniform. You were thinking about protocol and about my mom being your mother-in-law and not wanting to correct an older woman in public. I get that. I don't like it, but I understand it."
He looked down at the table for a moment, at the place card that still had my name on it, propped against the floral arrangement where the server had left it.
"I hated that you had to open your clutch like that," he said. "Like you had to prove you belonged at your own table."
"I hated it too," I said. "But I did it. And Bennett saw it."
He reached over then and covered my hand where it rested on the clutch. His palm was warm. The stubble on his cheek caught the light when he turned back to me.
"Do you want to leave?" he asked. "We can be gone before the toasts. I can get the car and tell the staff we had a family emergency. No one would question it after tonight."
The offer was careful, like he was trying to give me an out without pushing me toward it. I looked at the ballroom doors, at the hallway my mother had gone down, at the empty chair that was still pulled out at an angle.
I thought about walking out into the parking lot and driving home with the dress zipped in the back seat and the whole night sealed as a story I didn't want to tell. It would have been easier to leave.
"No," I said. "I'm not leaving early."
I shifted my hand under his so our fingers laced properly.
"If I leave now, that's what people will remember," I said. "That I was embarrassed and left. I want to stay and finish the evening on my own terms. I want to sit through the toasts and the coffee and let them see me where I'm supposed to be."
He studied my face for a second, then nodded. A small, relieved breath came out of him.
"Okay," he said. "We stay."
"When she comes back," I said, and I glanced toward the hallway again, "we don't do the awkward separate thing. We present as a united front. No more you in the middle and me on one side and her on the other."
"You and me," he said.
"Right," I said. "If she apologizes, we accept it clean and don't drag it out. If she tries to explain it away, we don't argue here. We just stay seated, together. We let the table do the work."
He moved his chair closer so the space between us closed and our shoulders were aligned toward the empty chair, toward the room. He straightened his jacket and I smoothed the blue fabric of my gown over my knees. The diamond necklace rested cool against my skin again.
May you like
From the hallway, I could see the navy dress reappear past the bookcases. My mother was coming back, her clutch held tight, walking slower now. The nearby tables quieted in that small, polite way they do when they notice something.
We stayed seated, our hands still linked just above the linen, the two champagne flutes untouched between us, and waited for her to reach the table.
