Chapter 5 - The Photo From Last Night
The vestry was too warm. That was the first thing I noticed when I actually looked around instead of at Claire. Small room, low ceiling, a couch against the wall that nobody ever sat on, a table with a coffee maker that hadn't been turned on. The stained glass threw a little blue square onto the carpet. Outside that door, sixty people waited in pews and tried not to whisper.
Claire had her hand back near her ear but not touching it now. She watched me, her veil folded over one shoulder. Lily sat on the edge of the bench with her legs not quite reaching the floor, her white dress puffed around her. She wasn't kicking her feet. She was watching me too.
I had my phone in my hand. I hadn't realized I'd pulled it out until the screen lit up.
"Can I just check something?" I said. My voice sounded too loud in that small room.
Claire said, "Mark, what are you doing?"
"I want to be sure," I said. "About yesterday."
Lily said nothing. She just folded her hands in her lap.
My sister had taken the pictures at the rehearsal dinner. She'd sent them late last night in a group text with a heart emoji and a line that said BEST NIGHT. I hadn't looked past the first one. I scrolled now, thumb moving slow, trying to keep my hand steady.
The first photo was all of us at the long table in the back room at Romano's, the Italian place on Main. Claire was laughing at something my dad had said. Her hair was pulled back the same way it was today. I zoomed in.
Her left ear. It was a little blurry at first, but when I pinched the screen it came clear enough.
It wasn't a drop. It was a small round pearl, tight against her earlobe, with a thin gold rim around it. A stud. I stared at it and felt my stomach drop a little.
"Here," I said, and turned the phone so Claire could see.
She didn't take it. She looked and her mouth tightened.
"That's last night," I said. "At the dinner. That's a stud."
Claire let out a breath. "It's the same set, Mark. They come with different backs, you can—"
"No," I said. I kept my voice even. "That's not a drop, Claire. Lily said yesterday it looked different. She was right."
Lily leaned forward just an inch to look at the screen. She didn't say I told you so. She just nodded once, small.
I swiped to the next photo. My sister loved taking detail shots. There was one of the table, one of the cake, and then one that stopped me cold. It was taken at our apartment yesterday afternoon before we left for the dinner. My sister had come early to help Claire with her dress bag. She'd taken a picture of Claire's dress hanging on the closet door, and on the dresser right under it, open, was Claire's little white jewelry box.
Inside that box, clear as day, were the pearl drops. Both of them. Lying on the gray velvet, catching the light from the window.
Yesterday. Before the dinner.
Which meant she hadn't worn them at the dinner. She'd left them in the box and worn the studs instead.
I held the phone out so Claire had to look. I didn't say anything right away. I could hear the wall clock ticking.
Claire looked at the second photo and then away, toward the stained glass. Her hand came up again and hovered near her ear, then dropped.
"Okay," she said softly. "Okay, yes. I wore the studs last night."
"Why didn't you just say that at the altar?" I asked. "Lily said it looked different and you said she was confused."
"I didn't want to make a thing about it," Claire said. She was speaking quickly now, like she was trying to keep it small. "It was just earrings, Mark. I swapped them this morning because the drops go better with the veil. That's all."
I looked down at Lily. "You saw the studs last night, didn't you, bug?"
Lily nodded. "You had the little circle ones," she said to Claire, not mean, just careful. "With the gold around. You told Aunt Jen they were new."
Claire's eyes widened a fraction at that.
I turned the phone off and slid it into my pocket. The weight of it felt heavier than before. It wasn't about studs and drops. It was that there were two photos on my phone that proved Lily had remembered exactly right, and that Claire had stood at the altar and told me, told both of us, that Lily was confused.
And that she'd swapped them overnight without mentioning it, and then covered her ear when Lily noticed.
"Claire," I said, "why swap them without telling me? Why hide it?"
She pressed her lips together. Her eyes went to Lily and then back to me. She didn't answer.
Behind the vestry door, someone coughed in the sanctuary. A chair scraped. The waiting was getting long.
May you like
I sat down on the bench next to Lily and put my hand lightly on her back. She leaned into my side. Claire stood across from us with her veil and her tiara and one earring she wouldn't let anyone touch, and for the first time since I'd put that gold band between my fingers at the altar, I understood this wasn't a mix-up.
This was something she'd decided not to tell me, and she'd kept not telling me until my five-year-old had to point it out in front of our whole family.
