I straightened my jacket and went out onto the terrace.
Part Seven: The Arbor
She was standing just inside the doorway at the top of the garden steps, out of sight of the seated guests, with her mother beside her and the photographer crouched down doing something with the hem.
She looked beautiful.
I am not going to pretend she didn’t.
The string quartet — two women from the Springs Philharmonic, hired for four hours — had started the piece that came before the processional.
Pamela turned and saw me, and smiled, and then she saw over my shoulder that I was alone and that I was not walking toward the arbor, and the smile stayed on her face for about a second longer than it had any business staying.
“Chris? What’s—”
“I need a minute.”
“We’re about to—”
“I need a minute, Pamela.”
Delia said, “I’ll give you two a moment,” and took the photographer by the elbow, and the two of them went down the steps, and I have always been grateful to that woman for how fast she read the room.
I said: “Why was Hannah in the laundry room?”
And here is where I have to be fair, because the version of this that people repeat has Pamela immediately snarling, and that is not what happened, and the truth is worse.
She was good.
Her face did something almost imperceptible — a settling — and then she said, warmly, with real concern:
“Oh, Chris.
Is she all right?”
