Chapter 8: Diane
She didn't come inside.
She stood at the gate for perhaps ten seconds — long enough for Kevin to go still beside me, long enough for me to feel his hand tighten around mine.
Then she turned and walked back the way she'd come, and the gate swung shut behind her.
Kevin let out a long breath.
"That was her," I said.
It wasn't a question.
"Yes."
"She left."
"Yes."
I watched the empty gate.
"She came anyway.
After your mother called her."
"I know."
"She wanted to see."
Kevin didn't answer that.
I think because there was no answer that wouldn't hurt one of us.
I let go of his hand.
"I need a minute."
I found a quiet corner near the garden wall, away from the band, away from the lights.
Donna appeared beside me thirty seconds later as if she'd been watching for exactly this.
"I saw," she said.
"I'm fine."
"I know you are.
I'm just standing here in case you're not."
I looked at the garden.
The dancing.
Kevin still standing where I'd left him, not moving, watching me from across the space.
"She came," I said.
"Patricia called her off and she came anyway."
"Some people need to see things for themselves."
"She waited three years for Patricia to come around.
Kevin told me." I paused.
"I almost feel sorry for her."
"You're allowed to feel sorry for her and still be angry."
"I'm not angry at her." I thought about it.
"I'm angry that she was used.
That Patricia called her like a card she could play."
Donna was quiet for a moment.
"What are you going to do?"
"About Diane?
Nothing.
She left.
It's done."
"About Patricia."
I looked across the garden at the dessert table.
Patricia was there again, laughing with Kevin's cousins, champagne glass refilled, every inch the gracious mother of the groom.
"Kevin said we'd talk to her.
Properly.
After tonight."
"And if talking doesn't change anything?"
I didn't answer immediately.
Kevin had started walking toward me.
Steady.
Unhurried.
He reached me and stood close, not touching, just present.
"She came," he said.
"I know."
"I'm sorry."
"It's not your fault."
"It's partly my fault.
I let this go on too long." He looked at the gate.
"I kept thinking she would adjust.
That she would see what I see." He stopped.
"She's not going to adjust on her own."
"No," I said.
"She's not."
"So we make a boundary.
A real one.
With real consequences."
"What does that look like?"
"It looks like what I should have done two years ago." He turned to face me fully.
"She gets one conversation.
We tell her exactly what we need.
We tell her what happens if she doesn't respect it.
And then we hold to it.
No exceptions."
"She'll push back."
"I know."
"She'll make you feel like you're choosing between us."
"I know that too." He held my gaze.
"I've already chosen.
I chose the moment I pressed play in that bridal suite.
I just need to make sure she understands that it wasn't a performance.
That it doesn't reset tomorrow."
Donna slipped away quietly.
Neither of us noticed her go.
The band was playing something slow.
Around us, the reception moved on — toasts, laughter, the comfortable noise of people who were happy and didn't know anything had nearly gone wrong tonight.
Kevin held out his hand.
"Dance with me."
I took it.
We moved back onto the floor.
His hand was warm at my back.
The lights were soft.
Somewhere behind us, Patricia watched.
I could feel it.
But I stopped looking for her.
I looked at Kevin instead.
"One conversation," I said.
"And then we hold the line."
"Together," he said.
"Together."
The song played on.
I let myself be there — fully, finally — in the middle of the life I had built from nothing, from the wreckage of a girl who had once thought she couldn't survive without something that was destroying her.
I had survived.
I had built.
May you like
I was standing here.
And I was not going to let anyone tie corks to that.
