Chapter 22
Dinner is surprisingly…lovely.
My father and Maggie look like they did the night of their rehearsal dinner.
There’s no lingering tension between them—though there’s still some in the air, mostly radiating from me.
Perhaps I’m the only one who can sense it: this feeling of something unresolved between me and every other person sitting at this table.
“How do you like your salad?” Maggie asks.
I stop poking through the arugula, forcing myself to eat one of the beets. I don’t know why I ordered this. It sounded nice in theory, with the goat cheese and all, but I forgot that beets taste like dirt.
“It’s okay,” I say.
Jacob watches me, a small tilt to his lips.
She likes insects but she doesn’t like beets, I imagine him thinking. I can almost hear it in his voice. He’d probably say it out loud under different circumstances.
Not now, though. He lifts his glass of water and turns his attention to Maggie. “So,” he says, “should we talk about it? Clear the air?”
Direct, honest, to the point. It’s so like him to handle things this way.
I feel a sharp pinch beneath my breastbone, and I lift my hand, rubbing the spot.
“It looks like you both were able to talk things out,” he continues. “So, is that—were you? Everything’s now…okay?”
Maggie smiles, reaching over and patting Jacob’s hand.
“It will be.” She shares a glance with my father.
“We’re going to stay here for a week,” she says.
“We booked the room for our honeymoon, so we’ve decided we’ll keep the reservation.
Extend the length of it. Take a bit of a break.
I—I’ve already told Ajit all of this, but I should tell you too.
” She looks over at me. “Both of you, really. I didn’t mean to make any of you worry.
I should have checked in sooner. I wasn’t really thinking, I was just reacting.
I had a lot of—well, I’ve lived my life one way for a long time, and there were some things that were said that really made me think. ”
My stomach bottoms out.
“I didn’t know how to process it, and I was just…scared. I think it’s hard, when you’ve been left before…” She trails off, but Jacob steps in.
“I know,” he says, and I remember what he told me. How James’s father—Maggie’s ex-husband—left both of them. How she raised her son alone.
A wave of nausea goes through me.
“Maggie, I’d like to—if we could talk—”
“Yes, of course,” she says. She lifts her napkin off her lap, folding it and placing it behind her.
“Oh, I didn’t mean—we can wait until after dinner, if you prefer.”
“No, it’s all right. We’re all done,” she says. She glances at my plate and gives me a small smile. “I think you’re done with that too.”
Her dry tone pulls a surprised laugh out of me, and I follow her lead, leaving my napkin on the chair.
“We’ll be back in time for dessert,” she tells the men, and then she puts her hand through my arm as we leave the dining room.
We’re barely back in the lobby before the words tumble out of me.
“I’m sorry,” I tell her. “I had too much to drink that night, and I had no business talking to you that way. Or saying any of that.” I swallow.
“I’ve seen these last few days how different my father is with Jacob, how worried he was about you, and I…
” The words leave me as quickly as they came, and I stop, uncertain.
“It’s all right,” she says, her voice soft.
She squeezes my upper arm gently. “I’m sorry too.
” She looks at me, faint lines around the corners of her mouth, and there’s something sad about the way she regards me.
“I know I was pushy, with the things I said about your father, about getting to know him again, but I realized—you know a version of him that I don’t.
And I think, well, I found it concerning.
He’s always been honest about what happened, about his regrets—and he does regret it, Neelu.
Deeply.” She pauses. “I don’t know if you two have had a chance to talk about it, and it’s all right if—it’s not my place—”
“We did,” I tell her. “A little.”
She lets out a breath, some of the tension on her face relaxing.
“Good,” she says. “I’m glad.” She goes quiet again for a moment.
“I think…even though I knew about it, even though Ajit had told me everything, it was different hearing it from you. When you said—when you talked about how you felt like he’d left you, all I could think, all I could see, was James.
He—” She stops, blinking quickly. “I saw him as a child. Broken. Wondering why his father had left him. Why he’d left us.
And I’d stood there with no answers, no way of making it better. And it was—”
She clears her throat, her voice thick, and my heart cracks in two.
“Maggie, I’m so sorry. I never meant to—”
“No,” she says. “None of it was—it made me think.” She blinks again and offers a small smile.
“I know Ajit is different now, that he’s not the same person he was then.
I know that, but in that moment, I panicked.
And I kept thinking about James, and how he felt, and how he wasn’t here, and I thought about you.
How you must have felt then, how you feel now, and none of it felt right. The wedding. It was all too much.”
“I understand,” I say. “And Jacob told me a little about James’s dad, and—” I think about my father buying me chocolate when I was a kid, never missing an important graduation, trying to be there for the big life moments, showing up even when things were strained and awkward, watching my show.
It wasn’t enough. It wasn’t what I needed from him.
But it was something. James’s dad completely disappeared, but at least, in some small way, mine somewhat tried.
“And I know they’re not the same,” I tell her.
“That my father—” My throat tightens. “He loves you, Maggie. I don’t know everything, but I’m sure of that. ”
She blinks again, her eyes shining, and leans toward me, wrapping me in a hug.
“Thank you,” she says, pulling back. “And I do not want to overstep. I know last time we spoke, I did, and it doesn’t excuse anything he’s done, or anything he hasn’t made right, but he loves you too, Neelu. So much.”
And now my eyes prick, tears forming, blurring my vision.
“Yeah,” I say, a little stunned that I’m agreeing. A little stunned that I believe it. “I know.”
—
My father sends us a sheepish look when Maggie and I return to the table.
“Sorry,” he says. His expression shifts, becoming almost apprehensive when he looks at me. “We ordered without you.”
Maggie waves a hand, settling back into her seat beside him. “We can forgive that,” she says. “But it depends on what you ordered.”
I sit back down next to Jacob. Under the table, I feel his knee press against mine.
Our eyes catch. You okay? he seems to ask, and I nod just the tiniest bit.
“Yes,” I say, looking back at my father. “What did you order?”
“Well, Jacob ordered—”
“Cranachan,” Maggie says with a smile.
Jacob laughs, and my chest warms. I bump his knee softly.
He bumps mine back.
“And Ajit ordered—” Jacob pauses for a long moment, waiting for Maggie to answer.
She glances at my father. “You usually never order dessert.”
“No,” he says. He rounds his shoulders a bit as the waiter stops by, dropping off a plate and a parfait glass. The glass is filled with layers of cream and raspberries. The plate is—
“Chocolate cake?” I ask.
“Yes.” My father glances at me, uncertain. “For you. I don’t know if you want it. I just thought, you like chocolate, so—”
My throat grows tight. “No. I mean, yes. I do.” I reach for a fork, and he pushes the plate toward me.
I take a bite, savoring the rich, deep taste. “It’s good,” I say, swallowing, my throat still tight, and my father smiles wide.
I didn’t understand it before. I still don’t, really. Why my father can’t simply talk to me, tell me how he feels. But I know him a little better now. I understand that this is some kind of gesture, the same way him handing me chocolate when I was a kid was.
It doesn’t make up for all the other stuff, but he’s trying, in this small way.
I smile back at my father, and out of the corner of my eye, I catch Maggie’s grin. “Can I?” she asks, reaching for the plate. And I push it toward the center of the table, letting her try some.
“You want some of this?” Jacob asks, passing the parfait to me.
Maggie’s brows rise. “Jacob sharing cranachan? I never thought I’d see the day.”
Jacob laughs. “I am not that selfish, Maggie.”
“Ordinarily, no,” she responds, “but when it comes to cranachan?” She shakes her head playfully. “Have you ever tried it, Neelu?”
“Cranachan?” I pick up my spoon, dipping into the cream and raspberries. I pause before putting it in my mouth, my eyes finding Jacob’s as I wrap my lips around it. “I have,” I say, after I swallow. “Once.”
Jacob’s eyes flash.
“Hmm,” Maggie says, a little too knowingly.
I snap forward to face her again, heat rushing to my face.
“And what are you two planning?” she asks.
I feel Jacob jump beside me, his leg jerking, pulling away from mine. “What do you mean?”
“Well, Ajit and I will be staying for a week, but I imagine you two need to get back?”
“Uh.” Jacob’s gaze flits to me, then away. “Fall semester won’t start for another two weeks, but yes. I think I should get back home. Prepare for things.”
“And I need to return the rental car,” I say. “And then…I need to get back home too.”
My father starts. “You’ve rebooked your return flight?”
“No. Not yet. But I will. When I get back to the room tonight.”
Jacob goes stiff beside me. He’s only a few inches away, but there’s no part of our bodies in contact anymore. It feels like he’s a mile away.
“Well, that’s great,” Maggie says, clapping her hands together, drawing my attention back to her.
It is?
My father’s mouth tilts down into a frown. “What do you mean?” he asks.
“They’re both going to the same place,” Maggie says, looking between me and Jacob. “You’ll be able to drive together. Back to Aberdeen.”
“Oh,” I say. “Yeah.”
My pulse picks up as I feel a flicker of hope. I’ve been trying not to think past tonight, but if we drive back together, we’ll have hours on the road. And when we reach Aberdeen, then…I don’t need to fly back right away. I could have another night. Maybe fly back the next morning.
“I wouldn’t want to impose,” Jacob says. He reaches for the cranachan again, taking another spoonful.
“You wouldn’t be,” I tell him. “I’m driving there anyway.”
“It’s settled, then,” Maggie says with a smile, but I don’t feel the same kind of joy that’s obvious in her voice.
Because Jacob doesn’t look happy about this return trip. And I think I understand why.
A few more hours won’t change anything. It’ll only delay the inevitable.
“You don’t have to,” I tell him. “If you’d rather take the train back—”
“No,” he says. He licks some of the whipped cream off his spoon, and my insides melt, warmth spreading through me.
The corner of his mouth ticks up.
“I’d love to go home with you,” he says.
“Great,” I croak, and he looks down at his parfait, hiding his smile behind his spoon.