Chapter 5 #5
The living room seemed to shrink around her: gifts, flowers, tissue paper, the vanilla candle unlit on the mantel, the bracelet open in her lap like a question.
A minute later, another text arrived.
Adrian at Bell & Wren: Lara said timing is tight before the wedding, but this should be simple.
Ella’s hand tightened around the phone.
Upstairs, water ran in the shower.
Across the hall, Lara moved around in the guest room, packing boxes, preparing to leave.
Two weeks, Ella thought.
No.
Less now.
Less than two weeks.
She could wait it out. She could ignore the text. She could tell Lara not to give out her number. She could tell Noah and watch his face do that careful concerned thing. She could tell Carolina and receive a response involving knives.
The choices crowded her.
Then the front door opened.
Ella looked up.
Lara came in carrying an empty box from the porch. She stopped when she saw Ella with the bracelet in her lap.
“Oh,” Lara said. “Did Adrian text?”
Ella stood.
The bracelet box slid shut in her hand. “Yes,” she said.
Lara smiled, relieved, not noticing yet. “Good. He’s wonderful. I knew he’d respond quickly.”
“I didn’t ask you to contact him.”
The sentence was quiet.
Lara’s smile faded. For a moment, neither woman moved.
Then Lara said, “I know. I’m sorry. I thought—Margaret seemed anxious, and you said sure when she said I could send the name.”
“Sending a name is not giving a stranger my phone number.”
“No. You’re right.”
“I hadn’t decided if I wanted to use him.”
“Of course.” Lara set the cardboard box down slowly. “I should have checked.”
“Yes.”
“I’m sorry.”
Ella nodded.
There was nowhere for the apology to go. It sat there between them, accurate and useless.
Lara’s face paled a little. “I really was only trying to make it easier.”
“I know.”
That was the thing.
Ella did know.
And she was beginning to hate how little that helped.
Noah came downstairs in sweatpants and a T-shirt, towel still around his neck. He stopped at the bottom step, eyes moving from Lara to Ella to the bracelet box in Ella’s hand.
“What happened?”
Lara spoke first. “I overstepped.”
Ella looked at her.
Lara did not embellish. Did not cry. Did not defend herself.
“I gave Adrian Ella’s number about the bracelet without asking,” she said. “I thought I was helping, and I should have checked.”
Noah looked at Ella.
The fact that Lara had told the truth should have made Ella feel better.
Instead, she felt cornered by her own pettiness. What could she say now? Lara had named it. Lara had apologized. Lara had made herself small enough that any further anger would look excessive.
Ella’s throat tightened. She wanted to be alone. She wanted Carolina. She wanted the house she had before the doorbell rang weeks ago. She wanted to wear Noah’s father’s bracelet without picturing it clasped around Lara’s wrist.
“I’m going upstairs,” she said.
Noah reached for her hand. “Do you want me to come?”
Yes.
No.
If he came, Lara would stand there wounded in the living room. If he stayed, Ella would hate that too.
“I just need a minute.”
She went upstairs before either of them could answer.
In the bedroom, she shut the door and sat on the edge of the bed. Then she sent screenshots of Adrian’s texts.
Carolina called immediately.
Ella answered.
“Before you say anything,” Ella whispered, “she apologized. She told Noah herself. She said she overstepped.”
Carolina was quiet for exactly one second.
Then she said, “Helpful people ask before they take your choices away.”
Ella closed her eyes.
Downstairs, voices murmured. Noah’s and Lara’s. Too low to understand.
“She’s moving soon,” Ella said.
“I know.”
“I can get through it.” Ella pressed the heel of her hand to her chest, where something hurt. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”
“Nothing is wrong with you.”
“I keep reacting to tiny things like they’re big things.”
“They’re big because they keep happening.”
Ella heard movement in the hall and lowered her voice further. “I don’t want to become suspicious and ugly.”
“Suspicion is not ugliness when someone keeps crossing lines.”
A soft knock came at the bedroom door.
Ella looked up.
Noah’s voice came through. “El?”
“I have to go,” she whispered.
“Send me everything,” Carolina said. “Even the things you think are stupid.”
Ella ended the call and opened the door.
Noah stood there alone. His face was serious. He stepped into the bedroom and closed the door behind him. “She knows she messed up,” he said.
Ella looked away.
“I know that’s not enough,” he added quickly.
Her eyes stung. He came closer but did not touch her. “I told her no more. No more handling anything connected to the wedding. No more calling people. No more solving things before asking. I was clear.”
“Did she cry?”
“No.”
Ella let out a breath she had not known she was holding.
“She wanted to,” he said. “I think. But she didn’t.”
“That’s something, I guess.”
“I also told her she needs to talk to the landlord about moving in earlier, even if she has to sleep on an air mattress.”
Ella looked at him sharply. “Noah.”
“I didn’t kick her out.”
“It sounds like you did.”
“No. I told her this isn’t working for you anymore. For us.”
Us.
She wanted to trust the word.
He reached for her then, carefully, and when she did not pull away, he took her hands.
“I should have said it sooner,” he said.
Ella’s anger, which had been wandering the room looking for somewhere safe to land, turned toward him.
“Yes. I’ve been trying so hard not to be unfair.”
“I know.”
“And I kept telling myself each thing was small.”
“I know.”
“But it’s my phone. My wedding. My dress. My bracelet. My house.” Her voice broke on the last word, which made her angrier. “And somehow every time I say that, I feel like I’m being cruel to someone who’s sad.”
Noah’s face looked stricken. “You’re not cruel,” he said.
“She’s your best friend.”
“You are my fiancée.” The words came quickly, fiercely.
Ella looked at him.
He squeezed her hands. “That should have been clearer in this house. I’m sorry it wasn’t.”
She wanted to fall into that apology. She also wanted to throw it back at him because apologies did not unmake the last two weeks. Instead, she stood very still. “I don’t want to talk anymore about this tonight.”
“Okay.”
“I’m tired.”
“Okay.”
“I don’t want you to go downstairs and comfort her.”
Noah’s expression flickered.
There. There it was. The reflex. The pull of Lara’s hurt. The old muscle of care.
He saw that she saw it.
Then something in his face firmed.
“I won’t.”
Ella’s throat tightened.
He reached for the extra blanket at the end of the bed and unfolded it. “I’ll stay here.”
“You don’t have to babysit me.”
“I’m not.” He set the blanket over her lap. “I’m choosing where I belong.”
The sentence was almost enough.
Almost.
She let him sit beside her.
For a long time, neither of them spoke.