15. Clarence #2
Charly’s mother is standing between us and the bar, purse clutched in front of her, wearing that face Charly’s described to me a dozen times. The one that means someone’s about to be put back in their place.
She stops right in front of Charly. Doesn’t look at me once.
“I hope you’re pleased with yourself.” Low, controlled, every word aimed.
“I asked you to come home. I asked you to make peace with your sister and let this family heal. And instead you’re out here wearing another man’s ring, making a spectacle of yourself, making sure nobody ever forgets what happened. ”
“Not here, Julie.” I step forward. She doesn’t even glance my way.
“I’m not talking to you.” Her eyes stay on Charly. “My family is falling apart in public and my daughter is out here pouring gasoline on it. Your sister lost a baby, Charlotte. She’s alone in that apartment and you’re at a party with a ring on your finger. Does that not bother you at all?”
“Don’t use the baby to guilt me.” Charly’s voice drops and her jaw sets. “I sent flowers. I sat with her at the cemetery. I told her to leave him. What did you do, Mom? Did you even ask her how she’s doing, or did you just come here to yell at me?”
Julie’s mouth snaps shut. Her eyes cut to the room, to the donors watching, running the math on how this looks.
“You should be ashamed of yourself.”
“You slapped me across the face the last time you said that.” Charly doesn’t blink. “You want to try it again here? In front of all these people?”
The color drains out of Julie’s face.
“Go home, Mrs. Scott.” My voice is quiet. “This is my event. You’re not doing this here.”
She looks at me for the first time. “You don’t get to tell me what to do with my own daughter.”
“I’m not telling you what to do with your daughter. I’m telling you you’re not welcome in my venue, harassing my fiancée, at my event.”
Charly’s hand finds mine. Squeezes.
Julie looks between us. At the ring. At our hands. Whatever she sees there, she doesn’t have an answer for it.
“You’re going to regret this, Charlotte. Both of you.”
She turns and walks out. Heels clicking. Door shutting. Gone.
Charly’s grip on my hand tightens.
“You okay?”
“Same as always after a visit from my mother.” She lets out a breath. “Nope. But I will be.” She squeezes once more. “Let’s finish this.”
We do another hour. The ring keeps doing its job. Gerald’s relaxed. Two donors who went cold are warming up. The word fiancée moves through conversations and the story tells itself.
And the whole time, her hand keeps finding mine. Not for the room. Not for the cameras. Just because.
It happens during the last round of goodbyes.
She pulls me sideways into a hallway off the main room. Dim, empty, the reception just noise through the wall.
“What are you doing?”
“I need thirty seconds where I don’t have to smile at anyone.” She leans back against the wall and closes her eyes and lets out a long breath. “We pulled it off. Did you see Gerald’s face? Margaret’s going to tell every person she’s ever met by tomorrow.”
“Yeah, we pulled it off.”
“You don’t sound happy about it.”
“I’m happy. I’m just trying to figure out which parts tonight were for them and which parts were for us.”
She opens her eyes. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Your hand was on my arm all night. And half the time nobody was around to see it.” I take a step closer.
“Nobody was watching in the elevator. Nobody was watching when you fixed my collar outside the bathroom. Nobody was watching when you leaned into me during Gerald’s toast and stayed there for a full minute after he was done talking. ”
Her back is against the wall and I’m close, closer than I need to be, and she’s not moving. Not an inch. If anything she’s tipped toward me, chin up, like the space between us is a dare neither of us will say out loud.
“That was just for show,” she says, but her voice has gone low and unsteady, nothing like the bright version she used on the donors all night. “Back there. That was the act.”
“Charly. There was nobody back there to act for. It was just us in a hallway.” I brace one hand on the wall above her shoulder, and she watches me do it, and she still doesn’t move.
“Okay, well.” Her eyes drop to my mouth and come back up, and she has to know I caught it. “You shouldn’t be standing this close, then.”
“You’re not exactly stepping back.”
“I’m working up to it.” She doesn’t move. Her breathing’s gone shallow, and the pulse in her throat is going as fast as mine. “Give me a second.”
“Take all the time you want.” It comes out rough. “Say the word and I’m gone. I mean it.”
She doesn’t say it.
Her hand comes up to my jaw, slow, like she’s giving me every chance to stop her and hoping I won’t take it. Her thumb traces along the edge of it, and my eyes close, and the whole hallway narrows down to that one warm point of contact.
“This isn’t part of it,” she says quietly, her forehead almost against mine now. “Whatever this is. It’s not for them.”
“No. This one’s just mine.” I turn my face into her palm before I can stop myself, and she goes still, and then her fingers curl against my skin like she felt it too.
She pulls me down and kisses me.