Chapter 3 The Woman They Chose for Him #2
"The greeting. As if Signora Benedetti had just arrived."
"I've known Signora Benedetti since I was six years old. She has heard me speak often enough. I don't think she needs me to perform at her."
"It's not performing, darling. It's presentation. The way we speak reflects on the family."
"The way we speak reflects on whether we actually care about the person we're speaking to. Signora Benedetti would see through a scripted greeting in half a second."
Another pause, longer this time. Nadia is studying her coffee cup with great interest.
"I see." Vera's voice is pleasant, but I can hear the steel underneath. "Well. Perhaps your approach works for familiar guests. For the overseas visitors at the launch, we may need something more... refined."
"I'll be polite to the people we meet abroad, too." I reach for the seating diagram and make a small mark, moving the Benedettis closer to center. "For this dinner, I think we should focus on making sure the people we're hosting actually enjoy themselves."
Vera takes the diagram back and redraws the places beside our guests. Nadia's name goes next to Leon's. Mine goes beside the older couple. I have got them seats where they can hear, and somehow I am farther from my husband.
We work through the rest of the arrangements, and I contribute where I can, noting that one guest has stopped eating shellfish and another always asks for sparkling water instead of still.
Small things. Things I know because I pay attention, because I grew up watching these people and learning what they needed.
Vera acknowledges each point with a nod and a note, and Nadia watches it all with an expression I'm learning to recognize as careful neutrality.
I ask Lucia to close the terrace doors before dinner. Then I carry my cold coffee to the kitchen. I need to tell the cook about the shellfish, and I would like to hear my own name without a correction following it.
Later that afternoon, Vera appears in our bedroom while I'm looking through my wardrobe for something to wear to the dinner two nights from now.
"I had some things sent over," she says, laying three dresses across the bed. Cream silk, dove gray, pale blue. All beautiful. All expensive. All nothing like what I would choose for myself. "For the launch events. I thought you might want options."
I look at the dresses, then at my own wardrobe, then back at Vera. "I have clothes."
"Of course you do. But these events require a certain... polish. We want to make the right impression."
"We." I pick up the cream silk, feel the weight of it in my hands. "Did Nadia help you choose these?"
"She offered some suggestions. She has wonderful taste."
I set the dress back down on the bed. "I appreciate the thought, but I think I'll wear the blue dress Leon bought me for our anniversary. The one I wore to the estate dinner last month."
"That dress is lovely for local events," Vera says carefully. "But for international guests..."
"The blue dress," I repeat. "It fits well, it's appropriate, and it's mine. But thank you for thinking of me."
Vera's smile doesn't waver, but something shifts behind her eyes. "Of course, dear. Whatever makes you comfortable."
She leaves the dresses on the bed anyway, and I hang them in the wardrobe beside my own clothes, and I try not to feel like I've won a battle that shouldn't have needed fighting.
***
The dinner is two nights later, a small gathering of neighboring landowners. I wear my blue dress. Vera says nothing about it, but I catch Nadia's gaze lingering on me as we take our seats, and I can't tell if she's judging or simply observing.
The conversation flows easily enough at first.
Leon is charming and attentive, turning from Nadia to the guest on his other side. I do my best to engage with the woman beside me, Signora Benedetti, who has considerably more to say about the almonds than she did to me at the reception. For a little while, I almost forget to be on guard.
Then the man across from me, a red-faced gentleman who has been drinking steadily since the appetizers, leans forward and fixes me with a jovial smile.
"You know, I was just saying to my wife the other day, it must be quite an adjustment for you. Running a house like this when you were raised carrying trays in it."
The table doesn't exactly go silent, but the conversations nearby falter and fade. I feel eyes turning toward me, feel the weight of attention settling on my shoulders like a physical thing.
I look at Leon. He's heard. I can see it in the slight tension of his shoulders, the way his hand has stilled on his wine glass. This is the moment. This is where he says something, where he makes it clear that speaking to his wife this way is not acceptable.
"You should see what she can do with a dinner table," Leon says, his voice light and easy. "Speaking of dinner, did you ever find someone to replace that cook you were telling me about?"
The man blinks, then starts complaining about the trouble of finding someone who will cook the way his mother did.
"My mother taught me to carry a tray," I say. "She taught me to welcome people, too."
He glances back at me. "Of course, my dear."
Then he asks Leon whether he knows of anyone looking for work. I sit with my fork resting against the edge of my plate. There was time for Leon to say something. There is still time.
The woman beside me asks whether there is orange in the cake. I tell her there is, and when she asks for the recipe I promise to write it out. My voice sounds quite ordinary. I can explain how finely to grate the peel while the man across from me complains about his supper.
Leon offers me the bread basket. I take a piece I don't want.
After dinner, when the guests have finally gone and the house has settled into quiet, I sit at my dressing table and begin removing my earrings. In the mirror, I watch Leon come into the room and settle onto the bench near the window, loosening his collar.
"That went well," he says. "Apart from the cook complaints."
"Mm."
"I thought he would never leave."
I set one earring in its box and leave the other beside it, still caught in my hair. When I pull it free, I put it down without looking. "Leon, at dinner. When that man said what he said about me."
"He's always been an ass."
"He said I was raised carrying trays. In front of everyone. And you changed the subject."
"I defused the situation."
"You could have said something. You could have told him not to speak to your wife like that."
Leon is quiet for a moment. "Making a scene wouldn't have helped. It would have made things awkward for everyone, and it would have given him exactly what he wanted, a reaction."
"So I'm supposed to just sit there and take it? While you protect everyone else's comfort?"
"That's not what I..."
"That's exactly what you did." I turn on my stool to face him. "You smoothed things over. You moved on. You made sure the evening wasn't ruined. But you didn't defend me, Leon. You never defend me. You just make it so the moment passes without anyone having to feel uncomfortable."
He opens his mouth to respond, but before he can, my stomach lurches violently and I have to press my hand to my mouth and breathe slowly through my nose until the nausea passes. It's worse than it's been, sharp and sudden, and for a moment I think I might actually be sick.
"Ysabel?" Leon is on his feet, crossing to me. "Are you all right?"
"I'm fine. It's just my stomach again."
"You've been unwell for days. Maybe you should see someone."
"It's nothing. It comes and goes." I take another slow breath and the queasiness subsides to its usual low murmur. "I think I just need sleep."
He helps me to bed, solicitous and gentle, and I let him because I'm tired and because the fight has gone out of me. We lie there without touching, and I listen to his breathing and wonder if he understands anything I said.
My earrings are still on the dressing table, one inside the box and one beside it. I stare at the little bright shape until Leon switches off the lamp.
The next morning, Vera reminds Leon at breakfast that they are expected at a neighboring estate for lunch. "We should leave before noon. Nadia is coming with us."
"I could come," I say. "We haven't visited them together in months."
"That's sweet of you, darling, but I think we'll manage. Besides, you haven't been feeling well. Perhaps a quiet day at home would do you good."
I look at Leon, waiting for him to contradict her, to insist that I be included. But he just nods and says, "She's right. You should rest. We'll fill you in on everything when we're back."
And so I am left behind again.
I spend the day in the house, trying to find things to occupy my time. I walk through the gardens. I flip through a book I can't concentrate on. I sit in the kitchen and talk to the cook about nothing in particular, grateful for the company of someone who doesn't make me feel like an intruder.