Nobody spoke while Julian scrolled.
He didn’t rush. He read the way I had read on Wednesday, one message at a time, his thumb moving slowly. Once he stopped and closed his eyes for a second, then kept going.
Under the table, Kate found my hand and held it.
Sienna stared at her lap. She didn’t touch the plate. She kept her arms folded over the front of the dress, as if she could hide it now.
Tyler said my name twice.
“Lauren. Lauren.”
I didn’t answer. I watched Julian, because he deserved one person at that table who was looking at him.
The baby kicked. Hard, right under my ribs. I remember thinking, good girl.
Julian set the phone down very carefully, face down, by Tyler’s place.
He stood up. He didn’t look at Tyler at all.
He looked at his wife and said, “Get your coat.”
Three words. He didn’t yell. He didn’t throw anything. He gave her one instruction and walked to the entryway.
He took his coat off the rack, and that’s when he saw the duffel bag under it. He looked at the bag. Then he looked back at me across the room.
“You’ll get your dress back,” he said. Not to her. To me.
Sienna got up. On her way past me, she stopped like she was going to say something.
I looked at her. She kept walking.
They left in separate cars. I heard both engines through the glass wall. Hers first, fast. His a minute later, slow.
Then it was six of us and the candles.
Wes cleared his throat. “Tyler,” he said. “Man. What were you thinking?”
Tyler opened his mouth. Gabe stood up before he could get a word out. “I think we should go,” he said, and Renee was already reaching for her purse.
Nobody shook Tyler’s hand on the way out.
Renee hugged me at the door and whispered, “Call me tomorrow. I mean it.”
Kate stayed a beat longer. She hugged me, carefully, around the baby, and looked back at the photo on the wall.
“I’ll print you a new one,” she said. “Of just you.”
Then it was just the two of us.
Tyler finally found his voice.
“You humiliated me,” he said. “In front of my friends.”
I almost laughed. Of everything he could have said.
“Your bag’s by the door,” I said. “I packed it Thursday.”
He turned and looked at the entryway. At the duffel he’d walked past for three days.
“You knew since Thursday and you let me—“
“Wednesday,” I said. “I’ve known since Wednesday. I packed it Thursday.”
He stood there for a long moment. I think he was waiting for me to cry, so he’d have something to manage. I didn’t give him that.
“It’s our anniversary,” he said finally. As if I’d forgotten.
“I know,” I said. “I set the table.”
He spent our anniversary night at his brother Marco’s.
After the front door closed, I reached across the table, pulled my plate back, and finished my dinner.
It was still warm.
My phone started buzzing at 11:40.
“That was a joke. You know that was a joke.”
“It’s just a dress. You can’t even wear it right now.”
“You’re not thinking clearly. It’s the hormones.”
“Think about the baby.”
That last one made me put my phone face down on the nightstand, the way he used to. I sent everything to the lawyer.
On Monday morning I sat in her office with my swollen ankles up on a chair she pulled over for me. She called Tyler that afternoon.
When I got home, there was a long flat box on my porch.
Inside, in clear plastic from a dry cleaner across town, was my dress. Pressed. The belt folded and pinned to the hanger so it wouldn’t slip.
There was a card tucked under the hanger, in a man’s square handwriting.
“I’m sorry. — J.”
I sat down on the porch step and cried for the first time since Wednesday. Not because of Tyler. Because a stranger had taken better care of my mother’s dress than my husband had.
