Chapter 16
Adrian saw Serena again eventually.
Not because I arranged it.
Because Chicago is large until family history wants to be inconvenient.
They met at a hotel charity dinner.
Talked.
Then coffee.
Then nothing for months.
I did not ask.
This nearly killed me.
One evening he finally said:
“You’re dying to know.”
“Yes.”
He laughed.
“We’re not getting back together.”
I nodded.
Then:
“At least not now.”
I looked at him.
He smiled.
“See? That face.”
“What face?”
“The one that tries to make decisions without words.”
I hated him.
He was right.
I relaxed deliberately.
“Your life.”
“Yes.”
Then he surprised me.
“I don’t know if I can trust her again.”
“Reasonable.”
“But I don’t hate her.”
“Also reasonable.”
“Grant says that makes me weak.”
“Grant thinks breakfast is political.”
Adrian laughed.
Good.
Then he became serious.
“Mom.”
“Yes?”
“If I ever marry, I don’t want an engagement like that.”
“Excellent.”
“I mean the size. The performance.”
I understood.
Thomas and I had done the same thing.
Large rooms.
Symbolic guests.
Families reading meaning into seating.
We called it celebration.
Sometimes it was.
Sometimes theater trains everyone to watch relationships as power announcements.
“What do you want?”
“Dinner.”
He smiled.
“Maybe twenty people.”
“Fifteen.”
“Mom.”
“Negotiation.”
He laughed.
Not engaged.
No bride.
May you like
Just possibility.
For once, future did not feel like something we needed to arrange before it arrived.
