Chapter 16
I saw Isabetta at Clara’s wedding.
Invited by Dominic.
Not by me.
Fine.
She stood near the back when Clara entered wearing Rosamund’s gown.
Her face changed.
Not jealousy.
Something like relief.
Later she found me outside.
“She looks nothing like Rosamund.”
“No.”
“Good.”
I understood.
The gown had stopped being a ghost costume.
It belonged to a living woman doing something new.
Isabetta asked:
“Did you ever wish we tried again?”
I thought.
“No.”
She nodded slowly.
“Me neither.”
That surprised me.
Then she smiled.
“I wished you would ask.”
Different.
Validation.
Not relationship.
“I’m glad I didn’t.”
“So am I.”
Good.
She had married no one.
Neither had I.
Not tragic.
Just life.
She worked with Dominic now on mentoring younger family members who made mistakes before those mistakes became identity.
Appropriate.
Sebastian called it dramatic guilt management.
I called him insufferable.
Then Isabetta said:
“I still dream about that room sometimes.”
“The blue room?”
“Yes.”
“What happens?”
“You open the door.”
“And?”
“Nothing is inside.”
Interesting.
Maybe healing.
Maybe brain being weird.
Not everything needs interpretation.
She looked toward the ballroom.
“Celandine saved me too.”
I raised an eyebrow.
“By exposing you?”
“Yes.”
Good.
Then:
“I would have married you with that lie still growing.”
That was true.
Better to lose the future than build it around rot.
We returned inside separately.
Clara danced badly.
Rosamund would have approved.
Maybe.
May you like
Maybe not.
I no longer needed certainty.
