“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because I wanted to see what she’d do first.”
“She wrote me two weeks ago.”
“And now?”
“Now I know.”
Jerome, Adele’s fiancé, stepped into the kitchen with seating cards in hand and stopped when he saw our faces.
“Bad time?”
Adele looked at him. “My mother texted Dad.”
Jerome set the cards down. “She’s coming?”
“My mother texted Dad.”
“With Harry,” Adele said. “And I need the box.”
I looked at him. “Don’t get dragged into this.”
“I’m marrying into this family in three days,” he said. “I think the dragging already happened.”
Adele touched my arm. “Please, Dad. Let me handle it.”
“You don’t know what that box will do.”
“I know what her lie is already doing.”
“Please, Dad. Let me handle it.”
I looked at my daughter. Still the girl on the stairs somewhere in there, but not little anymore.
“What are you going to do with it?”
“Use it only if she lies.”
“And if she doesn’t?”
“Then it stays closed.”
That seemed fair.
“Use it only if she lies.”
The box was where it had always been, behind old papers and a blanket nobody used. I pulled it down with both hands and carried it back.
“There,” I said, setting it on the table. “Fifteen years.”
On the wedding day, I woke before sunrise.
I was in a small room fighting with my tie when Jerome came in.
“Need help?”
I woke before sunrise.
“I raised six girls,” I said. “You’d think I’d have fabric figured out by now.”
He fixed the knot. “You handled the hard part. Today’s about Adele. But I know what it took to get her here.”
I had to blink hard.
“Take care of her.”
“I will.”
The door opened and Lucille walked in like she was heading into a fight.
“I raised six girls.”
“If Maya makes a scene,” she said, “I’m walking outside before I say something I can’t take back.”
Behind her, Shannon appeared in a soft blue dress, twisting her bracelet.
“Dad?”
“Yeah, baby?”
“Do I have to hug her?”
The room went quiet.
I put both hands on her shoulders. “No. Nobody gets a hug just because they share blood.”
“Do I have to hug her?”
Her shoulders dropped. “Okay.”
Piper kept asking if everyone had eaten, which meant she hadn’t.
