Chapter 10
One year after Lena’s birthday dinner, she invited me to another one.
“Small table,” she promised. “You can leave whenever you want.”
“I’ll come,” I said.
We met at a different restaurant. Tasha sat beside me. Ryan arrived with a camera he had bought for his class, and Lena warned him not to photograph anyone until after dessert.
The chair beside me remained empty for my coat.
I noticed it, then laughed at myself.
I had spent a year learning that I could enter a room without preparing to defend where I belonged.
Lena raised her glass.
“This birthday has no speeches about personal growth,” she said. “I just want cake.”
“Finally, a reasonable plan,” Ryan replied.
We ate. We talked about books, work, and Tasha’s son learning to play the trumpet. No one brought up the dinner from the year before.
Later, Lena and I stepped outside for air.
“I used to think I ruined your birthday,” I said.
“You didn’t. Megan made choices, Daniel made choices, and then the truth arrived at my table.”
“I’m glad you came outside.”
“I almost didn’t. I thought it wasn’t my place.”
“It was.”
She took my hand.
“I’m glad you’re here tonight.”
“So am I.”
When we returned, the cake had arrived. Ryan tried to take a picture just as Tasha blew a stray candle out with a napkin. Everyone laughed.
I stayed until the end.
On my way home, I stopped by the bookstore. I had forgotten to bring in a display sign before the forecast rain. The street was quiet. I unlocked the door and turned on the front lights.
Mom’s photograph stood behind the counter. Jules had left a note reminding me about Saturday’s reading night.
I brought in the sign and checked that the windows were closed.
Then I sat for a moment in the chair where Mom used to drink tea after closing.
I thought of the woman I had been a year earlier. She had stood before a table of friends, trying to find a harmless reason her husband let another woman hold him. She was frightened of being called dramatic.
I wished I could tell her she would not have to persuade everyone at that table.
The truth would come. It would hurt. She would make decisions she had once thought impossible.
And she would still laugh at a birthday dinner again.
My phone buzzed.
It was a picture from Lena: all of us around the cake, caught mid-laugh. Ryan’s camera had worked after all.
I saved it.
Then I locked the bookstore and went home.
The green room was warm. A new novel waited beside my chair. I made tea and opened to the page I had marked.
Outside, rain began to fall.
Inside, nothing needed explaining. No one was waiting for me to accept a cruel joke. I had people I trusted, work I loved, and a future I could choose for myself.
I read until I grew sleepy.
Before turning out the lamp, I looked once at Lena’s photograph.
May you like
Everyone in it was laughing.
So was I.
