Chương 2 - Một Tuần Trước Lễ Cưới

“Your best friend just put her name next to yours 249 times.”

“She’s an idiot.”

“And you still won’t reprint them.”

“Because it’s irrational.”

I laughed.

“Irrational.”

“Yes.”

He picked up one of the programs from his desk.

He turned it over and looked at my father’s handwriting.

Then he softened his voice.

“Daniel trusted me.”

I felt something cold move through my chest.

“Don’t.”

“He did.”

“Do not use my father right now.”

“I’m not using him.”

“You are.”

“He asked me to take care of you.”

My father had been sick for almost a year before he died.

Toward the end, he had spent more time worrying about me than himself.

Once, while Evan was visiting him in the hospital, Dad took Evan’s hand and told him I was terrible at asking for help.

He said, “She’ll tell you she’s fine long after she stops being fine. Pay attention.”

Evan cried that day.

So did I.

Now he stood in our office with another woman’s name printed above my father’s words and said, “If Daniel were here, he would not want you destroying your marriage over this.”

I opened the office door.

Tessa was back.

Of course she was.

She was sitting on the living room floor with two of Evan’s groomsmen on FaceTime.

One of the programs was held against her chest.

“Look,” she said to the phone. “I’m one typo away from marrying him.”

Someone laughed through the speaker.

Another voice said, “Claire runs, you’re up.”

Tessa threw her head back laughing.

I walked over and ended the call.

She looked up at me.

“What the hell?”

I took the program from her hand.

Then I ripped it in half.

Linda gasped.

Evan came out of the office.

“Claire.”

I tore another one.

Then another.

Tessa jumped to her feet.

“Are you insane?”

“These aren’t being used.”

Evan grabbed my wrist.

“Enough.”

I pulled free.

“No. I’m done.”

He stared at the torn paper on the floor.

Then at me.

His voice got very quiet.

“You’re going to show up next Saturday.”

“You really believe that?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because you care too much about humiliating me in front of three hundred people.”

I stopped moving.

He had said it like he knew me better than I knew myself.

Like my love for him was a weakness he had already calculated.

Tessa stopped smiling.

Even Linda looked uncomfortable.

I said, “You think I’ll let you humiliate me because I’m too considerate to return the favor.”

“That isn’t what I said.”

“It is exactly what you said.”

I picked up my purse.

Evan stepped in front of the door.

“Where are you going?”

“My dad’s shop.”

“What for?”

“To get the things that still belong to me.”

His face tightened.

“Claire.”

I walked around him.

He let me.

My father’s old shop had been closed since he died.

He had owned the narrow brick storefront outright, so I never sold it.

I kept telling myself I would reopen it one day.

Mostly, I used it as a place to store his presses, paper samples, old commissions and letters.

When I rolled up the metal shutter the next morning, the smell hit me immediately.

Paper.

Wood.

Oil.

Dust.

Home.

I sat at Dad’s old worktable for almost an hour before I did anything.

Then I found the wooden printing block he had carved for me when I turned eighteen.

It was small enough to fit in my palm.

A monogram.

C.B.

He used it to stamp the first set of stationery he ever made for me.

I had planned to put it beside his photograph at the wedding.

I was wrapping it in tissue when I heard the front door open.

Evan walked in.

Tessa was behind him.

I actually laughed.

“What is she doing here?”

Tessa held up both hands.

“I came to apologize.”

“No.”

Evan said, “Claire.”

“No. She leaves.”

Tessa’s face hardened.

“I drove forty minutes because he said you were upset.”

“I am upset.”

“Then let me fix it.”

“You can’t.”

She looked around the shop.

“So this is where your dad worked?”

I turned back to the table.

“Don’t touch anything.”

She ignored me.

She picked up a metal type block.

“This place is cool.”

“Tessa.”

“I’m just looking.”

“Put it down.”

She put it down dramatically.

“There.”

Then she saw the carved plate Dad had made from his handwriting for one of his last print runs.

She reached toward it.

I stepped between her and the table.

“Don’t.”

She gave me an irritated look.

“I said I’m trying to help.”

“You can help by leaving.”

Evan sighed behind us.

“Can we all just stop acting like children?”

Tessa looked at the ink station.

Then at me.

“Fine. I’ll prove I can actually use this stuff without destroying your life.”

She grabbed a brayer.

I said, “Put that down.”

She rolled it through a tray of red ink left over from some test prints I had done weeks earlier.

“Tessa.”

“Oh my God, Claire. Relax.”

She rolled it across scrap paper.

Then she reached for Dad’s carved plate.

I grabbed her wrist.

“Stop.”

She jerked away.

The brayer flew sideways.

Red ink splattered across the worktable.

Across a stack of old envelopes.

Across three of my father’s letters.

My brain went blank.