‘Armour,’ said Savannah, ‘wow, imagine what I could do if I had armour.’
The call for the TV show came on Friday just as they were heading off for the rehearsal dinner. Chantal answered Rory’s phone.
‘Louise,’ she said, ‘so nice to hear from you.’ Chantal didn’t feel it was that nice to hear from Louise, because she was a little tired of picking up the pieces in connection with Rory’s book, and Louise seemed to be a part of that. Yet it would mean money and money would mean a settled life, would mean them being able to buy a house and – Chantal let out a breath – have a child.
But first, Rory needed to face up to her past and to let it go, to make peace with her family over this book, to stop drinking so much. So much needed to change.
‘Yes, of course I’ll get her for you. It’s the rehearsal tonight for the big wedding.’
‘Gosh, yes,’ said Louise on the phone. ‘Terribly exciting. Take lots of pictures. Put them up on social media. You know we talked about that. Rory’s really got to get it together, it matters a lot in this business.’
‘Yes,’ said Chantal, already feeling like the dismissed spouse.
Rory put down the phone from Louise ten minutes later, her eyes wide.
‘I’m going on a TV show on Friday night, next Friday night,’ she said.
‘Oh lord,’ said Chantal.
‘Yes,’ said Rory, half smiling, half grimacing. ‘To talk about the book, to discuss the deal and what it feels like and how marvellous it is and how there’s interest from Netflix.’
‘Wow,’ said Chantal. ‘This is huge.’
‘Yes,’ said Rory. And then she sank onto their emerald-green couch and suddenly seemed much smaller. ‘Oh, Chantal, what am I going to do? I’m going to have to tell the family.’
‘You are,’ said Chantal. ‘You are going to have to tell the family and you’re going to have to decide in your interviews whether you say this is fact or fiction or a mixture of both, because they’re all in it. They all deserve to read it. I want to read it.’
‘You’re not in it,’ said Rory. ‘It’s not about now, it’s about then.’
‘Everyone remembers their childhood differently,’ said Chantal. ‘I know I do. My brother has one vision, I have another. It’s the way it is. You must make this right before the book gets out there or you will lose them all, Rory, the way you are losing me …’
‘What do you mean, the way I’m losing you?’ said Rory.
Everything stilled in her brain. All thoughts about the book floated away. None of that mattered. What mattered was what Chantal had just said.
‘I love you,’ said Chantal, ‘but I don’t know if we have a future.’
Rory was rarely lost for words, words were her tools, her weapons. The things she used every day and she felt as if she had no words for this conversation.
‘We want different things,’ said Chantal. ‘I want to be with you, to marry you, to have children, a happy home, and that is not going to happen because none of this is on your list. You are content to continue on the way we are. You want the fame and fortune of your book and no children. We are too different. I didn’t realise it for a long time but I do now.’
‘What do you mean I want fame and fortune? I don’t want that.’ Rory tried to work out how to say it. ‘I want to talk about how it was—’
Chantal cut her off: ‘Talking about how it was is one thing, but you have become obsessed. Your life, your childhood, the big secret of Chloe and what that means. You think no other family has secrets. All families have them.’
‘But—’
‘No buts,’ interrupted Chantal. ‘What happened happened to Lori, to your parents, to Chloe. She is happy and she would like to meet everyone. Your father has tried to meet her, he will not be so shocked, and your mother—’ Chantal shrugged. ‘Your mother must know. She is the wisest woman. She must have known that your father was out at night. It is not your trauma, Rory. You are holding the secret, that is all.’
‘But what’s any of this got to do with you leaving me? I love you,’ said Rory.
‘Do you love me enough to have children with me?’
‘Of course,’ said Rory and Chantal stared at her.
‘You’re just saying that to get what you want.’
‘No. No,’ Rory repeated. She thought about how to phrase it. ‘I think that Eden not having children always made me feel that perhaps some of us weren’t good at it, but I’d like to have children with you.’
