“The Sullivan-O’Rourke alliance would have been so beneficial,” Aoife continues, her voice taking on a slightly wistful quality. “For both families. The development deal alone—well. I suppose love conquers all.”
She smiles when she says it. The smile of someone who knows exactly how far into my flesh her barbs are sinking.
“Cillian has always had a soft heart for underdogs and strays,” Kathleen says, rejoining the conversation. “Even as a boy. He once brought home an injured crow and kept it in his room for a week.” A small, fond smile.
Underdogs and strays. An injured crow.
I think about what Cillian said this morning.You areenough.I try to hold onto it. I try to hold the warmth of it against what’s happening now.
It’s harder than I expected.
The food arrives. I pretend to eat. I smile at the right moments. I ask a question about the children’s hospital that turns out to be the right question, and for a few minutes, the conversation expands away from me and I can breathe.
Then Aoife reaches for her phone.
“I was just thinking,” she says, “I have a picture from last year’s gala that Cillian and I attended together.” She turns the screen toward me. “You might enjoy seeing it.”
I look.
Cillian is in a tuxedo, the dark kind that makes him look like he could be on a billboard in Times Square selling men’s cologne. He’s standing with one hand in his pocket, the easy posture of a man who belongs everywhere he stands. And beside him is Aoife—her auburn hair swept up, a gown in deep emerald that makes her eyes look lit from inside. They’re both turned slightly toward each other. They’re not touching, but they look like they’re about to.
They’re both gorgeous, and they complement one another just right. They look like the perfect couple. Wealthy, attractive, sophisticated, and born to attend galas and fundraisers.
“Everyone assumed it was only a matter of time before he proposed,” Aoife says. Her voice is very soft. “Imagine our surprise when…you happened.”
You happened.Like I’m an accident. Or a weather event.
I hand the phone back.
“It’s a lovely photo,” I say.
I don’t look at myself in the mirror on the far wall, but I know what I’d see. A girl in a borrowed life. A girl whocounts steps and ceiling tiles and stitches in tablecloths because it’s the only way she knows to stay calm. A girl who slept in a closet the first night Cillian brought her home.
Kathleen is watching me now. I can feel it.
I pick up my water glass. I take a slow sip. I set it down in exactly the same spot.
You’re enough. Cillian’s words made me feel good at the time.
But what does that mean? Not you’re the best. Not you’re amazing. Just…enough.
This whole atmosphere is foreign. A women’s luncheon at a country club? I can honestly say I never expected to participate in anything like this. This is for women who have earned graduate degrees from colleges like Northwestern. Not a woman who waited tables at the local diner through high school to keep the utilities on and ate moldy food to stop her stomach from growling.
But it’s more than not fitting in. I’m in enemy territory.
Kathleen and Aoife are what I’d consider hostiles. They’ve been doing this their entire lives—this particular kind of dismantling. The kind that leaves no marks. The kind that sounds like pleasant conversation but is fraught with verbal landmines. And I have no armor for it.
I smile at something the woman to my right says about a Spring fundraiser.
I count the number of diamonds on her wedding band. The number of water glasses on the table.
I think about the look on Cillian’s face this morning when he kissed my forehead before I got in the car.
By the time coffee is served, I’ve catalogued every exit. Two doors to the dining room, one to a hallway, one to the terrace. I’ve counted everything in sight, and I’ve smiled eleven times without meaning a single one of them.
Aoife is telling a story about a trip to Dublin. Kathleen is laughing.
I look at my reflection in the window.
