"Cass, I didn't—I didn't know."
"Nobody does. That's sort of the point." She gives me a small, crooked smile. "But I'm not telling you so you'll feel sorry for me. I'm telling you because I've thought about this exact thing more than anyone alive, probably." She leans back against the mirror and smiles sadly in my direction. "And here's what I figuredout: There's a very, very essential difference between a man whochoseto hurt you and a man who's hurtingforyou."
I don't say anything. It's hard to reply when someone's busy scrambling your brain so effectively.
"Did Afon want to hurt your family?" she questions. "Was that the plan? Get in, ruin the Oglethorpes, watch you cry over their graves and cackle like a supervillain?"
"No," I say, shaking my head. "No, I think it was all just… You know how one desperate choice leads to another? I think it was something like that. Grief just makes us all stupid, I guess."
Cass nods, as if that's exactly what she figured I'd say. "So he made one decision," she says. "Twenty years ago. Out of his mind with grief, chasing the people who murdered his wife, desperate, alone, and he went to your dad. And it spiraled. And then it kept spiraling, bigger and bigger, until,boom,it rocks your world." She fixes me with a glance. "Just curious: Did he tell you he was sorry?"
It takes me a moment to remember the details of our conversation. I think my brain wants to blot it all out and erase it from the record. "He told me there was nothing to forgive because there was no making it right." I let out a tear-stained laugh. "And that he'd rather I walk out hating him with the truth than stay loving a man who never existed."
To my surprise, that makes her smile from ear to ear.
"Caroline, you crazy girl," she says finally, "do you understand how rare that is?"
"What?"
"A man who tells you the worst possible truth about himself when lying would have been so, so easy…" She shakes her head slowly. "He could have told you anything. There's a billion people he could plausibly blame. But he took the burden on himself, let you know thathewas the villain. Even though he also knew damn well that it would make you run for the hills. Or, well, maybe run for the beach. I get the feeling you're sick of heights." She laughs pleasantly and smiles at me again, full of wisdom I never knew she had. "Men lie about everything. Trust me, I know better than most. But the one man with the most reason in the world to lie to you—he told you the truth. The one that costs himyou."
I stare at the floor. I can't even cry, because I'm not even sure that what's happening right now qualifies as "sad." It's just… a lot, I guess. It's so much. Too much. My heart can't take this many simultaneous feelings.
Because Cass is right.
Afon told me. Over and over, in a hundred ways, from the very first day, he told me exactly who he was and exactly what was coming. He never once pretended to be a good man.
"He told me at the beginning," I say slowly. "He said it would break my heart, and that he was going to make me leave before that could happen."
"Yet you didn't leave," Cass infers. "Why not?"
The answer is obvious. "Because I'd already started to love him."
Another wise woman grin. Cass reaches over and takes my hand. "The way I see it, we're not concerned anymore with what Afon did or did do. The question is, what areyougonna do about it? Can you love an imperfect man?"
"I'm just so mad at him, though," I protest.
She laughs like I just told the world's best joke. "Damn right you are! But guess who's even madder at him than you are?" She waits a second before she delivers the only possible punchline. "He is, of course. Honey, he's tortured himself for a long time now because of what he did. He quite literally turned himself into a hermit. But then you come stumbling along—literally, from what I hear—and suddenly, the man who swore he'd never want something ever again finds himself wantingyou.It's no wonder he kept trying to give you back. He doesn't think he's allowed to have you. You get to decide whether or not that's true."
I'm crying again. But it's different this time. It's not the scooped-out, rotten-wound crying from the hallway last night. These tears come from somewhere deeper, somewhere that's been clenched tight for days.
"He's so stupid," I sob. "He's such a stupid, brave idiot."
Cass laughs and pulls me into a hug, careful of the silk dress. "They all are. Every single one of them. It's a whole epidemic in this family. You'll fit right in."
The others come back in eventually. Rae with red eyes of her own, like she'd been doing some crying in the hall, and Jillian with a fresh bottle of champagne.
"Ladies, are we okay?" Rae asks gently.
I look at myself in the mirror. The dress is beyond gorgeous, but my face above it is puffy from crying, blotchy, red, just a straight up mess.
And yet…
I've got my mom's bright eyes. My dad's strong chin. And the eyes are shining and the chin is high and proud, just like they taught me.
They're here with me, in their own way. I think I can live with that.
"Yeah," I say. I'm surprised to find I mean it. "I think we're okay."
