"Sophie isn't ready."
"Stay."
"What?"
"Stay here. For once, don't decide what happens next."
He stopped.
I held out my hand. "Give me her grandmother's address."
His face tightened. "Sophie isn't ready."
"You have made too many decisions for other people."
Sophie's grandmother lived twenty minutes away.
"She could hate you."
"Maybe. But she gets to decide that—not you."
He looked at me for a long moment, then unlocked his phone.
Sophie's grandmother lived twenty minutes away.
I drove there in my wedding dress with the seatbelt digging into my ribs.
An older woman opened the door.
"You must be Claire."
"Of course he did."
"Is Sophie here?"
She nodded. "She doesn't want to talk to you."
"I figured."
"Nathan called."
"Of course he did."
She almost smiled. "You can sit on the steps."
So I did.
Finally, the door opened behind me.
Ten minutes passed.
Then fifteen.
Finally, the door opened behind me.
