The laughter intensified.
I sat frozen. My face burned with a heat that started in my chest and consumed me. My heart hammered against my ribs like a trapped bird. I gripped my napkin under the table, twisting the fabric until my fingers ached.
Used goods. Dented car.
I looked at my mother, begging her with my eyes to say something. To be a mother. She took a sip of her wine, her hand trembling, and looked away.
That betrayal hurt more than the insult.
I wanted to vanish. I wanted the floor to open up and swallow me whole. I thought of Milo, sitting just twenty feet away, happily drawing a spaceship, oblivious to the fact that his existence was the punchline to a cruel joke.
I prepared to do what I always did. Swallow it. Smile. Pretend it didn’t bleed.
But then, the chair scraped against the floor.
The sound was harsh, violent in the laughter-filled room. Dylan stood up. He didn’t look at Tessa. He didn’t look at Reuben. He pushed his chair back with enough force that it wobbled. The laughter died instantly. Forks paused mid-air. The silence that followed was heavy, suffocating, and dangerous. Dylan turned his body, ignoring his fiancée completely, and began to walk slowly, deliberately, down the length of the table—straight toward me.
Dylan didn’t rush. His steps were measured, heavy on the plush carpet. The silence stretched so thin I thought it might snap and whip us all.
Tessa blinked, her smile faltering. “Dylan? Honey, are you doing a toast too?”
He ignored her. He walked past his future father-in-law, past the aunts and uncles, until he was standing directly beside my chair. The scent of him—clean soap and cedar—washed over me, replacing the stifling smell of expensive perfume.
He looked down at me. His eyes weren’t filled with the pity I expected. They were filled with a fierce, burning respect. A recognition.
