My parents texted me at 8:12 on the morning of their fortieth wedding anniversary.

“Don’t come tonight. Only high-society guests will be there. We don’t want things to feel awkward.”

I read the message twice in my Cambridge apartment, still wearing the old gray sweatshirt my mother once called “proof I had given up.”

My name is Hannah Reed.

I was thirty-six, unmarried, and—in my parents’ version of my life—still “doing computer work for some little medical company.”

They preferred my younger sister, Olivia.

She had married a cardiologist, lived in Beacon Hill, knew exactly which fork belonged beside which plate, and never seemed to leave the house without an expensive-looking coat.

I typed one word.

“Understood.”

Then I made coffee and stayed home.

Their anniversary party was being held at the Ashford Hotel in Boston.