Chapter 2

I held the cancellation form up in front of Ethan.

“Who signed this?”

He glanced at the signature, then immediately turned to the front desk clerk.

“Maybe someone on staff filled it in. We booked a lot of activities. The system could have made a mistake.”

The clerk opened her mouth, then stopped. Her name tag read Lucy.

She didn’t agree with him. She simply looked back at her computer.

Paige moved closer to Ethan, still holding her champagne.

“If this makes you uncomfortable, I can cancel the toast tonight.”

She sounded considerate. She also spoke loudly enough for every relative nearby to hear.

Several of them looked at me, waiting for me to prove I wouldn’t take a celebration away from a woman who had just gotten divorced.

I pulled the remaining pages from the envelope.

Saturday morning: family yoga.

Ten o’clock: Paige’s beach photo shoot.

That afternoon: spa treatments with the women in the family.

That evening: a family toast for Paige.

Our Sunday breakfast on the terrace had been replaced with something called Paige’s New Life Planning Session.

My name appeared once.

Saturday, 2:00–5:00 p.m.: Claire—Personal Time.

“What exactly is my personal time?”

Ethan put his hand over the itinerary.

“You just finished dealing with everything for your mother. I thought you’d need some rest. Paige’s marriage ended too, so I combined the two plans. This way, no one has to make another trip.”

“So you canceled our anniversary dinner and scheduled me to sit alone in the room?”

“Don’t make it sound worse than it is.” He lowered his voice. “I adjusted the weekend. We can always come back another time.”

Another time.

Ethan loved that phrase. It didn’t require a date, and it cost him nothing in the present.

Paige touched his arm.

“I really can cancel. It’s just that everyone has already flown in, and the cake and dinner have been paid for. If we change everything now, they might think I’ve caused more trouble.”

She didn’t ask me to give in.

She simply laid out, one by one, what it would cost me to say no.

Lucy printed another page.

“Mrs. Bennett, this is the original reservation we have on file. Would you like to review it?”

The original itinerary listed two guests.

A note beside Saturday’s dinner read:

Fifteenth anniversary. Please reserve a table by the window.

That was the arrangement I remembered.

A month earlier, Ethan and I had stood in our kitchen choosing between the seafood and steak menus. He had laughed and promised that, this time, he wouldn’t let Paige pull him away at the last minute.

I had believed he finally understood why this weekend mattered.

When Ethan saw the original reservation, he seemed relieved.

“See? The original booking is still there. The hotel just added some activities later. After the cake tonight, we can have a drink by ourselves.”

One drink.

After Paige’s toast.

I didn’t answer. I compared the two itineraries instead.

The photo shoot, breakfast, and dinner changes all carried the same confirmation number.

“Lucy, when were these changes made?”

She typed for a few seconds. The professional smile left her face.

“The final changes were confirmed four weeks ago.”

I turned to Ethan.

Four weeks ago, my mother was still alive.