“Elena, I want to make sure you’re comfortable with what happened. You were put in a difficult position.”
Elena looked toward the children’s table.
Theo was eating a second slice of cake.
Marissa sat beside him, speaking with another guest.
“I know,” Elena said.
“It’s okay if you have mixed feelings about it.”
“I do.”
Claire waited.
“I loved the dance,” Elena admitted. “But for a moment, when everyone was watching me stand, I felt like the whole wedding depended on whether my knee held.”
Claire nodded.
“And then?”
“Then I sat down. And James and I danced.”
She smiled.
“That part felt like us.”
Claire touched her shoulder.
“Then remember that part too.”
A little later, Vivian approached.
She was a longtime family friend who’d known Elena since she was a teenager.
Vivian had helped organize bridal showers, baked birthday cakes, and watched Elena grow from a shy student into a confident young woman.
But she’d also spent the months after the collision treating Elena as though every movement might cause a catastrophe.
At the reception, she’d been the one who whispered, “She can’t dance.”
Now she stood beside Elena’s wheelchair holding a small clutch purse.
“Darling, may I speak with you?”
“Of course.”
Vivian looked uncomfortable.
“I owe you an apology.”
Elena waited.
“When the boy asked you to dance, I should have kept quiet.”
Elena looked toward the ballroom.
“Why did you say it?”
