Paige let out a breath that seemed to come all the way up from her knees.
"Okay," she said. "I can work with both of those things."
They sat. The coffee went lukewarm. Outside, a neighbor's dog barked at a mail truck the way it barked at every mail truck, with the conviction of the betrayed.
"Will you still stand up with me?" Paige asked quietly. "In October?"
Avery thought about the consignment shop in April. Paige in the fitting room in the white dress, turning, saying *Is it too much, is it too much?* and Avery saying, *It's exactly enough.*
"I'm still your maid of honor," Avery said. "I'm still mad."
Paige laughed wetly. "You can be mad in a nice dress."
"Not yellow."
"God, no. Never yellow. That's Bev's color now."
* * *
Vivian Mercer did not call. She did not text. She did not ask Paige to pass along a message.
She bought bread.
"She was here again," Fran reported on Wednesday, sliding into the back with a tray of empty croissant racks. "Seeded rye. Paid cash. Asked how my weekend was. Didn't ask about you. Put two dollars in the tip jar and said to tell the baker the crust was *exceptional*."
"She said exceptional?"
"She enunciated it."
On Thursday it was the country sourdough. On Friday, a baguette and two morning buns. Each time she asked Fran a question about Fran — her cat, her niece's soccer team, whether the bobblehead saint was a real saint — and never once asked for Avery or looked toward the swinging kitchen door.
"She's not hunting you," Fran said on Friday. "She's just — there. Like a lighthouse. A very polite lighthouse who likes rye."
On Saturday, Avery came out.
Vivian was sitting on the bench in front of the bakery with a paper bag in her lap, wearing slacks and a cardigan despite the June heat. She looked up. She did not beam. She did not stand. She simply moved her bag from the bench to her lap, making room.
Avery sat at the far end, flour still on her forearms.