"He's Ellis's *brother.*"
"I know."
"You knew. In March. You knew when you set it up."
Paige's chin did the thing it did before she cried, a small trembling dimple. Avery had seen it at Paige's grandfather's funeral and at the end of every season of every show they'd ever watched together, and she hated that it still worked on her.
"I was going to tell you," Paige said. "If it went well. I was going to tell you, and it was going to be this cute thing. Like, *surprise, we could be sisters-in-law someday,* and you'd throw a pillow at me."
"And when it didn't go well?"
"Then it didn't matter." Paige's voice cracked. "It was one date. You came home and said it was the worst night of your life and you never wanted to hear his name again, so I never said his name again. And then Ellis proposed, and every week I thought, *I'll tell her this week,* and then it was the party, and I thought, it's a big yard, maybe you won't even—"
"Maybe I won't even notice the groom's brother. At the engagement party."
"I didn't say it was a good plan."
Avery took the yellow dress. It was soft from years of washing. It smelled faintly of cedar and of a closet that had not been opened in a long time.
"Why," she said. "Just tell me why. Why him, why a setup, why not tell me the truth."
Paige slid down the door until she was sitting on the bathroom floor in her consignment white, knees up. She looked about fifteen.
"Because you would have said no," she said. "Because you always say no. Because you have a rule about never dating anyone connected to anyone, so that if it goes bad you never have to see them again. You've had that rule since I met you, and I watched you keep it for six years, and I watched it keep you alone." She wiped her face with her wrist. "And because I'm moving out in October, Av. And I kept picturing you in that apartment by yourself, getting up at three-thirty to go make bread for strangers and coming home and nobody asking how it went."
"That's not your job."
"I know it's not my job."
"I'm not a houseplant, Paige. You don't get to arrange for somebody to water me while you're gone."
It landed. Avery watched it land and wished, immediately, that she could reach out and catch it before it hit, but that was not how words worked. Paige closed her eyes.
"Okay," Paige said quietly. "That's fair."
It was the second time in twenty minutes someone had said *that's fair* to her and walked away with their dignity intact, and Avery was beginning to feel like the only person at this party without any.
Paige got up. She smoothed her dress. She did not try to hug Avery, which was how Avery knew it was bad.