The Lies That Bind(59)

I feel a fleeting surge of irrational hope that Amy had it all wrong—that she received another engagement party invitation for a different Cecily and Matthew.

“She was married to…some banker…who died in the towers?” I say, stumbling all over my description of Grant. “She grew up in your building or something?”

“Oh. Yeah. Of course. Amy Silver,” he says. “How do you know Amy?”

“Oh…long story,” I say, the understatement of the century. My heart pounds as I bumble onward. “I…uhh…wrote a little blurb on her husband…for the paper…and we kind of became friends….Anyway, I guess your mom invited her parents to our engagement party.”

“Oh, okay. That makes sense,” he says, getting into bed.

“So they’re that close? Your parents with hers?” I ask, sitting down next to him.

“I mean, I wouldn’t say they’re super, super close, but yeah, they’re good friends.” He shrugs, picks his BlackBerry up from the nightstand, and starts to scroll.

“But I thought this party was going to be on the small side?” I say.

“I think it is,” he says, now distracted.

“What’s your mom’s idea of small?” I ask.

“Umm…probably your idea of medium,” he says, glancing up at me with a lighthearted smile.

    I don’t smile back. “Like what? Fifty? Sixty?”

Looking back down at his BlackBerry, he says, “Umm…I’m not sure….Probably more like eighty to a hundred.”

“One hundred?”

“Let’s say eighty. I really don’t know….Eighty to a hundred isn’t that many. Aside from my family and yours, that’s only about thirty or forty couples. My parents’ friends, my friends, your friends. It adds up fast.”

“But I only invited Jasmine and Scottie,” I say, so grateful that Scottie has agreed to fly in for it; I’m going to need him. “And they aren’t bringing dates. So that’s just two. Two of my bridesmaids aren’t even coming.”

Matthew puts down his phone and says, “Well, you’re welcome to invite them. Or anyone you want.”

“That’s not the point,” I say, biting my lip and reminding myself that it’s not Matthew’s fault he grew up in a building with Amy Silver, now Amy Smith.

“So what is your point?” he asks.

Flustered, I say, “My point is…we’re going to be announcing our pregnancy to one hundred people?”

Matthew opens his mouth to reply, then stops, reaches over, and puts his hand on my stomach. “Well, it’s not like we can keep it a secret for much longer,” he says, his voice now gentle. “You’re going to start showing soon, Cess. You’re nine—almost ten weeks.”

“It’s one thing to show…it’s another to announce it at a family party as if me forgetting my pill is a big accomplishment. And your parents won’t feel like this is the way things are to be done in…you know…polite society?” I say the last two words with a complete attitude.

He sighs, then says, “It’s a baby. It’s an occasion for joy. They’ll be fine. Everyone will be fine. Why do you seem so upset?”

“I’m not upset. I just…I don’t know…some random girl who you grew up with and I just met isn’t really the guest list of ‘close friends’ I’d prepared myself for.”

    “She’s coming?” he says, glancing over at me. “I thought you said her parents were coming.”

“She said she’s coming, too,” I say.

“Well. That’s nice,” he says. “It’s probably good for her to go out and do things right now.”

I stare at him a beat, then say, “So how well do you know her?”

“Not that well. She was a few years older. She was just my sister’s hot friend…who may or may not have been the subject of my earliest fantasies.”

I roll my eyes. “You really think she’s that hot?”

He gives me a look like of course she is.

“So was he hot, too?” I can’t stop myself from blurting out.

“Who?”

“Her husband,” I say.

“I don’t know,” Matthew says, doing the I’m-a-straight-guy-how-would-I-know? routine. “I mean, I guess he was a good-looking guy. I only saw him, like, once….”

“You saw him? When?”

“At their wedding,” he says.

Reeling, I tell myself to stop right there. Change the subject—to anything. But instead I say, “You were at the wedding? So you met him?”

“Briefly.”

“What was he like?”

“He seemed like a nice guy. A little aloof, maybe. Serious…but nice…Did Amy tell you the backstory with them? How they met?”

“Um, yeah…something about knowing each other as kids?” I say, now feeling completely nauseous.

“Yeah. That’s when they met. But how they met is so crazy,” Matthew says.

    I stare at him, my heart racing, as he tells me a story that feels so familiar—about a guy with a flat tire in Buffalo. It takes me a few seconds to realize that it’s the very same story Grant told me in the Adirondacks. Grant just left out one big, big part of the story. That the guy with the flat tire would become his father-in-law. I stare at Matthew in horror as he gets to the devastating punch line—that Grant’s dad was killed because he stopped to help Amy’s dad.