On March 27, Celia discovered that her wedding dress had pockets.
She had known it when she bought it. The knowledge had vanished during the ordinary business of moving her books, learning where Adrian kept things and deciding that half the things did not need to remain there. Now she put her hands into the silk and laughed with such pleasure that Ruth looked up from fastening Nell’s shoes.
“Second thoughts?” her sister asked.
“Pockets.”
“The foundation of a lasting marriage.”
Nell immediately removed one shoe. At seven months she had developed opinions about getting dressed that made Celia’s own seem modest. Ruth retrieved the shoe, considered the baby and put it in her bag instead.
“Excellent,” Celia said. “I’ve raised a free spirit.”
“You’ve raised a person who can reach her feet.”
The dress was green, soft against Celia’s legs, with sleeves she could move in. She had chosen it because she loved the color, because Adrian had looked briefly incapable of speech when she showed him the fabric, and because nothing about it suggested she ought to become smaller. Ruth had pinned a few white flowers into her hair. Celia touched them once, then left them alone.
Downstairs, Margaret was trying to persuade Adrian to stand somewhere the light did not make him squint. His forty-sixth birthday had come and gone in February, celebrated with a dinner Celia had chosen and a cake Nell was not allowed to help him eat. He had responded to being another year older by losing the same pair of glasses twice in one morning. Now he stood in a new charcoal suit looking beautifully familiar and visibly nervous.
When he saw Celia on the stairs, his expression changed.
“Hello,” he said.
“Hello.”
She stopped one step above him. For once she was taller. He put his hands at her waist and looked up at her, smiling slowly.
“I’m trying to remember what I meant to say.”
“You have time. The important bit’s written down.”
He laughed and kissed her. From the hallway Margaret made a pleased sound that caused Ruth to ask whether she was charging admission.
They took one photograph before leaving. Celia sat with Nell on her lap, Adrian beside her, the baby’s hand caught in his tie. On the bench behind them stood the basket Celia had been sorting the night before: outgrown clothes ready to put away, the tiny red cardigan folded beside a cream sleeper. Two wooden fox buttons showed above the edge. Celia had meant to move the basket. Then Margaret told them to look up, Nell yanked the tie, and the picture was taken with all three of them laughing.
Celia asked to see it. She looked at her mother’s knitting in the background and at the broad, open smile on Adrian’s face. Then she handed the phone back.
“That one,” she said. “Keep that one.”
The ceremony took place in a small room overlooking the town garden. There were flowers Ruth had been paid to choose and a window open a little at the top because the room was too warm. Dorothy sat beside Margaret. Imogen had come in a red jacket, looking mildly astonished to find herself attending something for which she did not have to prepare an agenda.
Nell stayed in Ruth’s lap for the first part. Then she decided the flowers were more interesting than the people talking. Ruth turned her gently the other way and offered a toy, saving the ceremony from its smallest critic.
Celia heard some of the words with extraordinary clarity and others through the sound of her own pulse. She knew what they had chosen to say. They had read the promises aloud in the kitchen the night before, Adrian worrying that he would speak too quickly, Celia worrying that she would cry. Now his hands were warm around hers, and he said her name slowly.
When it was her turn, she looked at him.
She did not think about Quentin or an apartment she had left or the many ways she had once learned to be useful. She thought of Adrian eating bread in her kitchen, listening when the answer displeased him, looking across a restaurant table as though delight were something he was still astonished to be given. She thought of wanting him yesterday and wanting him tomorrow, even when he would be tired and unreasonable and leave his papers on the stairs.
“I do,” she said.
When she took his wedding band, her fingers were less steady than she’d expected. Adrian held out his hand. It was a hand she knew in pieces: reaching for a cup, warm beneath her sweater, resting open beside Nell while the baby slept. For a moment she couldn’t get the ring past his knuckle.
He bent his finger slightly, helping her, and smiled as though this little difficulty were part of the pleasure. The band went on. Celia kept hold of his hand for a second after she should have released it.
“There,” she whispered.
“There,” he answered.
He put her band beside the blue stone. The two rings touched with a faint sound. She had imagined she would notice the people watching and feel self-conscious. Instead she was absorbed in the small movements of his fingers and the tender seriousness with which he looked at her. He wanted to get this right. She wanted the same thing, and neither of them had to pretend it would happen without effort.
From Ruth’s lap Nell made a delighted noise at the toy in her hands. Celia laughed, and Adrian’s face softened as he looked briefly toward her before coming back to his bride.
His smile broke open. When he kissed her, she forgot there were other people in the room until they began to clap.
At lunch, Nell fell asleep before the first course. The restaurant had given them a quiet room with a broad view of the water. Celia ate everything she had chosen, including a dessert Adrian claimed he hadn’t wanted until she offered him a spoonful. Ruth made a short toast, mostly about the inconvenience of having a younger sister who cried at things, and then cried herself halfway through it.
Margaret passed her a napkin without comment. Dorothy laughed and lifted her glass. Nobody was required to make a speech afterward.
Adrian leaned toward Celia. “Wife,” he said quietly, testing the word.
She turned her face toward his. “Husband.”
He smiled in a way that made her want to take him home immediately.
They stayed long enough to enjoy the afternoon. Imogen told them the bus had acquired three new regular borrowers at the center pickup, one of whom was a father pretending to borrow books only for his son. Ruth described the first planted beds from her contract, muddy work she complained about with undisguised pride. Margaret’s garden-trip photographs came out, including one of her eating something enormous beneath a trellis.
Celia listened, Nell warm against her after waking, Adrian’s hand resting on the back of her chair. Beyond the window the water brightened. Nothing had been arranged solely to flatter them, and every person at the table had come because they wanted to.
Later, at home, they hung up the dress carefully enough to make each other laugh. Nell had been fed, changed and settled; the sitter was downstairs for the evening, giving them the hours Celia had decided she wanted. There would be no departure for a honeymoon tonight. Their trip would come later, on dates they had chosen together.
Adrian found the little white flower Ruth had tucked into Celia’s hair and held it between his fingers.
“I think this belongs to you.”
“I wondered what was scratching me.”
He set it beside the lamp. Celia unfastened the top button of his excellent new shirt. He watched her hands with an attention that made her feel gloriously unhurried.
“You enjoyed lunch?” he asked.
“Very much.”
“And the ceremony?”
“Also very much.”
“Good. I was hoping to see you again.”
She laughed, caught by the familiar ridiculous earnestness of him. “I think we can arrange that.”
He put his arms around her. She rested against him for a moment, feeling his breath move beneath her cheek. Somewhere downstairs a floorboard creaked, then the house grew quiet again.
“I’ve got nothing to organize now,” she said.
“Wonderful.”
“No guests to feed.”
“They’ve all been fed.”
She lifted her face. “What shall I do with you?”
His answer was a kiss, slow enough to become a question. Celia answered it with both hands, drawing him toward the bed they had chosen together, in the room where her books filled the wall.