Sunday was busy at the café, so the wedding tasting happened on Monday after lunch.
Jo said nobody was allowed to call it a tasting while she was there. It was food she needed opinions on, not an occasion for Lena to buy another notebook.
Lena had brought the notebook anyway. She kept it in her bag.
They sat at a clean garden table with four plates of different little things. Bea arrived last, carrying two flower stems because she had been unable to stop being a florist for the walk down the road.
Daniel pulled out a chair for her. She looked at him, then sat. The awkwardness between them had not vanished just because Lena had stopped asking about the invitation.
Jo put the first plate down.
“Eat. You can be unhappy with each other after.”
The warm tart tasted of cheese and onion. Daniel closed his eyes at the first bite.
Lena nudged him. “Don't encourage her.”
“Too late,” Jo said.
They tried chicken skewers, little rolls, tomatoes Jo had roasted until sweet. Bea was suspicious of anything that dripped down the front of a dress. Daniel said that ruled out pleasure. Jo told him he could have a bib with his name on it.
Lena laughed. The table felt nearly normal. She wanted to stay there with these people liking each other.
Daniel got up to help Jo bring the last tray through. He came back carrying it level while her sister opened the garden door with her hip. Watching them work together, Lena felt a rush of affection. Jo didn't have to explain where things belonged to him. He had been here for years, making himself useful without taking over.
Bea leaned toward Lena.
“How was the music?”
“Lovely.”
“You sound surprised.”
“I shouldn't be.”
They looked at Daniel setting the tray down. He caught Lena watching and smiled.
She reached for his hand below the table.
For dessert Jo brought little lemon cakes and a bowl of berries. The cake was too dry, which Lena admitted because her sister had asked for honesty. Daniel said he liked it. Jo asked whether he was being kind.
“I like dry cake,” he said.
“No, you don't,” Lena told him.
He grinned. “I like this dry cake.”
Jo took his plate away. “Then you'll help eat the test batch.”
They had almost finished when Nate came through the gate with a long metal clip in his hand.
“Bea left this in my car,” he said.
His sister stared at it. “I've been looking for that since Saturday.”
“You left it under the seat.”
“I was loading flowers. You were directing.”
“And apparently I did it badly.”
He handed it over. Jo glanced at the empty chair, then at Lena. Lena knew her sister was deciding whether ordinary politeness would complicate the afternoon.
“There's cake,” she said herself.
Nate looked at Daniel before he answered. “Thanks. I'm on my way.”
Daniel sat back a little. “Where?”
“A job at Merefield. Theatre weekend. They need an extra pair of hands for the first setup tomorrow.”
“Lighting?”
“Yes.”
The men managed a few ordinary sentences about work. Lena had forgotten that they could. Their acquaintance hadn't begun with her as the topic.
Jo asked Nate whether the tables were still in the right place after Wednesday's group. He said he hoped so. They had fed eighteen without anyone losing a chair. Lena had taken the bad booking notes as a lesson only in writing down what a person said, not in suddenly becoming a perfect employee.
Nate put his hands in his pockets.
“I'm here tonight,” he told Bea. “Then back and forth until Sunday.”
He looked at Lena. “It's open to the public. If you ever wanted to see what I'm actually doing.”
She felt Daniel's hand change slightly in hers.
“Maybe,” she said.
Nate nodded. He didn't tell her which hour would be most convenient for a grand romantic tour. He left with Bea's empty flower bucket, which she made him take to the car.
The table was quiet for a few seconds after he went.
Jo collected plates. Bea began talking about how her shop had received an entire box of the wrong colour ribbon. Daniel listened. Lena watched the garden gate.
She could refuse. It would be sensible, perhaps. She had learned the old story. She had Daniel, a wedding, a life that didn't require trains to inland theatres.
She also knew how much of Nate she was still remembering rather than seeing. The boy who abandoned her and the boy who made her laugh on the beach were easy pictures. Neither was enough to tell her who had come back.
On the walk home she told Daniel she was considering Sunday at Merefield.
“Why?” he asked.
“I want to see him without all of this around us.”
“All of what?”
She gestured toward the café behind them. The garden, the tasting plates, the wedding they couldn't enter a room without finding.
“I don't know if I'm remembering somebody who doesn't exist anymore.”
“And you need to find that out.”
“Yes.”
He walked beside her in silence for a while.
“You're telling me,” he said finally.
“I don't want it hidden.”
“No.”
She waited for him to forbid it, then felt ashamed that part of her might have found a prohibition easier. He only asked whether she'd be home that night.
“Yes. It's not a long journey.”
At the flat she took out her notebook and crossed a line through centrepiece decision. She was not choosing the last decorative thing while her head was full of this. She could tell Bea the yellow flowers were still yellow. They didn't need to settle every inch of the table today.
Then she messaged Nate.
Sunday. If you're working, I'll go and look at the town. I'm not asking you to stop for me.
She sent it, knowing it was a promise she would have to keep.