The Aurora Borealis Keeps Its Lament novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: No Date to Set

At the families' dinner Alba cancels the wedding and Iker does not fight it; on the steps he says he leaves on the third too.

The families' dinner had been booked for weeks, in the private room at the back of the restaurant my mother liked.

It was meant to be the last tasting before the wedding.

My mother, Carmen, had come straight from her sewing table with pins still stuck in her sleeve.

She had brought my wedding dress in a garment bag, because she wanted to see it under good light.

Iker's parents arrived with a newspaper that had his face on the front page and the word LUZ above it.

His mother kept touching the headline.

"Half my clinic called me," she said. "They all want to know who the girl is."

"The girl is right here," my mother said. "She has a name."

"Of course she does, Carmen. We adore her."

Iker sat down across from me and spread his napkin over his knee.

He turned his face toward the candle between us.

His father raised a glass. "To the quiet wedding. Fourteen days, and my son has finally said something out loud."

Everyone laughed.

I stood up.

My chair scraped the floor, and the laughing stopped.

"I came to tell you there won't be a wedding," I said.

Nobody moved.

Iker's mother put down the newspaper.

"Alba, sweetheart, it's the cameras. Everyone gets nerves."

"It isn't nerves. I put in for the Wastelands Branch this afternoon. I leave on the third."

My mother set her fork down very carefully.

"The Wastelands," she said. "That's the end of the earth, mija."

"I know."

Iker's father looked at his son. "Iker. Say something."

I waited for it.

I had waited eight years for one sentence from that man, and now I stood in a restaurant with my hand tight on the back of a chair, waiting again.

Iker spoke to the candle.

"It's Alba's decision," he said. "I won't stand in the way of it."

That was all he said.

My mother pushed her chair back so hard that the dress bag slid off the seat and onto the floor.

"Look at her," she said.

Iker's head turned toward me.

His eyes settled on the wall beside my shoulder.

"I said look at my daughter. You will tell her to her face, in front of me, that you won't stand in her way."

"Carmen," his mother said.

"No, Señora. Four years that girl has run behind your son with a pen and a folder. She wrote his speeches. She walked into a warehouse for him."

"Mamá," I said.

"I'm finishing." She did not take her eyes off him. "And all she gets is a headline. What is that?"

Iker's hand tightened on his napkin.

"Carmen," he said, "I would never speak against your daughter."

"I didn't ask for a word against her. I asked you to look at her."

The silence lasted long enough for a waiter to open the door and back out again.

Iker stood.

He stood slowly, with a hand on the table edge, and bowed his head to my mother.

"You're right to be angry with me," he said. "I'm sorry. I'll take my leave."

His parents went after him, both talking at once.

My mother picked up the dress bag and held it against her chest.

"Mija," she said, and her voice broke.

"I'm fine, Mamá."

"You're not. But you're doing it. I'll take that."

I found him on the restaurant steps.

He stood in the cold under the awning, one hand on the rail, his face turned toward the street lamps.

I stopped two steps above him.

"The director showed me the list," I said. "Your name has been on it since March."

"Yes."

"You never told me."

"I meant to." He swallowed. "I had it planned for the day you asked to come."

"Come where?"

"North. With me."

"You didn't ask me, Iker. You asked me to marry you."

He was quiet for a moment.

"I leave on the third as well," he said. "You'll see me on the plane. I'll try not to make it hard."

"And in the north?"

"I'll sign your order myself. You'll have the data hut."

His hand moved on the rail.

"You'll never have to read for me again, Alba. I promise you that."

He went down the last steps and into the street.

I stood there with the cold coming through my coat.

Four years I had read for him every morning, and I had thought it was the best part of the day.

He had just called it something I should be freed from.

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