After We Got Engaged, the Six of Us Planned One Last Trip Together Before the Wedding or 24-Hour Couple Swap novel · Chapter 3 of 24

Chapter 3: Confessional

Winston finds the camera is taking silent photos, Signe wakes tangled against him, Tyler eats the oatmeal he swore he hated, and Melina slips a note into Signe's coat: Boathouse, alone, I'm sorry.

Winston was out from under the pillows before I finished saying his name.

He crossed to the dresser, tilted the camera toward the window, and read the little screen on its back.

"Photo mode," he said. "It takes a still every thirty seconds. The microphone is switched off."

"So she didn't hear us."

"No. She doesn't want to hear us."

He turned the camera so I could see a frame from the folder. It was the two of us in the dark, a gray shape on a bed and a gray shape beside it.

"She wants to see us," Winston said.

I pulled his jacket tighter around my shoulders.

"Then let's give her something to look at."

"Such as?"

"Absolutely nothing. Two people who can't stand each other."

"I can do that," Winston said, and went back to his side of the bed.

I woke up at seven with a weight across my ribs.

It was Winston's arm.

The pillow wall had collapsed in the night. My head was on his shoulder, and my hand was flat against his chest, and I could feel his heartbeat under it.

He was awake. I knew because he had stopped breathing.

Neither of us moved.

Across the room, the red light on the camera blinked and the shutter clicked.

"It's been taking pictures," I whispered.

"Since eleven," he said to the ceiling.

"How many?"

"Eight hundred and some."

I lifted my hand off his chest very slowly.

He sat up, put on his glasses, and studied a stain on the ceiling.

"Good morning," he said stiffly.

"Good morning, Mr. Ambrose," I said, just as stiffly, and for one second we looked at each other and almost lost it.

Breakfast was in the long room off the kitchen, with a huge pot of coffee on the sideboard.

Vera stood at the stove in a cream robe with a ladle in her hand.

"Oatmeal!" she called. "Steel-cut, brown sugar, or you can fight me."

Tyler sat beside her, in a robe of his own, with a full bowl in front of him.

Tyler hated oatmeal. He had told me so on our second date, and I had never made it once in fourteen months.

He took a big spoonful of it and said, "This is perfect, Vee."

Vee. He had never called her that in front of me.

I took my coffee to the window and watched the lake instead of him.

Vera set the camera on a tripod at the end of the table and clapped her hands.

"Confessionals! One at a time, in the library nook. Tell the camera how your swap is going. Be honest. It's for the wedding video."

Casper went first and came back saying it was the most awkward thing he'd ever done.

Melina went second. She was gone for a long time. When she came out her eyes were pink, and she didn't look at me.

Then it was my turn.

The library nook was a window seat with one lamp and a red record light. I sat down and folded my hands.

"So how's it going with Winston?" Vera's voice called from the doorway.

I put on the voice I use for patients who are afraid of the drill.

"He's very organized," I said. "He alphabetized the minibar."

"There's no minibar."

"He checked. He says it's a fire hazard."

Vera laughed in the doorway, a big happy laugh.

"And?"

"And I miss Tyler," I said, and made my face go soft. "I really do. Is that allowed?"

"It's the most allowed thing you could say."

She looked relieved. I saw it and I filed it away.

When I came back to the table, Tyler stood up and kissed me on the side of the head.

"There she is," he said into my hair. "Don't let him color-code you."

"He wouldn't dare," I said.

"I miss you too, you know," he said, quieter.

His eyes slid to Vera for half a second.

Then he walked back to his oatmeal.

I took my coat from the hook by the door to go stand outside for a minute, because I needed air that wasn't breakfast.

My hand went into the pocket and found paper.

A small square of paper, folded in four.

I opened it down by my hip, under the lip of the coat.

It was written in Melina's slanted handwriting, and the pen had gone through the page in two places.

Boathouse. Alone. I'm sorry.

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