Chapter 14: What Margo Kept in the Attic

Dawson's POV

My grandmother does not ask twice, and on Sunday morning she asked me once.

"Margo ran every Thornbury party for three years," she said. "Go through whatever she left in my attic."

I had not been up there since I was fourteen.

The air under the roof was hot and smelled of cedar and old paper.

Margo's boxes stood along the east wall, labeled in her neat capitals: Christmas, Gala, Engagement.

I opened the last one first.

Under the engagement party seating cards lay a thick white binder with a plain tab on the spine.

The tab said D + N.

I sat down on a trunk and opened it.

The first page was a calendar for the spring, and the date at the top was April.

That was months before the Trust Plan.

That was months before Kerry asked me about one photo from Charleston.

Margo had written Charleston on a Tuesday in April and drawn a box around it.

Next to the box she had written: Seat D. beside N. at the conference dinner.

Under it: Photograph from the far table. Wait for N. to find it.

I turned the page with a hand that did not feel like mine.

The next page listed three days, each with a date and a column of notes.

Day 1, the anniversary dinner, September 14.

Day 2, a medical event, date to be confirmed.

Day 3, the altar, October 25.

Beside Day 2 she had written: Mother's surgery will be scheduled by fall. Use it.

I read that line three times.

On the last page there was a small sticky note, and under it a line about a license.

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