AllFreeNovel
Share Us
But Rose was of the staunch belief that Oren was innocent. He was the love of her life.
The back of Rose’s neck was slick with sweat. She inhaled and exhaled. “We want to start over.”
“He’ll dump you, you know,” Mrs. Walden said. “At the first sign of how weak you are, or how little you are, or how inconsequential your family is, he’ll dump you for someone else. That’s the kind of man he is.”
Rose took a dramatic step back. All she wanted was to race through the house and whip into the chilly night. All she wanted was refuge from this horrible woman.
But Oren had left her here, and she didn’t have access to a phone till tomorrow. She had to sleep here tonight. There was no surviving the chilly October air.
“I can help you, honey,” Mrs. Walden said, adding honey to the horror she’d already shot. “I can get you out of this. We’re planning to go to Manhattan soon. You can move with us. Start over there. You can enroll in a few classes here and there. We know people at Columbia. And the children just adore you. I can’t let you go easily. Not when I see you destroying your life so plainly.”
Rose couldn’t help herself but say, “It’s too late. I’m pregnant.”
Because she hoped admitting to the baby would ease things between them. It would force Mrs. Walden to reckon with how “real” this was.
But instead, Mrs. Walden sniffed. “You’ll regret this day for the rest of your life.”
She then turned on her heel and whipped her hand toward the door, indicating it was time for Rose to leave.
Rose hurried out of the room, went upstairs, and wept into her pillow.
But she told herself,It’s over. I did what I came here to do.
She had to be proud of herself for facing that horrible woman.
And she had to remind herself,No matter how wealthy I become, I can never become like her.
It was much sadder to say goodbye to the children. They’d been difficult and unruly, but she’d loved them to a degree. When Mrs. Walden requested that she leave the house as soon as possible the following afternoon, Rose packed up her things and hugged the children, promising that she’d visit as soon and as often as she could. Hamilton kicked her shin a final time on her way out, which felt fitting. To him, he was enraged she’d decided to leave, and he wanted to show that.
Just before she left, Rose sent a letter back home to explain what was happening—that she was going to get married and she was moving.
But it had been a very long time since she’d spoken to her parents. She wasn’t sure how to tell them about the great and powerful events of her life.
Oren and Rose didn’t remain in Nantucket long after Rose left the Waldens. The beach house across the island was beautiful but far too small for Oren, who was accustomed to big, sprawling homes or else enormous apartments at the top of ornate Manhattan apartment buildings. “You really must know Manhattan in the winter,” he explained of the city. “It’s wonderful.”
So, by late November, they were in the city. Rose had never been before, and it captured her imagination. It felt beyond her wildest dreams. They ate at divine restaurants with Michelin stars; they ate at little hole-in-the-wall places with three tables and the “best-undiscovered chefs of the city.” They redecorated Oren’s apartment—a space, it turned out, where Natalie had never lived. Rose guessed that was part of the reason Oren was okay about bringing his new fiancée there. Natalie’s ghost didn’t haunt it.
Rose met with the “best prenatal doctor in the city” for her pregnancy. Everything was right as rain. She was six weeks along, but the doctor promised she probably wouldn’t start showing until five or six months because she was so tiny.
That meant it was time to plan a wedding.
Oren’s idea was to have the wedding on New Year’s Eve. “I used to have parties every year on New Year’s,” Oren explained one night in their living room. Out the window was Central Park, spread out like a fuzzy blanket. It was sunset. “Maybe we should make it a surprise. I’ll invite everyone. We’ll get the party started. Then you’ll appear in your white dress, and everyone will understand what’s what.” Oren snapped hisfingers as though this was the single greatest idea he’d ever come up with.
Rose was swept up in it.
A few weeks before their wedding, Rose turned twenty-two. Oren bought her an exquisite birthday cake—one that looked more like a wedding cake. They ate it and gazed through the window at the sprawling city. Because of the hormones, Rose felt perpetually on the brink of sobbing. Sometimes, she hugged Oren and said, “I’m so happy. I don’t know what to do.” Oren laughed at her and held her.
Christmas meant hanging out with Oren’s brother, Zachary. Their parents had died many years ago. Zachary had a new girlfriend; one Oren talked badly about as soon as they left that evening. “Zachary never knew how to get himself a good girl,” Oren scoffed.
Rose beamed. This was proof thatshewas a good girl. She was exactly what he wanted.
The wedding was just as sensational as Oren had said it would be.
Hundreds of people milled into the venue Oren had rented in Midtown—a place decorated with art nouveau stylings, forty-five circular tables, and dark shadows lit up with orange lamps that seemed taken from another era. Rose watched from above, already in her wedding dress, her makeup and hair done. She had to wait for her cue. She watched Oren shake people’s hands and whisper in older women’s ears, making them laugh. She watched the Waldens enter, though they’d left their children at home. Mrs. Walden was wearing something sensational and all black. Did she know this was Rose’s wedding? Or did Mrs. Walden think Oren had already kicked Rose to the curb?
Oren’s cue was taking the microphone and saying hello. “This has been one heck of a year for me,” he said as everyone raised their glasses of champagne to him and settled in their chairs. “I can’t tell you the wide range of emotions I’ve gone through. But through it all, I knew I had my marvelous family and friends. I thank you.” He raised his glass higher. “I have to admit, I haven’t been completely honest about this evening.”
Guests turned to twitter to one another curiously.What does he mean? Oh, Oren. He’s always so tricky, isn’t he?
