“They booked a table at The Gilded Lantern,” I said. “Jake insisted on it.”
She stopped walking and looked toward our front door.
“That’s a lovely place,” she said, her voice dropping a little. “You should let them spoil you. You’ve spent twenty-five years putting everyone else first.”
“I’m a little nervous about it, to be honest,” I said, looking down at the wooden porch steps.
“Nervous about a dinner?” she asked.
“I don’t want to make a fuss,” I said, my voice dropping. “Damon says it’s an expensive place, and I don’t want to look out of place.”
Mrs. Gable looked at me for a long moment, her hand resting on the wooden railing of my porch.
“A woman should shine on her birthday, Elena,” she said softly. “Don’t let anyone make you feel small in your own skin.”
She patted my arm before turning to walk back to her house, leaving her words hanging in the cool afternoon air.
I went back inside the quiet house and walked up the stairs to our bedroom.
The green dress was still there, tucked away where Damon would not see it when he looked for his clean socks.
I opened the wardrobe door just a crack, looking at the emerald fabric shining in the dim light of the closet.
Every little comment he had made over the last week seemed to gather in the room, heavy and cold.
The jokes about the lipstick, the remarks about the pearls, the warning about the credit card.
They were just his usual jokes, of course, but counting them up made my hands feel cold.
I reached out and pushed the dress further into the corner, behind my winter coats where the shadow was deepest.
Then I shut the wardrobe door, leaving the green dress hidden in the dark.
The steam from the iron smelled like starch and hot metal. I ran the silver plate of the iron down the sleeve of Damon’s white button-down shirt, pressing the crease flat.
